COMPARATIVE COCOONING INDUSTRIES. 



161 



During this and the earlier part of her weaving it seemed to me that 

 the silk escaped from the posterior pair of spinnerets alone. It came out 



as white silk with a little yellowish cast in it, bearing a pretty 

 Jif e d gloss. The spinnerets were widely flared, and the silk issued in 



several filaments. The hind leg was thrown upward as 'the 

 spider moved and seized these filaments with the foot, apparently using 

 all the spines from the claws upward to the tarsal joint, and even part of 

 the metatarsus. The thread was carried away from the abdomen rather 

 slowly toward the cocoon. (Figs. 194 and 195. 1 ) At the same moment,' 

 also, the abdomen approached the cocoon without touching it. Between 

 the spinnerets and the spider's foot the silken filaments were stretched 

 taut (Fig. 196), and after the first gentle motion of approximating the 

 cocoon the abdomen was swung in the opposite direction; that is, away 



FIG. 194. 



FIG. 195. 



FIGS. 194, 195. The action of Argiope in drawing out silk with the spinning legs. The 

 alternation of the legs appears by comparing the figures. 



from the foot, so that the intervening stream of silken threads was drawn 

 out to a considerable distance, sometimes as far as three-quarters of an 

 inch. In the meantime that portion of the outspun threads between the 

 spider's foot and the point at which the line was attached to the cocoon, 

 of course, relaxed and doubled up into a curled loop of several strings ; 

 and in this condition it was when the leg finally touched the 

 Laying cocoon. (See Fig. 196.) With a quick movement the thread 

 T was slipped off the leg and pushed into the mass of spinning- 



work already accumulated. It at once adhered, though no viscid 

 material appeared to be intermingled therewith, and added its flossy loops 

 to the mass that had been spun before. The position of the leg and spin- 

 nerets during this action is represented at Fig. 197. 



1 These two figures were made from a second spider with full complement of legs. 



