SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 9 
Paralysis appeared to follow immediately on the imsertion of 
the sting. 
On any warm summer morning a very active and brilliant 
blue wasp, not so large as Pepsis, may be seen hunting in the 
long grass for the Lycoside and smaller ground-spiders. 
Thus even the well-armed spider, the terror of the insect 
world, and therefore the useful ally of man, has her conqueror; 
and such is the case throughout the insect world. I do not 
know, however, of any enemy that can subdue the repellent 
scorpion, except the aggressive black small boy, who will catch 
two of them and make them fight to the death, when he usually 
annihilates the survivor! And his elders sometimes make a 
sure-thine cure for sore eyes by suspending a live scorpion at 
the end of a string over a slow fire; and the scorched body is 
then appled to the affected organs. 
As regards the reproduction of their species, the Arachnida 
offer perhaps the most interesting study of the mechanics of 
propagation to be found in the animal kingdom; and this has 
been exhaustively worked out by Professor and Mrs. Peckham. 
In this paper, however, I will only allude to one aspect of this 
important aim of their existence. Througnout the Arachnida, 
with hardly an exception, the male is considerably smaller and 
less powerful than the female. He is seldom more than 2-3 ds. 
her size, in some cases very much smaller. But his legs are 
longer in proportion to the size of the body than his mate’s, 
hence he is the more active of the two. The reason of this is 
that the period of courtship is the most critical time of his life. 
To be successful in his suit, he needs the tact of a—Governor 
of Jamaica, and the speed of a Dan Patch in ease he falls short 
in: the former requisite. For should his advanees be ill-timed, 
his more powerful spouse, being’—like Socrates’ wife—some- 
what short-tempered, at once attacks him; and should he fail 
in speed, she solves in one operation the double problem of 
domestic supremacy and domestic economy, by killing and eat- 
ing her luckless mate. Hence, bemg the smaller of the two, 
the male’s only safety lies in superior activity, which is’ pro- 
vided by the longer legs and lighter body. 
It is worth noting, in taking leave of the subject, that though 
the orders which I have attempted to deseribe, as fully as possi- 
ble in the limits of this paper, have not been very generally 
studied, yet the interest which the class as a whole has aroused 
in men of all epochs is remarkable. The spider-folk and their 
kin appear in the hterature and folk-lore off many lands; from 
the classic and presumptuous Arachne—who gave her name to 
the Arachnida—and thus survives as an awful example, to the 
historie and somewhat one-sided partnership between King 
