1/5/92
The Eucalyptus, of which you sent specimens, dear Mr Rodway,1 is of great interest, and was named at the Melbourne-Meeting of the Australian Association E. Perriniana, as then Mr Perrin, formerly Forest-administrator of Tasmania exhibited living and dried plants.2 It holds the same position to E. Stuartiana, which also occurs occasionally in an ashy grey form, as E. Risdoni to E. amygdalina, and as E. cordata to E. urnigera. The anthers are narrow-ellipsoid, not as in E Ridsoni kidney-shaped. I should like, to get some more specimens for critical examination, particularly also fruit quite ripe. What is the nature of the bark and the height of the tree?
While reconstructing with very diminished means my Department, I have had very little time to work descriptively on plants; but your Gahnia, which needs comparison with several New Zealand species and which meanwhile I named G. Rodneyi,3 shall soon also have attention.
Regardfully your
Ferd von Mueller
Eucalyptus amygdalina
Eucalyptus cordata
Eucalyptus Perriniana
Eucalyptus Risdoni
Eucalyptus Stuartiana
Eucalyptus urnigera
Gahnia Rodneyi
See L. Rodway to M, 27 April 1892 (in this edition as 92-04-27b).
At the Melbourne meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, held in January 1890, George Perrin exhibited a 'very singular' specimen of a small sub-alpine eucalypt that he thought would be found to be a new species (Report, pp. 555-7, i.e. Perrin (1890)). M was present and is reported as saying that he, too, thought it would prove to be a new species ('Intercolonial news', Launceston examiner, 13 January 1890, p. 3; Weekly times (Melbourne), 18 January 1890, p. 26). He may well have also suggested that if it so proved when fruits had been seen, it would be appropriate to name it after Perrin. The label on a specimen collected by Perrin in 1889 (MEL 1611960) has been labelled Eucalyptus perriniana by M. Rodway subsequently described E. perriniana in Papers and proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania for 1893, p. 181, attributing the name to M as he did so.
M presumably intended G. rodwayi, the name announced by Rodway for a sedge 'named after its finder, by Baron von Mueller' in Papers and proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania for 1892, p. 93. However, M did not publish a description and the name lapsed.
Please cite as “FVM-92-05-01,” 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