THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 253 



exigencies of the position), and the entrance appears to be 

 always at the earthward end; i.e., the lube seems always to 

 run upwards. One of the tubes submitted to me was 

 constructed in the channelled groove of a piece of wood 

 which had apparently formed part of some building or other. 

 The shortness of the tubes, compared with those made in the 

 ground by some species of Nemesia and Cteniza, is remark- 

 able, as is also the position in which they are found ; the lid, 

 too, differs from all yet known to me, in being a compound 

 of the two great types into which Mr. Moggeridge has divided 

 those already known^ — the 'cork' and 'wafer' types. Lids of 

 the former are of solid construction, and fit into the mouth of 

 the tube like a short cork, without any projecting margin ; 

 those of the second (or wafer) type are flatter, of much 

 slighter or thinner make, and simply shut down upon the 

 mouth of the tube. That, however, of the nest under consi- 

 deration is of the 'cork' type, with a projecting 'wafer' 

 margin ; the cork portion is less thick than that of the 

 typical 'cork' lid, but distinctly thicker than the margin, and 

 fits into the tube, while the margin covers its edges so closely 

 and completely that the nest is entirely concealed, — the outer 

 side of the lid, like that of the exposed parts of the tube, 

 exactly resembling the surrounding surface of the bark. The 

 use of the spines on the falces of Nemesia (and Cteniza) is 

 to excavate the hole in which the tube is made ; but, as the 

 present spider forms its nest in channels already made, these 

 spines would be useless, and hence their absence ; or perhaps 

 it would be truer to say that the spider, not being furnished 

 with the necessary implements, but gifted with the trap-door 

 nest-making instinct, has thus fixed upon a position in which 

 excavation is needless. Further details of form, colour, and 

 structure, would be probably out of place here; but I hope 

 shortly to prepare a more minute scientific description, with 

 drawings of the spider and its nest, for publication in the 

 Proceedings of the Zoological Society. With regard to its 

 specific name, I propose to call this very valuable and 

 interesting addition to our trap-door spiders, Moggridgea 

 Dyeri, after its discoverer, Dr. Dyer, of Uitenhage, South 

 Africa; and I would ask that gentleman to use his evidently 

 keen powers of observation (or the discovery of the male sex, 

 which would no doubt present far stronger and more 



