From George Bentham 13 December 1876
25, Wilton Place. | S.W.
Dec 13/76
My dearest Darwin
In reply to your note I believe Ægiphila to be exclusively American Æ laevigata Juss. from India and Æ viburnifolia Juss. from the Philippines are probably both of them Premnas, Æ. diffusa Andr. is entered in Steudel as Ind. or. by mistake for Ind. occ. as Æ laevigata is by mistake entered Ind. occ. for Ind. or1
In speaking of the waste of staminal power in the Australian Acacias I forgot to contrast it with the Brazilian Mimosas which appear to be much more generally fertilised although they have only 6, 8 or 10 or half those numbers of stamens and the style more exposed—whilst Acacias have the style scarcely protruding from 50 to 100 or sometimes many more stamens—2 Are the Mimosas more readily cross-fertilised?
Yours very sincerely | George Bentham
Footnotes
Bibliography
Steudel, Ernst Gottlieb. 1841. Nomenclator botanicus: seu: synonymia plantarum universalis, enumerans ordine alphabetico nomina atque synonyma, tum generica tum specifica, et a Linnaeo et a recentioribus de re botanica scriptoribus plantis phanerogamis imposita. 2d edition. 2 parts. Stuttgart and Tübingen: J. G. Cotta.
Summary
Believes Aegiphila to be exclusively American.
Contrasts fertilisation of Australian Acacia with Brazilian Mimosa.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-10718
- From
- George Bentham
- To
- Charles Robert Darwin
- Sent from
- London, Wilton Place, 25
- Source of text
- DAR 160: 167
- Physical description
- ALS 2pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 10718,” accessed on 19 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-10718.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 24
