DEATH AND ITS DISGUISES. 445 



spidei- ancestor may have been a feeble beginning of the habit, which 

 gradually was developed into tlie tixed characters which we now 

 Orig-in observe. A supposition of this sort, it is true, has no facts to 

 H h't support it, but is in accordance with prevailing ideas as to 

 the evolution of many, if not all the interesting traits in ani- 

 mal behavior. 



In this connection one may perhaps allude to the remaricable sem- 

 Idance of death into which the spider involuntarily falls when pricked 

 with the sting of tiie digger wasp. I have referred to this in the preced- 

 ing chapter, and quote here in confirmation a remark of Mr. Fabre, de- 

 scriptive of the condition of Lycosa narbonensis of France, after being 

 paralyzed by Pompilus annulatus. The spider is immobile, lithe 

 ^^ . as when living, without the slightest trace of a wound. It is 

 ' life, in fact, minus movement. Viewed from a distance, the tip 

 of the feet tremble a little ; and that is all. One specimen disentombed 

 from a wasp's burrow was placed in a box, where it kept fresh, jireserv- 

 ing the flexibility of life from the 2d of August to the '20th of September, 

 a space of seven weeks.' With spiders in such condition there is really 

 no appearance of death. They are unconscious though living, and there- 

 fore make no sham of being dead. 



' J. H. Fabre, Noiiveraux Souwniors Entoniologiquos. Studies u]ioii tlic Instinct and 

 Habits of Insects, page 210, 1S82. 



