From Ferdinand von Mueller to Ralph Tate   [June 1882]

N. 2 repeated.

Name not found (IPNI, accessed 30 May 2022).

for some of interlined, with intended position indicated.

End of page. It is possible that this sheet accompanied M to R. Tate, 2 May 1882 (in this edition as 82-05-02a), but that letter does not indicate that any identifications were enclosed with it. It is therefore included in this combined entry.

The items on this page cannot be matched to numbered records of Tate specimens in MEL, but there is a specimen of Hemiarrhena plantaginea without a record number collected from Cox's Peninsula. Vandellia is 'a widespread taxon previously recorded for Australia. Australian taxa formerly placed in this genus are now placed in various other genera in the Linderniaceae' (Australian Plant Census entry quoted by APNI). There are two specimens without numbers shown as 'formerly identified as Lindernia scapigera', one from Cox's Peninsula, the other from the Stapelton River, and two Linderna lobelioides, one from Cox's Peninsula and the other from Pine Creek (AVH, accessed 28 April 2022).

No species has been described under this name (APNI, accessed 28 May 2022).

MS annotation: 'Pine Creek'.

MS annotation: 'Surely some mistake'.

This is the final entry on a page.

Luerssen (1882), as Notholaena; see synonymy p. 443 in description of Cheilanthes Prenticei, pp. 442-3, dated end of February 1882. M supplied Luerssen two fertile fronds collected by Prentice from Thursday Island in 1881.

MS stops half-way down the page.

MS annotation: 'retd' [returned?].

Rottler is the author of Andropogon nervosus; M has evidently confused him with Rottbøll [Rottboell] who named numerous Australian Cyperaceae, but only one grass (APNI, accessed 28 May 2022).

MS annotation: '? ciliata'.

Final entry on the page.

Cyperus inserted by M at the top of a new page, with an indication that it refers to No. 7 below.

MS annotation: 'retd' [returned?].

C. B. Clarke (1881), p. 158.

Setaria macrostycha?

This is the final entry on the page, with about ¼ of the page left empty. There is an annotation below M's text, '11 12 [deleted number] ? [unicu…s]'.

Numbers 9 and 6 are both crossed through and marked 'retd' [returned?].

Justicia procumbens crossed through.

MS annotation: 'of what?'

MS annotation: 'retd' [returned?].

Jasminum simplicifolum and Clerodendron floribundum partially crossed through, presumably by Tate.

The last entry on the page.

MS annotation in an unknown hand: 'Euphorbi'.

Portulaca oleracea and the following Canthium lucidum both marked retd. [returned?].

MS annotation in an unknown hand: 'retd' [returned?].

The final entry on the page with no excessive space remaining.

The specimens in this list were collected during Tate's 1882 visit to the Northern Territory. He was granted leave of absence by the University of Adelaide to accompany a party of South Australian members of parliament which arrived in Darwin on 20 February 1882 (Northern Territory times and gazette, 25 February 1882, p. 2), and returned to Adelaide on 13 April (South Australian register (Adelaide), 14 April 1882, p. 6). A reporter from the Register with the group provided regular reports of the visit, and the localities in those reports correspond to the localities associated with Tate's collections at MEL (Various editions of the Register for 1882; Sowden (1882) is his revised consolidated account). M to R. Tate, 2 May 1882 (in this edition as 82-05-02a) suggests that Tate may initially have sent only some specimens, leading M to ask for a full set. M and Tate described Pachneyma sphenandrum, a species collected on this trip, in B82.14.01, read before the Royal Society of SA on 5 July 1882. M described Strobilanthes Tatei in B82.12.05, read before the Society on 5 September.

As It is likely that the first specimens were reported on around the time the description of Pachneyma sphenandrum was prepared, the item is dated to June 1882, but as M was still working on the collection when he wrote M to R. Tate, 16 December 1882 it is probable that not all of the pages were sent together. The physical nature of the reports, noted below, is consistent with the plants having been reported on in more than one communication to Tate. The arrangement of the MSS in the Tate collection at the University of Adelaide offers no clue to the sequence of receipt of the identifications. The record numbers included do not allow sheets to be sorted using that information. All undated MSS identifying plants from the 1882 trip are included here, but the sequence must be considered arbitrary.

It is not possible to match all the items in the numbered lists with a corresponding specimen at MEL. MEL does not hold specimens of some of the species under the name given in the list or a modern synonym. AVH data (accessed 28 April 2022) lists 66 MEL specimens dated 1882 of which 31 have a record number. In addition, there are 82 undated specimens from localities known to have been visited during the trip; of these 24 have record numbers. The same record number is used more than once, including for the same locality: for example, there are two Cox Peninsula specimens and one from Pine Creek with collecting number 3, all different species; for Adelaide River three different species have number 1. Specimens from other collecting trips, for example to the area around Lake Torrens in 1883, also have numbers used for the Northern Territory.

All locations are in what is now the Northern Territory, which at the time was administered by SA.

Annotations on the MS have presumably been made by Tate.