SPIDERS. 47 



CASE Frenchman, M. Bon of Languedoc, succeeded in manufacturing 

 some stockings and gloves of spider silk. The silk was grey, and 

 was said to look well, but not to be equal in lustre or so durable 

 as silk from the silkworm. M. Bon did not attempt to wind the 

 silk, but passed it through the carding machine (treating it like 

 shoddy or broken cocoons). He published an account of his 

 discovery or manufacture, and the Royal Academy of Paris 

 appointed Reaumur to report upon it. His report was not 

 favourable ; the thread of the spider was eighteen times weaker 

 than that of the silkworm, and it was found extremely difficult 

 to obtain it in sufficient quantity to operate on. It was calcu- 

 lated that 27,648 female spiders were required to make a pound 

 weight of silk, for it appears to have been only the silk bags con- 

 taining the eggs that were used, and, owing to the natural ferocity 

 and voracity of the spider, it was found impracticable to get the 

 silk in sufficient quantity. It seems that some thousands of spiders 

 were placed together in cells containing from fifty to two hundred 

 each, but these were soon reduced to one or two in each, the rest 

 having been all killed and eaten by the survivor, who,' if the fittest 

 in one sense, was at any rate not the fittest for the manufacturer's 

 purpose. A similar manufacture is mentioned by Mr. Blackwall 

 as having been tried by Mr. Tremeyer, a Spaniard, also without 

 practical success. It should be mentioned, however, that D'Azara 

 in his Voyage dans I'Americ, (quoted by Kirby and Spence), states 

 that in Paraguay a spider, which is found near the thirtieth de- 

 gree of South latitude, forms a spherical cocoon for its eggs, an 

 inch in diameter, of a yellow silk, which the inhabitants spin on 

 account of the permanence of the colour. 



Some specimens of M. Bon's manufacture, or of that of some 

 one else, are said to be still in existence ; and we should have 

 liked to illustrate our cases by a specimen. Not knowing, how- 

 ever, where to get one we made an attempt to get samples spun 

 and woven for ourselves, but without success. A quantity of 

 webs was collected and washed, with the intention of being carded 



