To Baldwin Spencer   17 January 1896

17/1/96

 

Herewith, dear Professor Spencer, I send you the description of the new scrophularineous genus, Elacholoma, which Prof Tate discovered, when you [w]ere out in Central Australia.1 As Prof. Tate sent me all his rough notes on the Horn plants, I find that Elacholoma Hornii should be inserted between Buechnera and Limosella in the msc. with you.2 It is the best plant, he discovered. Either to day or to morrow you will receive also a note on Helichrysum Ayersii, which Prof Tate, I see from the rough notes — indicates from Giles finding, on which I based the species The Professors specimen is somewhat aberrant as regards the pappus, but cannot be specifically separated.3

On Sunday and in the early part of next week I will attend to two cyperaceous plants left yet unfinished by me for the Horn-plants; that will be in time, as they come in only at the close which will take several days yet.4 Be so kind to send me the proofsheet, or proof slips, on which Elacholoma will appear, as I would be glad to revise the proof.

Very regardfully your

Ferd von Mueller

 

Could the R.S. here5 publish the Elder-plants, if Prof Tate approves of it? They would not require very many sheets print.6

Through the urgent enormous rural work in my branch of the service, the phytographic writings get incessently interrupted.

The correspondence is something prodigeous.

 

Buechnera

Elacholoma Hornii

Helichrysum Ayersii

Limosella

1
Horn Scientific Expedition to Central Australia. 1894. M's description was published in the report of the expedition, part 3 (1896), p. 190, i.e. Tate (1896), the name having previously been published in the Victorian naturalist, vol. 12 (May 1895), p. 14.
2
See Tate (1896), p. 172.
3
M's note on the specimens of Helichrysum Ayersii collected during the Horn Expedition was published in Tate (1896), p. 165.
4
A note by M distinguishing a variety of Cyperus umbellatus that he named fasciculigerus was included in the account of the Cyperaceae in Tate (1896), p. 181.
5
The Royal Society of Victoria. Spencer was Secretary of the Society.
6
The report on the plants of the Elder Expedition was not included in Parts I (1892) or II (1893) of vol. 16 of the Transactions of the Royal Society of South Australia dedicated to the Expedition,;the remaining reports, including that by M and Tate on the plants, appeared as Part III (1896), when Robert Barr-Smith paid the costs of the publication.

Please cite as “FVM-96-01-17,” 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/96-01-17