Naples
12 Apr /32
2 May.
My dear Henry
Tho you do not write yourself yet I see you perform your commissions, by a letter from Treuttel & Wurz <1>– I have seen a number of new plants this year in & out of gardens – Muscari dubium which may be your Corfiote – several Ornithogs which Tenore <2> has received from divers parts & cannot make out. One with a large leaf & white line, another ciliated – Cytisus Æolicus from Stromboli is a very handsome species – & promises seed. Do you know Robinia Chamlagu with various flowers? Ixia ramiflora I found wild – it is a much stronger plant than bulbocodium. I am watching a good many Euphorbias for you, I hope those I sent have vegetated & I think you will have the best Euphorbiæum in England You of course remember Bertoloni <3> & Mauri’s <4> Crocus suaveolens in Valle d’inferno near Rome on comparing it with Tenore’s C. Imperati of Castellamare &c it seems to me a variety, a rare thing among Crocuses – I enclose you a letter of Bertoloni’s, can you tell him any thing about the English plants he enquires after – they are not of my acquaintance if he does not mean Pyrethrum maritimum which grows near Abb. <5> I wonder he ventures to ask for anything from Sunderland in these choleric times. <6> Did the Sedums I sent do – pray let me know all that does or does not, that I may rule myself by it – Cuma was so lovely the other day I mean to go again & shall probably find quite a new set of plants – The sands were pink with Silene decumbens – & the banks studded with Cyclamen & Anemones – the rocks with Medicago, Lotus, &c – Do you know a very large Scrophularia? I believe Orientalis <illegible>. You did not tell me how your Colchicums did this year – Pray ask in the Gardens if they have a C. Persicum or Byzantinum with leaves tall & almost caulescent quite the Captain of the troop. Have you ever tried to get Pteris Cretica & other southern ferns? they are so difficult to send home. Osmunda Struthiopteris is handsome. The orchidiæ are in great beauty, particularly O. provincialis, pauciflora (deep greenish yellow) ensifolia, acuminata, undulata, fusca & others you know – What a useless book this great work of Redouté <7> is – He makes Scilla campanulata have erect flowers. Did you ever see the Ambrosinias in flower, they are very odd little things. I never saw till this year Geran. tuberosum which is very pretty & distinct. It is from the Abruzzi – Also Ranunclus <sic> alpinus, & garganicus <text missing> <8> in their way, his Sisyrinchium & flavissima, & a little brown leafed Violet with pale flowers Lamium garganicum, Allium striatum, Aristolochia glauca, pallida, Lotus biflorus – all out now – I have just got a letter from Mauri who begs to be remembered to you – I made a trip with Tenore & Gussone <9> to Fusaro Mare morto & all that coast yesterday, we found a beautiful Hedysarum (spinosissimum) 4 species of Salicornia Silenes, Medicagos, without end. Asplenium obovatum Inula Crithmoides, Daucus & Ranunc. <muricatis?> & B<illegible>ias do but no Cytisus nor Bulbine which were the objects of our search. Allium carneum very pretty & new to me, Gladiolus segetum, Arenaria maura, Aster acris, Lotus <illegible>, Medic. sphær<illegible>, napolitana; a low 3 leaved Rubus called Rustinella by the peasants, apparently a new, or undistinguished species Sedum stellatum – Statice cordifolia or Smithii, & Limonium Tenore calls S. Cumana that little one with hairy leaves you remember it on the Corniche, & doubts the English being the real reticulata of the Mediterranean – I am going today towards Calabria <&?> hope <to?> I mean to find all the 30 sp Orchidiæ round Potenza, & a 15th or 20th Ornithog – Gussone tells me to look for on the marina di Catanzaro – O. marinum would be quite a new thing. We have a large dwarf from Abruzzo that we can make nothing of.
Yr Aff
W F S
Notes:
1. Booksellers, of London and Paris. [See Doc. No: 00980, and Doc. No: 01127].
2. Michel Tenore (1780–1861), Italian botanist & traveller.
3. Prof Antoine Bertoloni (1793–1868), Italian botanist.
4. Ernesto Mauri (1791–1836), Italian botanist.
5. Abbotsbury, Dorset: home of William Thomas Horner Fox Strangways.
6. See reference to cholera at Sunderland in Doc. No: 02254.
7. Pierre Joseph Redouté (1759–1840), botanical artist.
8. This letter is heavily worm eaten and pages 3 and 4 are missing lots of letters.
9. Giovanni Gussone (1787–1866), botanist.