The Life of the Spider 



they seen to put their mouths to the skin that 

 should be a sort of teat to them. On the other 

 hand, the Lycosa, far from being exhausted 

 and shrivelling, keeps perfectly well and 

 plump. She has the same pot-beUy when she 

 finishes rearing her young as when she began. 

 She has not lost weight: far from it; on the 

 contrary, she has put on flesh : she has gained 

 the wherewithal to beget a new family next 

 summer, one as numerous as to-day's. 



Once more, with what do the little ones 

 keep up their strength? We do not like to 

 suggest reserves suppUed by the egg as recti- 

 fying the beastie's expenditure of vital force, 

 especially when we consider that those re- 

 serves, themselves so close to nothing, must 

 be economized in view of the silk, a material 

 of the highest importance, of which a plenti- 

 ful use wiU be made presently. There must 

 be other powers at play in the tiny animal's 

 machiner}-. 



Total abstinence from food could be iinder- 

 stood if it were accompanied by inertia : im- 

 mobility is not life. But the young Lycosae, 

 although usually quiet on their mother's back, 

 are at all times ready for exercise and for 

 agile swarming. When they fall from the ma- 

 164 



