The Bryophyta form a much smaller group, reported to have about sixteen thousand species. Some of these appear, as do the mosses, to have true leaves, but their apparent leaves are not really like those of the higher plants. They have no true wood or vessels. They have a definite alternation of generations, but the spore-producing generation grows on to the “leafy” sexual generation, and is generally, but wrongly, called its “fruit capsule.” To this group belong the Mosses and Liverworts.
(5) Thallophytes (thāl´ō-fitz).
The Thallophytes have the largest number of species after the Angiosperms, and number about eighty thousand species all told. They are all comparatively simple in structure and have no differentiation into stems and roots. The Thallophytes include the algæ, the large fungi, the toadstools, and all the parasitic and disease producing forms of plants.
Algæ are divided into Florideæ, the Red Seaweeds, and the orders Dictyoteæ, Oösporeæ, Zoösporeæ, Conjugatæ, Diatomaceæ, and Cryptophyceæ.
Fungi include the molds, mildews, mushrooms, puffballs, etc., which are variously grouped into several sub-classes and many orders. The Lichenes or Lichens are now considered to be of a mixed nature, each plant partly a Fungus and partly an Alga.
THREE CELEBRATED PICTURES OF ANIMAL FAVORITES
ORPHEUS AND HIS LUTE.
From the painting by J. C. Dollman.