VOL. XXII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 5g5 



These eggs were almost round, and the axis of one of them was about the 

 30th part of an inch ; and when they lay altogether, they made a roundish 

 body, whose axis was half an inch, but looking upon them sidewise, their 

 diameter appeared a quarter of an inch ; from whence it is very easy to calculate 

 what a vast number of eggs one spider will lay. On a narrow view of this large 

 heap of eggs, that lay in order by one another, one would think it impossible 

 for such a number to proceed from the body of one spider. But the wonder 

 will cease, when we consider that the eggs are not exactly round while they lie 

 in the spider's body, but being pressed together they assume particular figures. 

 These eggs being round and lying in order, and touching each other only in 

 one point, must needs take up more room than when they lay in the spider's 

 belly. The membrane or shell of these eggs is very weak, so that in endeavour- 

 ing to separate them, for they stick together by a viscous matter, I could not 

 help oftentimes breaking them. 



On the last of October, about five in the evening, I observed that another 

 spider had made its web against the sides of the glass-tube, to lodge its eggs 

 there ; and whereas before I could not imagine how the spider had placed its 

 eggs in the middle of the glass, I was now fully satisfied in that matter, for I 

 saw plainly that she made her web like a thick bed against the glass, that as 

 yet there were no eggs in it ; and it was remarkable that this bed was not flat, 

 but had a well-contrived hoUowness within it, not exactly round, but oval. About 

 40 minutes after, viewing the spider again, I found that the bed was not only 

 full of eggs, but that there was a large heap of them standing above the bed, 

 and the spider very busy in covering them with her web on every side, using 

 her two hinder feet as well as her breech to fasten the threads that proceeded 

 from thence, and to range them all in order ; all her working instruments were 

 open, and all of them seemed to be delivering out thread for the work ; some- 

 times she raised up her body a straw's breadth, then removed it as much, that 

 the threads might have a freer passage, and cover her eggs the better. When 

 she was delivered of all her eggs, her body was not the fourth part so large as 

 before ; and though lately smooth and distended, it was now full of wrinkles 

 and cavities. 



Being desirous to see how the spider laid her eggs, on the 7th of November 

 I had my wish in some measure ; for I saw 6 or 8 eggs laid, which did not issue 

 from the hindmost part of the body, as in all other animals, but from the 

 upper part of the belly, not far from the hind legs, where is a sort of hook of 

 a particular form ; this hook came partly over the opening from which the eggs 

 proceed. I could have wished indeed, that I had come sooner to the laying of 

 the eggs, that I might have mentioned it with greater certainty, for the spider, 



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