104 INSECT TRANSFORMATIONS. 



upon its eg'g's*, because De Geer found a mother of 

 this species surrounded with a brood of thirty or forty 

 young' ones following' her as chickens follow a hen. 

 She never leaves her family ; but as soon as she 

 moves, all the young ones closely follow, and assem- 

 ble arotmd her in a cluster wherever she makes a halt. 

 De Geer once cut a branch of birch, upon which a 

 family of these bugs had assembled, and the mother 

 showed every symptom of fear and distress. Had 

 she not had a family to protect, she would have taken 

 immediate flight ; but instead of this, she kept beat- 

 ing her wings rapidly and incessantly, and never 

 stirred from her young. But even all this, affection- 

 ately maternal as it must be considered, is far from 

 authorizing the conclusion that she sits upon her 

 eggs ; thong-h it is certain she must remain near them 

 till they are hatched, unless she belong to those men- 

 tioned by Busch as ovo-viviparous f. 



One of the most common instances of something 

 similar to birds hatching their eggs occurs in several 

 species of spiders, which may be seen sitting near or 

 upon the silken bag in which they have inclosed their 

 eg-gs. Many of these mothers, however, die before 

 their young are hatched, — all of them, perhaps, when 

 the eggs are laid late in autumn. During the winter 

 of 1829-30, we watched a considerable number of the 

 geometric spiders {Epeirce) brooding over their eggs 

 for several weeks; but though the weather before 

 Christmas was litlle more than an average decree of 

 coldness, every one of them died, some living a 

 longer time, and others a shorter |. But this is not 

 the case with a very common wandering spider called 

 by Dr. Lister the wolf {Lycosa saccata, Latr.), and 

 first observed, we believe, by the celebrated Har- 

 vey §. " In order," says Swammerdam, *' to hatch 



* Intro, i.358, and iii. 101, 



I Schneider, Europiiische Schmctterlinge, i. 206. ;* J. R. 



§ Harvey, De Generatioiie. 



