44 ARANEIDEA. 
spicuous, slightly curved, strong, tapering, sharp-pointed red-brown spine ; the upperside is white, 
cretaceous-looking, and marked only with some dull leaden irregular reticulations and lines ; the sides 
and underside are leaden-black, the former has a few perpendicular tapering white stripes dropping 
downwards from the upper part, and on the underside are two longitudinal parallel rows on the hinder 
half of three white spots each, the anterior spot largest, the posterior ones placed on either side of the 
spinners, which are short, rather small, and black. The genital process is moderately strong, almost 
perpendicularly prominent, and ending with a very short epigyne directed backwards. 
An immature male had the upperside of the abdomen whitish-yellow, with a longitudinal central slightly 
tapering dark greyish band edged with black, and ending with a large black blotch on each side at the 
upper part of the end of the abdomen, the black continued over the hinder part and spotted with white ; 
from the black edge of the central band, on each side, issue several strongish black tapering stripes over 
the sides, where are also a few white spots; the anterior spots on the underside are oblong and very 
much the largest. 
Hab. Panama, Bugaba (Champion). 
This spider is allied to £. tawricornis. 
Epeira tauricornis, sp. n. 
Adult female, length 23 lines; adult male, 2 lines. 
This spider is one of a group which marks the transition to the Gasteracanthidw, and in the prevailing rage 
for the multiplication of genera it might well form the type of a genus separate from Epeira; but 
although no doubt the subdivision of many of the old genera became, and is, necessary for the practical 
dealing with crowded generic groups, it seems, in some instances at least, to have been carried to excess 
and to thwart its own end. Upheld, therefore, in the present case with the opinion of so able an Arach- 
nologist as Count Eugéne Keyserling, I retain the spider before us, at all events for the present, in the 
genus Hpeira. 
Cephalothorax broad, the caput somewhat quadrate before and gibbous above on each side near the thoracic 
region. It appears to vary in colour from yellow-brown to a deep bistre-brown, marked with lighter or 
darker patches, and dotted with short grey hairs or pubescence. 
The eyes are in the usual three groups; those formed by the two lateral pairs are widely distant from the 
central group owing to the width of the caput, at the extreme outer fore corners of which they are placed, 
forming a straight transverse line with those of the fore central pair, which are almost contiguous to the 
fore margin of the clypeus. The four central eyes form a square, the hinder pair being much larger than 
the anterior. 
The falces are rather long, strong, vertical, prominent in front, and similar in colour to the cephalothorax. 
The legs are short, not very strong; they are of a brownish-yellow colour annulated with darker brown; the 
femora of the first and second pairs being of a dull orange or red-brown, their anterior halves, as well as 
the genual joints, being, in a well-coloured example, nearly black. They are clothed with short greyish 
hairs, but there appears to be an almost total absence of spines. The relative length of the legs is 
apparently 1, 4, 2, 3, or 1, 2, 4, 3, though the difference between 1, 2, 4, is very slight. The tibiz have 
the slightly bent form characteristic of the Gasteracanthide. 
The mawille, labium, and sternum are black-brown, the apex of the labium being of a rounded form, and the 
maxille have a pale margin at their extremities. 
The abdomen is large, of a somewhat quadrate-cylindric form (like that of the well-known European Cyrtophora 
opuntice). It has on the upperside eleven variously sized circular and flattened conical prominences or 
boss-like humps—three on each side in a longitudinal line, and five forming a diamond-shaped group of 
four, with one in the centre on the hinder part. The central one of this group appears to be very variable 
in its size and length: in one example of each sex it is much the largest, and in others the whole posterior 
portion of the abdomen is drawn out into a tail bearing the prominences at the end of the group and pro- 
jected in a caudiform manner. The anterior prominence on each side (situated at the fore corners of the 
abdomen) is much the largest, and terminates in, or is drawn out at its summit into, a strongish, slightly 
bent, sharp thorn-like corneous spine; all the other humps end with a rudimentary spine of a similar kind. 
