NETS OF SPIDERS. 133 



' The animals of this order are amply provided, by an all- 

 wise Creator, with the means of entrapping and securing 

 insects much larger than themselves for their subsistence, 

 constructing habitations for their abodes, and for the defence 

 of their offspring against the inclemency of the seasons and 

 the attacks of their enemies. The means by which these 

 effects are produced are exceedingly simple namely, the 

 secretion of two fluids by internal organs, one of which is a 

 gummy fluid exuding from an apparatus near the extremity 

 of the body, and the other is of a poisonous nature, and flows 

 from the mandibles. With the first they are enabled to con- 

 struct webs or nests of various texture and form, serving 

 for the purposes of habitation, of traps for their prey, or of 

 covering for their eggs and young : and with the latter they 

 are enabled to destroy insects larger than themselves, in a 

 very short time, for food. 



A very great diversity exists in the modes in which the 

 nests or webs of these insects are constructed, and the situ- 

 ations in which they are placed. The internal apparatus for 

 secreting the silk is lodged within the abdomen near its pos- 

 terior extremity, and consists of a small number (four or six, 

 according to the species) of twisted, elongated, and unequal- 

 sized vessels, being thickest in the middle, at the extremity 

 of which is a great number of similar vessels, but of a much 

 smaller size, and considerably shorter, and which are pressed 

 against each other, uniting in a common base, which is in 

 connexion with the external apparatus. The latter is visible 

 to the naked eye on the under side of the abdomen, appear- 

 ing, when pressed, in the shape of a small star, having several 

 small oval-shaped or sub-conical appendages, teats, or spin- 

 nerets, as we may call them, placed near the extremity of 

 the body, their extremities, when at rest, being brought into 

 contact. In the greatest number of spiders there are four of 

 these spinnerets, but in some there are six, two of which, 



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