HIGHLIGHTS OF BOTANICAL EXPLORATION IN THE NEW WORLD 239 



in the exploration of the Rios Tacutu and Uraricuera, visited Mount Ro- 

 raima, and along the Colombian frontier traveled up the Rio Negro to 

 the Rio Uaupes. From these explorations 2000 herbarium specimens were 

 sent to Munich. During the years 1935-1937 he again traveled in eastern 

 Brazil. 



Ernst Heinrich Ule was one of the great productive explorers of Brazil, 

 whose extensive travels in Brazil occupied much of his life between 1883 and 

 1912. Three extended return visits to Germany, in 1898-1899, 1903-1906, 

 and 1908, interrupted this long period of field activity. The early part of his 

 work centered in the south of Brazil, chiefly in the states of Santa Catarina, 

 Rio Grande do Sul, and Rio de Janeiro. Later he spent much time in Minas 

 Gerais, Goyaz, and Piaui. In 1900 he became active in the study of the vast 

 forest floras of the Amazon Basin, working in the basins of the Jurua and 

 Marary during that year. In 1902 and 1903 he conducted extensive work in 

 the upper Amazon basin from Manaos to the regions of Tarapoto and Iquitos 

 in Peru, returning after nearly a year and a half to Manaos in late 1903. 

 After his return from his last visit to Berlin, he was again in Manaos and 

 took up residence in Boa Vista on the upper Rio Branco from October, 1908, 

 until February, 1910. During this period he was much assailed by fever and 

 tropical sores and had to return to Manaos at least once for hospitalization. 

 From Boa Vista he conducted an excursion of some seven weeks to Mount 

 Roraima, which he ascended on four separate occasions. From Manaos in 

 November, 1910, he began the last of his long journeys, progressing up the 

 Rios Purus and Acre to the region of the Bolivian frontier, reaching Manaos 

 in February, 1912, after nearly a year and a half's absence. He returned to 

 Berlin the last time in April, 1912, and remained there working on his mate- 

 rials. He never fully recovered from the ravages of fever and tropical sores 

 and died July 15, 1915, at the age of sixty-one. 



The enormous effort of his field activity yielded approximately 17,000 field 

 numbers, of which more than 10,000 were vascular plants. Unfortunately, 

 most of the original set was destroyed in Berlin during the war. The most 

 complete duplicate sets that now exist are at the Museu Goeldi at Belem and 

 at Leiden. Substantial bodies of his material are at the British Museum and 

 elsewhere. 



During the years 1931-1936, B. A. Krukoff conducted five expeditions to 

 the Amazon Basin, during which he amassed a total of about 10,000 numbers. 

 In addition, he had prepared 40,000 wood hand samples, for which voucher 

 specimens were represented in the exsiccatae. R. L. Froes for the most part 

 was Krukoff's chief assistant and collected independently for him in 1939- 

 1941. The original sets of the very important Krukoff collections are at New 

 York; duplicates are widely distributed in world herbaria. A resume of the 

 regions of the five expeditions is as follows (the first and second expeditions 

 were respectively to Africa and the Far East) : 



