Balloon Spiders. — During the last month, I have placed in my parlor-window several 

 glass jars in which plants and animals are displayed, in the way that you may have seen 

 them, on a grander scale, in t]ie Royal Zoological Gai-dens. Diving water spiders (Argyroneta 

 aquatica) prove very attractive. " These spiders," says De Greer, " spin in the water a cell 

 of strong, closely woven, white silk, in the form of half the shell of a pigeon's egg, or like 

 the diving-bell. This is sometimes left partly above watei', but at others it is entirely sub- 

 mersed, and is always attached to the objects near it by a great number of irregular threads. 

 It is closed all round, but has a large opening below." Into this opening the spiders convey 

 air-bubbles and there burst them, so that their habitation is gradually expanded with atmo- 

 spheric air, until they have a large, dry room, surrounded by water, to deposit their eggs in, and 

 bring up their progeny. There is a crowd daily round my parlor-window to watch the ope- 

 rations of these balloon spiders. I hear the conversation of my juvenile visitors, and, when 

 I find occasion to do so, give open-air lectures to the auditors. I have, besides spiders, fishes, 

 beetles, and marine animals, all healthy, and kept with very little trouble. The only thing 

 needful is to establish a balance of animal and vegetable life. If the Valisneria spiralis 

 becomes brown, I put in a water-snail, which soon removes the confervas ; if the water becomes 

 cloudy, I add plants or animals, as experience directs, and without ever changing the water 

 it remains pure and bright. 



If gardeners would give themselves the trouble to attend to a few of the marvellous 

 objects around them, they would augment the pleasures of their occupations, and obtain 

 valuable knowledge, and thus might be established a bond between youth and age ; for, if 

 once a child is roused to the pursuit of natural history, he will become a pleasant companion 

 to grown-up people — he will become merciful, for it is impossible to love God's creatures 

 and be cruel to them, and it is impossible to know the wonderful works of our Almighty 

 Creator and not to love them. 



Schoolmasters should, by command, instruct their scholars in the outlines of natural 

 history. Nothing is more easy — nothing tends more to give purpose to pleasure, or to fill 

 up spare moments more profitably. 



I would not have lads made collectors but observers. Instruct them to venerate life, and 

 to destroy it only as an act of necessity — never in wantonness — never needlessly, not even 

 the life of a plant. C. E., in Cottage Gardener. 



WiEGELA Amabilis. — In your number for May, page 139, is a notice of this plant, com- 

 paring it with rosea, which, as an early forcing pot shrub, it far suipasses, and only requires 

 to be more known to become a general favorite, and admired as much, I have no doubt, as 

 it has been here for the last two seasons. It blossoms freely in a 4S-sized pot ; its light, 

 graceful branches, when covered with pinky blooms, make it a fit companion for the pretty 

 Deutzia gracilis, which it much resembles in the treatment it requires. When done bloom- 

 ing, I cut the plants down like the latter, inducing them to make as many young shoots as 

 possible for the next season's display. By a succession, it can be had in bloom from Feb- 

 ruary up to the present month. — J. F., in London Florist. 



Sale of Mr. Loddige's Orchids. 

 place on the 15th and IGth. 



-The first portion of this unequalled collection of Orchids 

 The collection comprises two thousand specimens, and 



YoL. VI.— October, 1856. 



31 



