THE ATTID/E 



51 



extending little beyond the spinnerets. The first and fourth 

 pairs are of the same length, but the first are twice as thick as 

 the fourth. The legs are without markings and darker toward 

 the head. The abdomen is longer than the cephalothorax and 

 as wide or wider. There is little difference 

 between the sexes, the males being only a little 

 darker colored and larger in front. Usually 

 found under stones in a thick silk nest. 



Phidippus tripunctatus. — Black, with three 

 bright white spots on the back of the abdo- 

 men (fig. 136). Large females are half an 

 inch long and the males a little smaller. 

 Though the general color is black, it is modi- 

 fied, especially in fresh specimens, by white 

 hairs on parts of the body. The joints of the 

 legs are grayish in the middle and black 

 toward the ends. There are white hairs on 

 the front of the head and upper side of the 

 palpi and a white band around the front of 

 the abdomen, plainest in the males. The 

 three large white spots on the abdomen correspond to the 

 second and third pairs in mystaceus (fig. 135) and multiformis 

 (fig. 133), and the other pairs, though generally present, are 

 small and inconspicuous. On the under side of the abdomen 

 are usually two gray stripes. This is a common spider all over 

 the country. It lives under stones and sticks and passes the 

 winter half grown in a thick silk bag. 



Plexippus puerperus. — Very variable in size, from a third to 

 half an inch in length. The females (fig. 137) are pale, light 

 yellow, or almost white, with a few black spots, while the 

 males (fig. 138) have the cephalothorax and legs brown, some- 

 times almost black. In both sexes the mandibles are large 

 and the cephalothorax high and flat on the top as far back as 



Fig. 136. Phidippus tri- 

 punctatus, enlarged six 

 times. 



