Document information

Physical location:

RB MSS M4, Library, Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne. 62.06.24

Plant names

Preferred Citation:

George Bentham to Ferdinand von Mueller, 1862-06-24. 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/62-06-24>, accessed April 28, 2025

Kew June 24/62
My dear Sir,
Since I wrote last month
1
G. Bentham to M, 24 May 1862.
I have done the Australian
Cruciferae

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,
Capparideae

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,
Violaceae

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&
Bixineae

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(following the order of our Genera)
2
Bentham & Hooker (1862–83).
and am now in
Pittosporeae

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I have had but little change to make in your arrangements. The Australian Sisymbria should however I think all go into Blennodia for they have 2-rowed seeds whilst in all the true Sisymbria they overlap so completely as to form decidedly a single row — the only exception is S. officinale and there it is only at the base of the pod. Sis. or Arab.
3
Arabidopsis.
thaliana
4
thalianum?
which you thought you had identified in
Blennodia cardaminoides

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is quite distinct both in foliage and in the pod and seeds — In Cardamine I cannot go so far as to unite C. pratensis hirsuta and resedifolia I am too familiar with them all over Europe to venture upon an union which no European Botanist would agree to — and if they are kept distinct Hooker's C. tenuifolia must be kept up too — leaving the small flowered annuals with very short styles in C. hirsuta — Your C. eustylis is very marked as having the 2-rowed seeds and convex valves of
Nasturtium

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but from its habit I suppose it must remain in Cardamine — Drummond's plants supply two or three interesting
Cruciferae

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not in yours — amongst others
Geococcus

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which may be one state of a dimorphous plant and a new
Thlaspi

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(in very bad specimen) Of Brown's
Cruciferae

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I have unfortunately only seen the few that are laid in the Banksian collection for Mr Bennett had mislaid the parcel but he hopes still to find it
5
Plants collected in Australia by Robert Brown (1773-1858) were at the British Museum.
— As the order however is not tropical I do not suppose that Brown had any that you have not. — In
Capparideae

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your Capparis (Busbeckia) biformis
6
Not in APNI as either C. biformis or B. biformis (accessed 23 April 2020).
seems to me to be the same as C. canescens DC. characterised chiefly by the four prominent angles of the calyx. Your C. corymbiformis
7
corymbiflora?
(Busbeckia) is DC's
Thylacium lucidum

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— though that and C. nobilis appear to have been confounded by Brown under C. lucida.
Emblingia

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is a very curious plant I wish there were more I could only venture to examine one ovary in which I found 2 parietal placentae with one ovule to each. In
Violaceae

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I am rather puzzled with Ionidium suffruticos[a]
8
I. suffructicosum?
yellow flowered ones from Cunningham & others have certainly the striate seeds of the purple one — although your yellow one from Victoria river
9
NT.
has them smooth. — In
Hymenanthera

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I feel convinced that Hooker is right in distinguishing the Tasmanian from the Australian one. In
Bixaceae

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10
Bixineae

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?
I have 4 Cochlosperma — Frasers which is the nearest to the Indian one in flowers but of which we have no leaves — your two species and a fourth gathered by McGillivray in Lizard Island We have also a
Scolopia

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and a
Xylosma

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, both new — Of the Australian Pittospora the only one which can be identified with extra-Australian ones is ovatifolium which is P. ferrugineum Ait. — P. rubiginosum Cunn. is a very distinct species only in his collection.
Brown's
Menispermaceae

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supply me with another new one which I must make a genus of although I tried hard to get [it]
11
editorial addition.
into Pachygone of which it has the habit and imbricate flowers — but 3 petals 9 to 12 stamens in the males, 3 petals no staminodia and 2 ovules to each carpel in the female will not do — at least whilst the fruit is unknown.
The plants you mention in your letter to Sir W. Hooker as having been sent by the Dover Castle & the Orwell have not yet arrived.
I am afraid that the new genus
Lamprospermum

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you sent in fruit is not sufficient to publish
12
Lamprospermum

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was not published by either M or Bentham. In any case, the name had been used previously by Klotsch for a genus from British Guiana (see IPNI, accessed 23 April 2020).
— It would only be a puzzle — the placentation approaches that of
Bixineae

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but the disk appears to have been very different and to bring it nearer to the Passifloral orders.
I am still very busy with our Genera
13
Bentham & Hooker (1862-83), vol. 1.
It is now (the first part) all in type
Ranunculaceae

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to
Connaraceae

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— except the index and will I hope be out next month It makes a very large 8vo in small type of about 450 pages comprising 1300 genera and at least as many synonyms. I shall now endeavour to get on with the corresponding vol. of the Australian Flora so as to print it in the winter and then go on with
Leguminosae

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both for Genera & Australian Flora — I shall however be absent the greater part of August & September
Ever yours sincerely
George Bentham
Dr F. Mueller