13/7/95
Feel greatly elated, dear Dr Bornet, with having been deemed worthy of a corresponding membership of the Institut. It was my greatest ambition all through life and is the crown of all my scientific positions! You also have been most kind to advocate my interests, and this will ever remain in my grateful rememberance.
Mr Bracebridge Wilson has not yet sent the surplus algs of his collection, formed last summer in his own yacht and with his trouling1 apparatus. But the season seems not to have been favorable for his purposes. But when the prepared specimens arrive, Prof Cornu and yourself shall both have a series.
By this post I send you a considerable quantity of Algs, collected at Lacépède Bay2 by a medical friend, Dr Engelhardt on my request. I have forwarded by this weeks mail the whole of his present sending, and trust that you will find among this material some specimens new to your collection or better fructificans As I have myself hardly any Algs from Lacépède Bay by a medical friend, Dr Engelhardt on my request. I have forwarded by this weeks mail the whole of his present sending, and trust that you will find among this material some specimens new to your collection or better fructificant As I have myself hardly any Algs from Lacépède Bay and as Dr Englehardt likes to have named specimens himself, I would beg of you to send named back one or two specimens, when they can be spared. Altho’ I know most of these species by name, I have sent you the whole, as a small specimen will be sufficient for the purpose of representing the locality in my large "Herbier" here, commenced in Denmark 1839, now filling two large halls and containing nearly a million sheets!
Moreover I am so extremely taxed in my time, as I have in addition to the heavy daily professional routine duties to pass the nineth (again enlarged) edition of the "Select plants for industrial culture and naturalisation” trough the press.3
Altho’ I have scarcely any plants from Lacépède Bay in my collection, I have very many Algs from another Bay in the vicinity Rivoli-Bay,4 where I gathered them myself when exploring geographically in 1848 as a young Doctor. These Bays were discovered named by your Compatriots in Baudin’s expedition 1802.
Pray convey to all the generous members of the Institut my best thanks for the special exertions made in my favor. When the official announcement reaches me, I shall endeavour to express my gratitude adequately in your beautiful french language.5
Reverently yours
Ferd von Mueller
Please cite as “FVM-95-07-13,” 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 27 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/vonmueller/letters/95-07-13