920 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HIST. SOCIETY, Vol. XXVIll. 
She dashes out with unusual speed, much more rapidly than we should ever ex- 
IK?ct. She comes down upon her struggling prey ; she seizes it in her long fore- 
legs ; she draws it towards her and sweeps it into her jaws. She falls first upon 
the thorax ; it is there that she makes the deadly stroke. This is the vital 
spot, for Avithin lies the nervous centre and into its substance she must strike. 
She acts like the Hippasa, which weaves a non -viscid sheet, or the Tarantula 
of Fabre which digs a tunnel in the soil ; she behaves as though she knew the 
anatomy of her prey ; she first pierces the vital and essential point in 
the whole nervous chain. Nor is it any gentle thrust, for her fangs are suffi- 
ciently powerful to penetrate the human skin. I have watched her drive them 
deep into my finger, and have .seen the drops of limpid poison gather round 
the bleeding wound. The insect has little chance from such a deadly and unerr- 
ing stroke. At the first thi'Ust the nervous ganglion is reached. The poison 
is driven in ; the victim is struck motionless ; it can no longer struggle and 
beat its wings and injure the precious snare. The spider by her cunning has 
prevented this, for instant paralysis occurs. 
The swift struggle is over, and the insect prey is dead. She now takes it be- 
tween her palpi, and with her middle pair of legs secures it on either side. In 
this attitude for about half a minute she holds it tenaciously in her jaws. No 
doubt she is forcing in her fangs and injecting the poison deep into her prey. 
Satisfied at length that her capture is overwhelmed, she commences to drag it 
away. She takes it between the claws of her middle legs, tears it from its 
viscid attachments to the lines, and transports it to her station at the very cen- 
tre of the snare. Then comes the next process, the sheathing of the captured 
prey. She releases her jaws ; she thrusts her capture out in front of her, hold- 
ing it in position betweeir the tips of her middle legs. It also receives an addi- 
tional support from the palpi on either side. The next act is as follows. 
The Nephila bends in her long hind legs and brings the claws to the tip of her 
abdomen just behind the spiimerets. She hooks the claws round the project- 
ing line and draws the silk steadily out. But she does not pull forth the ordi- 
nary line ; she extracts a dense sheaf of many .slender threads, and these she 
slowly carries forward beneath her until they reach tJtre capture held out in 
front. Then she begins to rvind them round her victim. The hind leg of one 
side first makes a turn ; then follows the hind leg of the opposite side, and thus, 
by their alternate action, coil after coil is wrapped around the prey. Some 
assistance is given to the operation by the pecuhar use of the middle legs. By 
their efforts the prey itself is rotated ; and, since the coiling of the sheaf is in 
the opposite direction to the twisting of the prey, both actions help towards 
the same result. At length, after a number of turns, the victim is completely 
sheathed ; it is both closely imprisoned and dead. Then she lowers it a little 
and with a slender strand of silk anchors it near the centre of the snare. 
The capture is made, sheathed and anchored ; the Nephila now begins to 
feed. like evei-y other operation it is a slow and patient act. She commences 
at the head ; she brui.ses it a little and sucks from it all its juice. She then passes 
on to the thorax, deals with it in the same manner, and then turns to the soft 
and succulent abdomen. Into the entrails .she thrusts her greedy fangs; all 
the time they are working, sucking, masticating ; but there is little bruising 
of the victim's skin ; her object is to extract the soft internal tis.sues and suck 
out the animal juice . At length she finishes ; she has erfscerated her victim 
and nothing but a shrivelled carcass remains. She swathes a few more turrrs 
of silk around it and fixes it again to her snare. Occasionally she returns to it, 
takes it up again and tries to extract a further drop. At last it is completely 
gutted ; nothing is left but a mere husk, a dry and empty shell. This is no fur- 
ther use, so she drops it out of the snare. The little drama is over, and she 
waits for the next capture to occur. 
