To William Leighton   26 July 1865

26/7/65

 

On the 5th july I entrusted, reverend & dear Sir, to Dr Stanley Haynes, a pupil of Prof Balfour, now on his way home to England, a package for you. It is but a very small (indeed a commencement) of the reciprocate for the magnificent collections of well determined lichens, which you so generously sent me.1 I have not been in the field for some time and could therefore offer only a few duplicates of lichens, which I happened to have at hand. I will send more for you to Kew, as soon as I can; but as the species of Lichens here are not numerous, and the stations of the beautiful Stictae are very distant, I propose to send you a large case of Algae, dried crudely on the air. You will probably be able to draw on paper from this consignment 10,000 specimens & obtain thus large lot of surplus samples for interchanges

I feel not less grateful for the essays of great intrinsic value sent by you. They bear testimony of the excellence of your microscoped investigations. I was missing your translation of [Steinheils] Zannichelleae & as I have not the original, I should be much pleased for a spare copy,2 especially as we have an Australian species of Zannichellia, Z Preissii of Lehmann pl. Preiss,3 and Z palustris of J Hook. Flor. Tasm.4 I find the anther 6-celled.

I have at this moment no photogram in the house, but will be happy to send you my card if you will do me the favor of returning yours for my Gallery of scientific & befriended celebrities.5

With most friendly regards, rev & dear Mr Leighton, your

Ferd. Mueller

 

Zannichelleae

Zannichellia palustris

Zannichellia Preissii

 
1
No doubt a partial set of Leighton’s Lichenes britannici exsiccati (London, 1851-67) that he distributed to numerous herbaria (see TL2). MEL has a number of specimens that originated from such a set.
2
The library at the Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne holds offprints of a number of Leighton’s papers, but not a copy of his translation of Steinheil (1838) that was published in The Analyst, vol. 9 (1839), pp. 262-73.
3
Lehmann (1844-7/8), vol. 2, p. 3.
4
J. Hooker (1855-60), p. 43.
5
There is no photograph of Leighton in M’s surviving album at MEL.

Please cite as “FVM-65-07-26c,” 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 27 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/65-07-26c