ABOUT FRUITS, FLOWERS AND FARMING. 65 



legends represent witches as addicted to riding brooms. I 

 wish that many women would get bewitched enough to do 

 this, something more than they do. Down cellar, then, 

 with your broom. Look now ; the window is perfectly 

 covered ; there is a great sprawling gaunt spider in the 

 corner and half a dozen empty bugs hung up like scalps to 

 commemorate his triumphs ; next to him is a great over- 

 swollen potbellied fellow for all the world he looks like a 

 huge glutton ; then there is a sharp, nimble, enterprising 

 spider, below him, who has just opened an office and 

 is keen for business, preparing to inherit, like many other 

 fellows, his neighbor s custom, who, having got rich frau 

 dulently, will soon burst ; there, too, are several pale and 

 shadowy spiders, who look as if the cobwebs had kept 

 them from the light until they had become quite sallow and 

 emaciated ; then there are several little round, shining-black, 

 pestilent fellows, whose legs are so long in proportion to 

 their bodies, that they make one think of a little potato 

 with yard-long sprouts all over it. I say nothing of crab- 

 spiders on the window-sill, who, like metaphysicians, run 

 backward just as easy as forwards. Just look, too, my dear 

 madam, at the various patterns of their webs. Here is one 

 from point to point resembling a sheet-like shelf of dusty 

 cotton, and running like a tunnel, into a knot hole, where 

 stands the venomous old fellow waiting for flies, like a usu 

 rer waiting for customers. Another corner is filled up with 

 a web like a skein of tangled silk ; then there is a beautiful 

 wheel, worked more beautifully than any lace-work, while 

 there are a multitude of base and lazy little spiders who, 

 like many of their betters, live on other folk s webs. Well, 

 we have talked long enough ; dash your brush into that 

 spider- village, give it a dextrous twirl, and with the whole 

 population on the end of it, run to the door and crush them ! 

 So much for spiders. 



As to salt ; the only advantage of salt in a cellar, that 

 occurs to us, is its effect in destroy ing snails, bugs, and that 



