168 ARACHNIDES. 



however, a single instant is sufficient, as the animal employs 

 them the moment they escape from the apparatus. Those 

 white and silky flocculi that may be observed floating about in 

 spring and autumn in foggy weather, vulgarly termed in 

 France fits de la Vicrge, are certainly produced as we have 

 satisfactorily ascertained by tracing them to their point of 

 origin by various young Araneides, those of the Epeirse and 

 Thomisi particularly; they are mostly the larger threads which 

 are intended to afford points of attachment to the radii of the 

 web, or those that compose the chain, and which, becoming 

 more ponderous by the access of moisture, sink, approach one 

 another, and finally form little pellets: we frequently observe 

 them collected near the web commenced by the Spider, and 

 in which it resides. 



It is also very probable that many of these young animals not 

 having as yet a sufficient supply of silk, limit their structure to 

 throwing out simple threads. It is, I think, to the young Ly- 

 cosse that we must attribute those which intersect the furrows 

 of ploughed grounds, whose numbers are rendered so appa- 

 rent by the reflection of light after sunrise. By chemical ana- 

 lysis, these fils de la Vierge exhibit the same characters as 

 the web of the spider: they are not then formed in the atmo- 

 sphere, as, for want of proper observation, ex visu, that cele- 

 brated naturalist, M. Lamarck, has conjectured. Gloves and 

 stockings have been made with this silk ; but it was found im- 

 possible to apply the process on a, large scale, and as it is sub- 

 ject to many difficulties, is rather a matter of curiosity than 

 utility. This substance, however, is of much greater impor- 

 tance to the little animals in question. With it, the sedentary 

 species, or those which do not roam abroad in search of their 

 prey, weave webs(l) of a more or less compact tissue, whose 

 form and position vary according to" the peculiar habits of 

 each of them, and that are so many snares or traps, where 

 the insects on which they feed become entangled, or are 



(1) Those of some exotic species are so strong 1 , that small birds arc entangled 

 in them; they even oppose a certain degree of resistance to num. 



