Ferdinand von Mueller

25, WILTON PLACE. S.W.

London

May 4 /75

My dear Sir

I feel quite ashamed to write to you as I must do in acknowledgement of two or three letters received from you as I have done nothing yet towards the 7th volume

1

Of Bentham (1863-78).

— but I feel it my duty to Hooker and others to defer everything till the present part of Genera Plantarum

2

Bentham & Hooker (1862-83).

is out — and owing to Hooker's additional engagements imposed upon him by his Presidency

3

Hooker was President of the Royal Society of London, 1873-78.

and by family affairs resulting from his severe domestic loss

4

Hooker's wife had died the previous November.

an unusual proportion of the present part of Genera falls upon me — and I am growing old It is however now in the printers hands and I trust to get over it in a few months when nothing but failure of power will stand in the way of Flora Australiensis

I feel much distressed that you should not yet find yourself comfortable in your position

5

See, for example, M to G. Bentham, 26 January 1875, and M to G. Bentham, 23 February 1875.

and should really have been very glad to have done anything to assist you — but I have no intercourse with official people and if I had it would have been impossible at this distance and without any means of investigating colonial affairs for me to interfere upon any plausible grounds. It is well known how fully we appreciate your scientific eminence and to that we are always ready to bear our testimony whenever occasion seems to call for it.

Baron v. Mueller