Welsh Journals

A CONTRIBUTION TO THE SPIDER FAUNA OF THE COUNTY OF GLAMORGAN. A. RANDELL JACKSON, M.B., M.Sc. During the year 1901 I resided in Glamorganshire, at Ystrad, in the Rhondda Valley. My time was chiefly occupied by professional work, but I paid considerable attention to the spiders which inhabit that locality. Ystrad is situated in the middle of the narrow valley, and is dominated by the neighbouring hills, which rise to an altitude of over 1,700 feet above the sea. The village itself is elevated some 500 feet above that level. Few people visit the Rhondda for pleasure, and, indeed man has done his best to render it as ugly as possible. At one time, however, it must have possessed considerable natural beauty. It was, I am told, well wooded, and dotted over with farms and cottages. Now it is, at all events at Ystrad, almost devoid of trees, and permeated with the charming sights and sounds characteristic of large colliery districts. However, it is not entirely shorn of its former beauties. Still the mountains lift up their rounded heads about it. They are covered with short grass, and in places there are patches of scanty heather. Their sloping flanks are scarred, and riven by numerous small watercourses, the banks of which are sometimes embroidered with stunted trees. Their summits are usually in the form of extensive grassy or boggy plateaux, and occasionally command inspiring views of neighbouring valleys similar in character to the Rhondda. Of these moun- tains, Mynydd Bwllfa, though not the highest, is the boldest in