NOVEMBER 277 



seen festooned in fantastic forms, so delicate that too close a 

 breath will spoil it, even the lightest touch will mar its beauty ; 

 it seems a fabric woven upon some elfin loom. On a morn- 

 ing (the last but two of October) these mist-strung gossamers 

 were the loveliest to be seen this year : the morn was misty 

 and raw, every leafless twig was tipped as with a diamond, 

 with its large drop of gathered moisture. Throughout Octo- 

 ber these gossamers were floating in the dry, clear air, almost 

 invisible, flashing like a thread of light in the sunshine. But 

 the time to see them is in the early misty morns of these 

 present days, when they lie scattered everywhere, powerless to 

 rise in the air, being fettered, for the dew has sought them 

 out and threaded them thickly with its silvery beads. The 

 weft of these Autumn flosses is, as most of us know, the work 

 of an unconsidered spider, an insect of passage. This is cer- 

 tain, although incomplete information prevents the exact 

 knowledge of the doings of this gossamer-spider, who weaves 

 this silken cordage to navigate it in its aerial flights. How 

 wonderful is this instinct, planted by Nature even in this atom 

 of life ! 



One web of gossamer stretched in a leafy corner of the 

 garden was, a day or two since, a marvel of loveliness ; it was 

 but the work of the common garden spider (Eperlra diaddma). 

 Who has not often watched it at work in the Summer garden, 

 weaving its new home or mending the riven meshes ? In no 

 spot is the contrast more striking than where the gossamers 

 are flung amid the blush of the osiers, or veiling the golden 

 leafage of the hedgerow, or silhouetted against the tarred 

 fences. 



