280 SPIDERS AND WILD BEASTS. 



tradicted by several carnivorous creatures, both of land and 

 water ; but the spider follows pre-eminently in the path of the 

 principal and earliest fratricide, by the habit of killing, and, in 

 cannibal-fashion, devouring its comrades, even of the same 

 family. Reaumur attempted to establish a factory of the large 

 garden spiders, for the sake of their strong and beautiful silk ; 

 but the factious weavers overturned his "projet" by turning 

 their fangs upon each other. If it were an agreeable object of 

 discovery, we might seek and find yet a few more correspond- 

 ing points of character betwixt ourselves and the " villain 

 spider;" and what is singular, such resembling features are 

 the most apparent in those species of the race which are 

 greatest frequenters of the human habitation and its neigh- 

 bourhood, in those which 



" Spread their nets, whether they be 

 In poet's tower, cellar, barn, or tree," 



and which, comprising the spinners of house and garden, are 

 of a class called Sedentaries, in distinction to the " Vagrants" 

 and "Hunters" which, using no net, either lie in ambuscade, 

 or roam about, seeking what they may devour. 



Now^as the " Sedentaries" are best representatives of prey- 

 ing men, so these latter, the "Vagrants" and the "Hunters," 

 are the nearer prototypes of preying beasts. And first, the 

 "Vagrants," cunning also in their cruelty, bear, perhaps, 

 greatest resemblance to the feline races, springing, like the 

 tiger from his lair, upon their unsuspecting prey. Of these, 



