198 Transactions.— Zoology. 
concave one. When the spider is laid in such a glass on its back, the glass is 
as nearly as practicable filled with spirit, and the flat glass which may be 
square and a little larger all round than the other, is sized down upon it. 
The spider may then be seen in every direction, and it looks, in fact, like a 
living creature swimming inside. The objections to this mode are its compara- 
tive costliness, and the impossibility of avoiding the inevitably enclosed air- 
bubble; as regards the latter, however, its presence might be rendered 
harmless by slightly tilting the whole in the cabinet drawer; this fully 
presents the spider to the eye, and frees it also from contact with the air- 
bubble. Spiders, however, so preserved are sealed up from all higher 
scientific purposes, such as the minute examination, under a strong lens, of 
special portions of structure, and their often necessary dissection. 
Another mode, which T have practised successfully myself, is far easier, less 
eostly, and leaves the spider free for any scientific investigation, while it is yet 
made a pleasing object for ordinary observers. My modus operandi is first to 
catch the spider in a pill-box ; it is then rendered motionless in a minute or 
two by а few drops of chloroform allowed to run into the box through the 
slightly opened lid; when perfectly insensible it is set out and secured in a 
natural position on a piece of wood or cork, by means of pins placed wherever 
needed (except through any part of the spider) ; the whole is then placed in a 
shallow jar, deep enough, however, to allow of sufficient spirit being poured in 
to cover the spider completely ; the jar is then covered over, and allowed to 
remain undisturbed until the limbs have become sufficiently rigid, by the 
action of the spirit, to allow of the removal of the pins without affecting the 
natural position of the spider; this will take place in a week or ten days, 
more or less, according to circumstances ; the longer it is allowed to remain, 
the less chance there is of the legs curling up afterwards. When removed, 
after the limbs have become rigid, the spider is put carefully, with the fore- 
legs downward, into a test-tube just large enough to admit it freely, without 
unduly compressing the legs, the tube having previously had a slip of white 
card-board inserted into it, exactly the width of the diameter of the tube, and 
about three-fourths of its length ; this slip of card is to form a back-ground to 
the spider, and to keep it steadily in one position ; the tube is then filled 
perfectly full of clean spirit of wine, a parchment label containing the name of 
the spider is inserted in an inverted position, so as to coil round next to the 
glass, just above the spider, and the tube's mouth is pretty firmly stopped with 
a pledget of cotton wool, after which it is placed, wool downwards, in a broad- 
. mouthed, glass-stoppered bottle, large enough to contain from five to fifteen, 
or so, tubes, when ranged within in a single row close to the glass, and kept 
in place by the whole vacant centre being firmly filled in with cotton-wool ; 
the glass-stoppered bottle thus packed, is then filled up nearly to the brim 
