20/6/70
The Argania seeds, dear Dr Hooker, did not arrive.1 I raised one tree of Argania Sideroxylon 16 years ago,2 but the growth in our clime and in our locality is so slow, that the tree is only now about mans high. It has not yet flowered. I fully anticipate, that thirty years growth will form no commencement [even]3 of a colossal Todea stem in culture. You can not possibly give them that nourishment, which an ever running brook and the decaying forest leaves of a natural valley of deep soil afford. It is quite possible that your Todea from here is several 100 years old. If the recesses of the mountains were well examined in rich gullies of S. Africa, doubtless huge Todeas would be found there as well. In dry gullies the plant may grow for many hundred years, merely as it were exisiting, but never attaining gigantic dimensions.
Always Yr.
Ferd. von Mueller
Dicksonia antarctica has recently be found as far west as St. Vincents Gulf.
Argania Sideroxylon
Dicksonia antarctica
Todea
Please cite as “FVM-70-06-20,” 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 26 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/70-06-20