Arachnida 199 



spicuous objects hanging beneath their hammock-like webs 

 in bushes and herbage, and also a multitude of forms only to 

 be discovered by searching carefully among the grass and 

 sedge. Among the latter are many rare fen species, though 

 the group is not one which can lay claim to any particular 

 beauty. 



EPEIRIDAE. These are the spinners of the familiar circular 

 snare, and include the common garden spider Epeira dia- 

 demata. More than twenty species are locally recorded, and 

 they include the handsome E. pyramidata, which, however, 

 is rare, and E. sclopetaria, which is tolerably plentiful. It is 

 in this group that the male runs the singular risk of being 

 summarily trussed up and devoured by the female if she 

 chances to be hungry when he is paying his attentions, and 

 he always approaches her snare with a hesitation which is 

 perhaps scarcely to be wondered at. The spinning operations 

 of the Epeiridae are much aided by the extreme mobility of 

 the abdomen, which is united to the cephalothorax by a very 

 narrow pedicle. 



THOMISIDAE. From their latigrade motion, and the general 

 crab-like appearance of many of these spiders, they are popu- 

 larly known as crab-spiders. About fifteen species are found 

 in Cambridgeshire. Among the rare Wicken species are 

 Xysticus pini, Oxyptila trux, 0. atomaria and Thanatus 

 striatus, while Oxyptila simplex is found on Fleam Dyke. 



LYCOSIDAE. These are the " wolf- spiders," examples of 

 which may be often seen in vast numbers running over the 

 ground among dead leaves and herbage. In the breeding 

 season the females carry the egg-cocoon on all their expedi- 

 tions, attached by silken threads to their spinnerets, and when 

 the young hatch out they mount on the mother's back. Some 

 make a silk-lined burrow in the ground. The most interesting 

 local form is Lycosa farrennii, which is extremely common 

 in Wicken Fen though not found elsewhere, unless Simon 

 is correct in thinking that he has recently met with it near 

 Paris, 



