Ferdinand von Mueller

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Letter not found. The text given here is from 'The Melbourne Herbarium', Gardeners' chronicle, 25 August 1888, pp. 211-2 (B88.08.01). It is dated to early-to-mid-July as the latest likely date that it could have been sent to be included in this issue.

Herewith I send you a photograph (just taken)

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Photograph not reproduced in the article.

of the Herbarium here. The main building, consisting of one large room, was constructed in 1857, under the direction of Captain (now Major-General) Pasley, the then Minister of Public Works for Victoria. The material used for the walls is basalt, the ordinary building material in Melbourne; the roof is constructed of English tiles, rarely seen in use over here, slate being generally adopted for roofing purposes. The cost of the main building was about £1000, but several hundred pounds sterling were expended subsequently for fittings in wood of

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. Three years ago, when the great Sonderian collection was acquired, an annexe of galvanised iron was added at a cost of a few hundred pounds with further costs for shelves, &c., amounting to several hundred more. The total collection of dried plants comprise now about half a million sheets, each as a rule containing several specimens. My own collections were presented to the public herbarium. I commenced collecting in 1840, and have continued in Australia uninterruptedly since 1847 (till 1853 entirely at my own private expense), and later also with my own means to a not inconsiderable extent.

About 1859 Dr. Steetz's important collections were added by departmental purchase;

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M purchased the herbarium of Joachim Steetz for £80 in 1863 (see Short & Sinkora (1988)) and received it in early December 1863 (M to G. Bentham, 12 December 1863).

later, by the same means, Mr. T.

4

Typesetter's error for J.

Drummond's private set of West Australian plants, and various other collections. Many other things were secured for Australia, either by purchase or by exchange, and large donations were received from Sir William and Sir Joseph Hooker, including typical specimens of R. Brown's Australian

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J. Hooker to M, 10 June 1881, reported that Kew was setting aside for Melbourne specimens collected by Robert Brown (1773-1858) that had been transferred from the British Museum. M acknowledged Hooker's news about Brown's specimens in M to J. Hooker, 29 July 1881, and then acknowledged receipt of five cases of Brown's plants in M to J. Hooker, 22 May 1882 (in this edition as 82-05-22a), and M to J. Hooker, 29 May 1882. M had already received some Brown specimens from Hooker a few years earlier (see M to A. de Candolle, 4 August 1880), probably duplicates extracted from a collection of Brown's specimens received by Kew in 1876.

and Sir Joseph Hooker's Indian plants.

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See M to J. O'Shanassy, 1 April 1859, and M to W. Hooker, 15 March 1859.

It would take too long a story, to enumerate even the main treasures of the herbarium in a brief communication like this; but it is my intention to publish a small volume explanatory of the richness of our gatherings here.

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No such volume has been found.

Through Dr. Sonder's herbarium, original specimens from the collections of several disciples of Linnaeus were obtained, coming from Professor Lehmann's herbarium. Thus we have many authentic specimens from Thunberg, Giseke, Ehrhart, and Gouan. In Australian plants the Melbourne collections are by far the richest of any in existence. But South Africa is also particularly well represented, chiefly through Steetz's and Sonder's herbaria; and although the main portion of the South African plants went many years ago from Sonder's herbarium to Stockholm,

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See Nordenstam (1980).

authenticated fragments of most are here also. No region of the globe is unrepresented in the Melbourne Herbarium, and this often by original material not extant in many other places nor now obtainable anywhere.

The herbarium building is about a mile distant from Melbourne, within the Government House Reserve, and in the close vicinity of the astronomic and meteorologic observatory.

The technologic-botanic collections, accumulated largely by my exertions, are located in the "Technologic Museum," close to the great Public Library in the centre of Melbourne, the museum being under the administration of the trustees of the Public Library also. A special hall is soon to be provided for the vegetable technologic articles, as the timber collections, and also those of various other vegetable products are so extensive; moreover, the Centennial Exhibition

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Centennial International Exhibition, Melbourne, 1888.

is sure to add to those riches.