573 



PAPERS ON SPIDERS 



By the Rev. J. E. Hull, M.A. 



I. 



The Genus TMETICUS (Simon, 1884; Cambridge, igoo) 



and some Allied Genera 



The species whose systematic position I now propose to 

 discuss are the British representatives of the very hetero- 

 geneous group included under the name Tmeticns by M. 

 Simon (Arach. de France, 1884; Hist. Nat. des Araign^es, 

 1894) and the Rev. O. Pickard-Cambridge (List Brit, and 

 Ir. Spiders, 1900), together with the species of Hilaira 

 enumerated by both authors. To these must be added 

 certain species discovered since 1900, and a few others which 

 have been assigned to other genera, though really belonging 

 to this alliance. 



Thus constituted, the group falls into two obvious sections — 

 Centromerus, in which the outer falcal teeth are three, the 

 maxillae quadrate, the labium short and very broad, the front 

 eyes very unequal, while the femora of the first pair of legs 

 (at least) bear a spine or spines ; and all the remaining species, 

 which have four or five outer falcal teeth, oblong maxillae, a 

 labium comparatively long, the front eyes not so diverse in 

 size, and no femoral spines at all. 



Centromerus is now generally recognized as an established 

 genus, and only one author, the Norwegian arachnologist 

 Mr. E. Strand, has proposed a sub-division. For the two 

 very nearly related species bicolor Bl. and concinnus Thor. he 

 proposes the genus Ceniromeria — a proposition not to be 

 lightly set aside. The two species differ conspicuously from 

 all the rest of the section, in that all the tibiae are armed 

 underneath with a double series of spines, while all the dorsal 

 spines of the tibiae are alike, not stronger on the posterior legs 

 than on the anterior as in all the other species : the surface of 

 the fakes is not granulate, and the copulatory organs are of a 

 slightly different type. 



