298 Miscellaneous. 



(i. e. forty-eight hours after the discovery of the state) the two 

 carapaces were separated. 



After treatment with osmium-chromium-acetic acid and staining 

 with picrocarmiue, the two carapaces were mounted in shellac. 

 When carefully crushed only one of them appeared to be filled with 

 protoplasm, while the other was quite empty. T was able to recog- 

 nize bv definite characters that the carapace previously distinguished 

 as the lighter one was now the empty one. In the isolated plasma 

 of the darker-coloured carapace there were two entire nuclei and 

 one in course of breaking up. The two entire nuclei showed in a 

 lio-hter-colourcd basal substance a great number of small darker 

 corpuscles, and further a distinctly double-contoured, colourless, 

 nuclear membrane was distinguishable. Among the products of 

 disintegration of the third nucleus a darker-coloured central body 

 is more or less clearly distinguishable within th-e less coloured prin- 

 cipal mass. 



I have interpreted the process above described as a copulation, 

 although I did not observe the union of originally separate indivi- 

 duals. As there can be no question of division in this case it could 

 only be urged against my interpretation that we might here have 

 to do with the known process of rejuvenescence, in which an animal, 

 after forming a new shell around the gradually protruding proto- 

 plasm, finally quits the old one. I think, however, that this objec- 

 tion will be disposed of by the observation of the lively pseudopodial 

 action at the commencement of the process, as also by the breaking 

 up of one of the nuclei, and by the fact that at the end of the 

 whole process it was not the lighter but the darker carapace that 

 contained the protoplasmic body. All this is not in accordance with 

 the phenomena observed in rejuvenescence. I will also not omit to 

 mention that a great number of Biffltuj'uv of the same species which 

 were in the same watch-glass, on careful examination showed only 

 one or two nuclei with a single large nucleolus. 



If am not mistaken, then, in interpreting the observed process as 

 a copulation, we obtain the following facts : — 



1. In the llhizopoda, as in the Infusoi'ia, a copulation occurs. 



2. As in the Infusoria a stage of depressed vital energy occurs 

 here during the copulation. 



3. As a consequence of the process there is also a breaking-up of 

 the cell-nucleus. — Zoologisclw Ameiger, no. 174, August 18, 1884, 

 1>. 449. 



How Lycosa fabricates her' Hound Cocoon. 

 Dr. H. C. McCook said that while walking in the suburbs of 

 Philadelphia lately, he found under a stone a female Xycos« (probably 

 L. riparia, Hentz), which he placed in a jar partly fiUed with dry 

 earth. Tor two days the spider remained on the surface of the soil, 

 nearly inactive. The earth was then moistened, whereupon (May 2) 

 she immediately began to dig, continuing until she had made a 

 cavity about one inch in depth and height. The top was then 

 carefully covered over with a tolerably closely woven sheet of white 



