18/6.] REV. O. P. CAMBRIDGE ON EGYPTIAN SPIDERS. 511 



3. Catalogue of a Collection of Spiders made in Egypt, 

 with Descriptions of new Species and Characters of a 

 new Genus. By the Rev. O. P. Cambridge, M.A., 

 C.M.Z.S., and Hon. Memb. New-Zeal. Institute. 



[Received May 31, 187l>.] 

 (Plates LVIII.-LX.) 



Since the time of Savigny, who, in conjunction with Audouin 

 (a.d. 1809-13), figured and described about eighty-four species of 

 Araneidea in his great work on Egypt, very little has been done in 

 this particular branch of Egyptian zoology. The chief, if not all, of 

 the later additions to the known Spiders of those regions are several 

 species of Drassides (a portion of the present collection) published 

 in the 'Proceedings' of the Zoological Society, 1872, pp. 224-247, 

 and nineteen others of the same family and collection, likewise pub- 

 lished in the Zoological Society's ' Proceedings,' 1 874, p. 370 et seq. 

 Dr. Ludwig Koch also records and describes, in ' /Egyptische und 

 Abyssinische Arachniden,' Niirnberg, 1875, nineteen species of 

 Araneidea, found near Cairo by Herr C. Jickeli. Egyptian ento- 

 mology in general appears to have received comparatively little 

 attention, considering the great number of tourists and naturalists 

 who have visited the Nile during the last fifteen or twenty years. 

 Probably this has arisen in a great measure from the superior at- 

 tractions offered by the birds of that rich ornithological region ; a 

 strong and very decided love of Insects and Arachnids would be 

 required to make these more attractive to most travellers than the 

 numerous feathered tribes. There are regions of the world where 

 the size, the number, aud the beauty (or ugliness, as it may be) of 

 the Insect and Arachnid orders almost oblige the most indifferent 

 observers to note and collect them ; but Egypt is decidedly not such 

 a region. We have a strong proof of this in a lately published 

 lecture on the Rambles of a Naturalist in Egypt, by Mr. J. H. 

 Gurney, jun. ; a notice before me of this lecture says, " Mr. Gurney 

 briefly alluded to the entomology of the country, which appears to 

 consist of fleas, flies, and mosquitoes." It would argue a tough 

 skin, and indifference to entomology indeed, were a naturalist, or 

 any other traveller, to pass over these without notice, so very close 

 and persistent are their attentions ; and perhaps more attention 

 would be paid to entomology (in a wider sense) were their attentions 

 rather less pertinacious. As it is, however, the " fleas, flies, and 

 mosquitoes " are numerous and persistent enough to make it im- 

 possible to escape them, while others of this class (Spiders included) 

 are comparatively scarce, and, generally speaking, so little attractive, 

 from their usually small size and sombre colouring, as to require 

 close observation and careful search to obtain any thing like a fair 

 representation of their indigenous forms. Still any naturalist with 



Proc. Zool. Soc.— 1876, No. XXXVI. 36 



