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It is highly desirable, therefore, to have before us a bird’s-eye view of the Animal Kingdom even if it is only occasionally brought into actual use by the average reader. Classification, it should be understood, is only a process of comparison for the purpose of enabling us to determine the exact place of each animal in the plan of Nature. In other words it is simply a scientific method of naming the various animals from the relation of their resemblances.

We are chiefly indebted to the great Swedish scientist Linnæus for the scientific method of naming animals. For his purpose, Linnæus used the Latin as the universal language of science. For example, he named the dog in his classification Canis familiaris, using a generic word and a specific word—just as they are used in the name of George Washington. In scientific classification, however, these names have become abstract terms, and they represent certain grades or degrees of resemblance which are spoken of as species, genera, families, orders, classes, and so on.