of hundred, clamber
on the Spider's back and there sit motionless, jammed close together,
forming a sort of bark of mingled legs and paunches. The mother is
unrecognizable under this live mantilla. When the hatching is over, the
wallet is loosened from the spinnerets and cast aside as a worthless rag.

The little ones are very good: none stirs none tries to get more room for
himself at his neighbours' expense. What are they doing there, so
quietly? They allow themselves to be carted about, like the young of the
Opossum. Whether she sit in long meditation at the bottom of her den, or
come to the orifice, in mild weather, to bask in the sun, the Lycosa
never throws off her great-coat of swarming youngsters until the fine
season comes.

If, in the middle of winter, in January or February, I happen, out in the
fields, to ransack the Spider's dwelling, after the rain, snow and frost
have battered it and, as a rule, dismantled the bastion at the entrance,
I always find her at home, still full of vigour, still carrying her
family. This vehicular upbringing lasts five or six months at least,
without interruption. The celebrated American carrier, the Opossum, who
emancipates her offspring after a few weeks' carting, cuts a poor figure
beside the Lycosa.

What do the little ones eat, on the maternal spine? Nothing, so far as I
know. I do not see them grow larger. I find them, at the tardy period
of their emancipation, just as they were when they left the bag.

During the bad season, the mother herself is extremely abstemious. At
long intervals, she accepts, in my jars, a belated Locust, whom I have
captured, for her benefit, in the sunnier nooks. In order to keep
herself in condition, as when she is dug up in the course of my winter
excavations, she must therefore sometimes break her fast and come out in
search of prey, without, of course, discarding her live mantilla.

The expedition has its dangers. The youngsters may be brushed off by a
blade of grass. What becomes of them when they have a fall? Does the
mother give them a thought? Does she come to their assistance and help
them to regain their place on her back? Not at all. The affection of a
Spider's heart, divided among some hundreds, can spare but a very feeble
portion to each. The Lycosa hardly troubles, whether one youngster fall
from his place, or six, or all of them. She waits impassively for the
victims of the mishap to get out of their own dif