14/4/78.
Recently, dear Sir Redmond, I received from Dulau & Co of Soho Square a copy of the extremely rare "systema naturae" of Linné,1 a work valued so much as it gave the first outlines of the Linnéan System & fixed many genera, before the "genera plantarum" were published. Mess Dulau thought to have conferred on me an extreme favor by securing this copy for five £, but I am too poor to purchase even the most needful recent works, after my Department became destroyed and nearly all votes withdrawn from me. I shall send the work back again, unless you like to secure this rare literary treasure for the public Library.
Regardfully
Ferd. von Mueller.
Linnaeus (1735); there is no copy listed in Public Library, Museums, and National Gallery [of Victoria] (1861), but there is a copy listed in Public Library of Victoria (1880), p. 794. M owned a copy of the 'edition reformata' (i.e. Linné (1776-8)); see M to J. McCulloch, 30 September 1865 (B65.10.01), which also lists the title without edition number, as well as Gmelin's editon (Linné (1789-91)).
MS annotation by R. Berry: 'Mr Sheffield be so good as to say whet. you have this work'.
Please cite as “FVM-78-04-14b,” 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