ALEXANDER] WHY SPIDERS ARE INTERESTING 331 



her offspring straight away begins doing a most unnatural thing: 

 being bom with good healthy appetites and finding food scarce, 

 they turn fraticides without compunction, and the stronger 

 devours the weaker. When the warm spring sun warns the in- 

 mates of the nest that the great glad worid is ready to be tried, 

 but few come forth and these have grown strong to meet the battle 

 of life at the expense of a great many Uttle brothers and sisters. 

 In this fashion I might go on indefinitely, taking up one group 

 after another; all are of about equal interest and well worth our 

 close attention, but rather than do this I will again refer the nature 

 lover to "The Spider Book" which treats every phase of this vast 



subject with great thorough- 

 ness. The writer knows only 

 of the ecxeedingly interesting 

 family Lycosidae, or the Wolf 

 spiders from, the pen of Prof. 

 A wolf-spider carrying her egg-sac Comstock; the narrative is 



absorbing; think of spiders 

 with the maternal instinct so highly developed, that they 

 not only carry the large egg-sac about with them attached to the 

 spinnerets, but when the young are hatched actually take them on 

 their back from place to place caring for them tmtil they become 

 strong enough to break family ties and go out in the world alone. 

 Before closing I will say just a word or two of the silk of spiders. 

 Most of us think of a spiders web when we see it imdoubtedly as 

 being cob-web or something of that indefinite nature. But this 

 is not the case. The web of the orb-weaver is made up of at least 

 two very different kinds of silk. Silk that is dry and inelastic, 

 and silk that is \'iscid and flexible, the latter kind is amazing in its 

 structure, and is the silk that catches the prey that happens into 

 the web. The dry silk makes up the radii or support alone. The 

 spiral is of viscid siUc. Prof. Comstock has photographed this 

 vicsid silk and it wiU startle many to learn no doubt, that the 

 viscid matter is strung on the fine silk like pearls in a very regtdar 

 fashion and a picture of such a strand suggests strikingly a beauti- 

 ful string of perfect pearls carefully graded. 



The writer can only hope that this brief touching on so import- 

 ant a topic will stimulate an interest in others in this fascinating 

 subject. He who will study "The Building of an Orb-web" with 

 care, will be amply rewarded for his time and trouble. 



