Strange Sights in Far-away Papua 



567 



outside of the web to about ys inch at 

 the center. The web was most substan- 

 tial, and had great resisting power, a 

 fact of which the natives were not slow 

 to avail themselves, for they have pressed 

 into the service of man this spider, which 

 is about the size of a small hazel-nut, with 

 hairy, dark-brown legs spreading to 

 about 2 inches. This diligent creature 

 they have beguiled into weaving their 

 fishing nets. At the place where the 

 webs are thickest they set up long bam- 

 boos, bent over into a loop at the end. 

 In a very short time the spider weaves 

 a web on this most convenient frame, 

 and the Papuan has his fishing net ready 

 to his hand. He goes down to the stream 

 and uses it with great dexterity to catch 

 fish of about one pound weight, neither 

 the water nor the fish sufficing to break 

 the mesh. The usual practice is to stand 

 on a rock in a backwater where there 

 is an eddy. There they watch for a fish, 

 and then dexterously dip it up and throw 

 it onto the bank. Several men would 

 set up bamboos, so to have nets read\' 

 all together, and would then arrange little 

 fishing parties. It seemed to me that the 

 substance of the web resisted water as 

 readily as a duck's back. 



AN ARMY OF SOI.DIER-CRABS 



On one of our expeditions along the 

 coast we saw one of the most extraordi- 

 nary sights of all our travels — many thou- 

 sands of soldier-crabs traversing the 

 sandy beach in detached, regularly 

 ordered bodies, that moved evidently by 

 the signal of some common commander. 

 These "armed battalions" stretched for 

 miles, and no matter what figure they 

 assumed, whether wedge, triangle, or 

 rhombus, the dressing, so to speak, of 

 the outer ranks was perfect, and would 

 have put many a volunteer corps to 

 shame. Not a crab was out of line. The 

 advance was fairly rapid, and was al- 

 ways toward the sea for a distance of, 

 say, two hundred yards. When the crabs 

 come out of their holes in the sand they 

 throw themselves into this compact for- 



A Spider's Web as a Fishing-net : A 

 Strange New Guinea Device 



A very huge and strong spider's web, com- 

 mon to New Guinea, is used by the natives as 

 a fishing-net. They set up in the forest a 

 bamboo, bent as in the picture, and leave it 

 until the spiders have covered it with a web in 

 the manner shown. 



