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Show 588 REV. O. P. CAMBRIDGE ON EGYPTIAN SPIDERS. [June 20, used to occur on board the daha-beah. Waking up on one occasion in the middle of the night, I heard a crunching and crackling noise close to my head ; and on looking round, close to m y ear was a large Spider, and a still larger Cockroach in deadly struggle together. To stretch out m y hand softly and reach a large chip-box close by and enclose them within it was the work of a moment; hut on looking in the next morning, the Cockroach had disappeared, all except the harder parts, which were reduced to small fragments. I gave the monster several days to digest his meal and think upon things in general, and then, after a dose of chloroform, consigned him to the collecting-bottle. Savigny's figure of this Spider is so good that it is impossible to err in the determination of the species. SPARASSUS COGNATUS, sp. n. The examples of this Spider met with are not nearly so large as those of S. walckenaerius-though, not having met with either species in the adult state, this cannot be considered any certain proof of their relative size when arrived at maturity. The following differences will serve to distinguish the two species. In the present one the cephalothorax is of a plain yellow colour entirely devoid of the brown markings so characteristic in S. walckenaerius ; the legs also are completely destitute of the darker annulations which are more or less visible in all the examples I met with of that species; the central eyes also of the hinder row in A cognatus are as widely separated from each other as each is from the hind lateral eye on its side, or perhaps a trifle more widely, while in S. walckenaerius the interval between the hind centrals is a trifle less than that between each and the hind lateral on its side. Also the dark markings on the abdomen in S. cognatus are of a red-brown colour (often of a bright rusty red), while those on S. walckenaerius were of a dull brown hue. Examples of this Spider were met with both near Cairo and in Upper Egypt. Possibly it may be the immature form of Spai-assus linnai, Sav.; but at present I am inclined to think otherwise. SPARASSUS SUAVIS, sp. n. Adult male, length 3| lines; adult female, 4 | lines. The cephalothorax of this Spider is broader than long, though constricted and truncated at its fore extremity ; the profile line of the upperside describes a slight and uniform curve; it is of a dull orange-yellow colour, clothed with greyish yellow hairs, and marked faintly with dusky brown in the normal grooves and indentations ; the height of the clypeus scarcely exceeds the diameter of one of the fore central eyes. The eyes are in two curved rows, the curves directed away from each other, the hinder row being the most curved and the front row the shorter; those of the fore central pair are largest of the eight; those of the hind central pair are further from each other than each is from the hind lateral on its side, while those of the fore- |
