He relates how he witnessed the capture, in the long low snare which Cteniza Ariana spreads close to the ground, of two strong, night-flying beetles (Pimelia and Cephalostenus), and how these were at once devoured, and their horny coats thrown away.
More observations of this kind are greatly wanted, as it is most important that we should know what are the principal sources of food upon which these spiders depend for their existence.
If we could answer the questions, what do they eat? and what do they fear? we should have advanced a long way towards resolving the larger problem as to the causes which limit particular species to certain districts.
I greatly envy those who are able to travel, and who have it in their power to investigate the habits of these creatures at several widely separated points; for there seems every probability that other new types of nest remain to be detected in warm climates, some of which may perhaps exceed those we have been here studying in beauty of workmanship and adaptation; it is at least certain that an abundant harvest of interesting facts in the life history of trap-door spiders remains yet to be gathered in.
Indeed it appears to me that we are only on the threshold of discoveries of this kind, and that the materials brought together in the preceding pages may be considered as but a small sample of what may be collected on the outermost edge of this great domain.
I shall be satisfied if I have been able in the present little work, to hold the door sufficiently ajar to permit those who love nature and her ways to catch a glimpse of the wonders and beauties of the untrodden land that lies beyond.
[APPENDIX.]
A.