1897] NOTES AND COMMENTS 227 
Mr G. H. K. Marshall, the observer, seems inclined to attribute the 
sound produced to ‘“‘trituration of the creature’s powerful jaws 
against the hard ground in which they seem to prefer to dig their 
holes, the operation being performed with the jaws, and the sound 
ceasing when the spider stops digging.” Although Mr Marshall 
kept them alive he failed to detect any stridulation, though they 
made a considerable noise by energetically biting at the sides of the 
boxes, one of them nearly succeeding in escaping by gnawing its way 
through at one spot. A further note is to the effect that the 
Solfugae succumb more rapidly to the cyanide bottle than the ordinary 
spiders or scorpions; and Mr Pocock, in quoting Mrs Monteiro, to 
the effect that a large black scorpion was confined eight hours in a 
strong poison bottle before it succumbed, states that this is no doubt 
due to the fact of the richer development of the respiratory system 
in Solpuge. A further note of Mr Marshall’s corroborates Hutton’s 
observation as to the use of the terminal organ on the palpus. This 
is a gelatinous fan-shaped sucker with which the animal has the 
power of picking up objects, probably prey, and conveying them to 
its mandibles. The principal food of the Solpugae, according to 
Mr Marshall, are termites, “a small species which makes no mound, 
but builds mud tunnels along the surface of the ground among dead 
leaves, sticks, etc. When the Solpuga comes across such tunnelling 
it examines along it carefully, then suddenly breaks through the 
mud and extracts a termite, the presence of which it detects, I 
suppose, by either hearing or touch.” 
The evidence as to the poisonous nature of these animals varies. 
A Kaffir boy declared them very poisonous, sometimes fatally so, 
and a bite supposed to be from S. darlingii did not subside till the 
fourth day; on the other hand, Mr J. M. Hutchinson of Estcourt, 
Natal, finds the bite of S. hustilis “ to be quite harmless, the forceps 
being unable to pierce the tenderest skin.” 
THE BRITISH PLEISTOCENE MOLLUSCA 
In 1890 a valuable summary of the Pleistocene (non-marine) 
mollusca of the London district was published in the Proceedings of 
the Geologists’ Association by Mr B. B. Woodward. This paper treated 
the material from a geographical point of view, describing the geology 
of the localities where the shells were found, and concluded with a 
valuable table of distribution, in which were distinguished the living 
and extinct species. It was hoped that Mr Woodward would extend 
his researches into other districts, and we have now to welcome a 
second paper by Mr A. S. Kennard and himself, to which Mr W. M. 
Webb has contributed, on the Post-Pliocene (non-marine) mollusca 
of Essex (Hssex Naturalist, x., pp. 87-109). This paper is treated 
