Plates I.-V.*)The Spiders here dealt with were captured during a fortnight's stay which I made, from the 9th till the 23rd of May, 1935, in the Babors Mountains : they form an interesting collection, chiefly because it originates from a country rather diEcult to reach, the Zouagha Forest. My base was the forest-house of Bir-Chouchen, a spring almost sixty miles from Constantine, near the road from this town to Mila and Djidjelli ; except the indigenous mechtus (hamlets), where hardly anybody speaks French, the nearest villages with European colonists are Zera'ia, at a distance of nineteen miles, and beyond the pass of FBdoulBs Texenna, twenty-eight miles off. My excursions around Bir-Chouchen did not exceed half-a-day either on foot or on horscback. My work did not suffer, I think, by the small range of my walks or rides, as the district explored is a very homogeneous one.In the immediate neighbourhood of Bir-Chouchen cork-trees form the forest, with the normal undergrowth proper to this environment ; towards its top, reaching 3180 and 3530 feet in height, the Djebel Daya t is, however, covered with Quercus mirbeckii D. R. mixed with Quercus afares Pomel; there the undergrowth is quite different, scarce, formed of heathers and brooms sticking out from a thick carpet of dead leaves. These last two trees also cover the Djebel A d s , more remote, to which I was not able to pay fcequent visits ; it is, perhaps, a deplorable fact, as the fauna, a less rich one it seems, much differs &om that of the cork-trees forest. In the glades and where the forest is not very thick there are numerous tufts of diss, Ampelodesmos tenax Vahl.I have also collected a few species on the bank of the Oued Endja at some distance below its junction with the Oued Tassala (bou Kriza) ; this river, after its confluence with the Rummel, becomes the Oued-el-Kebir. When explored the bank was a slimy sandy ground, very dry, planted with but rose-laurel (Nerium oleander L.).The Spider fauna of the above-defined area is very nearly allied to that of the'cork-tree forest in the south of France, Mediterranean seaboard. The collected species that may be identified are 144 in number : amongst them 91, viz., 63-88 per cent., are also to be found in France, including Dictyna civicu frutetorum, an -Af?ican subspecies the typical form of which spreads far in the north ; six more species reach Corsica (Chiracanthium angulitarse, Textrix Jlavomaculuta, Ero Jlammeolu, Evophrys herbigrada, Icius congener, Blurillus afinis), the three latter and four others Spain (Prodidomus amranthinus, * For explanation of the Plates, see p. 1069. t The geographical names here adopted are those on the map of the forest service (scale 1/20,000), as they seem to come nearer the indigenous appellations than the names borne on the map of the Service g6ographique de l'Arm6e (scale 1/50,000). Instead of Dj. Daya and Dj. Arrbs the latter indicates Dj. Besbass and Dj. bou Rhara, and Zouagha is spelt Zouarha, an orthography more in accordance with the pronunciation.
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MR. JACQUES D...