THE JUMPING SPIDER. 



Singular in its manners. 



warm water was again used to free them from 

 the soap, Sec. ; and, after having been laid for 

 some days to dry, they were loosened with the 

 fingers previously to being carded by the com- 

 mon silk-carders. A beautiful ash- colored silk 

 was thus obtained, easy to be spun, and much 

 stronger in the thread than that of the silkworm. 

 This was woven in a stocking weaver's loom, and 

 there can be no doubt but that it would bear any 

 other loom. The thirteen ounces of bags yielded 

 near four ounces of silk, three of which made a 

 pair of stockings large enough for a man. Had 

 there not been insurmountable difficulties attend- 

 ing this task, we should have had from the dif- 

 ferent species of spiders several genuine colors 

 in silk ; such as grey, white, sky-blue, and coffee 

 color; whereas silkworms yield only white and 

 orange color. There are about fifty species of 

 the spider, of which the following, besides those 

 already mentioned, are the most remarkable. 



The jumping spider is very singular in its man- 

 ners. It does not, like manv others, take its 



tr 



prey by means of a net, but is constrained to 

 seize them only by its own activity. It is ex- 

 tremely nimble, at times leaping like a grass- 

 hopper, then standing still, and raising itself on 

 its hind legs to look around for its prey. If it 

 see a fly at the distance of three or four yards, 

 it does not run directly to it, but endeavors, as 

 much as possible, to conceal itself till it can 

 arrive near ; and then creeping slowly up, and 





