To Jane Gray   24 January 1891

24/1/91.

 

On my return-voyage from New Zealand, dear Madam, where I had by the rules of the Austral. Association for Advancement of Science to instal Sir James Hector as my successor in the Presidency, I avail myself of spare-hours for correspondence, and as the genial Professor Goodale, to whom I mentioned two remarkable passages from letters of your lamented Consort, desired me to communicate them to you, I feel it a particular but sad privilege to do so, — altho' I write only from memory.

The one passage constituted the whole of a letter, written to me at the time of the dreadful fratricidal civil war,1 when the arms of the Southern States were in the ascendence. Thus he wrote "My dear Dr. Mueller. I am distracted, but do not forget you, and now send you a parcel of plants from Texas" Yours Asa Gray. The other letter, to which I refer,2 was also of laconic but significant briefness: "My dear Baron. This is the Centennial day, and in the streets it is noisy joyous, but I get a quiet day for my work." This shows with what close application your renowened husband devoted himself to science-considerations.

Prof. Goodale's presence at the N.Z. meeting of the Australian Association3 shed a great lustre on it. In my short opening speech, referring to the American president, I paid him homage for having crossed two oceans to bring us a greeting from antipodal distance of your great Science-Union, and added, that the highest praise, we could bestow on him, was to recognize in him the Successor of Asa Gray! 4

Ever, dear Mrs. Gray, yours with profound regard

Ferd. von Mueller.

 

It was so kindly thoughtful of Prof Asa Gray to invite me specially to the American Assoc. meeting, when he was President,5 but in the administrative Departments in Victoria never vacation-time arises, and as I was then extra-taxed also with unusually heavy work, I could not make the needful time free, and thus one of my greatest worldly wishes, to meet Asa Gray, remained unfulfilled. When I think of him, I like to express myself in slightly altered words of Caroline Pichler, written at the time of the death of Koerner,6 a companion under arms in 1813 of my father, "Also stand er hoch vor Wissen's Söhnen, Weckte mächtig mit des Wortes Tönen, Die Begeisterung die ihn durchglüht"!7

The U.S. Civil War, 1861-5. Letter not found.
Letter not found.
Third meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, Christchurch, NZ, January 1891.
These comments were not included in the published version of the speech; see B91.13.08, pp. xxvii-xxviii.
American Association for the Advancement of Science. Gray was president in 1872. Invitation not found.
The poet Karl Theodor Körner (1791-1813) was killed while fighting against the French in the Mecklenburg-based Lützow Corps.
'Thus he stood high before the sons of knowledge, mightily with resounding words awakening the enthusiasm which burns in him.'

Please cite as “FVM-91-01-24,” 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 March 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/91-01-24