As to the International Exhibition; I have not even seen it & I doubt if I shall. I have no time whatever now to attend to these matters. I believe it will be annual but I think the public interest in these Exhibitions is fast waning.1
Booth has not sent for his Cycas yet, one of the two is growing I hope, at least it is swelling at the top. The other shows no signs of life yet. The 12 ft. tree fern (Dicksonia) is doing well, but the 20 ft Alsophilla I despair of. The Todea is in superb order. Xanthorrhoea quadrangulata is flowering.
The little box of K.G. Sound2 plants arrived last week, all dead. That Calico plan of roofing does not answer for any thing I find.
We are very busy now with the Flora of British India3 of which I hope to send you Pt II in a month at the outside. Bentham is at Mimoseae for Martius Flora4 after which he will proceed to the concluding volume of the Flora Australiensis.5 He is remarkably well & very busy with the change of apartments of the Linn. Soc.; which will have him splendidly housed at Burlington House.6 How I wish that we could welcome you there — but I suppose that you have no intention of taking a holiday & visiting England.7
Boronia megastigma is flourishing, so our Australia shelves will [bear] a lasting testimony to your services to Scientific Horticulture.8
Ever my dear Mueller
Most sincerely your
Jos. D Hooker.
Alsophilla
Boronia megastigma
Cycas
Dicksonia
Mimoseae
Todea
Xanthorrhoea quadrangulata
London International Exhibition, 1873. International exhibitions were held annually in London, 1871-4.
King George Sound, WA.
J. Hooker (1875-97).
The final part of Bentham (1859-76), 'Leguminosae, III: Mimoseae', was published on 1 July 1876 as vol. 15, part 2, pp. 257-504.
Bentham (1863-78), vol. 7.
The Linnean Society occupied its new rooms in Burlington House, London, at the end of October 1873.
but …holiday is marked with a pencilled line in the margin.
shelves … Horticulture is marked with a pencilled line in the margin.
MS is embossed with the crest of 'Royal Gardens Kew'. The fragment is undated, but the references to John Booth's Cycas and the tree ferns clearly follow on from mentions of them in J. Hooker to M, 15 January 1873. The account of the Cycas seems, however, to report a later stage in their development, suggesting that it was sent later than that letter. The page begins without any salutation.
Please cite as “FVM-73-00-00c,” 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