To William Odgers   20 March 1871

Melbourne bot Garden

20/3/71

 

May I ask of you, dear Mr Odgers, whether my requisitions cannot be passed for public works. One of my poor gardeners with little infants around him is unable to be in one of the small wood cottage, as he must be under umbrellas in rain and so it is with two rooms in my office building as regards the ingress of rain.

The fences on the domain road and in Anderson's Street are also in a shocking state, £500 were voted for public works by the Legislature in November last for the first 6 months of this year; now 3 months are nearly passed and I have been unable to get anything approved, notwithstanding repeated solicitations, except a few pounds worth building material, and (I believe) repair of Steam engine. It is a cruelty to the poor children, born on the place, to keep them in dwellings, in which no private gentleman would ask his servants to dwell in.

The poor man who procured so many weeks ago the Eucalyptus seeds for India writes again to me from Sandhurst in great distress on Saturday, urging pay.1 If I had the money, I would pay him privately, but I have none. Surely it is not right to keep poor mens just claim standing in this way for so long a time. They live from hand to mouth and always expect payment on delivery of their goods

Pray excuse the frankness and candor of my remarks and do what you can

your regardful.

Ferd. von Mueller

 

Requisition 2 refers to the repair of the little Cottage: Price estimated £35

1
Letter not found. The collector has not been identified. There is an annotation over this section of the letter: 'Treasurer has been requested to pay the account 5/4/71'.

Please cite as “FVM-71-03-20a,” 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 25 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/71-03-20a