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77.12.00

Plant names

Preferred Citation:

Ferdinand von Mueller to the Gardeners' Chronicle, 1877-12. 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/1870-9/1877/77-12-00-final.odt>, accessed June 4, 2026

1
Letter not found. The text given here is from 'Foreign correspondence', Gardeners' chronicle, 3 August 1878, p. 146 (B78.08.01). The letter is dated to December 1877, when M was at King George Sound before embarking for Melbourne on the Assam which sailed on 29 December 1887, arriving in Melbourne on 4 January 1878 (Argus, 5 January 1878, p. 5). The letter was evidently written at King George Sound 'here in South West Australia' and was either much delayed in reaching London or was held over by the editors.
King George's Sound.
I write a few lines, to inform you of the progress made by me here in South West Australia. While completing my tour from Swan River I went along the base of the Darling ranges to the Collie and Preston River, through much forest land, timbered prevailingly with
Eucalyptus marginata

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, among which E. calophylla is interspersed, as is the case in all the so-called Mahogany forests of West Australia.
I did not expect to find many novel forms, but wished, while journeying, to watch the distribution and association of species. I may instance that the lovely
Goodenia Eatoniana

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, which was only known from the Blackwood River, extends from the Preston to the Shannon, Walpole, and Gordon Rivers, being a forest plant of humid valleys. Another pretty blue-flowered Goodenia, G. leptoclada, of which, like of so many other of Drummond's plants, we did not know the natural localities, belongs to the forest heaths of the Hay River and Torbay, as I have just found out. Previously I met G. Hassallii on the Murchison River, the Irwin, and Arrowsmith River, also on the Upper Greenough River. The best plant of this latter part of the journey is a stately Xerotes from the valleys of the Lower Shannon. It attains a height of 8 feet, the caudex increases finally to a diameter of nearly ½ foot, while the leaves are
Typha

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-like and the panicles purplish, of which flowers are large and formed on the model of those of X. Brownii. This species is still grander than X. Banksii, and I have named it In honour of General Sir Harry Ord,
2
Xerotes ordii, described in B78.03.01, p. 23.
the new Governor of W. Australia, His Excellency having evinced a great interest in my researches here. My attention was directed to this showy plant by Mr. Muir, who had previously noticed it in the few localities to which it is confined, and I shall have seeds of this Xerotes to introduce into European conservatories. The glorious
Eucalyptus ficifolia

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extends from Brooke's Inlet to the western side of Irwin's Inlet. It has a deeper fissured bark than E. calophylla, and is a smaller tree. But the most noteworthy of all the Eucalypts remains, the splendid "Karri," true, E. diversicolor. While the Yarrah
3
The former spelling for 'Jarrah'; see B79.13.10, p. 3. 'The name of our 'jarrah' was 'yarrah,' 'jarrah' being a corruption of 'yarrah,' as was attested to yesterday by the Government Botanist (Mr. C. A. Gardner)' (West Australian, 27 July 1932, p. 12).
or Mahagoni tree has the features of a stringy-bark tree of the Eastern colonies (E. obliqua), the Karri resembles in habit quite the E. amygdalina, and it is also quite as gigantic as that world-renowned species. The conflagrations of the scrubs do not here deface the forests as in so many other parts of Australia, the bark of the Yarrah not catching fire so fully as that of E. obliqua; thus not so many shabby objects of dead trees are found in the woodlands here; indeed the forests look fresh and green everywhere. I discovered a new
Ionidium

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(or, better,
Hybanthus

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), also a Stylidium, twining like S. scandens, and also up to 6 feet high. It is leafless, and the comparatively larger rosy flowers are fringed like those of a small Dianthus. On other interesting plants I will communicate on another occasion.
Ferd. von Mueller.