118 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [Jan., 



tached to the roof by her third pair of legs, and went back and fed 

 upon the fly; after this meal she returned and took the cocoon into 

 her jaws again. She repeated this process next day with another fly, 

 and the day following without a fly being put in. ? No. 12 was ob- 

 served to do the same operation once with her first cocoon to secure 

 food, and once with her second in order to clean herself. 9 No. 82 

 was observed to do so also. 9 No. 181 was observed to do so likewise 

 in order to clean herself, and she, when regaining the suspended cocoon, 

 first seized its envelope with her jaws, then with her legs snapped the 

 supporting lines. 



The hatching of the young has been observed before, but never 

 very fully described, so that a few notes may be of interest. 9 No. 82 

 was observed on the afternoon of July 4 holding her cocoon in her 

 mouth, the young slowly unfolding themselves, the most superficial 

 first; at 2.40 all the young had unfolded and hung as a great mass to 

 her jaws; at 6.15 all had dispersed and the empty cocoon was hanging 

 in the web. With 9 No. 174 the process was noted in more detail. 

 At 8.30 P.M. the young were beginning to unfold their legs at the 

 lower side of the cocoon, which the mother still held in her jaws; the 

 more superficial of the spiderlings stretched themselves, and by the 

 enlacement of their legs together, and enlacement with the legs of 

 those that succeeded them, there was attached to the mother's 

 jaws a great mass of young spiderlings, a mass of a diameter fully 

 equalling the length of the mother's body. Next morning early 

 I found all the young, nearly 60 in number, distributed over the 

 web, the mother motionless near them, and lower in the web 

 the empty cocoon. 9 No. 12 acted differently. On June 15, at 

 2.30 P.M., I found the young spiders beginning to escape from 

 the cocoon, which in this case was suspended from the web, and not 

 from the mother's jaws. At 2.35 she tore away with her jaws a por- 

 tion of the cocoon, which allowed the young to emerge more easily; 

 this she repeated at 2.40 and 2.43, each time avoiding biting the young 

 spiders. By this time about 17 of the young were upon the web, and 

 the mother moved about the young, spinning, and careful not to injure 

 them. At 3.40 I put a large beetle {C haul log nathus sp.) upon her 

 web, which became entangled there and shook the web. For a minute 

 the mother remained quiet, then went to the mass of young which had 

 not yet become scattered, and enshrouded it with silk as she does a 

 victim, but more slowly; then carried it with her jaws. I watched 

 her until 6 o'clock; at intervals she left the enshrouded mass of young 

 hanging on the web, but always returned to it again to take it in her 



