| OCR Text |
Show 1876.] REV. O. P. CAMBRIDGE ON EGYPTIAN SPIDERS. 585 The abdomen is roundly truncated before, and broader behind than in front; it is of a whitish hue, marked and mottled above with pale yellow-brown and a few blackish markings; on its hinder half these are arranged in two well separated longitudinal lines, and indicate the spaces between the denticulations of the ordinary broad central longitudinal band, which is otherwise scarcely traceable ; the sides are rugulose and marked with some rather indistinct oblique rows of brown spots; and the underside is faintly spotted with yellowish-brown ; besides some ordinary bristles on the upper-side, there are on each side of the fore part a few strong curved clavate ones in an obliquely longitudinal line; these bristles increase gradually in strength from the base to the rounded extremity, something like the form of a racket-bat: there may have been others originally ; but if so, they had been rubbed off before capture. Several of these bristles, as well as some others, equally strong but not clavate, are also apparent on the cephalothorax. A single adult female was found near Alexandria. Gen. SELENOPS, Duf. S E L E N O P S .EGYPTIACA. (Plate LIX. fig. 10.) Selenops agyptiacus, Sav. et Aud. Egypte, p. 162, pl. vi. fig. 6. This Spider appears to be tolerably abundant in the Nile boats ; it used frequently to be seen at night in the cabins and passages of our daha-beah, but, owing to its swift movements and the numerous cracks and crevices at hand, it was very difficult to capture it; I managed however, to obtain three adult and immature females and several adult males. As no other species was met with during my stay in Egypt, I conclude that this is probably the one described and figured by Savigny and Audouin, though the example from which their figure and description were made, being immature, gives but little idea of the characteristics of the species. A more detailed description from the adult form will therefore be useful. Adult male, length 4-^ to a little over b lines; adult female, 6 to 7\ lines. The Spider with legs extended covers a width of two inches and three quarters. The cephalothorax is slightly broader at its widest part than it is long; its form is very nearly that of a heart, the ocular region forming the acute point, which, however, is here truncated ; it is flat and level throughout, the caput being only a little constricted laterally ; its colour is yellow-brown (the caput being darker than the rest, as also are the normal converging grooves and indentations), and it is clothed with hairs and a yellowish grey pubescence. The eyes are unequal in size and disposed on tuberculate black spots along the whole width of the fore margin of the caput; four form a curved row in the middle, the curve directed forwards; and at some little distance from each end of this row is a lateral pair, the eyes of.which are very unequal in size, wide apart, and placed obliquely, so that the hinder eye, which is the largest of the ei°ht is much further from the curved row than the foremost |
