20 Templecourt Melbourne
April 28th 1864
Sir
I have the honor to inform you that Mr B. Smyth1 and I inspected inspected2 the S. W. angle of the Royal Park on the 21st inst. and in accordance with the request contained in your letter of the 22nd ult.3 I now beg to hand you the following report upon the same for the consideration of the Trustees.
The road leading from Brunswick is in a bad state of repair in several portions, especially after you descend from the crown of the hill and a deep gully is forming on the upper side which if not attended to will soon render that portion dangerous.
The gates are in a very dilapidated state and a new one is required at once.
Mr Smyth suggested that plantations be formed on both sides of the entrance and as this agrees exactly with my original design for ornamenting this portion of the Park I have much pleasure in recommending it to the Notice of the Trustees and it would considerably increase the beauty of the locality.
I estimate the cost of these works as follows viz.
|
£ |
s |
d |
|
| Rough channelling 20 Chains at £2.10.0 |
50 |
— |
— |
| Repairs to the Road |
10 |
— |
— |
| New Gates |
20 |
— |
— |
| Post and four rail fencing 42 chains at £2.0.0 |
84 |
— |
— |
| Repairing old fence and making same goat proof 30 chains at £1.0.0 |
30 |
— |
— |
|
£ |
194 |
— |
— |
I have not added anything to the above for the cost of planting
I have the honor to be
Sir
Your obedient
(signed) A. Purchas. C. E.
Dr F. Mueller F.R.S.
Hon. Secret. to the
Trustees of the Royal Park4
i.e. Robert Brough Smyth.
Word repeated in copying letter into Minutes.
M to A. Purchas, 22 March 1864 (in this edition as 64-03-22a). M to R. Smyth, 22 March 1864 is a similar letter.
The meeting resolved (p. 131) 'to transmit this document to the A[cclimatization] Society as deserving the Council's consideration', and the Honorary Secretary 'was at the same time instructed to point out that the work concerning rough channelling, the repairs to the road & old fence and the new gate deserved precedence to that of the new fence'.
Please cite as “FVM-64-04-28,” in Correspondence of Ferdinand von Mueller, edited by R.W. Home, Thomas A. Darragh, A.M. Lucas, Sara Maroske, D.M. Sinkora†, J.H. Voigt† and Monika Wells accessed on