The Crab Spider 



hurries from her watch-tower, lifts a limb and 

 puts the intruder to flight. If I tease her with 

 a straw, she parries with big gestures, like 

 those of a prize-fighter. She uses her fists 

 against my weapon. When I propose to dis- 

 lodge her in view of certain experiments, I 

 find some difficulty in doing so. She clings 

 to the silken floor, she frustrates my attacks, 

 which I am bound to moderate lest I should 

 injure her. She is no sooner attracted outside 

 than she stubbornly returns to her post. She 

 declines to leave her treasure. 



Even so does the Narbonne Lycosa struggle 

 when we try to take away her pill. Each dis- 

 plays the same pluck and the same devotion; 

 and also the same denseness in distinguishing 

 her property from that of others. The Ly- 

 cosa accepts without hesitation any strange pill 

 which she is given in exchange for her own; 

 she confuses alien produce with the produce of 

 her ovaries and her silk-factory. Those 

 hallowed words, maternal love, were out of 

 place here: it is an impetuous, an almost me- 

 chanical impulse, wherein real affection plays 

 no part whatever. The beautiful Spider of 

 the rock-roses is no more generously endowed. 

 When moved from her nest to another of the 



221 



