TRAP-DOOR SPIDERS. 
217 
Again, Mr. F. Pollock 1 relates of the young of Epeira aurelia , 
which he observed in Madeira, that when seven weeks old they 
made a web the size of a penny, and that these nets have the 
same beautiful symmetry as those of the full-grown spider. 
And, speaking of trap-door spiders, Moggridge says,— 
I cannot help thinking that these very small nests, built as 
they are by minute spiders probably not very long hatched 
from the egg, must rank among the most marvellous structures 
of this kind with which we are acquainted. That so young 
and weak a creature should be able to excavate a tube in the 
earth many times its own length, and know how to make a 
perfect miniature of the nest of its parents, seems to be a fact 
which has scarcely a parallel in nature . 2 
Regarding the steps whereby the instinct of building 
trap -doors probably arose, Biichner quotes Moggridge 
thus : — 
To show, lastly, how various are the transitional forms and 
gradations so important in deciding upon the gradual origin of 
the forms of nests, Moggridge also alludes to the similar build- 
ings made by other genera of spiders. Lycosa Narbonensis , a 
spider of Southern France much resembling the Apuleian 
tarantula, and belonging to the family of the wolf spiders, 
makes cylindrical holes in the earth, about one inch wide and 
three or four inches deep, in a perpendicular direction ; when 
they have attained this depth they run further horizontally, 
and end in a three cornered room, from one to two inches broad, 
the floor of which is covered with the remnants of dead in- 
sects. The whole nest is lined within with a thick silken 
material, and has at its opening — closed by no door — an above- 
ground chimney-shaped extension, made of leaves, needles, 
moss, wood, &c., woven together with spider threads. These 
chimneys show various differences in their manner of building, 
and are intended chiefly, according to Moggridge, to prevent 
the sand blown about by the violent sea- winds from penetrating 
into the nests. During winter the opening is wholly and con- 
tinuously woven over, and it is very well possible, or probable, 
that the process of reopening such a warm covering in the spring, 
1 * The History and Habits of Epeira aurelia in Annals and Mag. of 
Nat . Hist, for June 1865. 
‘ 2 Harvesting Ants and Trap-door Spiders , p. 126. This admirable 
work, with its appendix, contains a very full account of the whole 
economy of the interesting animals with which it is concerned. 
