4 T. THORELL. DESCRIPTIONS OF SEVERAL EUROPEAN AND NORTH-AFRICAN SPIDERf*. 



prefaced the descriptions with diagnoses, although this is not done by the generality 

 of modern arachnologists: it is in fact iny tirni conviction, that tolerably good diagnoses 

 very greatly facilitate the (hitcrniination of unknown species, even though they niay 

 not be real definitions — which indeed they but seldom can be — but consist, as in 

 the following pages, merely of an abridgement of the description, containing those 

 features whicli seera most to characterize the species. 



3:0 Araneie (iiiclucliiijj all spideis not belongiiis^ to the thiee other suborders), aiul 4:o Oculata; (= Citi- 

 ijradce + Salti f/rada' Thor., exclusive of the Eresoidce). The classification into OvbitelaricB, Retitelance etc, 

 whieh I in iiiy work 'On Eiirop. 8piders' had adoptcd, is rejected by Simox, oii the score that the characteristies oii 

 which this grouping is grouiided, are exeliisively taken from the animals' habits and the lornQ which they give 

 their webs: he adduces (loc. cit., p. 4) as an evidence of the inappiopriateness of the raethod of classification 

 adopted by me, among others the genns Eresus, which I have aggregated to the -Saltigradce, but the spe- 

 cies of which, according to his opinion, ought to be distiibuted aniong no less than tkree of my suborders 

 Simon accordingly supposes that among ray Saltigradce no other spiders may be reckoned than thosc which 

 "jump". that I by Tubitelarice niean only those spiders that "wcave tubes", by Tevritelarice those which 

 "weave on the grouad", by Citigrada: those which "run fast", and so on. Any one who takes the trouble 

 to read ray work above mentioned (vid. e. gr. p. 198: "Subordo VII, Saltigradce"), will however find that 

 1 have always sought for the characteristies of the groups I have formed or adoptcd, in the organization 

 of the animals, and never in the form of their webs or in their habits; and I cannot therefore consider 

 Si.MOx's criticism as applicablc to myself, a criticism which indeed would have been just, if 1 had either 

 proposed or applied such views as he ascribes to me, or at least explicable, if I had not expressly (f. ex. 

 On Eur. Spid., pp. 49, 71 (uote 1), 73; Rem. on Syn., pp. 212 and ö99, note 3) stated just the contrary. 

 On p. 212 in the 2°'' Number of the last mentioned work — which Nurabcr is cited by Simon — I said. 

 with reference to the very dissimilar forms which the various species of the genus Dictyna give their webs, 

 that that genus "offers a striking example of how that different habits of life aud a different form of wei) 

 may be quite compatible with very near relationship between species, and shows that the affinity and 

 systematic arrangement of spiders is first and principally determined by the form of the animal itself, 

 and not by its habits and instincts"; nevertheless Dictyna is among the genera that Simon adduces in order 

 to show how widely I err in classifying spiders according to the form of their webs and their habits of 

 life. — For the distinetive features of the suborders, I have (On Eur. Spid., p. 19) referred to the works 

 of L.vTREiLLE, SuNDEV.xLL, Westrino and Ohlert; and any one who may imagine that these characteristies 

 are not principnlly taken from the organization of the spiders, will easily discover his niistake by examining 

 for example Suxdkvall's 'Svenska Spindlarnes Beskrifning' and 'Conspeclus .\rachnidum', and Westring's 

 Araneie Suecicse". The additions and explanations I myself made with a view more accurately to determine 

 and limit the groups in question, also refer, as has been already stated, to the animals' bodily strueture. 

 (I suppose however that no one will venture to deuy that the form of a spiders web and its habits of 

 life have oceasionally given very welcome hints as to its systematic position; and that authors, in charae- 

 teriziug the different spider-groups, are accustomed to raention the general form of the web within the 

 group as well as peeuliarities of habits, seeras to me a practice w'hich, even vvhen considered from a ch - 

 scriptive or systematio point of view, ought to be approved and not looked upon as heretical). — In my 

 work accordingly it is only the naines of the suborders, that are deduced from the habits of the spiders or 

 from the form that they give their webs. These nanies, which are merely the old LatreiiPian appellations, 

 with some slight modifications, I thought it right to retain, because they are in general very appropriate 

 for the typical species and for the plurality of the species in each particular group. That they are taken 

 from the animals' habits, and that they do not suit all the species, no one, who is acquainted with the 

 nomenclature of zoology in general, will be likely to consider as a suflicient reason for eashiering theni. 

 Nobody has any scrupies about the appellation " Natatores" , although the name be taken from the animals' 

 habits, and although some of these birds are said seldom or never to visit the water: and that several 

 "Oscines" do not sing, and that certain "Scansores" do not climb, has never, that I know of, induced any 

 body to reject these names. 



When Simon says that I, in my classification, have gone back to "les vieux errements de L.\TREILLE 

 et Tableau des Aranéides" , he ought to have omitted the latter work, w-hich is W.\i,ckenaer's, and to have 

 added instead of it the names of Lister, Clerck, De Geer and most subsequent arachnologists of any 

 note: for not only Laxreille, but also Sundevall, Westring, L. Koch, Ausserer, Pavesi, and in the 

 main also Blackwall, Ohlert, Menge, and others, have adopted the classification of spiders followed by 

 me, which originated with Lister, and of whieh Blackwall says (Spiders of Gr Brit., p. V) that it "has 



