Arachnida. 7147. 



covered, during the last two or three years, raore new British species 

 than had been added to the Ust for many years before. 



I am happy to know that the greatest impediment to the advance- 

 ment of my favourite pursuit is on the point of being removed ; for 

 the long-promised work on British spiders, by Mr. Black wall, is at 

 last in the press, and the first volume will, I hope, very soon be pub- 

 lished by the Ray Society, with numerous and accurate figures by 

 Mr. Tufl5n West. As soon as this appears, naturalists will no longer 

 have any excuse for neglecting these most interesting objects of study. 



In my earliest communications to the 'Zoologist' I entered into the 

 subject of preserving spiders; and the further experience of years has 

 fully confirmed me in still advocating the plan I first proposed, viz., 

 that of putting up specimens in small glass tubes filled with spirits of 

 wine. For the larger specimens I use the ordinary rectified spirit of 

 the druggists, and for small species two parts of this mixed with one 

 part of water. The only alteration I have adopted is in having the 

 lubes converted into small bottles, by the formation of a slight con- 

 striction or neck near the mouth, so that the cork can be compressed 

 and the rapid evaporation of the spirit prevented. 



1 preserved some specimens for three or four years in a strong 

 solution of sulphate of magnesia ; and with a iew it answered ad- 

 mirably, but in most cases 1 found the colours to become dark and 

 altered in the course of time. I put up a number of species in this 

 saline solution, and gave them to the Entomological Society of Lon- 

 don five years ago, but I have not seen them since, and should be 

 much obliged if some member who has the opportunity would inspect 

 them, and let me know how they have kept. 



During the last two or three years I have had but few oppor- 

 tunities of searching for new British spiders, and consequently have 

 no new captures to record ; and, as far as 1 have had the means of 

 forming a judgment on the subject, 1 am of opinion that the unusual 

 drought of the last two summers has been very unfavourable to 

 spider life. 1 spent a few days during the summers of both 1858 and 

 1859 in a locality in Oxfordshire which 1 had found particularly rich 

 as a collecting-ground on previous occasions, and in both the seasons 

 I could scarcely find a spider. Vegetation was very much dried up, 

 and the spiders seemed to have evaporated along with the moisture. 

 Mr. Blackwall tells me that he also noticed this scarcity ; and Mr. 

 N. B. Ward (the well-known author of ' Observations on the Growth 

 of Plants in Closely-glazed Cases'), when 1 met him at the Leeds 

 Meeting of the British Association, said he had particularly remarked 



