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84.05.00

Preferred Citation:

Ferdinand von Mueller to [Wilhelm Bäuerlen], 1884-05. 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/1880-9/1884/84-05-00-final.odt>, accessed June 13, 2026

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Letter not found. The text given here is from 'Forest culture and Eucalyptus trees', Manaro mercury, and Cooma and Bombala advertiser, 28 May 1884, p. 3 (B84.05.10). It is introduced by
We have had the pleasure of perusing a book entitled as above, being a printed copy of Mr. Ellwood Cooper's "Lecture on Forest Planting and Australian Gum trees" delivered before the Santa Barbara College Association in California; also a lecture delivered by Baron von Mueller, C.M.G., at Melbourne on "Forest Culture." The latter shows forcibly how rain deserts lands that have been deprived of forests. Baron von Mueller has presented the valuable book to a friend in Cooma, also a letter from which we have permission to make the follow tracts ( sic) : —
The letter is dated to May 1884 as the last date that it could have been written, but the publications referred to date from 1876. Cooper's edited collection of M's papers exists in two versions, but only the smaller edition, E. Cooper (1876), contains both Cooper's lecture and a reprint of B71.07.02. M's 'friend in Cooma' was probably Wilhelm Bäuerlen; see W. Bäuerlen to M, 10 March 1890, and W. Bäuerlen to M, 21 March 1890.
I have sent a little book this day for your kind acceptance. The Bombala and Delegate district is hardly at all yet searched for plants, so that numerous species would be new for locality there, and all be recorded in my works under the author's name. Perhaps teachers, during their vacation time, would investigate the flora there, and send successively small parcels of dried plants (either in flower or fruit) by post. If a numbered set was retained by them, they would receive from me the respective names for all species forwarded. I should be willing to pay some money if any intelligent youth, who has an eye for differences of plants, and would be handy in drying specimens, liked to earn a little money in this manner during spring. The Government of the Argentine republic wants seeds of the Riverina saltbushes, and I should like to spend a few £ if I could get a good lot of saltbush seeds of the best pastoral species.
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The item concludes 'Baron Ferd. von. Mueller, K.G.M.G, M.D., Ph.D., F.R.S., is Government Botanist for Victoria, and Director of the Botanic Gardens in Melbourne [ sic , M had been removed from the directorship in 1873]. We hope some of our Manaro friends will send specimens of new plants to him.