344 Transactions of the Soutli African Philosophical Society. 



had Angiospermous ancestors in even somewhat earHer times. In 

 fact some of the Palaeozoic Lycopods had Angiospermous fructifica- 

 tions, though I do not wish to imply by this statement that our 

 Angiosperms have been derived from them. 



We must now briefly consider how it is that we find some of the 

 Cape types in Southern South America. Neumayer assumes that in 

 Jurassic times the whole of Africa was still connected by land with 

 the w^hole of South America, and thus a huge continent was in 

 existence bounded in the north by the Mediterranean Ocean, which 

 reached westwards to the Pacific (see map in Stanley Gardiner, 

 1906, p. 319), and that in Lower Eocene times the South Atlantic 

 had been sufficiently carved out so as to leave only a few large 

 islands between North and West Africa and North-East South 

 America. If such a connection existed in Jurassic times, it may 

 account for the presence in southern South America and in Tristan 

 da Cunha of some of the Cape types, but as a matter of fact the 

 Flora of southern South America is so closely connected with the 

 Flora of New Zealand and Australia that we must rather assume a 

 direct connection between these countries in Cretaceous times. 

 Dr. von Zittel rightly points out if such a connection had taken 

 place during the Tertiary period we ought surely to have found 

 South American types of Edentates and Perissodactyles in Australia. 

 At the same time the fossil Marsupials of Argentina show that at 

 some time there must have been a connection between the Australian 

 and Neotropical faunas. This connection must, however, have come 

 into existence after the connection with South Africa was broken, 

 otherwise we should expect to find remains of Marsupials in 

 South Africa. The absence of such remains seems to me also 

 clearly to prove that the direct connection of South Africa and 

 South America did not exist when the Cape Flora originated. 

 To the indirect connection through Tropical Africa reference will 

 be made later. 



Quite recently Hackel (1905, 1906) has given attention to the 

 relations of certain constituents of the Flora of the countries near 

 the Straits of Magellan to the Flora of North America and Europe, 

 and he also comes to the conclusion that there must have been a 

 former land-connection between them and Australia and New 

 Zealand. 



Before leaving the typical plants of the Cape Province we must 

 briefly consider the Ericacece, Penceacece, Btitacece and Bruniacece. The 

 distribution of the Ericacece defies at present a satisfactory explana- 

 tion. Their prevalence in South-West Africa and the prevalence 

 of Epacridace^ in x\ustralia cannot be used as evidence that these 



