320 REV. O. P. CAMBRIDGE ON SPIDERS [Apr. 20, 



3. On some new and little-known Spiders of the Genus 

 Argijrodes, Sim. By tlie Eev. O. P. Cambridge, M.A., 

 C.M.Z.S., &c. 



[Eeceived April 1, 1880.] 



(Plates XXVIII.-XXX.) 



Tlie Spiders described in tlie present paper have been received at 

 various times during the last few years from widely distant exotic 

 reo-ions South America, East Indies, Ceylon, South Africa, Mada- 

 gascar, Samoa Island, and Amboina ; and I now beg leave to record 

 my thanks to those kind friends who have either collected them 

 for me or sent them to me, viz. Mr. Frederick Bond, Major Julian 

 Hobson (H.M.S. Staff Corps, Bombay), Professor Traill (Univ. 

 Aberdeen), Mr. G. H. K. Thwaitcs (15otanic Gardens, Ceylon), 

 Mr. Henry Rogers (of Freshwater, Isle of Wight), the Rev. J. 

 Whitmee (of the Samoa Islands), Mr. H. H. B. Bradley (of Sydney, 

 N.S.W.), Capt. F. W. Hutton (of New Zealand), Mr. J. P. Mansel 

 Weale (of South Africa), and Mr. R. H. Meade (of Bradford, York- 

 shire) . 



Few Spiders are equal to those of the genus Argxjrodes (and none 

 exceed them) in the brilliancy of their hues. Some of them look 

 like drops of burnished silver suspended in their snares ; and one of 

 those here recorded, Argyrodes scintilhdana (p. 332), resembles a bit 

 of jet studded with diamonds. Their structure also is of a very 

 marked and distinctive kind. The abdomen is subject to a greater or 

 less abnormal development of the posterior extremity, but varying in 

 the two sexes ; and the caput (in the male sex) is almost invariably 

 developed into a form which makes some of them resemble very closely 

 some species of the ^&\\nsWalckenaera (BL). The fore extremity of 

 the caput is produced and split into two lobes or segments by a more 

 or less deep transverse indentation or cleft. There is, however, a very 

 marked and constant difference between these two genera in respect 

 of the position of the eyes. In Argyrodes no eyes are ever found on 

 the lower segment of the caput, while in Walchena'era the eyes of the 

 fore-central pair are always placed either in front of it or at its ex- 

 tremity. Another very obvious characteristic of Argyrodes is the 

 great length and slenderness of the first two pairs of legs, though 

 in this respect, as well as in the development of the abdomen, 

 Argyrodes is far surpassed by the Spiders of an allied and, in some 

 respects, still more curious genus, Ariamnes, Thor. {Ariadne, Dol.). 

 The adult females of some (perhaps all) species of Argyrodes are 

 subject to the apparently adventitious addition to their genital pro- 

 cess of a bright, transparent, reddish, resinous-looking accretion. 

 This often gives an abnormal appearance to the genital aperture ; and 

 it has been mistaken by Mr. Blackwall for part of the process itself 

 {vide description of Epeira cognata, Bl., Proc. R. Irish Acad. 1877, 

 2nd ser. vol. iii. pp. 17, 18). I feel, however, quite convinced that 



