392 Mr. E. L. Layai-d's Rambles in Ceylon. 



When they were gone and the lamp was ht, I found a fresli object 

 of mterest to look at. This was the large hairy-legged spider (called 

 Tarantula by the Europeans) hunting his game. I knew they fed 

 on cockroaches {Blatta), but was not aware how they captured them: 

 now my curiosity was to be gratified ; still I am at a loss to know 

 whv the cockroach did not escape. When I first saw them they 

 were at least a yard apart, the spider with his legs slightly doubled 

 and his body raised, the cockroach facing him and directing his an- 

 tennae with an imdulating motion towards his foe. I saw the spider 

 approach by almost imperceptible degrees to within a foot : here a 

 long pause ensued, both parties eyeing each other ; sudderdy a rush, 

 a scuffle — both fell to the ground, and when the BJatta's wings 

 closed (extended, I suppose, in falling), I saw the spider had him by 

 the under side of the throat, with the body under his abdomen, and 

 supported by the last pair of legs. He retired to a comer, and after 

 some time I heard his powerful jaws at work. Next morning, before 

 daylight, I found the soft part of the body devoured, and nothing 

 but the head and the thorax, with the elytra attached, remaining. 

 When I left the shed, the remnants were moving briskly away to the 

 nearest ant's nest. So it is that nothing is lost or perishes in vain. 

 Scorpions, too, — the large black fellows I mean (Sr^orp/o afrieanvs ?) — 

 feed on Blatfee. How do they catch them ? sluggish as is the one, 

 and active as is the other. Can there be any fascination? Several 

 species of Sphegidee and a curious-shaped minute black Ichneumon 

 feed on them. A brilliant blue Sphex only attacks them in the larva 

 state. After digging a hole between the bricks of our floors, the 

 lovely fly liies away up to the roof and into odd crannies and nooks 

 where the broom cannot penetrate. Suddenly he ahghts, and, flap- 

 ping his wings, enters a crack and reappears, dragging out by the 

 horns an immature and wingless cockroach : slowly he descends the 

 wall, walking backward and leading the unresisting, disgusting ver- 

 min by the boras. Finding this slow work, he gives it a sudden 

 jerk, and, having fairly loosened it from the wall, drops it and follows 

 it to the groimd. Gaining the excavation, the doomed wretch is 

 thrust in head foremost and buried alive. 



" "SVlio enters at such griesh' door, 

 Shall ne'er, I ween, find exit more." 



As I sat reading I was attracted by a commotion in my horn-mug, 

 which, full of the muddy water we were compelled to drink, had been 

 placed at my elbow. This I found to proceed from a water beetle, 

 who had darted into it in his flight. How do these creatures so ac- 

 curately discover the position of water, even in small quantities, as to 

 be able to fly into it at once ? It is no uncommon thing, in rainy 

 weather, when the perfect insects are stirring, to hear a knock against 

 your drinkiug-glass while at table, and to find one of the numerous 

 kinds of water beetles in it, for several species have the same habit. 

 I have often watched the largest of them ascend the sides of the glass 

 by means of the suckers on the centre of the forelegs, attain the rim, 

 and take to flight again. 



