SPIDERS. 319 



way down. Eacli 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 thiis 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 appeared in each cell, 

 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 nothing 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 number 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. I made a rent 

 in this cell, and expelled the air, upon which the spider came 

 out ; yet though she appeared to have been laid u]3 for three 

 months in her winter quarters, 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."! We have recently kept 

 one of these spiders for several months in a glass of water, 

 where it built a cell half under water, in which it laid its 

 eggs. 



Cleanliness op Spiders. 



When we look at the viscid material with which spiders 

 construct their lines and webs, and at the rough, hairy 

 covering (with a few exceptions) of their bodies, we might 

 conclude, that they would be always stuck over with frag- 

 ments of the minute fibres which they produce. This, 



* Clerck, Aranei Suecici, cap. viii. 



t De Geer, Me'm. des lusectes, vii. 312. 



