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upright, but the ordinary web-malcing spiders are not intended for climbing up 

 bricks and walls. They want their beautifully made toothed claws for cleaning 

 themselves and their webs, which they do admirably. You will not find much 

 dirt on the webs ; no, the spider would rather make a new web, or cut oflF a few 

 dirty threads and replace them with clean ones, than be as filthy in his house 

 as many a Christian is. 



When spiders make their webs they dart the threads immense distances, 

 thus making the long web they do, and thus attaching them to places some 

 distance apart. If you ask, why are they not often seen in the act of making their 

 webs ? the answers are not difiBcult. In the first place it is not easy to see a 

 newly -made web — then again, the spiders much prefer working by night, probably 

 because the night air is more humid than the air of the day. The length of the 

 thread of a spider is at times very great, measuring several feet. These single 

 threads are often troublesome as we walk in our gardens, because being invisible, 

 we know nothing of their presence until we feel them interfering with our personal 

 comfort, such as eyesight, or breathing. They must be of great service, however, 

 to the spider itself, because when they are spun from the insect and wafted in the 

 air by the passing current, the spider at once gets into a new region and moves 

 over fresh territories. You may find these creatures in most extraordinary places 

 —they may send forth their first thread from almost any place they may happen 

 to be — say, for instance, the top of a shrub, or tree, or even a door, or roof of a 

 house. The thread being once discharged must attach itself somewhere, and so 

 find a cord for passage for the spider to go to the opposite place of attachment to 

 where he is. This process reminds us very much of the rocket system in cases of 

 shipwreck ; once attach the rope from the shore to the ship, as the spider does his 

 web from one place to another, and there is at once a means of communication 

 opened for transit. Spiders, you know, do build their nests in places we should 

 scarcely imagine they would. As an instance, you may detect them, with the 

 spider in their centre waiting for his prey, right across a stream of water. When 

 this is the case, there is much wisdom shown by the animal in choosing so good a 

 spot. It is not likely he will die of hunger, because as flies and various insects 

 emerge from the larvae state and rise from the water to fly, the spider invites them 

 into his parlour, so that he may feed upon thern and fatten himself. A web 

 across water must, during the summer season, be as good a feeding ground as a 

 shoal of herrings, or sprats, or mackerel, at sea must be to the creatures that feed 

 on them. The webs of all the spiders are very beautiful. Amongst the best of them 

 in this respect we find that of the English garden spider. Its geometrical arrange- 

 ment is very fine, especially when you meet with a small one just made and quite 

 free from damage. In general appearance it reminds us of a cart wheel, the 

 central part being where the spoke should be, and which is sometimes occupied by 

 the spider himself. From this centre rays proceed, as you know. These we may 

 call radii, which of course get wider and wider from each other as they increase in 

 length. Then between these radii we have what may be called the cross-bars. 

 The radii are rigid, very firm and strong, the cross-bars are nothing like so rigid. 

 Their structure in the primary formation is, I believe, identical with the radii. 



