152 



AMERICAN SPIDKRS AND THEIR SPINNING WORK. 



of forked twigs and are composed of very wliito stiff silk, the stiffness prob- 

 ably being caused by the tightness with which the lines were spun. 

 (Fig. 187.) 



Misuniena vatia is well known among the Laterigrade spiders by its 

 remarkable mimicry of the colors of flowers upon which it lurks for prey. 

 A line example of its cocoon was brought to my notice by a lady who had 

 transported a specimen from the Wyoming Valley to her home in Phila- 

 delphia. Ilcr attention had been arrested by the remarkable resemblance of 

 the creature to the bright golden yellow Coreopsis flower on which she discov- 

 ered it. The spider was. placed in her bedroom chamber about the 28th of 

 August, and during the first week in September it wove the cocoon repre- 

 sented at Fig. 188, in a corner of the dressing bureau, just where a mirror 



is fixed in the woodwork. 

 The cocoon consists of a 

 flossy mass, something 

 after the fashion of that 

 of Epeira, which covers 

 over the eggs. A tent of 

 close white spinningwork 

 encloses this, having at 

 the bottom a circular 

 opening one-eighth inch 

 in diameter, through 

 which the spider passed 

 to and fro. A thicker 

 band of silk, of the most 

 beautiful whiteness, look- 

 ing like spun glass, passes 

 across the centre of the 

 enclosing tent, joined at 

 one end to the mirror, 

 and at the other to the 

 cabinet work. The tent and cocoon are partly woven upon the glass of 

 the mirror. The tent is about two inches long and one and a half inch wide, 

 and the cocoon, which is somewhat irregular in shape, is about three-fourths 

 of an inch in diameter. A few separate lines are stretched across the entire 

 spinningwork, and attached on either side of the angle or corner which 

 contains the cocoon. A few days after finishing this work of maternal 

 industry the mother died. According to Hentzi this species attaches its 

 cocoon to the under side of a leaf, and remains near it. 



There is evidently a good deal of variety among the cocoons of Lateri- 

 grades. Many of them consist of two stiff, paper like pieces, viz., first, a 



Fig. 188. Cocoon and tent of the Laterigrade, Migumena vatia, 

 woven upon a ladies* dressing bureau. 



1 Spiders U. S., page 78, on Thoinisus fartus. 



