New Years morn,
1883.
My work in the new annual space of time, dear Mr Bentham, can most worthily be commenced by writing a few words of felicitation to distant illustrious friends. May the new year to you be a happy one, and may providence preserve you in the vigorous health, which enabled you to carry on in an unexampled manner scientific researches most resultfully up to a time, when the mental and physical strength of most mortals has become very greatly diminished or even had passed away.
It must be a source of infinite enjoyment to you to reflect, in what state you found our favorite science, when you commenced to promote it, and to see what grandeur it has attained much through your own unabated exertions at the present day.
I spent the last moments of the year past and the first of the new one in sharing in devotional service in a Wesleyan Church.
Ever with regardful remembrance your
Ferd. von Mueller.
Please cite as “FVM-83-01-01b,” 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/83-01-01b