The Garden Spiders: My Neighbour 



allows her to approach or withdraw from the 

 leafy piers at will. From the height of the 

 cable, the upper boundary of the projected 

 works, she lets herself slip to a slight depth, 

 varying the points of her fall. She climbs up 

 again by the line produced by her descent. 

 The result of the operation is a double thread 

 which is unwound while the Spider walks 

 along her big foot-bridge to the contact- 

 branch, where she fixes the free end of her 

 thread more or less low down. In this way, 

 she obtains, to right and left, a few slanting 

 cross-bars, connecting the cable with the 

 branches. 



These cross-bars, in their turn, support 

 others in ever-changing directions. When 

 there are enough of them, the Epeira need 

 no longer resort to falls in order to extract her 

 threads; she goes from one cord to the next, 

 always wire-drawing with her hind-legs and 

 placing her produce in position as she goes. 

 This results in a combination of straight lines 

 owning no order, save that they are kept in 

 one, nearly perpendicular plane. They mark 

 a very irregular polygonal area, wherein the 

 web, itself a work of magnificent regularity, 

 shall presently be woven. 

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