Garden Spiders: Question of Property 



weave another in their own style. The 

 Spider, therefore, is incapable of recognizing 

 her web. She takes another's work for hers, 

 even when it is produced by a stranger to her 

 race. 



We now come to the tragic side of this con- 

 fusion. Wishing to have subjects for study 

 within my daily reach and to save myself the 

 trouble of casual excursions, I collect different 

 Epeirae whom I find in the course of my 

 walks and establish them on the shrubs in my 

 enclosure. In this way, a rosemary-hedge, 

 sheltered from the wind and facing the sun, is 

 turned into a well-stocked menagerie. I take 

 the Spiders from the paper bags wherein I had 

 put them separately, to carry them, and place 

 them on the leaves, with no further precaution. 

 It is for them to make themselves at home. 

 As a rule, they do not budge all day from the 

 place where I put them : they wait for night- 

 fall before seeking a suitable site whereon to 

 weave a net. 



Some among them show less patience. A 

 little while ago, they possessed a web, between 

 the reeds of a brook or in the holm-oak 

 copses ; and now they have none. They go off 

 in search, to recover their property or seize on 

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