SPIDERS : THEIR STRUCTURE AND HABITS. 127 



Most persons will have observed on fine, calm autumn days, a 

 filmy substance covering the fields and hedges with a confused 

 kind of network, and rising and floating in the air in flakes varying 

 from a few inches to several feet in length. I refer to the "gos- 

 samer," the phenomena of which have been made the subject of 

 much marvel and mystery by poets and philosophers, and have 

 been explained even by scientific men on various fanciful theories. 



The word still remains as great a puzzle to etymologists, as the 

 thing itself once was to naturalists. The derivations found in the 

 dictionaries are various and unsatisfactory. Wedgwood's seems to 

 me to be the best, who compounds it of God and summer. 

 " God's summer " would pass into gossamer as naturally as " God- 

 spel " does into Gospel, or " godsip " into gossip ; and the idea 

 was doubtless suggested by the names under which it is known in 

 France and Germany : — ^^ fils de la vierge " in the one, and 

 " Marien fadeii " in the other. Both of these connect it with a 

 tradition respecting the blessed Virgin's winding-sheet. 



But whatever the meaning of the word, gossamer is now 

 acknowledged to be the production of spiders. There are certain 

 species, and those about the smallest of their respective tribes 

 {Thomisus cristatus and Lycosa exigtia, being only i — 6th of an inch 

 long), which, at certain seasons of the year, and for reasons best 

 known to themselves, are suddenly seized with an excursionist fit. 

 Mounting to the sum.mit of a blade of grass or the top of a gate, 

 they emit from their spinning-tubes (which are kept separate the 

 while) a multitude of fine filaments, invisible to the naked eye. 

 These are drawn out and carried upwards by an ascending current 

 of rarefied air ; and uniting into flakes, they soon acquire, by the 

 action of the current upon them, a buoyancy sufficient to support 

 the spider, who then quits her hold of terra fir?na^ and launches 

 into the fields of air. This phenomena is never seen except under 

 suitable atmospheric conditions : it requires a bright and calm day, 

 the former being necessary to create a stratum of hot air near the 

 ground, and the latter to allow of the establishment of an upward 

 current. 



By way of conclusion to these remarks upon our British 

 Spiders, I have added a tabulated arrangement of their families 

 and genera, with letters affixed to each genus, pointing out its 

 most characteristic details of structure. It may, perhaps, help 

 towards the identification of captured specimens. 



