25, WILTON PLACE. S.W.
London
Sept 20 1876
My dear Sir
The Composite which has invaded Australia and of which you sent a specimen in your last letter is Inula graveolens a common weed in a great part of southern Europe especially in maritime districts
I returned to town on Wednesday last after a six weeks absence1 and have now set to work at Cyperaceae — I shall be anxious for the arrival of the Agamemnon with your specimens. They have sent me from Berlin on loan the Australian species published as new by Boeckeler
— he has been working up the Berlin Cyperaceae with great care but from what I see I scarcely think he is a good appreciator of generic and specific characters. His genus Anosporum for instance (that is Anosporum Nees as extended by him) is a most unnatural combination of very different species of Cyperus and Scirpus on an imaginary character2
I hope that by this time your Gramineae may also be on their way here.3 I have been visiting at General Munro's4 and whilst there I took notes on all the Australian Gramineae in his collection and with his and your assistance I hope to get through the Order rapidly Genl Munro is now preparing for De Candolle a general monograph of the whole Order and it would be rendering a service to science if you would allow me to select for him where it can be well spared a set of your Australian ones.5
I hear nothing from Wendland about your Palms — I have worked them up as well as I could with the materials I had and I returned you yours with the other specimens I still had in the box that left Kew whilst I was away but there are still two or three of Drude's species that I have not seen
Young Balfour is working up Pandaneae with great care and doing them well6
I think of beginning to print as soon as I have got through Cyperaceae which if your specimens come soon will I hope be soon after Xmas
Ever my Dear Sir
Yours sincerely
George Bentham
Baron v. Müller
Anosporam
Cyperaceae
Cyperus
Gramineae
Inula graveolens
Pandaneae
Scirpus
Bentham left London on 3 August and returned on 13 September; see B. Jackson (1906), pp. 237-8.
Boeckeler [1868-77], Die Cyperaceen des königlichen Herbariums zu Berlin, was published in parts in Linnaea from vol. 35 to vol. 41 (TL2). Anosporum is defined in Linnaea vol. 36, part 4, p. 410 (April 1870), where he comments that the description by Nees is 'non bona' [not good].
See M to G. Bentham, 26 September 1876.
Bentham stayed with William Munro from 3 to 14 August; see B. Jackson (1906), p. 237.
See M to G. Bentham, 28 November 1876. Munro's monograph was not completed (Journal of botany, British and foreign, 1880, vol. 18, p. 96).
I. Balfour (1880) (read 6 December 1877, issued 31 July 1878).
MS annotation by M: 'Zannich macrostem [i.e. Zannichellia macrostemon] Anth 4-celled'. See M to G. Bentham, 28 November 1876.
Please cite as “FVM-76-09-20,” 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