132 HOMES WITHOUT HANDS. 



bird, that, failing a credible eye-witness, the story was not be- 

 lieved. That want, however, has been recently supplied, for Mr. 

 H. W. Bates, who spent eleven years upon the banks of the Ama- 

 zon Eiver, has been an eye-witness to the murder of a small bird 

 by a great spider, and the question is now finally set at rest. 



"In the course of our walk, I chanced to verify a fact relating 

 to the habit of a large hairy spider, belonging to the genus My- 

 gale, in a manner worth recording. The species was M. avicula- 

 ria, or one very closely allied to it; the individual was nearly 

 two inches in length of body, but the legs expanded seven inches, 

 and the entire body and hair were covered with coarse gray and 

 reddish hairs. I was attracted by a movement of the monster on 

 a tree-trunk; it was close beneath a deep crevice in the tree, 

 across which was stretched a dense white web. The lower part 

 of the web was broken, and two small birds, finches, were entan- 

 gled in the pieces. They were about the size of the English sis- 

 kin, and I judged the two to be male and female. One of them 

 was quite dead, and the other lay under the body of the spider, 

 not quite dead, and was smeared with the filthy liquor or saliva 

 exuded by the monster. I drove away the spider, and took the 

 birds, but the second one soon died. ... I found the circum- 

 stance to be quite a novelty to the residents hereabout." 



One of these spiders, kindly presented to me by Mr. Bates, is 

 now before me, and after examining the terrible fangs as they lie 

 folded under the head, and the enormous power of the long, 

 clinging legs, I believe that a small bird would stand a very poor 

 chance of life if once entangled in the fatal clutch. There are sev- 

 eral species of Mygale, some of which are great burrowers, mak- 

 ing holes of considerable depth. One species, Mygale Blondii, 

 which is easily known by the yellow stripes which run down its 

 limbs, is an admirable burrower, digging tunnels of two feet in 

 depth, and rather wide, and lining them with a silken coating, so 

 as to prevent the earth from falling in. In the evening, the spi- 

 der may be seen at the mouth of its hole, evidently watching sur- 

 rounding events, but as soon as it perceives an approaching foot- 

 step, it pops back into the dark recesses of the tunnel, and will 

 not make its appearance for some time afterward. Others live 

 under stones ; and others, again, make their dens in the thatched 

 roofs of houses. The natives do not seem to entertain any feel- 

 ings of abhorrence toward these creatures, which to a European 

 mind are so repulsive ; for Mr. Bates once saw a group of children 



