16/4/94.
This evening, dear Mr Macdonald, I received your kind letter of this day,1 and in answer I support your view, that a sum of £10 or more be voted for the children of Mr Le Mestre,2 all the more so as their father gave really the first impulse to the formation of the RGSA and worked for a year or two strenuously for it, til he came into antagonism to Sir Strickland.3 Thursday afternoon I will make free for a Council meeting. Perhaps you could ascertain before, whether Mr Turner4 will or can make free £10 (or more) from our locked up fund for this appealing purpose.
Please return your kind brothers letter, as I have not yet replied. Yesterday I sent your brother, the Police-Magistrate5 one of my book.
Regardfully your
Ferd von Mueller.
I write in great hurry amidst mail-work
Letter not found.
La Meslée? Edmond Marin La Meslée and his wife were drowned when the pleasure-boat Ripple capsized in Sydney Harbour in December 1893, being survided by three sons (ADB). A fund was established to support the orphans (Sydney morning herald, 12 January 1894, p. 4).
Sir Edward Strickland.
Henry Gyles Turner.
John Graham Macdonald (1834-1918), Queensland Police Magistrate from 1872 (Brisbane courier, 30 May 1918, p. 9). In 1894 he was based in Townsville (The week (Brisbane), 20 April 1894, p. 24).
Please cite as “FVM-94-04-16,” 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