Lacock Abbey, Chippenham
Decr 5. 1867
My dear Sir
Pray accept a few specimens of photographs of flowers, coloured by hand. They are made by artists who live at Berlin & Prague. I think you will agree with me that this improvement is likely to be very useful. It will enable a Tourist to make pictures on the spot of any plants he may meet with. And a Record might be kept in this way of all plants that flower in your Botanic Garden <1> or at Kew <2> &c &c
I have been travelling on the Continent all the summer and I fear I shall not be able to visit Edinburgh this winter. Has the Vellozia <3> which I sent you yet flowered with you? And has anything further been done by yourself or any other botanists about settling its name? I am still of opinion that it forms a separate genus and I could quote to you many examples of genera established by modern Botanists which are distinguished by much smaller differences from their nearest allies –
I remain Dear Sir Yours very Truly
H. F. Talbot
[in Balfour’s hand:] Spricea venacta[?] Spricea betulæfolia
Stanhopea integri[illegible]
Edinburgh
[on blank side of sheet, in Balfour’s hand:]
H Fox Talbot
Notes:
1. The Royal Botanic Garden, Edinburgh.
2. The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
3. See Doc. No: 09168. Curtis’s Botanical Magazine published his plant as Vellozia elegans, Natal Vellozia, s. 3 v. 25, 1 November 1869, Tab. 5803. Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker observed, 'our first knowlege of this plant was derived from a specimen brought from his garden by the Hon. H. Fox Talbot, F.R.S., to the Kew Herbarium, in 1866, which was raised from seed procured either from the Cape or Madagascar, which Professor Oliver prounded to be a Vellozia (identical with a Natal plant, Hypoxis barbacenioides, Harv. MSS.), and the name V. elegans was proposed for it. A specimen, presented by Mr. Fox Talbot to the Edinburgh Botanical Gardens, was next exhibited to the Botanical Society of that city by my friend Professor Balfour, as Vellozia elegans (see Proc. Bot. Soc. Edinb., ix. p. 79, Jan. 1867). At a subsequent meeting (l.c. p. 1839, 13th June), Dr. Balfour again exhibited this plant as V. Talboti, or, if it should prove a new genus, Talbotia elegans. On a third occasion (l.c. p. 192, 11th July), he exhibited it as Talbotia elegans, without a generic character....'