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RBG Kew. Letters to W Mitten. 1848-1905. ff. 219. 81.11.22aPreferred Citation:
Ferdinand von Mueller to William Mitten, 1881-11-22 [81.11.22a]. 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/81-11-22a>, accessed September 11, 2025
22/11/[81]
1
Text obscured by folio number stamp. Dated on the basis of the content of the first
paragraph: Hampe died in 1880; B82.01.06 was printed in January 1882 (M to W. Mitten,13
February 1882 (in this edition as 82-02-13a)).
I was pleased, dear Mr Mitten, to hear from you by last mail and to learn, that you
have kindly undertaken to complete & rearrange the list of Australian Mosses, which
the lamented Dr Hampe had written just before his death. Your splendid “Musci Austro-Americani”
are on my writing-table, as I consult this
splendid
enumeration of yours just now for an index of genera of
all
Australian plants, under the press for the R. S. of Sydney.
Altho’ I shall have your valuable revision of the Australian Mosses not in time for
that index, I shall be able to use it in my Census of
all
Australian
species
of plants, now about 12000, of which fully 3000 are cryptogams.
2
Mitten (1869).
3
B82.01.06.
4
B83.03.04. The Cryptogam volume projected on p. vii, was never published. There is a manuscript bundle at the library
of the Herbarium catalogued as 'Cryptogams: a census of Australian Cryptogams', dated
'ca.1885' (call number RB MSS 772). It contains four loose-leaf sets of papers, each
bundled with a paper wrapper identifying the group listed: Mosses & Hepaticae; Lichens; Fungi; Algae.
Following the comment in this letter that he would be able to use Mitten's list in
his Census, in M to J. Agardh, 12 August 1882, he reported that 'in 1883 I have to publish the Evasculares for the 3rd part of
the Census of plant species of Australia'. The Vasculares volume, dated 1882, was
issued in March 1883 (B83.03.04). As the projected part of the Census was not published, M evidently decided to publish it as part of volume 12 of his
Fragmenta: in M to J. Agardh, 15 June 1885 (in this edition as 85-06-15a) he wrote 'Unfortunately the printing of the Supplement list of Australian Evasculares
has still not begun for the 12th volume of the Fragmenta'. M's emphasis on 'printing'
suggests that the MS was ready. Volume 12 was never completed, with only one fascicle
(B82.12.03) published.
The layout of the entries in the bundles matches that in the Vasculares volume with
citations to species lists published in the Supplementum to the 11th volume of the
Fragmenta (B80.11.01, B81.13.12) and, as indicated in the announcement if intent in B83.03.02,
p. vii, Hooker (1860), vol. 2 was used as the other major source, as equivalent to
Bentham (1863-78) for the Vasculares.
Without wishing to raise a point of delicacy, I would say in allusion to a remark
in your last letter, that I am
most
willing occasionally to afford such substantial support to your researches, as you
may have had from Sir Joseph Hooker & others. If
you
could make a tour to Central Africa, the uplands, what wonders would
you
do for bryology!
A few mosses go to you by this mail, which may interest you for locality. These particular
mosses have not gone to Dr Carl Mueller, and I will arrange, that also in future sendings
not the same mosses go to you & him.
Will you afford me the pleasure of sending me your photographic card for the collection
of card-pictures of scientific Correspondents, and will you accept my poor photogram?
In a speech at the pharm. Soc. of Melbourne,
[…]
5
Text ends at the end of the folio. An unknown amount of text is missing.