premise: the <mask> of lost feelers, limbs, and claws by spiders and crabs
hypothesis: the best context for <mask> here is Long, narrow slips of canvas daubed with tar and wound about a rope like a bandage, before it is served; used, also, in mousing on the stayes, etc.; but not The reproduction of a part which has been removed or destroyed; re-formation; -- a process especially characteristic of a many of the lower animals.