366 INSECT ARCHITECTURE. 



sides of the glass about halfway down. Each of the 

 females afterwards fixed a close bag to the edge of 

 the glass, from which the water was expelled by the 

 air from the spinneret, and thus a cell was formed 

 capable of containing the whole animal. Here 

 they remained quietly, with their abdomens in their 

 cells, and their bodies still plunged in the water; and 

 in a short time brimstone-coloured bags of eggs ap- 

 peared in each ceil, filling it about a fourth part. On 

 the 7th of July several young ones swam out from 

 one of the bags: — all this time the old ones had no- 

 thing to eat, and yet they never attacked one another 

 as other spiders would have been apt to do."* 



" These spiders," says de Geer, " spin in the 

 water a cell of strong, closely woven, white silk in 

 the form of half the shell of a pigeon''s egg, or like a 

 diving-bell. This is sometimes left partly above 

 water, but at others is entirely submersed, and is 

 always attached to the objects near it by a great num- 

 ber of irregular threads. It is closed all round, but 

 has a large opening below, which, however, I found 

 closed on the 15th of December, and the spider living 

 quietly within, with her head downwards. 1 made a 

 rent in this cell and expelled tlie air, upon which the 

 spider came out; yet though she appeared to have 

 been laid up for three months in her winter quar- 

 ters, she greedily seized upon an insect and sucked 

 it. I also found that the male as well as the female 

 constructs a similar subaqueous cell, and during 

 summer no less than in winter. "| 



Cleanliness of Spiders. 



When we look at the viscid material with which 

 spiders construct their lines and webs, and at the 



* Clerck, Aranei Snecici, Cap. viii. 



t De Geer, Mem. des Iiisectes, vii. 312. 



