Ferdinand von Mueller

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This is part of a longer letter describing the writer's experiences while attending the second Congress of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science in Melbourne in January 1890. Only the section relating to M is published here.

22 Jany 1890

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After-dinner speeches are usually a weariness to the flesh, but at this dinner tho' everyone spoke & necessarily, impromptu, nearly every speech was good & most laughable or witty. I wish I could tell you a few, but if I began, this letter would be double or treble weight. The President of the Association this year was Baron von Mueller, and he was quite the funniest feature of it. A little German, spare in figure & thin in features, with round blue eyes, & a florid complexion unused to soap & water, his clothes ill fitting & set off by a dingy white comforter which would be much improved by a wash — he is a most grotesque figure & has a propensity for making little German English set speeches on every occasion. When Sah and I were presented he said "I am prahd Madam, to make your acquaintance; I am prahd you should have come from a so far country to dis association." After a similar greeting to another girl, at the reception where there were refreshments he said "Madam, I hope you have partaken of my frugality ". At the big champagne lunch at Sunbury he replied to the toast of the Assocn & himself in one of the funniest speeches I ever heard. I wrote down a few gems on the spot. It was good for scientific men to come to these meetings "where each meets mit its oder". He enlarged on what the Assocn would come to "when our warty (worthy) host's children had grown up in anoder century" The Association would last, in fact "its permanency can never come to an end". The weather was bad & the pass wet; but this had its compensations for "it would have mitigated our pleasures if we had any great excessive heat". Referring to himself he said "I am prahd of the magnificent reception dat has been accorded to me, but dis reception is not due to my 'umble merits, but to dis Association's " magnimosity ". That word is worthy of 'Alice in Wonderland'.

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