108 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [Jan., 



(7) $ No. 156 copulated withe? No. 123 at 12.10. 12.12, 12. 12^, 12.13 

 P.M., June 3. June 19, three times with d^No. 217. July 15, at 3.30 

 P.M., with (5^ No. 319. (A total of 9 observed copulations.) 



These observations show that while the copulations are of brief 

 duration, generally less than 10 seconds, they are frequently repeated. 

 The number must be larger in natural conditions than my figures 

 show for caged individuals, since in order to count the number I was 

 obliged to remove the males during those periods when I could not 

 watch them. Even when there are one or more cocoons in her web 

 the female mates as freely as before oviposition, and their presence 

 does not in any way seem to retard her mating impulses. 



Sperm-induction. — The following was the only case observed. 

 d'No. 319, after copulating with $ No. 156 at 3.30 P.M. on July 15, 

 was watched carefully with the hope of seeing this process. 'He left 

 the female and went to a corner where he remained quiet, hanging 

 with the ventral surface^ uppermost and the cephalothorax a little 

 lower than the abdomen. At 4.35 P.M. he flexed his abdomen slightly 

 on its pedicel so as to elevate its apex, deposited from his genital aper- 

 ture a small drop of sperm upon a line of the web, then applied the 

 jialpal organs alternately to this drop. This process continued until 

 4.39 P.M., when he was driven away from the place by the approach 

 of the female. The droplet of sperm had been only slightly diminished 

 in amount, so that probably the induction into the palpal organs 

 takes a much larger time. I watched him for half an hour more; for 

 a while he shook his palpi slightly in the air, but ceased this action 

 and did not emit any more sperm. ! 



Cocooning. — The brown ovoid or subglobular cocoons are very 

 familiar objects in barns and cellars where this species is most fre- 

 C}uently found. In captivity they make their cocoons usually in the 

 early morning, completing them before 8.30 AM., in one case as late 

 as 10.00 A.M. 



The process is as follows: 9 No. 16 was observed commencing her 

 first cocoon at 8.15 A.M., May 25. She was making a fluffy ball of 

 loosely curled white silk, barely a third the diameter of the finished 

 cocoon, suspended by a thread from the roof of the cage. She worked 

 by hanging in the web with her first pair of legs, using the legs of the 

 fourth pair in alternate action to pull out from her spinnerets and apply 

 to the silken mass the white thread, and occasionally helping with 

 the third pair of legs. At 8.23 J she placed her epigynum close to the 

 lower surface of the silken ball, and there issued from her genital aper- 

 ture a large, yellowish, viscid drop of fluid in which ova could be 



