22G 



AMERICAN SPIDERS AND THEIR SPINNINGWORK. 



stretched above the midiUe of tlie table for five feet. Thence it spread 

 upward, in diverging threads, to the window curtain, on wbicli many of 

 the wee adventurers hung. (Fig. 253.) I kept the bridge for several 

 days, during wliieh time the roadway received many additional strings, 

 and some of the baby bridge buililers spun delicate little cobwebs along 

 the edges and among the trusses of their bridge, and, separating them- 

 selves from their fellows, set up housekeeping for themselves. 



Another example shows that precisely the same habit exists among 



Fig. li.io. Bi'iilgu (.)!' siiiniiingwork laid l>y n I)i\'ik1 (iT K])uiroiil spiticrliu^s. 



spiders widely separated in structure. A largo specimen of Ctenus was 

 sent to me Ijv Prof. S. M. Scudder, who had received it from a 

 Young friend. The animal had come from Central America, and had 

 , brought her cocoon with her. This was a large conical object 



nearly an inch in diameter, constructed like the ordinary Lyco- 

 sid cocoon. Tlie mother with her egg bag was placed in a box, and after 

 a few days, tired of lugging her cradle, hung it to the side of the box in 

 a hammock of loosely meshed lines. It was not long before an immense 

 • host of little Gtenid.s, several luindreds in number, issued from the cocoon, 

 crawled out of an opening in the cover of the box, and distril>uted them- 

 selves over a large study table in my room at the Academy of Natural 

 Sciences. 



