30/11/95.
Yesterday, dear Prof. Lacroix, I received your kind letter of the 22 Oct,
accompanied by your grand volume on the minerals of the vulcanic rocks, so superbly
also illustrated.
Accept for this precious gift my special thanks, and also the high appreciation of
your important researches.Then let me now, late and tardy as it is, offer my best
expression of gratitude for the felicitation conveyed by you at my election as a corresponding
member of the Institut.
Of all honors in the world I appreciate this as the highest of science-gifts, the
only comparable being the bestowal of the medal of the Royal Soc. of London, a distinction
conferred on me in 1888.
I deeply regret having caused you and others of the Professors at the Musée some
anxiety by enquiring after the arrival of some sendings of mine, such as the large
plate of Nickel-ore being unreplacable.
It is with delight that now I learn of you having received it, and that you value
it. The none arrival or misplacement here of a letter here, such as the missing one
from you, is not surprising. I receive about
6000
letters annually, and as most of them are professional, I answer them nearly all
myself.
Now
I learn from the Agent of the Messageries maritimes
here, that certain printed labels from the Musée d'histoire naturelle glued on the
boxes here facilitates the transit to Paris. Will the Museum kindly provide some of
these to be used for further sendings of mine. I can send my cases to my London-Agents,
Mess Watson & Scull, Thames-Street when they are sure to be safely passed on to the
Musée, but as the French Government subsidises the Messageries maritimes, that Company
in a patriotic spirit is sure to help on my transmissions. If after the arrival of
each case I merely receive a
post
-
card
, I should know, what really did arrive at its final destination. The
most valuable
contents of two cases
, adressed to the Director of the Museum and shipped by the
Armand Behic
this day, are
minerals for
you, some of great rarity: I will write to Prof Milne-Edwards also about this new
sending,
as it contains some zoologic and phytologic specimens also; Capt. Castellan, an officer
of the Armand Behic, has promised me on a kind visit that he will see to the transshipment
at Marseilles. Will you kindly, as you have done before, send me some few lines, to
tell me,
whether
you
find these additional minerals from here to be of any particular interest for your
galleries. The large plate of Nickel-ore came from the wild uninhabited S.W. part
of
Tasmania
.
I will at once make some efforts for getting good specimens of Mantokite and Manhite,
and other Australian rarities. Your recognizing the Rhodomite is most interesting.
Kindly assure all your honored professorial Colleagues that I ever will be ready to
aid their grand researches from here by procuring material; but amidst the enormous
local work here, so multifarious and so responsible it may not always be able to get
what is required quickly.
I am getting ready the gentianaceous material for Prof Guignard and Mons Perrot. I
did send some months ago the roots in Alcohol of
and
for Prof Van Tieghem. I forwarded growing plants more recently of
to Prof M. Cornu, and trust all arrived in a state to be utilized. With my reverential
salutation to you all at the Musée, your
Ferd von Mueller
In one of the boxes is a small case with soil-specimens from Artesian Borings in Central
Australia. Dr Selwyn, the Governm. Geologist of Canada, formerly of this Colony, desired
to have such specimens. They will interest you also, and a portion of each could be
kept in your collection. Will you kindly send by French Steamer the other portion
to the geolog. Department of Ottawa. Dr Selwyn would be in a good position to enrich
your mineralogic galleries.
