The correspondence of Ferdinand von Mueller: Richmond ¶ May 13 /82 ¶ My dear Baron, ¶ ¶ I am glad you were pleased with Review. ¶ Mr Tenison-Woods pays you a handsome compliment in one of his recent articles, ¶ which I propose to notice. He h...

Document information

Physical location:

RB MSS M46, Library, Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne. 82.05.13

Plant names

Didiscus
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Zamia spiralis
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- Australian Plant Name Index

Preferred Citation:

William Woolls to Ferdinand von Mueller, 1882-05-13. 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/1880-9/1882/82-05-13-final.odt>, accessed May 15, 2026

Richmond

NSW.

May 13 /82

My dear Baron,

I am glad you were pleased with Review.

Not identified.

Mr Tenison-Woods pays you a handsome compliment in one of his recent articles,

Possibly Woods (1883), read to the Linnean Society of New South Wales on 22 February 1882 and issued in May 1882 (Anonymous (1929)), in which Woods began his notes on Queensland botany by saying (p. 76): 'Now that the grand work of describing and cataloguing has been accomplished by the illustrious botanists Bentham and Mueller, humbler laborers may step in to add to the account of knowledge'.

which I propose to notice. He has delivered a long & able geological address lately, but I believe that his views about our Hawkesbury sand stone &c are not universally accepted.

Woods (1882). The paper was read at the Royal Society of New South Wales on 10 May 1882. Woods's theory of the wind-blown origin of the sandstone was vigorously challenged in the discussion following the presentation of his paper, especially by the Government Geologist, C. S. Wilkinson.

I met Mr Stephens also. He has entered on his duties.

W. J. Stephens was appointed in March 1882 to a newly created chair of natural history at the University of Sydney.

The toothed leaves of Zamia which I sent you did not come from Z . spiralis . They were from the smaller plant growing in sandy places in this neighbourhood. I never find this latter plant with the lower leaflets reduced to spines.

I will send you the first opportunity some copies of my lecture for distribution.

Not identified.

Thanks for the amusing address to yourself,

Not identified.

& also for your valuable letter about . I did not know that it possessed any bad properties

Letter not found; but see B82.05.12.

Yours very sincerely

W. Woolls

P.S.

Our friend Mr Teitkins is going to be married, I think next month.

William Tietkens married at Richmond, NSW, on 14 June 1882.

I expect you will see him on his way to Sydney I called at the Museum, but Mr Ramsay was in the country.

P.S. I have just recd the index &c of Fragmenta .

B81.13.02? This fascicule of Fragmenta comprises an Additamenta and an index; a supplement on cryptogams by other authors, with a further Additamenta to this by M, completes the volume.

I will review it in the course of a week or ten days.

A long review (unsigned but almost certainly by Woolls) of Fragmenta, vol. 11 appeared in Sydney morning herald, 17 May 1882, p. 9. The review especially praised the supplement and drew attention to the 'elegant figures of Australian fungs'. No volumes bound as issued have been seen that included these figures. There is however, a separately-issued text (Cooke (1883)) described as "Supplementum ad Fragmentorum Phytographiae Australiae | pro auctorite | Baron Ferdinandus de Mueller, K.C.M.G. | Fungi Australiani, | M. C. Cooke, | enumerate. | (Impr "Grevillea," t. X., XI.) | 1883 | Melbourne.' That volume has a different letterpress and three plates. Woolls apparently received at least the plates of this supplement.