CHAPTER XIII 



FAUNA 



WHILE on the subject of noxious creatures, we 

 remember that one, if not more, of the spiders of 

 Madagascar must be included in the list. This is a 

 small arachnid, about the size and shape of a marble, shining 

 glossy black hi colour, except for a small red spot on the 

 fundament. It is greatly dreaded by the natives, who believe 

 its bite to be fatal, and it is probably so if cauterisation and 

 other remedies are not immediately applied. Dr Vinson, a 

 French naturalist, ascertained that this spider, called Menavbdy 

 by the people, is closely allied to the malignant Latrodectus of 

 Elba and Corsica, whose bite is believed to be fatal, and also 

 to another spider found in Martinique, which is equally 

 dangerous. People bitten by this Madagascar spider scream 

 out with pain at intervals of a minute or two, as if it came 

 on in paroxysms. I remember that one of our servants when 

 bringing one of these spiders to look at took care to hold it 

 at a very respectful distance from himself, at the end of a 

 long stick. 



As we push through the bushes we break through many 

 spiders' webs, and are struck by the extraordinary shape of 

 some of those whose snares we unwittingly destroy by our 

 passing along. Here is one, small and reddish in colour, but 

 much broader than it is long, each side projecting into a long 

 sharp spike indeed it is spiky in several directions, and is 

 utterly unlike any other spider we know of. This is, I believe, 

 a species of Ccerostris (C. stygiana ?), and belongs to a genus of 

 which several species have names denoting their demoniacal 

 shape and colouring e.g. avernalis, stygiana, etc. 



As we stop to observe his geometric web, and his bizarre 

 shape, we see on the tree to which several of his main " guys " 

 are fixed a very different spider's house and a very different 

 spider from our angular friend just mentioned. This creature 



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