No. -2.] PROTECTIVE RESEMBLANCES IN SPIDERS. 73 



ground warns her ; still, the danger does not seem imminent ; 

 she has time to make use of another power — she will render 

 herself invisible. The web begins to sway backward and for- 

 ward ; the rapidity of the motion increases ; the outlines 

 become indistinct, and within a few seconds of the first 

 movement, spider, web and all have vanished from sight ! 



If a wasp, in attacking cophinaria, becomes in the least 

 entangled in the web the position is quickly reversed. The spider 

 darts to the spot, holds the would-be destroyer, who is now the 

 victim, away from her body with her long legs, while she 

 rapidly binds it up and reduces it to a condition of perfect 

 helplessness.* 



The young cophinaria is more open to attack than the 

 adult, but is by no means so conspicuous. It is of a light, 

 somewhat greenish tint, so intermingled with dark gray as to 

 give the effect of transverse dark bands on a light ground. 

 The legs are also light, banded with a darker shade. The web 

 made by the young spider differs from that of the adult and is 

 curiously adapted to conceal it, having a thickened place in the 

 middle, which extends as far as the tips of the spider's legs 

 This thickened portion is made up of concentric lines of web 

 joined by short, transverse threads, so that it blends with the 

 banded body and legs of the spider and protects it from 

 observation. 



Cophinaria, then, is so protected, at different periods of its 

 life, that the disadvantage of its conspicuousness is, to some 

 extent, counterbalanced. How, then, shall we account for its 

 enormous number of eggs ? 



There is one stage of its existence which we have not yet 

 examined. Serious dangers assail it while it is still in the egg, 

 and hei"e, probably, is the secret of its excessive fertility. The 



* Once, when wisliing to mark a number of social wasps iVeapa maculata), 

 wMcli we had caged, we liberated a few at a time in our wire-enclosed porch, and 

 then catching them mth gloved hands, cut their wings. At the time there were three 

 or four individuals of -1 . cophinaria in the porch and many of the wasps were lost by 

 becoming entangled in their webs. The spiders bound them up very quickly, show- 

 ing no sign of fear. T". maculata is, of course, far from being so redoubtable an 

 enemy as the solitary wasp. 



