The Telegraph-Wire 255 



floor ; the others come down from the branch ; 

 all go to the Locust, swathe him with tape, 

 treat him, in short, as they would treat a live 

 prey captured under normal conditions. It 

 took the shaking of the web to decide them 

 to attack. 



Perhaps the grey colour of the Locust is not 

 sufficiently conspicuous to attract attention 

 by itself. Then let us try red, the brightest 

 colour to our retina and probably also to the 

 Spiders', None of the game hunted by the 

 Epeirae being clad in scarlet, I make a small 

 bundle out of red wool, a bait of the size of a 

 Locust. I glue it to the web. 



My stratagem succeeds. As long as the parcel 

 is stationary, the Spider is not roused ; but, the 

 moment it trembles, stirred by my straw, she 

 runs up eagerly. 



There are silly ones who just touch the thing 

 with their legs and, without further enquiries, 

 swathe it in silk after the manner of the usual 

 game. They even go so far as to dig their 

 fangs into the bait, following the rule of the 

 prehminary poisoning. Then and then only 

 the mistake is recognized and the tricked Spider 



