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sooi.er quit their egg than they begin to spin. Indeed theirthread; can scarcely be perceived, but the webs may: they arefrequently as thic k, and close as those of house spiders; and nowonder, there being often 400 or 500 little spiders concurring tothe same work. How minute must their holes be ; the imagina-lion'can scarcely conceive that of their papillae! The whole spideris perhaps less than a papilla of the parent which produced it. Butthera are even some kinds of sp'ders so small at their birth, thatthey are not visible without a microscope. There are usuallyfound an infinity of these in a cluster, and they only appear like anumber of red points: and yet there are u ebs found under them,though well nigh imperceptible. What must be the tenuity otone ot these threads? Mr. Leewenhoek has computed that 100 ofthe single threads of a full grown spider are not equal to the di-ameter of the hair of the beard ; and consequently, if the threadsand hair be both round, ten thousand such threads are not biggerthan such a hair. He calculates further, that when young spi-ders first begin to spin, 400 of them are not larger thanone of a full growth ; allowing which, 4,000,000 of a young spi-der’s threads are not so big as the single hair of a man’s beard.The act of generation among spiders varies in dilfeient species.As these insects prey upon each other, except during the time ottheir amours, they dare not come within the reach of one ano-ther but with the utmost caution. They may sometimes be seenstretching out their legs, shaking the web, and tampering with.each other by a slight touch with the extremity of their feet; thenin a frigid, dropping hastily down their thread, and returning in afew moments to make fresh trial by feeling. When once bothparties are well assured of the sex they have to deal with, the ap-proaches of their icet, in order to teel, become more frequent,confidence takes place, and the instant of amorous dalliance en-sues. “ We cannot,” says Lyonnet, “ but admire how carefulthey are not to give themselves up blindly to a passion, or ven-ture on an imprudent step, which might become fatal to them.”A caveat this to the human kind. Li-ter and Lyonnet, two ac-t urate observers, say, that the extremity of those arms, or claws,v, nich the spider uses to grasp his prey with, suddenly opens, asit were by a spring, and lets out a white body, which the maleapplies beneath the abdomen of the female to fulfil the wish of na-ture. In the water spider, die sexual organs are situated at thehinder parts of the mate, are curved, and act as it were by a spring;those of the females are distinct. Nature by a thousand variedmethods' accomplishes her purpose. Spiders frequently changetheir colour, which varies much, in respect to season, sex, age,&c. hut they are in general more beautifully variegated in au-tumn ; a season not only the most opportune and plentiful re-specting their prey, but the time when they arrive at their greatestinagiii'ude, and are in their height of vigour. Garden spiders,particularly the short-legged species, yield a kind of silk whichhas by some been judged scarcely interior to that of the silk worm.Mr. Bon of Languedoc , about seventy years ago, contrived tomanufacture from it a pair of silk stockings and mittens, of a beau-tiful natural grey colour, which were almost as handsome andstrong as those made with common silk: and lie published a dis-sertation concerning the discovery. But M. Reaumur, beingappointed by the Royal Academy to make a farther enquiry intothis new silk work, raised several objections and difficulties againstit, which are found in the Memoirs of the Academy for the year1710. The sum of what he has urged amounts to this. Thenatural fierceness of the spider renders them unfit to be bred andkept together. Four or five thousand being distributed into cells,fiify in some, one hundred or two hundred in others, the big onessoon killed and ate the le.s, so that in a short time there werescarcely left one or two in each cell ; and to this inclination of mu-tually eating one another M. Reaumur ascribes the scarcity ofspiders, considering tlie vast number of eggs they lay. Thespecies of aranea amount to upwards of fifty. AraneaTarantula,or Tarantula Spider, of which so many idle recitals have been de-tailed in the works of the learned, and which, even to this day,continues in some countries to exercise the faith and ignorance ofthe vulgar, is a native of the warmer parts of Italy and otherwarm European regions, and is generally found in dry and sunnyplains. It is the largest of all the European spiders, but the ex-traordinary symptoms supposed to ensue from the bite of this in-sect, as well as their supposed cure by the power of music alone,are entirely fabulous, and are now sufficiently exploded among

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all rational philosophers. The gigantic araneaavicularia, or bird-catching spider, is net uncommon in many parts of the EastIndies and South America , where it resides among trees; lre-quently seizing on small birds, which it destroys by woundingthem with its fang-, and afterwards sucking their blood. BeePlate VIE

Aranea, a silver ore, found only in the mines of Potosi.

ARAN IAS, a river in Transylvania .

ARAN’JUEZ, a town in New Castile.

ARAR, or ARA1HS, now the Soane.

ARARAT, the mountain on which Noah’s ark rested, thoughtto be in Armenia Major .

Ararat, the ancient name of Armenia .

ARASST, a maritime, town of Italy, in Genoa . Lon, 7. 20. E.Lat. 44. 3. N.

ARASTH, a maritime town of Fez.

ARATEIA, in antiquity, a yearly festival celebrated atSicyon,on the birth-day of A rat us, wherein divers honours were paid bya priest consecrated to this service.

ARATHAPESCOW Indians, a nation in North America ,who carry on constant wars with the Western Dog-ribbed Indians.

ARATO-BAEABEN, a fixed star ot the second magnitude inthe dragon’s head.

ARATUM terr®, in our ancient law books, as much land ascan be yearly tilled with one plough.

ARATUftA terr®, an ancient service which the tenant wasto do his lord, by ploughing his land.

ARATUS, a celebrated Greek poet, born in Cilicia , about 300years B. C. The Phenomena of Aratus , which is still extant,gives him a title to the character of an astronomer as well as a poet.In this piece he describes the nature and motion of the stars, andshows the particular influences of the celestial bodies. This poemwas translated into Latin by Cicero . A quarto edition of thePhenomena was published by Grotius , at Leyden, in 1000, inGreek and Latin, with the fragments of Cicero ’s version, and thetranslations of Germanicus and Avienus ; all which the editor hasillustrated with curious notes. There are several oilier works alsoascribed to Aratus , as Hymns to Pan : Astrology and Astrothesy ;a composition of Antidotes; an EmSuImn on Theopropus; aniifloOTia on Antigonus; . an Epigram on Phila, the daughter ofAntipater, and wife of Antigonus ; an Epicedium of Cleombrotus;a Correction of the Odyssey; and some Epistles in prose. St.Paul quoted a passage from Aratus, in his speech to the Athenians ,Acts xvii. 28. wherein lie told them, that some of their ownpoets have said, ar/xir: “ For we are also his oil-

spring.” These words- are the beginning of the fifth line ofAratus ’s Phenomena.

Aratus, a famous general of the Aclixans, who at 20 years ofage, commenced the great attempt to deliver Greece from itstyrants, and establish one general republic, among the dillerentstates. He began by expelling Nicocles the tyrant of his nativecountry, Sicyon ; which he thereby joined to the Acha-an League,B. C. 353 years. Aratus was poisoned by his ungrateful successor ,Philip VI . whom he had newly restored, in the 62nd year of hisage. He was interred at Sicyon , and received the greatesthonours from bis countrymen. Polybius gives us so great acharacter of Aratus ’s Commentaries of Ilislory, that the loss of sovaluable a work is highly to be regretted.

ARAVA, the name of a district; a fortress; and a river inUpper Hungary.

ARAUCO, the name of a fortress; a river; a valley; and, atown in Chili.

ARAUBIO, Civ it as Arausiensis, or Arausicorum. It isnow Orange, 26 miles N. of Avignon . Lon. 4. 49. E. Lat. 44.9- N.

A RAW, or AARAW, a large town and bailiwick of Bern inSwitzerland .

ARAXES, now Aras, a river of Armenia Major .

ARAYA, a cape of South America , which forms the N. pointof the Oronoque.

ARBE, or ABBA, in ancient geography, an island of Illyria ,ill the gulph of Quarnaro. Also its capital.

ARBELA, in ancient geography, a city of Assyria , famous forthe 3d and decisive battle fought near it,. between Alexander theGreat and Darius Codomannus . Long!" 44. 12. E. Lat. 33.15. N

arberg,