ery.

Early one morning, ten days later, I find her preparing for her
confinement. A silk network is first spun on the ground, covering an
extent about equal to the palm of one's hand. It is coarse and
shapeless, but firmly fixed. This is the floor on which the Spider
means to operate.

On this foundation, which acts as a protection from the sand, the
Lycosa fashions a round mat, the size of a two-franc piece and made of
superb white silk. With a gentle, uniform movement, which might be
regulated by the wheels of a delicate piece of clockwork, the tip of
the abdomen rises and falls, each time touching the supporting base a
little farther away, until the extreme scope of the mechanism is
attained.

Then, without the Spider's moving her position, the oscillation is
resumed in the opposite direction. By means of this alternate motion,
interspersed with numerous contacts, a segment of the sheet is
obtained, of a very accurate texture. When this is done, the Spider
moves a little along a circular line and the loom works in the same
manner on another segment.

The silk disk, a sort of hardy concave paten, now no longer receives
anything from the spinnerets in its centre; the marginal belt alone
increases in thickness. The piece thus becomes a bowl-shaped porringer,
surrounded by a wide, flat edge.

The time for the laying has come. With one quick emission, the viscous,
pale-yellow eggs are laid in the basin, where they heap together in the
shape of a globe which projects largely outside the cavity. The
spinnerets are once more set going. With short movements, as the tip of
the abdomen rises and falls to weave the round mat, they cover up the
exposed hemisphere. The result is a pill set in the middle of a
circular carpet.

The legs, hitherto idle, are now working. They take up and break off
one by one the threads that keep the round mat stretched on the coarse
supporting network. At the same time the fangs grip this sheet, lift it
by degrees, tear it from its base and fold it over upon the globe of
eggs. It is a laborious operation. The whole edifice totters, the floor
collapses, fouled with sand. By a movement of the legs, those soiled
shreds are cast aside. Briefly, by means of violent tugs of the fangs,
which pull, and broom-like efforts of the legs, which clear away, the
Lycosa extricates the bag of eggs and removes it as a clear-cut mass,
free from any adhesion.

It is a white-silk pill, soft to the touch and gl