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Show 320 REV. 0. P. CAMBRIDGE ON SPIDERS [Apr. 20, 3. On some new and little-known Spiders of the Genus Argyrodes, Sim. By the Rev. O. P. CAMBRIDGE, M.A., C.M.Z.S., &c. [Eeceived April 1, 1880.] (Plates XXVIII.-XXX.) The Spiders described in the present paper have been received at various times during the last few years from widely distant exotic reo-ions South America, East Indies, Ceylon, South Africa, Madagascar, Samoa Island, and Amboina; and I now beg leave to record my thanks to those kind friends who have either collected them for me or sent them to me, viz. Mr. Frederick Bond, Major Julian Hobson (H.M.S. Staff Corps, Bombay), Professor Traill (Univ. Aberdeen), Mr. G. H. K. Thwaites (Botanic Gardens, Ceylon), Mr. Henry Rogers (of Freshwater, Isle of Wight), the Rev. J. Whitmee (of the Samoa Islands), M r. H. H. B. Bradley (of Sydney, N.S.W.), Capt. F. W . Hutton (of N e w Zealand), Mr. J. P. Mansel Weale (of South Africa), and Mr. R. H. Meade (of Bradford, Yorkshire) . Few Spiders are equal to those of the genus Argyrodes (and none exceed them) in the brilliancy of their hues. Some of them look like drops of burnished silver suspended in their snares; and one of those here recorded, Argyrodes scintillulana (p. 332), resembles a bit of jet studded with diamonds. Their structure also is of a very marked and distinctive kind. The abdomen is subject to a greater or less abnormal development of the posterior extremity, but varying in the two sexes; and the caput (in the male sex) is almost invariably developed into a form which makes some of them resemble very closely some species of the genusWalckenaera (Bl.). The fore extremity of the caput is produced and split into two lobes or segments by a more or less deep transverse indentation or cleft. There is, however, a very marked and constant difference between these two genera in respect of the position of the eyes. In Argyrodes no eyes are ever found on the lower segment of the caput, while in Walckenaera the eyes of the fore-central pair are always placed either in front of it or at its extremity. Another very obvious characteristic of Argyrodes is the great length and slenderness of the first two pairs of legs, though in this respect, as well as in the development of the abdomen, Argyrodes is far surpassed by the Spiders of an allied and, in some respects, still more curious genus, Ariamnes, Thor. (Ariadne, Dol.). The adult females of some (perhaps all) species of Argyrodes are subject to the apparently adventitious addition to their genital process of a bright, transparent, reddish, resinous-looking accretion. This often gives an abnormal appearance to the genital aperture ; and it has been mistaken by Mr. Blackwall for part of the process itself (vide description of Epeira cognata, Bl.,Proe. R. Irish Acad. 1877, 2nd ser. vol. iii. pp. 17, 18). I feel, however, quite convinced that |
