1872.] SPIDERS OF PALESTINE AND SYRIA. 219 



sitate its complete removal from Emjo : it is probably with Filistata 

 (Latr.) that its family affinities are to be found, and, in accordance 

 with this opinion, I have here placed it in the family Filistatides. 



MlLTIA DIVERSA, Sp. UOV. 



Male adult. This species resembles M. amaranthina in size, form, 

 and colour ; but it differs remarkably in the structure of the palpal 

 organs ; the digital joints of the palpi are smaller, while the form of 

 the radial joint differs but little. The palpal organs are far less pro- 

 minent and not so highly developed ; they are entirely destitute of 

 the strong, nearly black, corneous fillet, which in M. amaranthina 

 surrounds their whole outer margin just beneath the margin of the 

 digital joint. The eyes also, though similar in position, are far less 

 visible, it being difficult to see them accurately. A single example 

 was found under a stone at Hasbeiya. 



Fam. (Ecobiides. 

 Genus CEcobius (Luc). 



(Ecobius trimaculatus, sp. nov. (Plate XIII. fig. 7.) 



Male adult, length 1 line, female adult lg line. 



In general structure and characters this species is very similar 

 to CE. domesticus (Luc.) and (E. annulipes (id.), as also to (E. ma- 

 cula tus (Sim.) ; but it differs from all three in the relative position 

 of the eyes, and notably from the first two in colour and markings. 



The male has the cephalothorax of the deepest black-brown colour : 

 the eyes are not very unequal in size ; they are placed in a compact 

 group on an elevation of the caput, which rises gradually from the 

 surrounding surface, but leaves a considerable and prominent clypeus, 

 the margin of which is pointed in the centre ; they are eight in 

 number (that is if two flat, irregularly formed, shining white spaces, 

 looking like rudimentary or atrophied eyes*, are really eyes or their 

 representatives), and may be described as in two transverse curved 

 rows of four each ; the two lateral eyes on each side of the front row 

 are near together, the inner ones being the largest of the eight ; close 

 behind each of these pairs is the lateral eye, on either side of the 

 hinder row, forming with the pair in front of it a triangle in which 

 all the eyes are about equally distant from each other. Each of the 

 two eyes forming the central pair of the hinder row is depressed, of 

 a bent oblong form, placed obliquely to and distinctly separated from 

 the lateral on its sitle. 



* These two eyes (the two middle ones of the hinder row) have not been con- 

 sidered to be eyes by either M. Lucas, who founded the genus, or Mr. Blackwal], 

 who lias since described a new species of it. M. Simon, however, as well as Dr. 

 Thorell, consider them to be true eyes. Not having had an opportunity of examining 

 them under a lens of high power, I cannot speak positively on the point ; but m v 

 impression is that they are undeveloped eyes, or perhaps the sites where perfect 

 ims once existed, but which have now become, from some train of causes, devoid 

 of ocular structure properly so called. Imperfectly developed eyes exist also in 

 some other species of Spiders. 



