To Joseph Hooker1    24 February 1876

Melbourne

24/2/76.

 

This month, dear Dr Hooker, I have been thrown into deep mourning through the death of poor Dr Wehl, the husband of my only living sister.2 He succumbed through the rupture of an Echinococcus-cyst of the larger omentum. It was too late discovered & too late opened, though tumours in that position are frequently beyond control. Thus the poor sufferer fell victim to medical practice, having probably swallowed the ovum of the parasite at some poor country dwelling, where a country practitioner amidst a sparse population is occasionally compelled far from home to take his meals.

I was not aware of his illness, til a few days before his death I was telegraphed for. The large family of young children of my poor sister, who was married out of the bot. Garden,3 is utterly unprovided, while the ruin inflicted undeservedly on me by depriving me of my house, my staff, my votes & my plants, has left me unable to do much for the afflicted family. I have however done what I could. One of the saddest moments of my life was, when on the day after the burial, I brought back my poor sister to her very very modest country-place, and the numerous children opened us the gate without me bringing back their ever affectionate father.

I have never felt my own financial social and departmental ruin so keenly than on that occasion. Let Mr Darwin speak on that subject to Mr Edw. Wilson

I thank you for your letter 22/12/754 and for the Museum plants - a rich selection - in prospectu. Too poor since several years to keep a collector, I can only promise gradual return.

As I think of it, I would mention, that I included the big Aloes amongst my supplemental industry-plants,5 because surely they will be a richer source of the extract of Aloes than the smaller species. In our climate such plants would moreover be more profitable for horticultural trade, than many an oil-plant for a mill. Critics in "Nature"6 & elsewhere should be more careful in their remarks, particularly so long as I am in distress & copefor the restoration of my departm. position.

I recognize your disinterestedness concerning the elaboration of Papuan plants. If we divide our work properly & aid each other, we may live to see the Flora of the globe mainly completed by the end of the century, so far as systematic diagnosis is concerned.7

What a pity you could not have merged the Monochlamydeae for the genera8 in the Calyciflorae.

Always regardfully your

Ferd. von Mueller.

 

What a glorious work the genera will be for all times, as so few will have to be added. I have asked Mr Elder, to send a full set of the plants of his Expedition to Kew. The rest of the new species will appear in 82 of fragmentawith the n.g. Wehlia9

 

Aloe

Calyciflorae

Monochlamydeae

Wehlia

 
1
On black-edged paper.
2
Eduard Wehl, husband of M's sister Clara, died on 11 February 1876.
3
27 October 1853, in the Duke Of Wellington Hotel, Richmond (Victoria, Register of marriages, 1853, no. 890).
4
Letter not found.
5
B75.13.11, p. 46.
6
'Baron Ferdinand von Mueller… has just published a second supplement to his … "Select Plants Readily Eligible for Victorian Industrial Culture" … Whether any of them are worth the trouble of cultivation … the botanist will be able to decide upon by a mere glance at the list. Thus we find included Aloe dichotoma, the Tree Aloe of Damara and Namaqualand … scarcely an industrial plant, we should say.' Nature, vol. 12, p. 426 (9 September 1875).
7
See also M to J. Hooker, 17 May 1875 (in this edition as 75-05-17c).
8
Bentham and Hooker (1862—83); see Maroske (2006).
9
B76.03.01, p. 23. The expedition in question was Giles' expedition from the Overland Telegraph Line to Perth, 1875. Plants collected by a member of the party, J. Young, at Ularring and other localities traversed by this expedition, are described in B76.03.01 and subsequent numbers of the Fragmenta; there are no species described from the other expedition active that year and financed by Thomas Elder, that of J. W. Lewis (Threadgill [1922], p. 154-66).

Please cite as “FVM-76-02-24a,” 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/76-02-24a