To Joseph Hooker1    20 September 1885

20/9/85

 

Herewith, dear Sir Joseph, I beg to send you fresh seeds of the Arnhem’s Land Livistona experimentally, some in Waxpaper according to Goeppert’s method, some in ordinary paper. It would be of interest to ascertain whether, those in the Waxpaper will endure their vitality during transmission better than the others.

As you wrote to me about Australian Palms inquiringly before, I would like to add, that the lamented Bentham rightly united Livistona Ramsayi and Licuala Muelleri.2

That is a Palm restricted to the East-Coast of Queensland, while Livistona inermis under which L. Ramsayi is placed in the Kew Catalogue (or Report)3 belongs to the North-Coast exclusively. As Bentham thought L. humilis seems merely the young state of L. inermis;4 the latter is neither unarmed; so both names are misleading and these two palms might well be united under the name Livistona Leichhardtii. At last I have some hope of getting flowers of the Australian Licuala, so that its generic position may become definitely settled.

Regardfully your

Ferd. von Mueller.

 

Have you two really distinct fan palms from North Austr growing in Kew? The Central Australian L. Mariae has globular fruits. Drude writes, that the genus Normanbya, indicated by myself, should be accepted.5

When the heavy extrawork for the London-Exhibition is over,6 more specimens from the supplem. Australian collections of dried plants shall be sent to Kew.

 

Licuala Muelleri

Livistona humilis

Livistona inermis

Livistona Leichhardtii

Livistona Mariae

Livistona Ramsayi

Normanbya

1
Annotated with a large X in purple pencil to left of date; and in left margin, f. 158, front, in pencil: Both lots of seeds arrd. fresh & sound | Will report on germination W.W.’ [William Watson].
2
Bentham (1863-78), vol 7, p. 135.
3

R eport on the progress and conditions of the Royal gardens at Kew, 1882. Appendix II, p. 65-6, lists the Livistona spp cultivated at Kew. The entry for Livistona inermis is 'L. inermis Br (L. Ramsayi, F. Muell.) Tropical Australia'.

‘The Report of the Director on the Progress and Condition of the Royal Gardens at Kew for the year 1882 was unavoidably delayed. It bears date only from November 1, 1883, and was not published until well on in 1884’ (Nature, vol. 30, pp. 316-7 [31 July 1884]).

4
Bentham (1863-78), vol 7, p. 146.
5
Annotated in pencil in the LH margin next to the postscripts: We have two species so called -i.e. L. australis and L. humilis, but they seem identical in general appearance. W.W. [William Watson].
6
Colonial and Indian Exhibition, London, 1886.

Please cite as “FVM-85-09-20,” 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 28 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/85-09-20