No. 1.] ANT-LIKE SPIDERS OF THE FAMILY ATTID.E. 5 



The first legs are short, and support the anterior part of the 

 body. The second pair, although it is sometimes used, seems 

 not to be needed for locomotion. All the threatening and 

 similar movements made by other spiders with the first pair, 

 are with picata made with the second. 



" Spiders commonlj' remain nearly motionless while they 

 are eating ; picata, on the other hand, acts like an ant which 

 is engaged in pulling some treasure-trove into pieces convenient 

 for carrying. I have noticed a female picata which, after 

 getting possession of a gnat, kept beating it with her front legs 

 as she ate, pulling it about in different directions, and all the time 

 twitching her ant-like abdomen. Pavesi says that the ant-like 

 Drassidse and Attidee continually move their abdomens exactly 

 as ants do."* 



The pairing of these spiders, so far as we have found, 

 takes place outside the nest. In our study of the mating 

 habits of Synageles picata, we say : " The most important 

 sexual difference is the greater thickness of the first legs of the 

 male. These are flattened on the anterior surface and are of 

 a brightly iridescent steel-blue color. Unlike most of the Attid 

 males, picata keeps all his feet on the ground during his court- 

 ship ; raising himself on the tips of the posterior six he slightly 

 inclines his head downward by bending his front legs, their con- 

 vex surface being always turned forward. His abdomen is 

 lifted vertically so that it is at a right angle to the plane of the 

 cephalothorax. In this position he sways from side to side. 

 After a moment he drops the abdomen, runs a few steps nearer 

 the female, and then tips his body and begins to sway again. 

 Now he runs in one direction, now in another, pausing every 

 few moments to rock from side to side and to bend his brilliant 

 legs so that she may look full at them. * * * ^^e had six 

 females in the box and saw him mate with all of them ; and 

 each, after a time, made a cocoon containing three large eggs."t 



*Proteetive Resemblance in Spiders, Occ. Papers of Natural Hist. Soc. of Wisconsin, 

 Vol. 1, No. 2., p. 110. 



tSexual Selection in Spiders, Oce. Papers of Nat. Hist. Soc. of Wisconsin, Vol. 1, 

 No. 1., p. 43. 



