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THE AMERICAN NATURALIST. [Vol. XXXVIII. 



before the eggs are laid : this period is often some weeks. When 

 about 100 males and females were put together March 6-1 1 

 the first eggs were laid March 24th, while other females laid 

 from then on to April 15th, though those laid after the first 

 of April were probably unduly retarded by various artificial 

 influences. That March is the normal time of laying for this 

 species and at the Maryland station on the Potomac whence these 

 specimens came is shown by the fact that 39 females taken there 

 April 20th, 1903, all bore eggs in late stages of development that 

 were almost the same as the various stages then present in the 

 eggs laid in March by the previously captured specimens. 



Pr-epamtion for laying. — The females tend to secrete them- 



selves in dark corners and four or five days before laying they 

 are noticeably excitable, an approaching object causes them to 

 raise their claws and to assume the defensive in a much more 

 active way than was previously the case. 



These days are also taken up with great and peculiar activity 

 upon the part of the female resulting in a very thorough cleaning 

 of the ventral side of the abdomen. No matter how darkly dis- 

 cok)red the exo-skeleton may have become during the winter 

 It IS now made white and clean over the under side which then 

 comes to contrast strongly with the remaining dark exterior. 



