To Joseph Hooker   12 August 1872

Melbourne botanic Garden

12/8/72

By the Somersetshire, dear Dr Hooker, I send you at last for the good Mr Bentham the Orchideae, a noble collection of 27 fascicles, containing all that I myself collected in Australia of these plants since 25 years, besides all what I got from amateurs or occasionally employed regular collectors.¹ From this material it will be possible to trace out the geographic and systematic range of the species of this order exhaustively, as so few Orchids exist in Central Australia, altho the maritime jungles of the tropics may yield a few species yet. By some unexplained circumstance the main collection of Corymbis, Oberonia and Phajus is missing. Since 10 years no addition is provided either to my office or to my Museum space; hence we are dreadfully put about for means of locating things; indeed lots of plants and documents have to stand in boxes nailed down and almost inaccessible under tables, proofs &c. Miss Charsleysexcellent work ought to be quoted, as so many nice drawings of the terrestrial orchids occur in it,² and as a Lady (I suppose) will not be attacked by the Hamburg Orchidologist like Fitch, not to speak of RBr, and ourselves.³ There are still about a dozen species left unnamed, so that Benthams labor will not be quite unprofitable in this respect. He will find it a very tedious operation to work out good diagnoses, as he will have to dissect so many flowers; but I suppose he will have some assistance in the preparing of the specimens for analysis at Kew. Could you kindly send me an extract out of the Xenia about Galeola,⁴ as this work is not in Australia, it being beyond my private means to purchase every desirable book. I do not known⁵ to which of the two very distinct Galeolas of Australia the G. altissima applies, and would like to secure one of the species for the fragmenta.⁶ In the collection are a second very distinct Gastrodia, and 2 or 3 new Dendrobia. The specimens of Caladenia Cairnsiana cannot now be found. If they turn up they will be sent by overland mail. I doubt, whether Drummond came ever across that species. Of Habenaria I have 5 species, Dendrobium cucumerinum I never saw myself or received it from any collector. Of Oberonia I have 3 spec, of Bolbophyllum 7 spec. Is the latter really a good genus? If Rchb fil. would only save his time, spent in useless unworthy and often unfounded animosities towards others, who cannot possibly have his own experience among orchids, but whose range of knowledge and whose value of work is far more extensive than his own, he might have found leisure to write for [u]s new definitions of genera, so far as the material of the present day admits of it.

With best salutation

Ferd. von Mueller.

Will you kindly send the parcel across to Agardh, or give it to Blackith & Co for transmissed,⁷ I filled up the case with a few wood specimens; therefore you will see how valuable the Acacia melanoxylon is. I hope the collective name of Caladenia pulcherrima will be maintained, as I have since 1848 mentioned it in all my writings,⁸ and connected under it since that time the various spurious species of RBr, Ldl. and Shldl.⁹ I shall next put into order the Haemodoraceae.

Caladenia Cairnsiana

Caladenia pulcherrima

Corymbis

Dendrobium cucumerinum

Galeola altissima

Gastrodia

Habenaria

Haemodoraceae

Oberonia

Orchideae

Phajus