SEXUAL COLORATIOX. 273 



pairing- ; the facts relating to these " love dances " are to be 

 found in two interesting- papers * by Mr. and Mrs. Peckham, 

 which are well worth a careful reading. One, out of many in- 

 stances described by these two observers, will be sufficient for 

 the present purpose. 



The male of a species of Habrocestum differs from the female, 

 in having his first legs of a delicate green colour fringed with 

 white hairs ; these ornamental appendages are displayed to 

 every advantage while the male is paying- his addresses to the 

 female ; the remarkable positions which the spider assumes 

 are illustrated by figures ; the authors mention that during 

 the performance the female " e3*ed him intently,'' and seemed 

 to be "interested 'in his display"; with reference to the 

 mating habits of another spider, the female is said " to become 

 excited, and watch the male with absorbing interest." The 

 late M. Alphonse Karr, in his delightful essays entitled " A 

 Tour round my Garden," gives a humorous description of the 

 courtship in spiders. " My friend," he says, " was more 

 fortunate, for the belle advanced towards him, whilst he waited 

 for her in visible anxiety ; but whether he perceived in her 

 behaviour any unsatisfactory sign, or whether the coquette had 

 not sufficient skill to compose her countenance, which I could 

 not distinguish from the sniallness of its proportions, or 

 whether she permitted to appear in her air more hunger than 

 love, or whether, in short, the lover was not struck with one of 

 those intense flames which brave all dangers, he took to flight 

 with such rapidity that I lost sight of him." The American 

 naturalists, through long familiarity with the objects of their 

 study, appear to be able to read with more accuracy the 

 countenance of the female. They speak of her as gazing 



* "Occasional Papers of the Natural History Society of Wisconsin/' 

 vol. i., two numbers. 



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