142 



The Book of Bugs. 



There's everything in living in a quiet neighbor- 

 hood. 



All spiders are pretty good navigators, and when 



thrown into the water can 

 skate ashore in no time. 

 They never get their feet wet, 

 because the hairy claws im- 

 prison the air and keep them 

 dry. 



If they are thrown out too 

 far to row in they get to land 

 in a way that puzzled the in- 

 vestigators a long time. The 

 spider stopped r u n n i n g, 

 braced its legs, and seemed to 

 be borne along by some mys- 

 terious force. But instead of 

 reporting the case to the So- 

 ciety for Psychical Research, 

 the investigators used their 



eyes, and finally one of them noticed that the spider was 

 trying to stand on its head. After that it was easy. She 

 was just casting off a long strand of silk, and the wind 

 was taking it for a sail. When the thread got close 

 enough to land to tangle on a bush or clump of grass, the 

 spider climbed out of the water on it. And then the in- 

 vestigators all said, " Why, sure! Why didn't we think 

 of that before? ' That is the way the young ones travel 

 when they leave home their fortunes for to seek. They 

 say, ' Well, good-by, ma! " and then climb up on a fence- 

 paling. While she is telling them to be good and to-be 

 careful about wasps, and to do up their laundry every 

 week and be sure and write, they are spinning out a 

 thread, and when it gets two or three yards long, away 



Fig. 31. Lake-navigating spider, 

 with its sails set. 



