I President's Address. [July 28, 



Uitenliage, the Langkloof, and Swellendam. Next year he started 

 for Namaqualand, where, like Zeyher, he had an almost fatal experi- 

 ence of that dry and thirsty land, returning- by the Cederbergen and 

 the Onder Bokkeveld. 



In 1831 he gladly accepted the invitation of the celebrated zoologist, 

 Dr. Andrew Smith, to accompany him on a journey eastward through 

 Ivahrland and Zululand up to Delagoa Bay, following the track of the 

 travellers Cowie and Grejii. Circumstances prevented the carrying 

 out of the whole plan, and Drege proceeded no further than the 

 Umgeni. Returning with the part}'-, he stayed some time in Uiteu- 

 liage and Albany, and th^nice started through what are now the 

 districts of Queenstown an I Aliwal North to the Witteberg, and, 

 following the course of l^ie Orange Elver, turned off by way of 

 Colesberg towards the Sneeuweberg, and thence by the Sunday's River 

 Valley back to Uitenhage. After returning to the Western Province 

 he made one more excursion to the mountains about the lower course 

 of the Olif ant's Biver at a more propitious season than before, and 

 with better success. 



Drege then collected together the vast material he had amassed, 

 amounting, according to Dr. Ernest Meyer's estimate, to about eight 

 thousand species, represented by two hundred thousand specimens. 

 The same author pays a warm tribute of praise to this laborious 

 and modest traveller. '' He collected the same species not once only, 

 but as many times as it occurred, recording always the peculiarities of 

 its habitat. He travelled through barren districts with equal atten- 

 tion as through fertile ones, at various times of the year, and collected 

 their flora with equal care and diligence. Wherever he went he took 

 care to determine the altitude above the sea level and the temperature 

 of the simngs." It is impossible to quote the whole of Meyer's well 

 deserved eulogy of this remarkable man, of whom, outside botanical 

 circles, no knowledge exists, and whose labours were enough to have 

 made famous half a dozen scampering travellers of the ordinary type. 

 I must refer you to a translation of the entire memoir, printed in 1875 

 by a talented member of our society ( ^ " ), with the assurance that it 

 will well repay perusal. 



Drege lived after his return to Europe, in his native Altona, to a good 

 old age, and in a fair measure of comfort. I am glad to be able, by 

 the kindness of a friend, to exhibit two portraits of this excellent Cape 

 botanist, and to have the opportunity of making his name and fame 

 known to-night to some who have not heard of him before. He died 

 in 1881. 



I regret that my notes contain so meagre an account of Dr. Karl 

 Wilhelm Jjudwig Pappe, long resident and practising medicine in this 

 city. He was born in Hamburg in 1803, and died here in December, 

 1862. He was a most accurate and painstaking botanist. Besides his 

 enumeration of the flora of Leipzig, presented as a thesis for his 

 degree in 1827, he was the author of three excellent little treatises of 

 botanical interest : Florm Capemia Mcdiccc Prodrotnits, an enumeration of 

 South African indigenous plants used as remedies ; Silva Capefisis, a 

 description of South African timber trees, and a Si/nopsis of Cape Ferns, 

 published in conjunction with Mr. Rawson. Incidentally I have 

 mentioned his practical interest in the welfare of Karl Zeyher, whose 



('") Oil the GeDgrapliical Dibtributioii ol' Plants iu South Africa, by Ernest Meyer. 

 Translated, with notca, by H. 13oiut<, F.L.S. : Capetown, 1875, 8vo. pp. 61. 



