Document information

Physical location:

RB MSS M4, Library, Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne. 66.01.18a

Plant names

Preferred Citation:

George Bentham to Ferdinand von Mueller, 1866-01-18 [66.01.18a]. 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//letters/1860-9/1866/66-01-18a-final.odt>, accessed June 5, 2026

1
Annotated by M: ‘treelists’.
25 Wilton Place
London S.W.
Jany 18 1866
My dear Sir
Your case of
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arrived safe a short time since.
After three months close work — and quite tired of going over and over again interminable specimens of the principal species — I at length got through Eucalyptus at Xmas and packed yours up in three boxes in which I have been able to put also a few parcels of miscellaneous
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returned. the remainder will go next time. The boxes have since been sent off I believe by the Lincolnshire — but you will receive the bills of lading direct from Kew.
Since Xmas I have gone through your supplemental
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and done
Melastomaceae

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Lythrarieae

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Onagrarieae

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Samydeae

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2
Bentham (1863-78), vol. 3 has Samydaceae.
(including
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) and am now at
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. I have also been searching into two or three old published Eucalypti which I felt doubtful about and the result has been one or two changes which I must beg you to make in the names given to your parcels.
1. There are two Port Jackson trees distinguished by all collectors, from R. Brown
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Robert Brown (1773-1858).
and Caley down to Woolls, as the "Black-butt" and the "Great Iron-bark" but confounded by De Candolle and other botanists under the name of E. persicifolia Lodd.. When we get good specimens with open flowers they are easily distinguished by the anthers and generally by the inflorescence, but in bud specimens of the short-operculum form of each are very much alike. Neither of them is E. persicifolia Lodd. which is with very little doubt nothing but E. viminalis. The Black-butt is the true E. pilularis Sm. as I have named it in your herbarium. To the other I had at first referred Sieber's specimens n. 477 (in bud only) and had consequently adopted his name of E. ornata as the only one already more or less published which was tenable — but a closer comparison of the venation etc. convinces me that Sieber's belongs to the Black butt and the Ironbark must receive a new name. I propose that of E. siderophloia which I would beg you to substitute for E. ornata in your herbarium.
2. The "Blue Mountain Blood Wood" is a very distinct species more nearly allied to E. maculata than to E. corymbosa but distinct from both. I had at first thought it quite unnamed and had called it E. Atkinsoniae , till I found it in Browns collection under the name of E. nitida which I gave it in your herbarium. Upon further consideration however I think it must be E. eximia Schau. It is the only one of Browns or indeed in the whole genus which answers to Schauer's character. What prevented me from taking Schauer's name at once was that Bauer was not with Brown on the Grose river
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NSW ; Ferdinand Bauer.
where Brown gathered it. It is possible however that Brown in whose collection is a very good set of excellent specimens may have given Bauer one. I am writing to Vienna about it and unless I hear to the contrary shall adopt the name of eximia .
3. On turning to Link and Otto's Icones Pl. Sel. Hort Berol. for their E. longifolia I find it to be unmistakeably your E. Woollsii The figure they give is very good.
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Link & Otto (1820-8), fasc. 10, tab. 45, pp 97-8.
Their name must therefore be adopted.
I believe I have now pretty satisfactorily made out all the old ones that have been described from specimens sufficient to supply specific characters — some of De Candolles and almost all those of the gardens of Paris and Berlin, described from specimens in leaf only or in young bud, cannot be identified even by inspection of authentic specimens and must be rejected as non-entities.
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are now ready for press with the exception of a few bundles of Brown's splendid collection which I have not yet gone through. As soon as I have done
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Loranthaceae

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Rubiaceae

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etc I shall begin printing and see what room I have for
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.
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will only make half the volume although they have given me much more trouble and taken much more time than the whole of the 2d vol.
Ever yours sincerely
George Bentham
Calythrix — I believe I had by mistake given the name of C. luteola Schau to the one with short obtuse bracteoles which is C. asperula Schau — C. luteola belongs to C. flavescens Cunn. with subulate acuminate bracteoles
Dr F. Mueller F.RS