Page:Evolution of Life (Henry Cadwalader Chapman, 1873).djvu/108

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plants, in their external appearance, present every variety of size, shape, and color, their internal structure does not offer the same amount of difference as is observed in the divisions of the animal kingdom. The old dogma that plants live, but animals live and feel, still holds true; there not having been found in the vegetal kingdom a trace of a nervous system. Some other basis for the classification of plants must therefore be chosen. More than a century ago, Linnaeus divided the vegetal kingdom into Cryptogamia and Phanerogamia, which may, for the present, be translated Flowerless and Flowering plants. Modern science has offered nothing better than the classification of Linnaeus, it being a natural one. The Flowerless plants, or the Cryptogamia, include: 1st, the Algae, or the greenish matter covering bricks, stones, etc., the green thread-plants of ponds and ditches, and the red and black sea-weed; 2d, the Fungi, or toadstools, mushrooms, etc.; 3d, the Lichens, or the parchment-like growths seen covering fence-rails, etc.; 4th, the Mosses; 5th, the Ferns. The Flowering plants, or Phanerogamia, are represented by: 1st, the Cycadae, bread ferns, etc.; 2d, the Coniferae, pine, cypress; 3d, the Monocotyledons (one-seed lobe), lily, banana, palm; 4th, the Dicotyledons (two-seed lobes), elms, mulberry, geranium, rose. The first three classes of the Cryptogamia differ from the Phanerogamia in the absence of flowers, and in wanting roots, stem, and leaves; the Mosses and (78)