4.36 Mr. Shuckard on Bird-catching Spiders* 



small birds when it could catch them, for there is nothing in 

 their organization to prohibit their indulging in such a re- 

 past when falling in their way ; and I still consider that Mr, 

 MacLeay's statement with regard to one of the Epeiridce 

 lends authority by analogy to the assumption that such might 

 be the case. If even it be the exception to the rule of their 

 insectivorous habits observed only by his father and himself, 

 and which he remarks nobody but themselves has witnessed 

 at Sidney, this gives further plausibility to Madame Merian's 

 statement ; for might not she have observed a similar diver- 

 gence from ordinary habits in the case of Mygale in the 

 Brazils to that which was detected by Mr. MacLeay and his 

 father in the case of one of the Epeiridce in New Holland ? 

 But Madame Merian is not the only authority upon which 

 this peculiarity in the habits of Mygale is based. We possess 

 much more recent, and much weightier evidence ; and as to 

 LangsdorfFs * total denial of it, this may pass current for 

 what it is worth, when we reflect how absurd every positive 

 negation is in natural history, merely because the fact has 

 not come under the observer's notice, provided always there 

 be no insuperable objection arising from organization to the 

 possibility of its occurrence. Pertyt says of LangsdorfPs 

 statement : " C. Langsdorff mea opinione perperam negat, 

 M. avicularem aves parvas apprehendere, et devorare, addens, 

 earn insectis solummodo victitare. Observatores recentissimi, 

 priscorum indicia repetentes, non tantum avibus sed etiam 

 reptilibus minoribus, praesertim Sauriis ex Anolis genere 

 nutriri asserunt." Baron Walckenaer, wha has made the 

 Arachnidce the study of his life, gives his opinion deduced 

 from the observations of recent travellers in the. following 

 words : "The Theraphoses," the tribe of which Mygale is the 

 first and chief genus, "include the largest species of Arachnidce, 

 and catch in their nets ! not only very large insects, but 

 also small birds, such as humming-birds %" In support of 

 this he cites Milbert's ( Voyage a l'Isle de France/ and 

 Palissot de Beauvais, who says of the Mygale Blondii, that 

 at night it ascends trees, enters the nests of humming-birds 

 and sucks their eggs or the blood of their young ones. Per- 

 cival, in his f Account of Ceylon/ says of the Mygale fas data , 

 " There is an immense spider found here, with legs not less 

 than four inches long, and having the body covered with 

 thick black hair. The webs ! which it makes are strong 

 enough to entangle and hold even small birds, which form 



* Reise um die Welt. i. Bd. 63. t Delect. Animal. Artie, p. 37. 



X Walckenaer, Apteres, torn. i. p. 205. 1837. 



