NOTES on the ARCHITECTURE, NESTING HABITS, and 



LIFE HISTORIES of AUSTRALIAN ARANEIDiE, 



based on SPECIMENS in the AUSTRALIAN 



MUSEUM. 



By W. J. Rainbow, F.L.S., F.E.S., Entomologist. 



(Plates lxii.-lxiv.; Figs. 13-15.) 



PART VII.-ENTELEGYNiE [Continued). 



Family ARGIOPID^ ( = EPEIRID^E, Auct.). 



Sub-family ARGIOPIN^L 



This sub-family is not only the largest of the family of which 

 it forms part, but contains some of the commonest, and most 

 familiar of all spiders. It is the sedentary, orb-weaving species 

 that are the first to attract the attention of the casual observer 

 or amateur collector. The reason for this is obvious, for not 

 only are many of the species large and more or less striking in 

 appearance but, with the exception of a few aberrant forms, 

 construct orbicular webs in prominent situations. Missionaries 

 and travellers in out-of-the-way places, who are good enough to 

 think of museums or arachnological students, when making col- 

 lections, invariably "bag" large numbers of Argiopida? — often 

 duplicating a species many times over — and little of aught else. 

 In fact, so numerous are arboreal spiders in such collections, 

 that one is often inclined to think that amateur collectors ignored 

 the fact that there were such things as ground-roving species. 



In Australia, the Argiopinse are represented by the following 

 groups : Argiopeaa, Cyrtophoieaj, Arachnurese, Cycloseae, Man- 

 goreae, Aranese, Caerostrese, Gasteracantheae, Anepsiea?, Cyrtara- 

 chneae, Glyptocranieaa, Poltyeae, Cehenise, Arcyeaj, Dolophoneaj, 

 and Anapese. 



The spiders included in the first of these groups are easily dis- 

 tinguished. The cephalothorax is very flat, rarely longer than 

 broad ; pars cephalica is truncated in front, relatively short and 

 straight, and has the segmental grooves well-defined laterally, 

 but indistinct or effaced posteriorly ; pars thoracica is rounded 

 laterally, the radial and median transverse grooves are distinct ; 



