68 AMERICAN SPIDERS AND THEIR SPINNINGWORK. 
the treacherous viscid or adherent lines. The action must also tend in 
some measure to locate the position of a victim. Can it possibly at times 
tend to produce a current of air into which insects are attracted? At all 
events, when Pholeus phalangioides is annoyed by being touched with 
pencil or finger, she is pretty sure to begin moving her body, and in a 
little while is swinging herself around, her body describing a circle which 
represents the base of a cone, of which the point whereat her clustered 
feet hold on to her line will be the apex. 
VI. 
Professor Wilder relates an interesting example of the tendency of young 
Argiope cophinaria to make excursions from the egg enclosure when oppor- 
tunity presents. Numerous cocoons 
were found at James Island, South 
Carolina, which had been torn open 
by birds to get nest building material. From 
the breach fragmentary wads and rolls of silk 
floss protruded, along which the spiderlings 
crawled, and finding themselves in the fresh 
air and sunshine concluded to enjoy the same. 
They would swing down from the projecting 
roll in long festoons, singly, or sometimes 
clinging to one another like bees when they 
swarm, but always retained their connection 
with the cocoon, to which they returned | 
when satisfied with their taste of sunlight | Y 
and liberty.! One is inclined to note here a ~* Fig, 49. Baby spiders on 
judicious mingling of conservative caution PP pi ee ss 
with youthful sportiveness. 
ty 
VII. f 
In Vol. I. of this work were considered the poison apparatus of spiders 
and the effects of their poison upon animals and man. Since then numer- 
ous contributions upon the general subject have been made by 
many persons, from widely separated parts. Some of the most 
valuable of these have been published in “ Insect Life,” the offi- 
cial journal of the Entomological Bureau of the United States Department 
of Agriculture. These leave the facts substantially as generalized by me, 
and my own view thereof is therefore unchanged, as follows: The poison 
secreted by spiders is sparingly used, and it is not necessary for securing 
prey; its object is probably chiefly defensive, and its effect upon creatures 
of its own rank and size may often be serious and fatal; the effect upon 
Baby 
Spiders. 
Spider 
Poison. 
' Harper’s Magazine, March, 1867, page 458. 
