To [George Bentham]1    September 1876

 

A full illustration of Levenhoekia2 in the Fragm.3

2 good plates of Latouria in the Fragmenta.4

a fourth (purple-flowered) Calogyne described in the Fragmenta5

A good illustration of Logania among the lithograms.6

Duboisia contains two species, one transferrred from Anthoceris after the fruit was recently obtained.7

Polypompholyx extend to S. Austr. & Vict.8

Diplanthera, one species decribed by Scheffer, after he had drawn his attention to the genus by my sending him D. tetrophyll9

Sentis seems to me very remarkable, at least as a section, on account of its 4 cleft calyx, which normally seems not to occur in any other myoporinous plant, hence this anomaly is not provided for in your ordinal chapter.10

Pholidia stands far nearer to Eremophila than to Myoporum. I think still, that it ought to a section merely.11

Denisonia. Several species known now.12

Dracophyllum. The aestivation of the Sphenotoma is very different and on this so very much depends among Epacrideous genera.13

Gaultheria. Asa Gray has found out that this for a dedication of any meaning should be written Gaultiera.14

Villarsia.– Its close affinity to Velleya I pointed out nearly 20 years ago in the volume of the Pharm Soc. of Victoria.15 All Goodeniaceae bitter also. It differs only from Limnanthemum as the aquatic Ipomaes from terrestrial species. 16

Menyanthes trifoliata. singularly distinct from all Limnanthema (Villarsias) in wingless lobes of the corolla, or at any rate, they are not broadly or induplicate winged which gives the corolla a totally different appearance. Menyanthes thus stands to Limnanthemum as Selliera to the other genera of Goodenoviaceae. Is the N.W. American sp. also wingless in its flowerlobes?17

Phyllachne. the identity with Forstera was shown prior to Willdenow by Swartz in 1799 already.18

Samolus; species overated. I still adhere to my views as expressed in the Chath. Isl. vegetation19

Linociera quadristaminea (Fragm VIII, 41)20 cannot possibly be placed in Notelaea, as the absense of the albumen forbids it. The presense or absense of albumen is the best character of the oleaceous genera. Neither Linociera nor Chionanthus have albumen according to A de Candolle, Blume, Miquel &c exalbuminous seeds.

 

Calogyne

Chionanthus

Denisonia

Dracophyllum

Duboisia

Eremophila

Forstera

Gaultheria

Gaultiera

Goodeniaceae

Goodenoviaceae

Ipomea

Latouria

Levenhoekia

Limnanthemum

Linociera quadristaminea

Logania

Menyanthes trifoliata

Myoporum

Notelaea

Pholidia

Phyllachne

Polypompholyx

Samolus

Selliera

Sentis

Sphenotoma

Velleya

Villarsia

1
The correspondent is probably George Bentham. The sheet contains comments on genera treated in Bentham & Hooker (1862-83), vol. 2, part 2, published in May 1876 (TL2) and sent to M in a box with returned herbarium specimens (G. Bentham to M, June 1876 [in this edition as 76-06-00]). No acknowledgement by M of the receipt of the volume, or of the returned specimens, has been found. The MS is dated to September 1876 as the earliest date that M is likely to have received the volume.
2
M was not consistent in his spelling of the generic name: Leeuvenhookia in B58.03.01, p. 18; Leeuwenhoekia in B62.10.02, p. 121, B67.12.01, p. 77 and B65.02.06, plate 48. Bentham (1863-78), vol. 4, p. 33 uses Levenhoekia.
3
The only illustration cited in Bentham & Hooker, p. 535, is Bauer (1813), t. 15. There is no plate illustrating Levenhookia in Fragmenta ; M published an illustration of L. creberrima in B65.02.06, plate 48.
4
Bentham & Hooker, p. 537, treated Latouria as a section of Leschenaultia , and did not list an illustration. M published plates of Leschenaultia agrostophylla (plate 47) and L. filiformis (plate 48) in Fragmenta , vol. 6 (1867-8).
5
Bentham & Hooker, p. 539, state that three species exist in Calogyne , but also cite M's B73.06.03, p. 57, the purple flowered species. Bentham (1863-78), vol. 4, p. 81, lists two species, and Bentham and Hooker would not have known of the last species M described, C. heteroptera (B76.03.01, p. 43) when the text of their entry was prepared.
6
Bentham & Hooker , p. 791, list illustrations from Labillardière (1804-6), vol. 1, t. 51; Endlicher (1838a), tt. 57, 58; and W. Hooker (1836-54), vol. 9, t. 832. M's illustration is B65.02.06, plate 60.
7
Bentham & Hooker, pp. 911-12, discuss Duboisia and Anthoceris , listing one species of Duboisia . M transferred Duboisia hopwoodii from Anthoceris in B76.01.01, p. 20; Bentham (1863-78), vol. 4, p. 480, had doubtfully assigned the species to Anthoceris in the absence of a fruit.
8
Bentham & Hooker, p. 558, give the distribution of Polypompholyx as South-Western Australia. Bentham (1863-78), vol. 4, pp. 532-3, lists specimens of P. tenella from South Australia, Victoria and Tasmania as well as from Western Australia.
9
D. tetrophylla . Scheffer (1870), pp. 334-5, described Diplanthera bancana from Bangka Island, off Sumatra. In addition to one Australian species, localities given by Bentham & Hooker, p. 1048, range from Maingay island (off Myanmar), Malacca, Borneo and New Caledonia.
10
Bentham & Hooker, p. 1126, treat M's Sentis as a synonym of his Pholidia divaricata, as was done in Bentham (1863-78), vol. 5, p 14.
11
Bentham & Hooker, pp. 1124-5, placed Pholidia between Myoporum and Eremophila , giving an account of M's views about generic limits within this grouping. See B68.03.04, pp. 147-51; G. Bentham to M, 9 June 1869 (in this edition as 69-06-09a); and Bentham (1863-78), vol. 5, pp 10-15, when Bentham treated as Pholodia many species M had treated as Eremophila .
12
Bentham & Hooker, p. 1141, list Denisonia as monotypic. M lists only one species in B89.13.12, p. 173. No reference to additional species in or outside Australia has been found.
13
Bentham & Hooker, p. 618, treated Sphenotoma as a section of Dracophyllum ; M's differences with Bentham about the classification of Epacridaceae are discussed in Lucas (2003), pp. 269-72.
14
Bentham & Hooker, p. 582. Cf. Gray (1868a), pp. 293: 'the orthography of the genus, if changed at all, should be Gaultiera'.
15
Bentham & Hooker, p. 536, point out the close affinity between Velleya (as Velleia) and Goodenia, which M had also done in B58.10.02.
16
Bentham & Hooker, p. 819, discuss Villarsia and Limnanthemum.
17

‘Menyanthes ... its flowerlobes?’ written at the bottom of the page, its, intended position indicted by an asterisk in text.

M is commenting on the nature of the relationship between Menyanthes and Limnanthemum (Bentham & Hooker, p. 819) by analogy with the relationship of Selliera to other genera discussed in Bentham & Hooker, pp. 536-41.

18
Bentham & Hooker, p. 535, recognise both Forstera and Phyllachne, but point out that Willdenow treated them under the name Phyllachne. M, in B73.04.02, p. 40 (cited by Bentham & Hooker), points out that Swartz (1799a), had united the genera; that is, before Willdenow did so in 1805 (1797-1825), vol. 4, part 1, p. 148.
19
Bentham & Hooker, p. 638, give the number of species as 8; M, in B64.13.02, pp. 34-7, reduces the number to 2, arguing that Samolus repens is 'one of the most variable of known plants'.
20
Bentham & Hooker, p. 678, treat a specimen from Lord Howe island collected by C. Moore as a Notelaea, presumably the species M originally described from collections, including Moore's, from Lord Howe Island as Chionanthus quadristaminea (section Linociera) in B73.04.02, p. 41. M's description states that the seeds are without albumen, whereas Bentham & Hooker give the presence of albumen as a character of the genus Notolaea.

Please cite as “FVM-76-09-00a,” 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 31 March 2023, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/76-09-00a