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RBG Kew, Kew correspondence, Australia, Mueller, 1891-96, ff. 27-31. 92.08.19

Plant names

Preferred Citation:

Ferdinand von Mueller to William Thiselton-Dyer, 1892-08-19. 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/92-08-19>, accessed April 20, 2025

1
MS is stamped 'Royal Gardens Kew 3. Oct. 92' and initialled by W. Hemsley.
19/8/92
I am just preparing an inaugural adress for the Horticultural Students Society here, dear Dr Dyer, so that I can answer your kind letter only hurriedly, other extra-work devolving on me in the Department also just now. I thank you for the sympathetic words, offered by you
2
Thiselton-Dyer's letter, evidently responding to M to W. Thiselton-Dyer, 17 April 1892, has not been found.
in my present departmental depression, and for the support official also you always give me, when occasion arises. P rivately I may say, that your idea, to get support from the other colonies, could not be carried into effect, as I am already as a Victorian Officer, on whom the other colonies have no claim, often harrassed by parties beyond Victoria, and if I had any emoluments from their colonies, the demands and worry would still become greater and my time for original research still more be encroached on. Moreover each colony has now its separate Herbarium already of its own plants I have discontinued subscriptions to nearly all periodicals, even Just's &c, but gladly keep the botanic Magazine
3
Just's botanische Jahresbericht ; Curtis's botanical magazine .
on. Pray thank Sir Joseph for his genial interest in my fate.
Of course any novelties, which I successively elaborate, will also in future be sent representatively to Kew. I shall be very pleased to see the morphologically so remarkable
Correa Baeuerleni

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figured by Prof Oliver.
4
M described C. Bauerlenii in B85.03.04, p. 960. It was illustrated in Oliver (1891-5), vol. 23, plate 2245. In his accompanying text Daniel Oliver wrote: 'Sir F. von Mueller, to whom we are indebted for excellent flowering specimens … suggests that this species is deserving of a figure … as "of singular structural interest"'; see M to W. Thisleton-Dyer, 10 May 1892 (in this edition as 92-05-10b).
In such a celebrated Serial as the icones, any one seeing a plant of his displayed, must be proud. I have cuttings of it now growing, and shall manage ere long to get it across to Kew. After 30 years exertions I have managed to get seedlings of
Verticordia oculata

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and V. grandis. When they are well established some shall go also to Kew. V. oculata is to my taste the most beautiful plant in its own delicacy of all Australia.
Kindly ask the excellent Mr Hemsley, to look once more through my 13 Decades of Acacias and Albizzias.
5
B87.13.04, B88.13.01.
As in each case the fruit is given, he will see, that on the form of fruit neither
Pithecolobium

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nor
Hansemannia

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can be maintained as genera, just as little as
Tetracheilus

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.
6
Tetracheilos?
With regard to the consistence of the fruits, we must remember that the pithy legume of
Vachellia

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counts not for a good genus, and that in
Gleditschia

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(not far off in affinity) we have species with pulpy and dry fruit. After my 46 years of the study of 300 species of Acacias, my judgement — I thought — should have some weight. Of course, genera, unlike species, are not natural, so that no absolute rule for their limitation can be laid down. In Trimens Journal of Botany 1872
7
B72.01.01.
I pointed out, that at all events the
Pithecolobium

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s of the eastern hemisphere could not be kept apart from the Albizzias. The well known A. lophantha shows us, that the inflorescence does not help us so far for the genera, and we find quite similar variation of fruit-form in Acacia as in Albizzia incl.
Pithecolobium

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.
I do not stand alone in uniting the two genera, as some recent authors followed me in this. In writing on the subject I do so, because the question came forward in the last Bulletin.
8
came forward in the last Bulletin is marked with a line in the margin. See Kew bulletin (1892), p. 125 under
Hansemannia

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oblonga where the anonymous author (Hemsley?) discusses the generic position of
Archidendron

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.
Sooner or later, whatever fate these genera may have, their position will become more settled, but I now write to show, that the union was effected only after long and careful study on my part.
Archidendron

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was established
9
B65.10.04, p. 59.
when I knew only the species with numerous pistils, up to 15, as shown in the plate.
10
B88.13.01, decade 13, pl. 7.
But when I subsequently ascertained in other species, that the number came down to 2, I gave up the genus. Excuse the frankness of my remarks, but I am thrown — so to say — on my defense.
Always regardfully
your
Ferd von Mueller.
Prosopis

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contains also species with succulent and dry fruits.
I have not responded to the invitation from Berlin to subscribe to the 4 theses, and to the rights of a list of genera; contrarily I pointed out to Prof Engler,
11
See M to A. Engler, 6 August 1892.
that the 4 passus
12
passus is marked with a question mark in blue pencil, and annotated passus = steps in lead pencil.
do not cover some still more important laws; — further that many of the genera, of which he and his collaborators acknowledge priority, cannot claim such, e.g. Salisbury & Knight's genera of
Proteaceae

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as RBr's belong to 1809 , not to 1810. This they could have seen in my Census.
13
B83.03.04, pp. 65-73; B89.13.12, pp. 111-24.
As RBr. read his famous essay on the
Proteaceae

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in Jan 1809, before the L.S., he must have finished the whole in 1808 .
14
R. Brown (1810a) on
Proteaceae

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was read at the Linnean Society on 17 January 1809. For further details, see M to A. Engler, 6 August 1892, n. 25. For the history of this publication and the controversial prior publication by Knight and Salisbury (Knight (1809)), see Mabberley (1895), pp. 146-52.
Private
Merely to show, how hopeless it would be, to work a Central Herbarium on the expenses of the several Australian Colonies, I instance the case of the Eucalyptography. Before I entered for Victoria alone on so costly a work, I applied to more than one of the neighbouring colonies for aid, but the result of a lengthened correspondence was none ! They purchase some few copies perhaps and use the work for the sake of their own trees, without probably ever thinking of the sacrifices made for it by my Department. However I did not apply to the other Governments direct , as the preliminary enquiries were not encouraging from among the colonists most interested.
Mr Fitzgerald, who death we just so much deplore,
15
Fitzgerald died on 12 August 1892.
had also no financial aid in his splendid "Australian Orchids"
16
R. Fitzgerald (1875-94).
from the other colonies. If I accepted any financial help, even if obtainable from the other colonies, I might — to speak figuratively — "be torn to pieces["]
17
editorial addition — obscured by binding.
by inordinate claims raised. Therefore I accepted during the 40 years of my official service never a single fee nor a single present, though perhaps not a day elapsed, except on occasional travels, when I had not to write professional information beyond Victoria! The Work on the fungs of Australian Fungs
18
Cooke (1892). The first 'fungs' is at the end of a line in the manuscript.
mainly arose under the hope that it would help to combat the extensive mycetous diseases in our warm clime and under other exceptional circumstances concerning which I need not write, as this subject is not one out of which much acknowledgement to me will arise.
19
See Maroske et al. (2018), p. 63, for the origins of the subsidy by colonial agricultural departments for producing Cooke (1892). M had earlier discussed organizing support for the project with the government botanists in Qld and NSW but it was seen as impracticable; see M to W. Thisleton- Dyer, 1 July 1891. See also M. Cooke to M, 1 September 1889.
Any how Dr Cooke had a substantial and disinterested support from me for many years.
Private .
The bot Garden has still after retrenchment £8000 or £9000 irrespective of heavy extra-expenses for Water-supply, the large Observatory Vote is also but slightly reduced, and Sir Fred. MacCoy
20
i.e. McCoy.
has still £400 a year for his decades of chromolithography.
21
No new decades of McCoy (1878-90) were issued.
Can the doubts about the true
Pittosporum ferrugineum

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Aiton be finally settled?
22
Can the doubts ... settled? is marked with a line in blue pencil.