Document information

Physical location:

RBG Kew, Kew correspondence, Australia, Mueller, 1858-70, ff. 296-9. 69.01.15

Plant names

Preferred Citation:

Ferdinand von Mueller to Joseph Hooker, 1869-01-15. 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/1860-9/1869/69-01-15-final.odt>, accessed June 4, 2026

On board of the Southern Cross
15/1/68.
1
The date is an error for 1869.
These lines, dear Dr Hooker, I write on board of the Steamer, which brings me back from a short excursion to Tasmania, which lovely island I at last in the 22 year of my stay in Australia, I was able to visit for a few days. A sudden occasion arose, to free myself for two weeks from the duties of my office and I gladly seized on this brief interval of rest to render myself personally acquainted with the vegetation of Tasmania and to seek invigoration of my health in the pure bracing air of its mountains. The low land vegetation of the island being so extensively alike with that of the continent, I felt more particularly attracted by the alpine vegetation and being anxious to avoid for the sake of rest to my mind all sociality, I struck out after a hurried journey from Launceston to Hobarton
2
Now Hobart, Tas.
at once to the higher mountain regions forcing my way to Mount Field East , a mountain range not phytologically explored before. I could not hope to add any actually unknown plants to those known through the zeal of Mr Gunn, Dr Milligan and Mr Archer, but I was anxious to extend our knowledge of the range of the species over the island. For this purpose in so short a visit as mine, Mt Field seemed to afford the best opportunity. Its situation being almost midway between Lake St Clair & Mt Wellington, and also remote from Mt Laperouse.
3
Its situation … Laperouse is a marginal note with intended position indicated by an asterisk.
Hence I passed the western mountains, thus depriving myself of a visit to Mr W. Archer, and also passed Georgetown, where the Rev. J Fereday expected me on a visit, deferring a ramble with these excellent friends for a future time of leisure. The surveyors track to Mt Field was all but obliterated it not having been traversed for 17 years. But accompanied by three good bushmen of the vicinity, Mess Rayner, we managed to mark it anew and reached the summit of the range after nearly a days ascent. It is quite as high as Mt Wellington and in as much as it is an inland locality it is at the same altitude considerably colder than Mt Wellington, the temperature of which is much mitigated by the warm sea air. On the rivulets at the base I found among plants not occuring in the continent of Australia
Aristolochia peduncularis

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.
4
Error for Aristotelia peduncularis?
Aristolochia peduncularis

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is marked in the margin with an asterisk.
Aristolochia peduncularis

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is not listed in IPNI (accessed 22 December 2019).
Podocarpus asplenifolia

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5
Podocarpus aspleniifolia?
Anopterus glandulosa

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. To see these and many other of the other endemic plants of Tasmania on this occasion for the first time in their native grace and to trace them to their geological relation, had to me an inexpressible charm. I shall not refer on this occasion to the geological data, because the
6
they?
involve large questions, cautiously to be submitted to lengthened observations, the results of which I trust later in life to make the material for a special memoir, which may prove acceptable to the Geologic Society.
7
No evidence of such a memoir has been found.
On the base of Mt Field I noticed also
Solanum vescum

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, indisputably distinct from S. aviculare. It is therefore like in Gipps Land also in Tasmania an inland plant, altho' it prefers as a rule coastrigious forets
8
forest?
localities. I did not see
Solanum aviculare

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, but probably both species are in the island. The settlers discern well between the two species, regarding (as already pointed out a dozen years ago in my paper on the Gunyang
9
B55.13.06.
) the berries of the one species edible and harmless, but those of the other acrid and poisonous. In my lithograms S. vescum is fairly illustrated.
10
B65.02.06, t. 62.
At the hight of 2000'
Scaevola Hookeri

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,
Utricularia uniflora

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Rubus Gunni

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,
11
Rubus gunnianus?
Astelia alpina

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,
Helichrysum antennarium

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,
Hierochloa antarctica

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and
Myosotis suaveolens

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made their appearance.
Telopea truncata

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grows also upwards to this hight but avoids the colder regions I camped with my companions for two nights on the summit of the range, to examine the alpine vegetation closely. It was better to concentrate my exertions for the three days allotted to the excursion, rather to the examination of one mountain tract, than to advance hurriedly to an other also, which I might have done, because when once the high altitudes are reached and the fern tree ranges are no longer to be traversed, progress is comparatively easy, if the traveller avoids descents and maintains a course on the summit of the mountains. At about 3000'
Euphrasia striata

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,
Richea sprengeloides

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,
Richea acerosa

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, Richea Gunni
12
Richea Gunnii?
and
Richea scoparia

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& B[ellendena] montana,
Drosera Arcturi

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made their appearance, also
Epacris serpillifolia

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13
Epacris serpyllifolia?
and several allied species, the dwarf mountain variety of
Sprengelia incarnarta

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, flowering already at the hight of 1 inch, especially when growing out of the cushions of
Abrotonella forsteroides

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14
Arbrotanella fosterioides?
and
Pterygopappus Lawrenci

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.
15
Pterygopappus Lawrenci

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i?
Orites acicularis

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, which has a slightly yellowish hue, and
Orites revoluta

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are at hights from 3-4000' common, but
Orites diversifolia

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likes to grow in rather lower localities. —
Pernettia Tasmanica

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,
Cyathodes dealbata

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and
Pentachondra pumila

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creep over the sphagneta. Helichrysum Backhous[e]i, H. baccharoides and H. [ ]
16
Space left in MS.
are also frequent on these in the winter snowy hight. On the second day we descended to Lake Fenton, an alpine water of about 3 miles length and one mile width, which bears the name of
17
the name of is marked with a cross in the margin.
Capt. Fenton, one of the oldest and most respected residents of the island and formerly Speaker of the Council at whose hospitable home I spent one night on my retour-journey.
The features of the 5 alpine lakes of this locality, of which only three are mapped, was quite novel to me. In the Australian Alps I found nowhere water collecting in highplaced basins and New Zealand, where these alpine lakes are predominent, I had never the good fortune to visit.
18
was quite novel ... predominent is marked by double lines in the margin.
Lake Fenton is situated rather below 3000'; yet the coldness of its surrounding mountains render the vegetation of its banks quite alpine, while in the Australian Mountains no alpine plants occur below 4500', a rule to which even
Scleranthus biflorus

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, a basalt plant, bears only rarely an exception. Descending to Lake Fenton I met
Arthrotaxis imbricata

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and A. selaginoides,
Richea dracophylla

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, which will attain a hight of 20' and that most glorious of all Epacrideous plants Richea pandanifolia. My companions assured me, that this noble palm-like tree, which reminds us much of the tall Cordylines of New Zealand, assumes in the rich vallies on the base of Mt Styx a hight of 75 feet! Its flowers I found frequently bright red, a character which amongs it congeners it seems to have in common only with
Richea scoparia

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. One of its cardinal characteristics is omitted in the Flora of Australia, namely that the flowers are axillary .
19
See Bentham (1863-78), vol. 1, p. 261.
Emerging from between the leaves they give, when deep red, to the tree an indescribably beautiful appearace.
I noticed also the persistens of the seed vessels along the stem to the h[e]ight of 12', a lenght representing many years growth, both seedvessels and leaves separating very tardily. On lake Fenton I saw
Diplaspis cordifolia

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,
Actinotus bellidioides

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,
Mitrasacme Archeri

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(if I rightly recognized the difference from M. montana) and what gave me most delight
Donatia Novae Zelandiae

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.
20
Donatia Novae Zeelandiae?
The bright green cushions strewed over with [p]early white flowers are indeed most beautiful and might well the patterns of Ladys embroideries. On the shallow marginal bottom of the Lake I caught
Isoetes humilior

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, a remarkably rigid plant, on which my companions at once very graphically bestowed the name "Water Porcupine" The 3 other Tasm. species, so well described by Prof Alex Braun last year in the papers of the Berlin Academy of sciences,
21
Braun (1869).
I met not in this journey
Baekea Gunni

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,
22
Baeckea Gunniana?
Aster ledifolius

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, A. obcordatus and A. pinifolius are common in many highland localities. Searching carefully the alpine plateaux and vallies on my return I was rewarded with finding
Diselma Archeri

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,
Microcachrys tetragona

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,
Podocarpus alpina

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23
Diselma Archeri

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…
Podocarpus alpina

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is marked with a double line in margin.
Ourisia integrifolia

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(here however far rarer than on Mt Wellington)
Caltha introloba

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, and a cushion-forming everlasting which bears resemblance to
Antennaria nubigena

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and has also half diclinous flower-heads but produces scapes a few inches long.
Eucalyptus urnigera

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E Gunni
24
E. gunnii?
and E. coccifera are noticed on the cold summits, but I did not see E. vernicosa.
Coprosma nitida

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and C. [ ]
25
Space left in MS.
occur in many localities between 3-4000', so also
Leptospermum rupestre

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26
Text ends about ⅔ of the way down the sheet, without valediction.