Experiments on the Color Sense. 
249 
then replaced in the box but remained perfectly quiet although 
several females passed near him. After a time the females were 
removed from the box and the blinded male was left alone. The 
next morning we found him trying to remove the paraffine by 
rubbing his face with his palpi. Two females were put in, 
close to him, but he did not notice them. One of the females 
seemed interested in him, approaching and finally touching him, 
but he was entirely unresponsive, and only moved away. By 
afternoon of the same day he had cleaned his eyes and we found 
him dancing before a female three and one half inches away. 
We repeated these experiments several times upon these two 
species, and also upon Phidippus rufus and Astia vittita always 
with the same results. 
We think that our experiments on vision prove conclusively 
that Attidae see their prey, (which consists of small insects) when 
it is motionless, up to a distance of five inches; that they see in¬ 
sects in motion at much greater distances; and that they see 
each other distinctly up to at least twelve inches. The observa¬ 
tions on blinded spiders and the numerous instances in which 
spiders which were close together, and yet out of sight of each 
other, showed that they were unconscious of each other’s presence 
render any other explanation of their action unsatisfactory. 
Sight guides them, not smell. 
EXPERIMENTS ON THE COLOR SENSE. 
Some years ago we made a few attempts to test the color 
sense of the Attidae by painting the females in the mating sea¬ 
son. The results were more or less doubtful. The males un¬ 
questionably altered their demeanor at first but some of them 
became reconciled, after a time, to the new style of coloration. 
The experiments were as follows: 
A female of Astia vittata was put into a box wuth four males, 
one of which was of the variety niger. (This species has two 
forms of male; one of them is colored somewhat like the female, 
while the other is black). All the males at once became greatly 
excited vying with each other in their display before the fe¬ 
male. The niger, always more active and excitable than the 
