44 REV. O. p. CAMBRIDGE ON NEW ARANEIDEA. [Feb. 5, 



clothed with grey hairs. The spinners are short, and in front of 

 the ordinary ones is a transverse spinning-organ, always found 

 correlated with the calamistrum on the fourth pair of legs. 



The 7nale, besides being very much smaller than the female, has 

 the cephalothorax of a very deep black-brown hue, with a marginal 

 stripe on each side and in fronc of white hairs, and a narrow longi- 

 tudinal stripe of the same kind bisecting the ocular area, and a few 

 other white hairs near the posterior eyes and on the occiput. The 

 legs are longer than in the female, especially those of the first pair ; 

 they are of a bright orange-red colour, the femora and tibiae of the 

 first pair suffused with blackish, the tibiae rather enlarged and 

 thickly clothed with long black hairs ; besides other hairs all the 

 legs are furnished more or less with some white ones on their upper 

 side. The abdomen is of a deep black-browu hue, with a pale yellow- 

 brown longitudinal central tapering stripe, clothed with white hairs, 

 and reaching a transverse bar of the same kind just above the 

 spinners ; and on the underside are two oblique, elongate pale spots 

 or patches similarly clothed, and placed transversely near the 

 spiracular plates. The palpi are short and of a black-brown hue ; 

 the radial joint is shorter than the cubital ; this latter joint has a 

 fore margin of conspicuous white hairs ; digital joint rather large, 

 and its fore extremity drawn out. The palpal organs are simple, 

 consisting of a roundish basal bulb, with a son.ewhat twisted paler 

 process at its anterior side reaching not quite to the end of the 

 digital joint. The sternum is black, clothed with coarse pale grey 

 hairs. 



A nest of this spider containing numerous live individuals of both 

 sexes, some adult, some immature, was sent a short time ago by 

 Col. Bowker, from Durban, to Lord Walsingham, who, kindly acting 

 on my suggestion, sent the whole to this Society's Gardens, where, 

 as I understand from Mr. Arthur Thomson, in whose care they 

 are placed, the whole family are in a very active and thriving 

 state. The nest is of considerable size, and filled a box of 2 feet 

 long by 9 inches wide and 5 deep. Above this nest I hear that the 

 spiders have now spun lines up to the top of the case in which they 

 have been placed, as though for the ensnaring of flies, &c. ; but as 

 their work is entirely nocturnal, no observations have yet been 

 practicable in respect to this most interesting part of a spider's 

 economy. They appear to devour cockroaches and crickets, tearing 

 them to pieces in concert, and each carrying off his share of the 

 prey, like a pack of hounds breaking up a fox. 



This spider is allied to Stegodyphus acanthophilus, Dufour, of 

 Southern Europe, Palestine, and Syria, but is smaller, differs greatly 

 in colour and markings, and is, so far as I am aware, unique in its 

 gregarious habits. Some of the examples had died during the long 

 transit from Durban to England, and from these the descriptions 

 have been made. 



