GOSSAMER 247 



no observations. We may suppose (until the point is 

 cleared up), that they retreat to hiding-places, and like 

 older Spiders, endure long abstinence with impunity, 

 procuring chance supplies of food at long intervals. 

 The power of emitting silken threads is commonly 

 used in the excursions of the young Spider to enable 

 it to climb from twig to twig, before it is turned to 

 account in aerial voyages. 



So long an interval separates the hatching-out of 

 the Spider from the time at which it begins to make a 

 web of its own that it may be given as a pure case of 

 constructive instinct. There is no parent to show it 

 how webs are made, nor can it be supposed to 

 remember the minute details of the web in which it 

 may possibly have been reared. How little we know, 

 or rather, how entirely ignorant we are of the means 

 by which the practical experience of by-gone genera- 

 tions is handed down to animals which have no 

 occasion to apply it until they have long been 

 separated from their own parents ! 



Dr. Lincecum l tells us that the mother and young of 

 the Gossamer Spider of Texas ascend together. Prob- 

 ably this is a species of small size. 



Darwin's account of the South American Gossamer 

 Spiders is well worth reading. 2 When the Beagle 

 was sixty miles distant from the shore, vast numbers 

 of small Spiders settled on the ship. A steady though 

 light breeze was blowing off-shore. Each Spider was 

 seated on a single thread. All were of one species, 

 but of both sexes, together with young ones. Another 



1 See Amer. Nat., Vol. VIII., p. 593 (1874)- 



2 Naturalist's Voyage, Chap. VIII. 



