PULMONARIA. 
457 
of which, in a state of repose, occupy a circular space of six or seven inches in diameter, and [are asserted] to 
seize Humming-birds. They form their nests in the slits of trees, beneath the bark, in the cavities of stones and 
rocks, or on the surface of leaves of various vegetables. The cell of the M. avicularia is in the shape of.a tube, nar- 
rowed into a point at its posterior extremity. It is composed of a white web of very fine texture, semitransparent, 
like muslin. M. Goudot gave me a nest which was about seven or eight inches long, and about two inches broad. 
The cocoon of this species had the size and shape of a large nut. Its envelope, formed of the same materials as 
the nest, consists of three layers. It appears that the young are there hatched, and undergo their first moulting. 
This naturalist informs me that he has obtained as many as a hundred young ones from one cocoon. (See my 
memoir on the habits of the Mygale avicularia, Lin., in those of the Mus. d’Hist. Nat., tom. vii. p. 456.) The 
body of this species is about an inch and a half long, black, and very hairy, with the tips of the palpi, legs, &c., 
reddish. 
South America and the Antilles also furnish other species, which are known to the French colonists under the 
name of Spider-Crabs, and of which the bite is reputed very dangerous. There is also a large East Indian species 
(M. fasciata, Seba) ; and a species is brought from the Cape of Good Hope, nearly as large as M. avicularia. 
Another species {M. valentina) has been discovered in the arid deserts of Moxenta, in Spain, by M. Dufour ; and 
another, from the same country, has been described by Walckenaer (ilf. calpeiana). These two species form a 
j particular group, having the ungues exposed. (See further our articles on this and the allied genera in the Nouv. 
Diction. d’Hist. Nat., second edition.) 
The other species of Mygale (forming the genus Cteniza, Latr., in Fam. Nat.) have a transverse row of move- 
able corneous spines at the superior extremity of the basal joint of the chelicera. The tarsi are less hairy beneath 
I than in the preceding, and their ungues are always exposed. They construct, in dry shelving situations exposed 
I to the sun, in the southern parts of Europe, &c., subterranean cylindrical galleries, often two feet deep, and so 
tortuous that the traces of them are often lost. They moreover construct, at the entrance, a moveable lid formed 
of silk and earth, fixed by a hinge, and which, by its precise size, inclination, and weight, closely shuts the open- 
ing, scarcely so as to permit the place of the nest to be distinguished from the neighbouring soil. The inner surface 
I of the lid is lined with silk, which enables the animal to hold it down, and prevent its being pulled open. When 
taken by violence from its nest, the Mygale is stupid, and offers no resistance. A silken tube, forming the nest, 
1 lines the interior of the gallery. M. Dufour is of opinion that the males do not make these burrows, being gene- 
I rally found under stones, and appearing less favoured with organs fitted for those works. We presume, with 
M. Dufour, that our ilf. carmmans is only the male of ilf. camentaria, Latr., although M. Walckenaer is of a dif- 
’ ferent opinion. The latter species, described by Sauvages under the name of the Mason-Spider {Hist, de I’Acad. 
der that of the Mining-Spider {Linn. Trans,, vol. ii. 17, 18), is about two-thirds 
; southern departments of France, Spain, &c. Another species {M. fodiens, 
Walck., ilf. Sauvagesii, Duf., Rossi), is rather larger than the preceding, and 
inhabits Tuscany and Corsica. The Museum d’Histoire Naturelle possesses 
a block of earth in which four of its nests are arranged in a regular square. 
[M. V. Audouin has published a long account of these nests in the Annates de 
la Societe Entoniologique de France.] M. Lefebvre has also brought another 
distinct species from Sicily, and another is found in Jamaica, (ilf. nidulans), 
w'hich, together with its nest, has been figured by Brown in his Natural 
Histoi’y of that island, pi. 44, f. 3. 
[It is to Madame Merian that we owe the origin of the stoiy that the large 
American Mygale attacks and kills small birds ; this lady, in her splendid 
work on the insects of Surinam, not only asserting this, but figuring the 
Spider in the act of feeding on a Humming-bird which it had dragged off its 
nest. Hence originated the idea that the Mygale spun the webs which are 
met with in tropical climates, of sufficient force to hold small birds, but 
which are the production of a species of Epeira. Mr. MacLeay, in the 
first volume of the Transactions of the Zoological Society, has attacked 
this lady’s writings with great violence, giving her credit for all that subsequent compilers chose to add 
to her account. She, however, did not assert that the Mygale forms these webs, nor is such the case, 
for that spider lives in holes under ground, and in all its movements keeps close to the earth, its food 
I consiting of luli, subterranean Crickets, and Cockroaches. On a living Humming-bird being placed into its 
I hole by Mr. MacLeay, the Spider even quitted it ; whence he disbelieves the existence of any bird-catching Spider ; 
[ but M. Moreau de Jonnfes expressly mentions that it climbs the branches of trees to devour the young of Humming- 
I birds, &c. Latreille published an elaborate memoir upon this genus in the Nouvelles Annales du Museum, vol. i., 
and more recently M. Walckenaer has described thirty -six species of this genus in his Histoire Naturelle des 
Insectes Apteres. 
The M. nidulans, which is sufficiently abundant in the West Indian islands, has been figured, together with its nest, 
by Mr. Kirby in his Bridgewater Treatise. It is also figured in Griffith’s translation of the Reg?ie Animal, but 
regarded as an undescribed species, named N. nitida. Mr. Sells has communicated some curious observations on 
I it and its nest to the Entomological Society of London.] 
Those species (of Theraphoses) which have the palpi inserted on an inferior dilatation on the outside of the 
maxillae, and 5-jointed ; the tongue very small in Atypus, but which becomes longer and advanced between the 
maxillae in the following genera, which is its general character ; the last joint of the palpi in both sexes long and 
I 
