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19. Contributions to our Knowledge of the Freshwater 

 Algae of Africa.* 



{2) A First Report on the Freshwater Algae mostly from the ('ape 



Peninsula in the herbarium of the South African Museum. — By 

 F. E. Fritsch, D.Se. (Professor of Botany, East London College, 

 University of London). 



(With 43 figures in the text.) 



A. Introductory Remarks. 



The literature dealing with the freshwater algal flora of the continent 

 of Africa is by no means extensive; moreover, collectors have shown a 

 preference for the Central and Northern parts and have almost com- 

 pletely ignored the South. Apart from two early papers by Eaben- 

 horstf and Beinscl).;:, we have, in more recent years, Nordstedt's 

 valuable account§ of Algae, especially Desmids, found amongst 

 museum-specimens of Utricularia, several of them collected at the 

 Cape; a brief paper by Wille||, mainly on Algae from the Zambesi; 

 and lastly, G-. S. West's paperU on the freshwater Algae of the Percy 

 Sladen Memorial Expedition in South- West Africa (1908-11). 



The field is thus an almost untouched one ; in fact, Cape Province 

 has been less known from the point of view of its Freshwater Algae 

 than almost any other important centre on the surface of the earth. 

 It is therefore not surprising that the collections of Algae, dealt with 

 in the subsequent pages, have yielded a number of very interesting 

 forms, as instanced by the description of two new species of Ecballo- 



* The first paper (Some Freshwater Algae from Madagascar) of this series 

 was published in the Annales d. Hiologie lacustre, vii, 1914 ; bo separate copies 

 have been receive! owing to the outbreak of the European war. 



f Rabenhorst, Beitr. z. Kryptogamenfl. Siidafrik., Pike u. Algen, Allg. 

 deutseh. nat urh. Zeit., i, 1855. 



% Eeinsch, Contr. ad. fl. Alg. aq. dulc. Promont. Bon. Spei, Journ. Linn. Soc, 

 Bot.. xvi, 1877, p. 232. 



§ Nordstedt, De alg. noimull., praecipue Desm., inter Utricularias, etc., 

 Lunds Univ. Arsskrift, xvi, 1880. 



i| Wille, Ueb. einige v. J. Menyhardt in Siidafrika gesanim. Susswasseralg., 

 •Oesterr. bot. Zeitschr., 1903. 



IT G. S. West, in Annals of the South African Museum, ix, 1912, p. 61. 



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