Document information

Physical location:

RBG Kew, Kew correspondence, Australia, Mueller, 1871-81, ff. 53-5. 72.08.12a

Plant names

Preferred Citation:

Ferdinand von Mueller to Joseph Hooker, 1872-08-12 [72.08.12a]. 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/72-08-12a>, accessed September 11, 2025

Melbourne botanic Garden
12/8/72
By the Somersetshire, dear Dr Hooker, I send you at last for the good Mr Bentham the Orchideae, a noble collection of 27 fascicles, containing all that I myself collected in Australia of these plants since 25 years, besides all what I got from amateurs or occasionally employed regular collectors.
1
Box 56 (Notebook recording despatch of plants for Flora Australiensis, RB MSS, M44, Library, Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne); Somersetshire cleared out of Melbourne 24 August 1872 (Argus, 26 August 1872, p. 4).
From this material it will be possible to trace out the geographic and systematic range of the species of this order exhaustively, as so few Orchids exist in Central Australia, altho the maritime jungles of the tropics may yield a few species yet. By some unexplained circumstance the main collection of Corymbis,
Oberonia

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and
Phajus

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is missing. Since 10 years no addition is provided either to my office or to my Museum space; hence we are dreadfully put about for means of locating things; indeed lots of plants and documents have to stand in boxes nailed down and almost inaccessible under tables, proofs &c. Miss Charsleys excellent work ought to be quoted, as so many nice drawings of the terrestrial orchids occur in it,
2
Charsley (1867).
and as a Lady (I suppose) will not be attacked by the Hamburg Orchidologist like Fitch, not to speak of RBr, and ourselves.
3
M is referring to less than complimentary comments made in Reichenbach (1871); see M to G. Bentham, November 1871 (in this edition as 71-11-00b) and notes thereto. Reichenbach was similarly blunt about Joseph Hooker's works: see, for example, comments under Prasophylla alpina (pp. 57-8). M responded to Reichenbach (1871) in B71.07.01, pp. 134-5, where he also defended Fitch's skill at depicting plants (p. 135). See also M to G. Bentham, 3 December 1871, and Bentham's opinion of Fitch's work, G. Bentham to M, 24 September 1871.
Reichenbach continued to be critical of Fitch: for example, in Reichenbach (1858-1900), vol. 2, p. 173 (published March 1873) he wrote: 'Cattleya amethystoglossa var. sulphurea Rchb fil Gardn. Chron. 1866. 313 [sic=315] tantum Xylographia a pictore Fitch sponte sua pro icone missa authentica incredibili negligentia ac ignorantia sculpta' [...such that the Xylograph of the authentic image that was sent [has been] engraved by the artist Fitch of his own accord with unbelievable carelessness and ignorance].
There are still about a dozen species left unnamed, so that Benthams labor will not be quite unprofitable in this respect. He will find it a very tedious operation to work out good diagnoses, as he will have to dissect so many flowers; but I suppose he will have some assistance in the preparing of the specimens for analysis at Kew. Could you kindly send me an extract out of the Xenia about Galeola,
4
The margin adjacent to this sentence is annotated, probably by Hooker: X Xenia Galeola. M's request refers to the citation in Reichenbach (1871), p. 70 of Reichenbach (1858–1900), vol. 2, pp. 77-9; part 4, containing these pages, was issued on 28 March 1865 (TL2). Hooker sent M his copy of the volume (see J. Hooker to M, 20 November 1872) and continued to send parts as they were published (see M to G. Bentham, 23 March 1873).
as this work is not in Australia, it being beyond my private means to purchase every desirable book. I do not known
5
know?
to which of the two very distinct Galeolas of Australia the G. altissima applies, and would like to secure one of the species for the fragmenta.
6
M transferred his Erythrorchis foliata to Galeola in B73.03.02, p. 31.
In the collection are a second very distinct Gastrodia, and 2 or 3 new Dendrobia. The specimens of
Caladenia Cairnsiana

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cannot now be found. If they turn up they will be sent by overland mail. I doubt, whether Drummond came ever across that species. Of
Habenaria

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I have 5 species,
Dendrobium cucumerinum

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I never saw myself or received it from any collector. Of
Oberonia

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I have 3 spec, of Bolbophyllum 7 spec. Is the latter really a good genus? If Rchb fil. would only save his time, spent in useless unworthy and often unfounded animosities towards others, who cannot possibly have his own experience among orchids, but whose range of knowledge and whose value of work is far more extensive than his own, he might have found leisure to write for [u]s new definitions of genera, so far as the material of the present day admits of it.
With best salutation
Ferd. von Mueller.
Will you kindly send the parcel across to Agardh, or give it to Blackith & Co for transmissed,
7
transmission? The adjacent margin is marked in with a cross and '100' in a circle.
I filled up the case with a few wood specimens; therefore you will see how valuable the Acacia melanoxylon is. I hope the collective name of
Caladenia pulcherrima

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will be maintained, as I have since 1848 mentioned it in all my writings,
8
The adjacent margin is marked with a cross. Bentham (1863-78), vol. 4, pp. 381-2, treats M's
Caladenia pulcherrima

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as a synonym of C. patersoni (R. Brown (1810), p. 324), but comments: 'The whole species, and the allied C. filamentosa and C. clavigera included in it by F. Mueller, require critical working up in their native country, where alone it can be ascertained how far hybridism may have contributed to the confusion of different species or subspecies'. M does not list C. pulcherrima in his censuses, B82.11.04 and B89.12.03.
and connected under it since that time the various spurious species of RBr, Ldl. and Shldl.
9
Robert Brown (1773-1858), John Lindley and Diederich von Schlechtendal.
I shall next put into order the Haemodoraceae.