74 TRAPDOOR SPIDERS. 



tects for several years past, and, indeed, I think it 

 may be safely asserted that the study of the habits 

 and interdependence of the members of the animate 

 world has not, during the last fifty years, made any- 

 thing like a corresponding progress to that which 

 may be seen in classification and description. The 

 microscope has led many who, a century ago, 

 would have found their chief delight in observing 

 those points in the habits and external characters of 

 living creatures which the naked eye could readily 

 seize upon, to look much closer, to anatomize and 

 describe in detail every organism, great and small, 

 and to examine every tissue and cell. 



It is, however, to the materials now being amassed 

 by these modern " cabinet naturalists" that recourse 

 must be had if we wish to form a true comprehension 

 of the functions and habits of living things. They 

 must tell us, for example, what instruments, tactile 

 and visual, an animal possesses if we wish to under- 

 stand how it constructs a particular fabric, so that the 

 " field naturalist" will have to apply to his brother 

 of the " cabinet " before he can turn his observations 

 to good account. 



Still, the fact remains that the habits of plants and 

 animals afibrd many openings for careful investiga- 

 tion, and such as are especially within the reach of 

 those lovers of nature who have ample time at their 

 disposal, and the opportunity to spend it in a warm 

 climate where life abounds, and is never wholly 

 checked even in the depth of winter. It seems 

 strange to think that collectors so frequently take 

 creatures out of wonderfully constructed nests and yet 

 never observe, or at any rate never describe, the 



