To Joseph Hooker   7 April 1886

Private

7/4/861

 

The Xanthorrhoea Preissii sent to you, dear Sir Joseph, is a gift of the Swan-River2 Exhibition-Commissioners, sent on my solicitation.3 It is not X. quadrangulata, which has similar leaves, but differs in various other respects, the latter being confined to the vicinity of St Vincents Gulf in S. Austr., while the other has a very wide range over West Austr, but not advancing far eastward.4

Can we hope, to get a supplement to the “genera”5 from you?

I will try to send Mr Dyer a fresh X. Australis. They want much nourishment from often renewed healthy moss-soil with sand.6

In my time I had to train six draftsmen successively; three are dead, one nearly now blind, one who does only care to furnish something at long intervals and one opposed to temperance-associations!7

So the pictorial progress is beset with difficulties in my Department

Mr Dyer will be able to get lots of things, sent by me, from the President of the Vict. Commission, Joseph Bosisto Esqr.

Regardfully yr

Ferd. von Mueller8

 

Xanthorrhoea Australis

Xanthorrhoea Preissii

Xanthorrhoea quadrangulata

 
1

Annotated in ink by William Watson: See entry 271 -1885 also letter 24-IV-85 [i e. RBG Kew, Kewensia, Kew inwards book; M to J. Hooker, 24 April 1885].

Annotated in purple pencil: And 31.5.86 [letter not found].

2
Perth, WA.
3
Vertical blue pencil line in margin, next tois a gift of . .. Commissioners.
4

A piece of paper pasted onto the back of f. 172 bears the following text in ink in an unknown hand: I cannot distinguish Preissii from quadrangulata by the young leaves, but Pressii is confined to west Australia & quadrangulata to South Australia

The slip also bears a note by Thiselton-Dyer in purple pencil: The plants from Chiswick will be the same kind as these from Mueller.

5
Bentham & Hooker (1862-83).
6
Vertical blue line in left margin next to they want . . . sand'; annotation in ink to left of line: noted. W.W. [William Watson].
7
Hewson (1999) lists the following artists who illustrated M’s work: Friedrich Schönfeld (1810–1868); Ludwig Becker (?1808-1861); Robert Austen (c.1851-1879); Emil Todt (c.1810-1900); Ludwig Rummel (c.1837-1904); Robert Graff (c.1841-1914). She has not included either Richard Shepherd, who drew and lithographed the illustrations for B74.13.07 and B83.13.04, or P. Ashley, who ‘had to be initiated into plant drawing’, the results ‘of which must be regarded as fairly credible’ (B93.13.01, p. 8) before preparing the plates of thistles. See also Darragh (2012). The person who was 'nearly now blind' was probably Todt, while the one 'opposed to temperance-associations' has not been identified.
8

Annotated in ink by William Watson: With this letter there came a packet containing cuttings of Correa Laurenciana presumably an experiment in sending living plants from Australia - The cuttings had been dead some time and were quite mouldy when they reached us C. Laurenciana is established here - W.W. [William Watson]

See M to W. Thiselton-Dyer, 6 April 1886. M had previously sent this species to Kew: see M to J. Hooker, 4 October 1876.


Please cite as “FVM-86-04-07,” 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 19 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/86-04-07