70 The Ohio Naturalist. [Vol. XIII, No. 4, 



THE CLASSIFICATION OF PLANTS, VIII. 



John H. Schaffner. 



Below is presented a synopsis of the fifteen plant phyla gi\-en 

 in the preceding paper of this series. The classification of the 

 fungi follows with a key to the orders. 



The following changes should be made in the arrangement of 

 the families of Anthophyta as presented in the sixth paper: 

 Transfer the Pamassiaceae from Saxifragales to Ranales following 

 the Ranunculaceae. Interchange the position of Loganiaceae 

 and Oleaceae. Also interchange the position of Bromeliaceae 

 and Dioscoreaceae. 



SYNOPSIS or THE PLANT PHYLA. 



A. Plant body unicellular or filamentous, or if a solid aggregate through the 

 ovary, when present, not an archegonium; never seed-producing; 

 nonsexual, with a simple sexual life cycle, or with an alternation of 

 generations. 



I. Cells typically with poorly differentiated nuclei and chromatophores, 



reproducing by fission; motile or nonmotile, colored or colorless, 

 with or without chlorophyll but never with a pure chlorophvll- 

 green color; resting spores commonly present. 



Phylum 1. ScHizoPHYTA. 



II. Cells with well differentiated nuclei, and if holophytic usuallv with 



definite chromatophores; with or without chlorophyll; colorless, 

 green, or variously tinted by coloring matters. 



(I.) Nonsexual, unicellular plants without chlorophyll having a 

 Plasmodium stage of more or less completely fused amoeboid 

 cells from which complex sporangium-like resting bodies are 

 built up. Phylum 2. Myxophyta. 



(II.) Plants not developing a plasmodium, but the cells normally 

 covered with walls in the vegetative phase. 



1. Unicellular or filamentous plants containing chlorophyll, 



either brown with silicious, two-valved walls or green 

 with complex chromatophores, the walls not silicified; 

 conjugating cells not ciliated, isogamous. 



Phylum 3. Zygophvta. 



2. Plants not with silicified, two-valved walls, if with a direct 



conjugation of nonmotile cells or branches then without 

 chlorophyll. 



(1.) Plants with chlorophyll; if without chlorophyll then 

 either without a true mycelium, or if a mycelium is 

 present having a sexual phase with ciliated, motile 

 sperms. 

 a. Antheridium when present not consisting of a 

 globular structure containing sperm-bearing 

 filaments; often with an alternation of gen- 

 erations, 

 (a.) Plants green with chlorophyll or colorless, 

 nearly all producing nonsexual zoospores, the 

 sexual forms isogamous or heterogemous. 

 Phylum 4. Gonidiophyta. 



