ecies; the palpi also are
held stiffly out in front with the points together. Again she
drives him off, and so the play continues. Now the male grows
excited as he approaches her, and while still several inches
away, whirls completely around and around; pausing, he runs
closer and begins to make his abdomen quiver as he stands on
tiptoe in front of her. Prancing from side to side, he grows
bolder and bolder, while she seems less fierce, and yielding to
the excitement, lifts up her magnificently iridescent abdomen,
holding it at one time vertical, and at another sideways to him.
She no longer rushes at him, but retreats a little as he
approaches. At last he comes close to her, lying flat, with his
first legs stretched out and quivering. With the tips of his
front legs he gently pats her; this seems to arouse the old demon
of resistance, and she drives him back. Again and again he pats
her with a caressing movement, gradually creeping nearer and
nearer, which she now permits without resistance, until he crawls
over her head to her abdomen, far enough to reach the epigynum
with his palpus." (G.W. Peckham, "Sexual Selection of Spiders,"
_Occasional Papers of the Natural History Society of Wisconsin_,
1889, quoted in _Nature_, August 21, 1890.)

The courtship of another spider, the _Agelena labyrinthica_, has
been studied by Lecaillon ("Les Instincts et les Psychismes des
Araignees," _Revue Scientifique_, Sept. 15, 1906.) The male
enters the female's web and may be found there about the middle
of July. When courtship has begun it is not interrupted by the
closest observation, even under the magnifying glass. At first it
is the male which seeks to couple and he pursues the female over
her web till she consents. The pursuit may last some hours, the
male agitating his abdomen in a peculiar way, while the female
simply retreats a short distance without allowing herself to be
approached. At last the female holds herself completely
motionless, and then the male approaches, seizes her, places her
on her side, sometimes carrying her to a more suitable part of
the web. Then one of his copulative apparatus is applied to the
female genital opening, and copulation begins. When completed (on
an average in about two hours) the male withdraws his copulatory
palpus and turns over the female, wh