30/10/78
These lines are written to you, dear Professor Owen, from my sick-bed, on which I have been thrown after an operation for varicous veins of the rectum.1 You will therefore kindly excuse my writing with graphit-pencil; but I did not wish to loose a monthly mail to bring under your notice an offer for sale of a splendid collection of Coleoptera formed by a Gardener, who for many years worked under me in the bot Garden.2
It is on my own suggestion, that Mr French now offers these collections to the British Museum, it being before his intention to sell it to some other less important institution To your glorious Museum it is of course an object to secure particularly such collections, as contain many novelties, so as to afford material for adding to the celebrated records emanating from the British Museum.
I consider the price cheap, considering the high expenses for travelling in any part of Australia!
Should you and the trustees be able to secure this almost unique collection, then Mr French must of course insure the sending and be responsible for its safe arrival3
Trusting, venerable Sir, that you are in the enjoyment of perfect health & happiness, and that a long serene evening after an eventful life of discoveries will be before you, I remain your
Ferd. von Mueller.
Pray Remember me Kindly to Sir Charles Nicholson & Sir Henry Barkly
The collection comprised about 700 species of Longicorn beetles in 890 specimens, for which French wanted £150, and about 3,500 specimens in other families, which French priced at £200, in each case without the cabinets containing the collections (particulars by Charles French, Natural History Museum, London, Archives, DF200/14, Letters 1878 L-Z, f. 379c).
Owen, in a letter to A. Günther, Keeper of Zoology, 23 December 1878, commented: 'I have, in acknowledging receipt of enclosed, told von Mueller [letter not found] that his letter with Mr French's statement have been refered to you with whom rests the initiative of recommendation. You will perhaps therefore, if you think the proposition worth entertaining, communicate to Dr Frd. von Mueller, (Melbourne Victoria) any suggestion tending to facilitate your wishes on the subject' (Natural History Museum, Archives, DF200/14, Letters 1878 L-Z, f. 379a).
No evidence of purchase can be found in the records of zoological accessions to the Natural History Museum, London. The longicorn collection was later offered to the Stuttgart natural history museum; see M to F. von Krauss, 19 March 1879. According to an interview with Charles French published in the Leader, 22 February 1890, p. 38, his longicorn beetle collection was by then in the Leyden Museum.
Please cite as “FVM-78-10-30,” 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 28 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/78-10-30