122 NATURALIST'S CABINET. 



Frequently reduced to great extremity. 



sort, and inspiring other insects with the dread 

 of approaching it. 



It often happens that the wind, or the shaking 

 of the supporters, or the approach of some large 

 animal, destroys in a minute the tedious labors 

 of this industrious insect. In this case the spider 

 is obliged to remain a patient spectator of the 

 universal ruin; and when the danger is passed 

 away, it sets about repairing the calamity, being 

 possessed of a large quantity of the glutinous 

 matter, which, when exhausted, nothing can re- 

 new. The time seldom fails to come when their 

 reservoirs are entirely dried up, and the poor 

 animal is left to all the chances of irretrievable 

 necessity. An old spider is thus frequently re- 

 duced to the greatest extremity ; its web is de- 

 stroyed; and it wants the materials to make a 

 new one ; but as it has been long accustomed to 

 a life of shifting, it hunts about to find out the 

 web of another spider, younger and weaker than 

 itself, with whom it ventures a battle. The in- 

 vader generally succeeds ; the young one is 

 driven out to make a new web, and the old one 

 remains in quiet possession. If, however, the 

 spider is unable to dispossess any other of its 

 web, it then endeavors, for a while, to subsist 

 upon accidental depredation ; but in two or three 

 months it inevitably dies of hunger. 



When two spiders of equal size meet in combat, 

 neither of them will yield; they hold each other 



