14 SPIDERS [CH. 



implement, and the foundation lines, the radii and 

 the notched zone will give negative results ; the 

 spiral line alone is viscid, and its viscidity is due to 

 the presence of thousands of little beads of gummy 

 matter strung on a thin elastic thread. The vast 

 number and uniformity of these beads estimated at 

 120,000 on a large web excited the wonder and 

 admiration of naturalists until it was proved that 

 they were not deposited by the spider as beads at all, 

 but as a uniform coating of viscid matter which 

 subsequently arranged itself into equidistant globules 

 easily explicable by the physicist. Indeed precisely 

 the same phenomenon is seen on a dew-laden web, 

 where similar but very much larger beads of water 

 decorate all the lines. 



From the hub of the wheel we shall very likely 

 notice a rather stout cable diverging from the plane 

 of the snare and leading to a nest of leaves spun 

 together. Here the spider is to be found when not 

 on duty in the centre of the wheel, and here it con- 

 structs its egg-cocoons. 



This, then, is the complete circular snare, but we 

 shall understand it much better if we watch the 

 spider at work in its construction. 



The first business of the spider is to lay down the 

 foundation lines. Any sort of trapezium or even a 

 triangle if large enough in a more or less vertical 

 plane will suffice, and under some circumstances the 



