ELISHA MITCHELL SCIENTIFIC SOCIETY. 135 



expresses himself inclined to believe that ^' the presence of a 

 door or covering- for the entrance to its nest, instead of being 

 wantino:, has bten ov^erlooked " and that in form of nest and in 

 food habit it is very similar to his new genns Nidivalvata, which 

 opens its folding trap-doors at night to watch for its prey and 

 closes them in the morning. 



European arachnologists are somewhat fuller and more definite 

 in their statements. Ausserer reckons in the family Atypiuse 

 Thorell three genera,— Pelecodon Dol., Calommata Lucas, and 

 Atypus Latr., and of Atypus six species. Touching the l)uild- 

 ing iiabit of the family, he remarks* that they live in tubular 

 webs under stones, in crevices in walls, or below the earth, the 

 males wandering about. The nest of the genus Atypus he de- 

 scribes (p. 128) as destitute of a lid and simply tubular, and con- 

 tinues: "The part of the silk tube projecting out of the earth 

 extends in protected places, under stones, etc., horizontally on the 

 ground just a little way; its opening is not enlarged." Of A. 

 piceus Sulz. (found in central Germany, Glaus) Leunisf says 

 that the females dig in the earth, mostly on sunny hill-sides, 

 tubes which they line with silk and in which the lenticular 

 eggsacks are fastened. Of the same species (A. Sulzeri Latr. 

 and A. piceus Sulz. are synonyms) LatreilleJ says: "This spe- 

 cies excavates a cylindrical gallery in sloping grounds cov- 

 ered with grass; in this gallery, seven or eight inches in length, 

 horizontal at first and then inclined, it weaves a tube of silk 

 of the same form and dimensions. The cocoon is fastened 

 with silk by both ends to the bottom of the gallery." The 

 late Rev. J. G. Wo()d§ makes about the same statement respect- 

 ing the gallery, and adds: "The upper part of the tube is rather 

 larger than the lower, and projects from the earth, falling for- 

 ward so as to form a flap, which protects the mouth of the bur- 

 row." I infer that Rev. O. P. Cambridge alludes to Atypus 

 when he says^l that "at other times" the tubes of the Territe- 



*Beitrage zur Kenntniss der Territelariee, p. 13. 

 fSynopsis der Zoologie, Vol. 2, p. 586 (Hanover, 1886). 

 JCuvier's An. King., Vol. 8, p. 178 (N. Y., 1831). 

 §Homes Without Hands, p. 131. 

 ^Encyel. Brit., Vol. 2, p. 295 (9th Ed.). 



