THE CLASSIFICATION OF PLANTS ~ 209 
has nothing to do with the matter, so the botanist finds no 
difficulty in recognizing the strawberry plant and the apple 
tree as members of the same family. 
This family affords excellent illustrations of the meaning 
of the terms genus, species, and so on. The Rose family con- 
tains (among many others) the Pear genus, which contains 
‘the apple species, which contains the greening variety. 
260. Grouping of Families. — Families are assembled 
into orders and these again into larger groups. The prin- 
cipal names of groups used in classification, beginning with 
the highest, are as follows: 
Plant Kingdom. 
Division. 
Series. 
Class. 
Order. 
Family. 
Genus. 
Species. 
Variety. 
The entire plant kingdom may be divided into four 
grand divisions and these into lesser groups, as shown in 
the table on page 210. This table is for reference only. It 
serves in a general way to represent the progress of plant 
development, beginning with the lowest (and oldest) types 
and proceeding to the highest. The alge and fungi should, 
however, be placed parallel to each other and not in series, 
since the latter are distinguished from the former mainly 
by their parasitic or saphrophytic mode of life and the 
modifications due to this. No perfect scheme of classifi- 
cation has yet been made out and the highest authorities 
differ in regard to details of classification. — 
