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RBG Kew, Directors' letters, vol. LXXV, Australian and Pacific letters 1859-65, letter no. 184. 64.08.25d

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Ferdinand von Mueller to William Hooker, 1864-08-25 [64.08.25d]. 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/64-08-25d>, accessed April 19, 2025

25/8/64.
My very dear & venerable Sir William.
The roughly dried specimen of
Lomaria discolor

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with doubly pinnatifid fronds herewith sent may interest you, though it is but a play-form. I have one large plant of it in cultivation; all its fronds are barren & bipinnatifid; but they suffered in the transit of the plant from the Dandenong Ranges. As soon as the plant produces new fronds I will send better dried ones. The Asplenium, which I temporarely named notabile, from East Australia may perhaps not be new altho' it is so to me.
1
M did not publish Asplenuim notabile; the fern given that name by Fée (1866), pp. 27-8 is from Réunion.
The receipt of your letters always so full of genuine kindness & sympathy, gives me on all occasions extreme pleasure, and so it was with your friendly lines of 18 June. I only fear that writing to correspondents must often become very burdensome to you in addition to writing for publications. It is marvellous to contemplate your unparalleled amount of literary productions, forming as they do a library in themselfes. Your synopsis filicum
2
Hooker & Baker (1868).
will be a blessed book to every one who cherishes a love for plants, & every true disciple of science should feel it a duty to place at your command any additional material he may happen to possess. To you I am again obliged for a generous contribution of plants for the Greenhouses, as indicated by the transmission of a bill of loading and shall not fail to recognize the gift adequately in my forthcoming annual report;
3
The earliest Report to the Chief Secretary found after this letter was submitted is M's report submitted in September 1865 (M to J. McCulloch, 30 September 1865). In it he acknowledged receiving 'from Sir William Hooker, Kew, large collection of seeds and some Wardian cases with ornamental plants'.
trusting that they will not come in the sad plight of one of the Boxes with
Leguminosae

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recently returned pr Sussex by Mr Bentham.
4
See M to G. Bentham, 25 August 1865, and C. Wilhelmi and T. Mueller to M, 24 August 1864 (in this edition as 64-08-24a).
My collection of New Zealand ferns is very extensive & I may say instructive; but I suppose it would be needless to send it to you for inspection, since your material must be ample from there. Am I right in my memory if I think that I have furnished you with notes on the range of the species of ferns of this Continent.?— e.g.
Platyzoma

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(which I have called
Gleichenia platyzoma

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) in my Chatham work —
Lomaria discolor

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, (the most common species in the Colony of South Australia). If I did not send such notes, they might be acceptable; for in your larger work you had only an opportunity of quoting in some instances a few localities from specimens, whilst the species in some instances have an universal range or nearly so through wide tracts of country.
With most affectionate regard your
Ferd Mueller
The collection of N.Z. ferns in our Museum here is consisting of 12 large fascicles. The Chathamian ferns will furnish some new habitats & I shall have done them by next mail, so that you may be able to quote them from my printing as well as from Mr Travers's collection.
5
See B64.10.02, pp. 62-74.