Funnel-Web Builder. 85 



which I recognized as Epeira domiciliorum. She was evidently 

 in quest of something, as I was led to suspect from her 

 seemingly thoughtful and deliberate movements. I watched 

 her closely and criticisingly for a long while, and in one of 

 her contemplative moods, when she stood perfectly motion- 

 less and fixed as it were to the railing, I reached out my 

 finger rather impulsively and began stroking her along the 

 abdomen, a familiarity which she did not resent, and which 

 seemed to give her the most intense delight. When the 

 caressing had ceased, she would turn round and confront her 

 newly-made acquaintance, but the lifting of the finger was 

 always the signal for her to assume an attitude of the most 

 perfect quiescence. That she enjoyed these little attentions 

 there cannot be a shadow of doubt, or actions are no use in 

 the interpretation of feeling. Had they been painful, she 

 would have sought relief in flight, or in the manifestation of 

 an untoward disposition towards her unintentional persecutor. 



