6/11/68
I have an other box with plants nearly ready for you, dear Mr Bentham. It contains exclusively Grevilleae, all lovely plants. I think there are not above 100 species, even with the few additions which my collections offer. Meissners specific discriminations are not sound, altho his arrangements are excellent. Thus he places the same species in two sections (vize Grev. Huegelii & Gr. rigidissima). G. [trit]ernata &
G. anethifolia are the same & numerous other of his supposed
species must be reduced.1 He evidently often worked with solitary Museum plants. However R Brown2 & Meissner have taken almost all novelties of Proteaceae out of our hands.
I am not quite ready yet with Isopogon & Petrophila, both, as far as I can yet see, forming one very natural genus. Some of my own Proteaceae on careful comparison with Drummonds plants do not hold their ground. You will find this order a very interesting one, very showy & very easily to work.
The material however is very Bulky. Hakea thus alone will fill a large box, and so Dryandra & Banksia. I believe the £100 for the 5th vol. will go by this mail home to the Agent General, at all events by the next. Should you pass the Office, perhaps you would kindly call.
I feel much indebted to you for your kind allusion to my labors in your Presidential Adress Kindly bear in mind, that the Fragmenta never claimed systematic and methodic uniformity. They are mere fragments of original observations to be construed into any structure afterwards. My leisure is far too circumscribed to work for lengthened periods on any subject. Hence the form of this particular work.3
I have been sadly thrown out of reckonings for leisure this spring. What with reformation of the public establishment, investigation of diseases of plants, Horticultural shows, a little occasional medical work4 [etc] I feel I cannot do duty as wished in all directions. And yet even now, when I am about to form a Museum of vegetable products for industrial purposes, I cannot engage extra assistance, because neither my private means, nor those of my Department will admit of it.
I am glad however that your & Dr Hookers genera5 are to proceed! It is such an important work, as the daily use of it to determine gardenplants, has amply proved to me.
Always your
Ferd. von Mueller.
Whenever a plant occurs at Twofold Bay6 you might safely record it for Victoria also, as the boundaries are only a few miles distant & the country there abouts is quite uniform. All Murray plants are universal to S. Austr, Victoria & N S Wales
Santalum diversifolium A.[C.] or [Fu]sanus diversifolius Miq. as far as the leaves are concerned is a phyllodinous Acacia! The marginal gland, so characteristic, is very distinct. On comparison even the species might be easily ascertained.
That Trichinium falls together with Ptilotus seems to be no longer doubtful. I shall work out this subject carefully.7
If Isopogon is to be retained it must be on a new basis.
Acacia
Banksia
Dryandra
Fusanus diversifolius
Grevillea anethifolia
Grevillea Huegelii
Grevillea rigidissima
Grevillea triternata
Hakea
Isopogon
Petrophila
Proteacea
Ptilotus
Santalum diversifolium
Trichinium
Bentham (1868a) p. lxxxvi. In his presidential address Bentham surveyed the progress of biology. In his reference to M, Bentham praised his undiminished zeal, his collecting in WA and, especially, B67.13.02, and hoped M would work on his 'promised monograph of [the] genus Eucalyptus'. Bentham noted the completion of the 6th volume of M's Fragmenta, a 'valuable repertory of descriptions and observations, the practial usefulness of which, however, is much diminished by want of order and method'.
M had always claimed that the Fragmenta was to be a step towards a systematic work; see for example, M to W. Hooker, 15 July 1858. Similar sentiments are expressed in some inscriptions M made in bound volumes he presented, for example, in the copies of volume 1 presented to H. S. Chapman (Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales, Sydney) and Jules Planchon, professor of botany at Montpellier (Northern Territory Herbarium, Conservation Commission of the Northern Territory, Darwin) as the first parts of a work for the future.
Please cite as “FVM-68-11-06,” 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 29 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/68-11-06