THE CHOICE OF A HOME 



of an invalid life to observing their ways and recording 

 their doings, and then wrote a beautiful book about them. 



Like our Atypus, the true trap-door spiders dig a deep 

 hole in the ground and line it with silk to prevent the sides 

 from falling in, but they add a neat little door to keep out 

 the rain and other troublesome things. The burrow is 

 usually placed in a sloping bank, or in an old, crumbling 

 terrace wall, where there are mosses and lichens growing in 

 patches, or creeping plants trailing over the ground. The 

 door, built of layers of silk, strengthened and solidified 

 with particles of soil, is round, and has a strong silken 

 hinge at one side. When situated on sloping ground, the 

 hinge is attached to the edge of the door at the highest 

 point, so that the door has a tendency to " swing to " by its 

 own weight after being opened, the closing being also 

 assisted by the elastic nature of the hinge. Now you may 

 suppose these round, silken doors dotted over the dark earth 

 are almost as conspicuous as silver coins lying upon the 

 ground, and make the discovery of the spiders 1 home a very 

 easy matter. In that case you underestimate the genius 

 of the little creature, which would never permit her to 

 advertise her presence in such a reckless manner. Instead of 

 doing so, she disguises or conceals the entrance to her home 

 with admirable art by planting moss on the outside of the 

 door living moss taken from the immediate neighbourhood 

 so that the top of the nest harmonizes perfectly with its 

 surroundings and is often exceedingly difficult to detect, 

 its discovery being in many cases made more difficult by the 

 fact that in her careful choice of a site for her dwelling the 

 spider appears to be influenced by the presence of patches 

 of white lichen which distract the eye. Some species 

 adopt a different method, weaving into the structure, or 

 fastening on with silk, dead leaves, bits of stick, grasses or 

 B 21 



