EIGHT-LEGGED FRIENDS. 107 



righteous wrath to rush out into the garden in hot haste 

 and put an end at once to the cruel wretch's existence 

 with a judicial antimacassar, a number of moral scruples, 

 such as could only be adequately resolved by the editor 

 of the Spectator, always occurred spontaneously to my 

 mind and conscience just in time to ensure that wicked 

 Eliza a fresh spell of life in which to continue unabashed 

 her atrocious behaviour. 



Has man, I asked myself at such moments, mere human 

 man, any right to set himself up in the place of earthly 

 providence, as so much better and more moral than 

 insentient nature ? If the spider cruelly devours living 

 flies and intelligent or highly sensitive bees, we must at 

 least remember that she has no choice in the matter, and 

 that, as the poet justly remarks, c 'tis her nature to.' 

 But then, on the other hand, it might be plausibly 

 argued that 'tis our nature equally to kill the creature 

 that we see so hatefully fulfilling the law of its own cruel 

 being. And yet again it might be pleaded by any able 

 counsel who undertook the defence of Lucy or Eliza on 

 her trial for her life against her human accusers, that she 

 was impelled to all these evil deeds by maternal affection, 

 one of the noblest and most unselfish of animal instincts. 

 Moreover, if the spider didn't prey, it would obviously 

 die ; and it seems rather hard on any creature to condemn 

 it to death for no better reason than because it happens 

 to have been born a member of its own kind, and not 

 of any other and less morally objectionable species. 

 Jedburgh justice of that sort rather savours of the 

 method pursued by the famous countryman who was 

 ofund cutting a harmless amphibian into a hundred 



