THE INSTINCT OF SPIDERS 131 



acute. All its bridges are gone. The radii are slack 

 from the loss of the scaffold ; they now wave and 

 tremble in the air. If the spicier can appreciate any- 

 thing of the precision of its work, it must do something 

 now. 



At first it is alarmed and hurries away to the edge 

 of its snare. I can divide two, three or four turns 

 while the spider continues in its course, but I cannot 

 remove the whole spiral. In twenty minutes the 

 spider returns. It again takes up its work, the con- 

 tinuation of the viscid spiral. It meets with immediate 

 trouble. It can find no bridge ; it moves with difficulty 

 along the slackened radii ; its confusion is clear. But 

 it makes no attempt to remedy the damage, no effort 

 to lay a new bridge. Into the centre it travels at 

 every segment except where the slack radii fall close 

 together, when it can step across from radius to radius. 

 Great disorder follows in its architecture. The loose 

 radii confuse its sense of tension ; the little tags of 

 filament perplex it and it anchors its line in the wrong 

 place. All its attachments are out of order ; radii are 

 glued to radii ; parallelism is completely lost. Con- 

 struction continues, but the snare rapidly develops 

 into a hopeless tangle. Yet the spider is satisfied. 

 It still makes no effort to place new bridges between 

 its radii. It cannot go back on its old work ; it is 

 bound to its routine. A few turns of a temporary spiral 

 would solve its difficulties, but this the spider is quite 

 unable to effect. It would mean the commencement 

 of the routine at some other point, while there is only 

 one point at which the spider can commence, and that 

 is the point at which the routine was broken. Still 

 the spider labours on. Its difficulties overcome it. 



