Document information

Physical location:

RB MSS M4, Library, Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne. 62.05.24

Plant names

Preferred Citation:

George Bentham to Ferdinand von Mueller, 1862-05-24. R.W. Home, Thomas A. Darragh, A.M. Lucas, Sara Maroske, D.M. Sinkora, J.H. Voigt and Monika Wells (eds), Correspondence of Ferdinand von Mueller, <https://vmcp.rbg.vic.gov.au/id/62-05-24>, accessed April 5, 2025

London May 24 1862
My dear Sir,
I wrote to you the other day in great haste for I do not like to encroach on my working hours at Kew by writing letters and at home I have been very much engaged of late Since then I have received yours of the 25th March and also a copy of the 2d vol. of your Fragmenta
1
The bound volume made up of fascicles 11–16, plus the unnumbered 'Additamenta' (B61.13.07).
for which many thanks. I am sorry I am unable to send you proofs of our Genera Plantarum
2
Bentham & Hooker (1862-83), vol. 1. See M to G. Bentham, 25 March 1862 (in this edition as 62-03-25d).
as they come out as we have no spare ones but as soon as the first part is finished I will send it you 23 sheets are already in type and three or four more will I think complete it (down to
Connaraceae

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) — there would be no time to receive your remarks for the addenda — which we shall probably not give with the Part. The printing is a very heavy expense to Dr Hooker and myself and we must endeavour to sell as many as we can towards defraying it — but we shall probably be ultimately at a considerable loss as we shall not put a high price on the work. I trust it will be out in a month or 6 weeks.
I wrote to you in a hurry about your new Menispermaceous plant which you had referred to
Pachygone

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.
3
See G. Bentham to M, 19 May 1862.
It certainly agrees in almost all essential characters with my African
Triclisia

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s but it has petals which the African ones have not and after much hesitation I have thought it as well in the present state of our knowledge of
Menispermaceae

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to make a distinct genus of it which I have called
Microclisia

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.
4
Although publishing the new genus in Bentham & Hooker (1862-83), vol. 1, p. 435, as an addendum to the
Menispermaceae

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, Bentham retained the plant within
Pachygone

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in Bentham (1863-78), vol. 1, p. 58, without citing his earlier genus in synonymy although indicating his uncertainty by listing the species as 'P. (?) pubescens'.
We had very good fruits of
Tremandra

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which I examined for our Genera last summer What with Drummonds, Preiss's and others we are rich in W. Australian Plants and I hope to be able to identify all the blundery puzzles of Turczaninoff and of Steudel and others of the Plantae Preissianae who put half their plants into wrong genera.
5
Lehmann (1844-7) contains enumerations of plants collected in WA by Johan Ludwig Preiss, plus some collected by others such as James Drummond, Thomas Mitchell and Johan Lhotsky. See Stearn (1939) for a list of collaborators and bibliographic details. Both Steudel and Turczaninow published extensively on Australian plants; see, for example, Steudel (1840-41) and Turczaninow (1851). See also Bentham (1863-78), vol. 1, pp 10*-11*: 'As many portions of [the plants published in Plantae Priessianae] were confided for publication to such botanists as the late Dr. Steudel, it would have been impossible to identify them without such an inspection of authentic specimens'.
I am puzzled with many of the localities on your labels. I find the greater number of them in the excellent atlas we have — Still there are several — such as Sealer's Cove
6
Wilson's Promontory, Vic.
— Mount Laperouse
7
Tas.
etc which are not there. I am also embarrassed sometimes to know who the collectors are — Mx I suppose means Maxwell — D. M. at first puzzled me much as you generally adopt the initials F. M. but on comparing localities I conclude it must mean yourself — Many labels are without any name of collector and then I quote Herb. Mueller — In general I try to give general stations which I can always take from your book for Victoria plants giving your authority — but where stations are few I must particularise and give the authority for each.
I cannot quite agree to uniting
Cardamine pratensis

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hirsuta and resedifolia — plants that I have so often and so long observed living in so many localities — and I much doubt the common Australian large flowered one being identical with the northern pratensis although both appear to be peduncial. Dr Hooker tells me that it certainly is so in Tasmania — from the specimens I should say that Hooker's C. tenuifolia (including lilacina intermedia and heterophylla) is one of those perennials which sends out a short stolone
8
stolon?
in autumn from whence proceeds the following years plant which thus often looks like an annual whilst the small flowered C. hirsuta is a true annual although here as elsewhere when it comes up early enough in autumn to form a good tuft before winter it looks almost perennial when it comes into flower the next season — but this may happen to all annuals that are not quite ephemeral.
I shall be out of town in August and September but letters addressed to me at Kew will always reach me.
Yours very sincerely
George Bentham
I shall not begin printing till the volume is nearly ready and then print rapidly in order to make the addenda and corrigenda in the MS as much as possible.