ge of it.

What strikes me more than anything else is the absolute inertia of the
fangs, which I tickle with a straw without succeeding in rousing
them from their torpor. The palpi, on the other hand, their immediate
neighbours, wave at the least touch. The Epeira is placed in safety, in
a flask, and undergoes a fresh examination a week later. Irritability
has in part returned. Under the stimulus of a straw, I see her legs move
a little, especially the lower joints, the tibiae and tarsi. The palpi
are even more irritable and mobile. These different movements, however,
are lacking in vigour and coordination; and the Spider cannot employ
them to turn over, much less to escape. As for the poison-fangs, I
stimulate them in vain: I cannot get them to open or even to stir. They
are therefore profoundly paralysed and in a special manner. The peculiar
insistence of the sting when the mouth was stabbed told me as much in
the beginning.

At the end of September, almost a month after the operation, the Epeira
is in the same condition, neither dead nor alive: the palpi still quiver
when touched with a straw, but nothing else moves. At length, after
six or seven weeks' lethargy, real death supervenes, together with its
comrade, putrefaction.

The Tarantula of the Ringed Calicurgus, as I take her from the owner
at the moment of transportation, presents the same peculiarities. The
poison-fangs are no longer irritable when tickled with my straw: a fresh
proof, added to those of analogy, to show that the Lycosa, like the
Epeira, has been stung in the mouth. The palpi, on the other hand, are
and will be for weeks highly irritable and mobile. I wish to emphasise
this point, the importance of which will be recognized presently.

I found it impossible to provoke a second attack from my Harlequin
Calicurgus: the tedium of captivity did not favour the exercise of her
talents. Moreover, the Epeira sometimes had something to do with her
refusals; a certain ruse de guerre which was twice employed before my
eyes may well have baffled the aggressor. Let me describe the incident,
if only to increase our respect a little for these foolish Spiders, who
are provided with perfected weapons and do not dare to make use of them
against the weaker but bolder assailant.

The Epeira occupies the wall of the wire-gauze cage, with her eight legs
wide-spread upon the trelliswork; the Calicurgus is wheeling round
the top of the dome. Seized with panic at th