SPIDER GOSSIP. 



The ducts which connect them with the discharge-tubes are 

 gathered into Httle bundles. Below these are the spindle-shaped 

 glands which supply the lower spinners, and Fig. lo is a section of 

 one of them. It is, like all the other shapes, a little bag coated 

 with layers of cells which have the property of absorbing the silk 

 elements from the blood, and transferring them as liquid silk to 

 the interior of the bag. Besides all these small glands the spider 



Group of silk glands of Epeira diadema, which serve the first or second 

 pair of spinners. Magnified 110 diameters. 



has about a dozen very large ones, similar in construction, which 

 supply two or three very large discharge-tubes on each spinneret. 

 Two of the large glands are shown in the former Fig. i, below the 

 ovary, which contains eggs. The position of the large discharge- 

 tubes does not allow them to be clearly seen in the present Fig. 7, 

 but one is drawn separately at a, Fig. 8. I conjecture that their 

 use is to supply the sticky fluid of the web, i.e., to glue each 

 thread into a solid mass, to fasten it down to a leaf, etc., and 

 perhaps to form the viscid globules (Fig. 12), which make a garden 

 spider's web sticky. This is only guessing, and I have grave 



