1817.] from one Point to another. 307 
spiders of this class possess, I filled a plate with water; and having 
put a piece of pipe-clay between two and three inches in diameter 
into the middle of it, [ stuck a straw about a foot long into the 
clay, so as to stand perpendicularly, and placed two small dry 
stones on each side of the straw to cover the clay, lest the opera- 
tions of the spider should be impeded by its moisture. I then put 
a geometrical spider on the straw, and set the plate on a table at 
some distance from any object. The spider ran up and down the 
stones and the straw the whole day, without making its escape. The 
water was particularly offensive to it when it touched it, as it 
always ran back immediately whenever it came into contact with it. 
I left it on the table all night, and in the morning it had made its 
escape. 1 observed a line drawn from the top of the straw to the 
roof of the room, and fixed there, at a distance of about four or 
five feet. The thread was almost straight upwards. I could not 
conceive how it accomplished this, without supposing that it had 
either flown in some way, or had shot out its thread to that length 
before it went off. 
I got another spider of the same kind; and having put it on the 
straw, it endeavoured to make a passage from its confinement much 
more readily than the first. Having dropped down by its line about 
an inch from the top of the straw, it seemed to fix its thread round 
its middle legs, and resting itself while hanging in this way against 
the straw with its head and fore legs. Its hindmost legs being 
stretched out behind it, ina few moments it shot out a thread 
from its spinners about a yard long. The thread went straight out, 
rising gradually upwards. It continued floating in this way for a 
minute or two, when the spider turned round, took hold of it with 
its fore legs, and began to pull it in. The thread was flying so 
much upwards as to form a very acute angle with the short line 
upon which the spider rested; but when the spider drew it in, it 
became more horizontal. It appeared to guide its line as a bo 
does a kite. While it drew in the threads very quickly with its fore 
legs, what was taken in was formed into a round ball upon its 
hindmost legs, which was left upon the straw. It seemed in calm 
air to have the power of making the line move slowly round it, 
like a long feeler. When the thread was blown upon, so as to 
change its position, and throw it into waves, it quickly returned to 
irs former place and elongated form. It at last caught hold of the 
arm of a chair within its reach; and as the thread continued hang- 
ing loose, the spider pulled it in, till it became tight ; and when it 
found it sufficiently fastened to bear it, it ran along it, strengthen- 
ing it by another thread much thicker as it moved on. ‘The spider 
being very young, it was very difficult to observe the thread, on 
account of its great tenuity ; but I was much assisted in perceiving 
it by the particles of dust which stuck to it. I tried the same ex- 
periment with several other geometric spiders, aud observed nearly 
the same results; but as they are mostly very young at present, it 
GZ 
