PREF A (!:. 



souglit to marshal the facts in hand for or against this or that philoso- 

 phy of life and its origin. Indeed, my aim has heen to write a natural 

 history, and not a philosophy thereof. Yet I have here and there alluded 

 to matters with which current thinking has much to do. This fact may 

 also tend to make this volume more generally interesting than the preced- 

 ing or succeeding one. 



I have not found the difficulties of my task lessened, but rather in- 

 creased in treating these features of the history. Spiders arc solitary and 

 secretive at the best, and these characteristics have reached their highest 

 expression in those acts cocooning, for example with which a large part 

 of Volume II. is concerned. It has thus been unusually difficult to secure 

 a continuous authentic record of habits. Then, again, these studies have 

 necessarily .been only the recreations of a busy professional life, whose en- 

 gagements have rapidly multiplied, and been more onerous and exacting 

 in the last six years than ever before. These off labors have, therefore, 

 continually receded or been suspended before the pressing and more se- 

 rious obligations of duty. Nevertheless, I am glad to have done so much, 

 and have great satisfaction in the hope that others, stimulated by my 

 labors, may pass on through the vestibule where I must stop, and explore 

 the vast temple of aranead lore that lies beyond. 



I have spoken of my task as substantially completed. I do not forget 

 that the Third Volume yet remains to be finished, and that it is the most 

 costly, and, in some respects, the most -difficult of all. But much of the 

 work thereon is already done, and I feel justified in finishing it in a more 

 leisurely way. That volume, with the exception of two chapters, will be 

 devoted to species work, and will present, as far as it seems to me neces- 

 sary for identification, descriptions of the Orb weaving fauna of the United 

 States. These will be illustrated by a number of lithographic plates, 

 drawn in the best style of art and colored by hand from Nature. Plate 

 IV. of the five colored plates in the present volume will best illustrate 

 the character of those which are to follow. To the above I will add some 

 species of other tribes whose habits have had especial notice in this work. 



I have now said all that I expect to make public of my observations 

 of spider manners, with the exception of one chapter on General Habits, 

 which I have reserved for the opening pages of Volume III., and, per- 

 haps, a second chapter, which may be necessary for the explanation and 

 enlargement of matters to which attention may be called by those who 

 have followed me in the preceding studies. 



