422 AMERICAN SPIDERS AND THEIK SPINNINGWORK. 



upon her web unnoticed by me. Now she hung behind her orb in tlie 

 position represented by Fig. 359. Onlj^ a scant patcli of the central sliield 

 remained. One hindermost foot was extended ujjward almost 

 First straight from the cephalotliorax, and grasped tlie ragged edge 



f^^^- ^^ *^^^ patch. The corresponding last leg on the opposite side of 

 talitv ^^^^ spider was outstretched in a like position and held to the op- 

 posite portion of the ragged shield. The third legs on both sides 

 were holding to straggling threads. The second legs were curled forward 

 towards the snare beliind which she hung, and the claws held to cross 

 lines of the notched zone. Tlie first pair of legs hung free, and were 

 projected through tlie meshes of the snare. Thus, even in death was 

 maintained the habitual position of the creature when watching for a 

 victim or an enemy, the first pair of legs being kept free in order to feel 

 towards and find contact with an object of desire or dread. Between the 

 patch of silken shield and the parts of the snare immediately beneath was 

 a great gap, the size of the spider's body, which had evidently been pro- 

 duced by the weight of the creature as she hung downward. The whole 

 web, indeed, was relaxed in all its remaining parts. The abdomen of the 

 spider hung downward at an inclination from the cephalothorax of jierhaps 

 forty-five degrees, in which position it Avas held bj' a trapline attached to 

 the spinnerets and at the opposite end of the ragged shield. 



The next day, September 25th, the position of the spider was sub- 

 stantially the same. September 26th the first and second legs were bent 

 over towards the body, and the claws seemed to have entangled with portions 

 of the cross lines. The palps were as at the time of the first observation, 

 one stretched out holding a thread by the palpal claw, and the other bent 

 over a line, as one would bend his arm across a rope by which it was 

 supported at the bended joint. By September 28th the web which had 

 been gradually sinking was quite sagged down behind the vines, and but 

 few portions of it remained; but upon lifting the leaves, the spider was 

 seen hanging, but with the legs considerably more procurved. One fore leg, 

 however, was still stretched out straight, and held to tlic drooping line l^y 

 the clasped claws. 



There is little to detail concerning the subsequent history of the deceased 

 Prima. I watched during the first week of October, and saw the various 

 , . . fragments of the orb frayed away by the winds and rains, which 

 were c[uite severe. But the corpse hung in the position last de- 

 scribed, the one outstretched leg strained to high tension and supporting 

 the whole weight of the body. When last seen, the remaining legs were 

 rigidly bent at the joints and clustered together over and around the head. 

 October 8th the spider had disappeared, dropped down or washed down by 

 the rains into the mass of leaves and tendrils below, no doubt, althougli I 

 could not find it. Thus the chapter ended ; a seemingly quiet, gradual, 

 painless death ; a winding sheet among the leaves like an ancient Egyptian 



