1881.] Entomology. 399 
It was midnight when I left her and laid down in my rubber blanket, and at dawn 
i ished a i 
and a half inch in diameter. I reluctantly destroyed the nest, but was anxious to exam 
mine allits parts. I first tried to get the spider out by inserting a straw, but she would 
not move. I then carefully removed the thatch and web for preservation, and then 
dug down to ascertain the de and structure of the excavation. I found it to be 
d e upper and lower chambers were 
just twice the size of the main tube, which in this case was 
seven-tenths of an inch in diameter. There was nota vestige 
of web, except in the two chambers, as the sand was damp an 
adhesive. 
In the month of June I have found the female on her eggs 
at the bottom of the tube; these were loosely covered with 
web and agglutinated sand, similar to the egg bag of the Lyco- 
sa maritima Hentz, She seldom leaves her eggs, but remains 
with them till they are hatched, when the young cling to her 
_ body till they are about three-eighths of an inch long. 
Fig. 5 represents the male, and Fig. 6 the 
female of this interesting species. 
Mr. S. H. Scudder has published in Psyche 
(January, 1877) an account of a tube-construct- 
ing ground-spider which dwells in the sandy : 
spots and dunes of Nantucket, and which he a 
calls Lycosa arenicola. While the habits differ fel: ad 
from those of Tarentula pikei (for instance, t 
shaft is without the widenings in the upper half and at the bot- 
tom) and the two species differ in some respect in form and color, 
they certainly belong to the same genus and are nearly related. 
nother mention is made of a spider which makes similar 
habitations, by that gifted ob- Ps 
Server, Mrs, M. Treat, of Vine- 
land, N. J., who in Harper's 
Monthly (April, 1880) describes 
at length its habits, and names 
few facts about the habits of the 
spider ( 7. nidifex) which I have 
ound, in which it differs from as del 
the other three species here F'6 6—Tarentula pike: Mee dre 
mentioned, viz: 7. pikei, L. turricola and L. arenicola. 
While the discoverers of these three species are unanimous in 
Stating that they have found egg-bags at the bottom of the tubes, 
I have never found any egg-bag, although I have opened more than 
twenty tubes in spring and summer. Nor have I noticed any indi- 
cation that the spider uses this subterranean structure as a home 
during the time she has to care for her eggs or young ones. On the 
contrary, I am convinced, for the following reasons, that this spe- 
cies (Widifex) uses this structure only as a safe and secure winter 
‘ "See also an article « The Lycosa at Home,” by J. H. Emerton, in the NATUR- 
List, Vol. rv, p. 664.—EpiTors NATURALIST. 
