238 Transactions. 



and the door (fig. 10, c, the arrow). In many cases she is found dead 

 behind this screen, while her door, after warping with the weather, 

 allows the entrance of all sorts of vermin — woodlice, centipedes, aptera, 

 small spiders, and a large number of other forms of insect-life. These 

 cannot reach her, for the screen shuts them off. 



Unless there is an absence of moisture, hunger has no terrors for these 

 spiders, for they are easily able to exist without food for three or four 

 months. Frequently in a famine a spider devours her neighbour, a hard 

 fight always ensuing first. 



I have several reasons to suspect that Pompilius fugax, &c, is a keen 

 enemy of M. distinctus. I have caught P. fugax dragging a trapdoor 

 spider across a bank. Whether the spider was caught by the fly by the 

 latter opening the door, or by the spider jumping out to catch the fly and 

 instead catching a Tartar, I know not, but I have more than once found 

 a pupa-case of a small Ichneumon fly lying among the remains of a spider. 



The Spider's Age. 



This is a question I could not definitely settle, although I have kept 

 specimens three years and a half. Unfortunately, I was obliged to 

 travel to the north for a holiday, and my pets were put with their box 

 in the garden, and when I returned the only remaining member of the 

 thirty spiders was a young one three months old. 



I know that some spiders take two to three years to reach maturity, 

 but if the food-supply is short the time may be longer. I have kept 

 i nature spiders three years and a half, and possibly they would have 

 lived much longer. Hence the spider may be six or even seven years old 

 when it dies. 



The Food of M. distinctus. 



This consists mainly of Diptera and small Lepidoptera. The young 

 eat small organisms like Aptera (Podura). While catching her food she 

 shows a cleverness that is immensely superior to that of other sedentary 

 spiders. 



On fine sunny days flies and other insects hover about the banks. 

 Now and again they will alight on the bank near a group of nests. The 

 spiders, if they are hungry, keep on the alert; when one hears a fly she 

 creeps up from the bottom of her den, lifts the door slightly, and 

 reconnoitres (fig. 10, b). Whilst peering out the spiders often become 

 rather excited when an unsuspecting fly draws nigh, and this is shown 

 by the rash way in which they sometimes open the door ; the fly then 

 discovers its enemy, and escapes. This makes the spider more circum- 

 spect, and the next fly that draws nigh is watched more carefully. 



The person who is watching the hunting operations of the spider is 

 compelled to admire her great patience, and also the way she controls, 

 with a front leg, the peeping-out space between the door and the rim of 

 the tube (fig. 10, b; notice the bent leg). At last her patience is re- 

 warded : a fly accidentally alights right in front of the treacherous door; 

 the spider throws open the trapdoor and leaps right upon the back of 

 the fly, driving her falces into it (fig. 8). She withdraws quickly into 

 the tube, and pulls the door till it shuts firmly. Then she crawls down 

 to the end of her tube and devours the fly. The capturing takes a very 

 short time, and unless the observer watches closely he will miss the whole 

 operation. 



