THE SPIDEES. 7 



he is, upon the first thread of the -web of her whom he loves; 

 terrified at his own audacity, he recoils and flies away, but 

 only quickly to return. He makes one step, then another, 

 then stops. 



Gentle reader, you have seen timid lovers, you have been 

 one yourself if you have ever really loved. You have trembled 

 with terror beneath the pure and innocent glance of a young 

 girl ; you have felt your voice fail when near her ; and certain 

 words which you wished to utter, but durst not, have seemed 

 to fin your throat to strangulation. But never have you 

 seen a lover so timid as this — and not without good reasons. 



The female spider is much larger than the male, and this is 

 almost generally the case with insects. If, at the moment at 

 which the lover presents himself, her heart speaks to her, she 

 yields, like all other beings, to the sweet influence of love; she 

 softens as the panther does, she gives herself up to the delight 

 of loving and being beloved, and ventures to evince it ; she 

 encourages her timid lover, and her web becomes for that 

 beloved lover the silken ladder of our romances. 



But if she is insensible, if her hour has not yet come, she 

 nevertheless advances slowly to meet the trembling Hippo- 

 lytus, who seeks in vain to read in Ker features whether he is 

 to hope or to fear; then, when'^ a few paces from the 

 amorous youth, she darts upon him":^seizes him — and eats 

 him ! 



True it is then that the most ancient and most ridiculous 

 metaphors invented by lovers cease to be metaphors, and 

 assume a real and terrifying sense. Here is certainly a lover 

 who has reason to complain of the hard-heartedness of his 

 beloved. Here is a lover who will not be aocused of exagge- 

 ration, if, into the avowal of his sentiments he should allow 

 to glide the often-abused question, "Am 1 1( live or die?" or 

 even this sentence. " If you repulse my \ovb, it wiU be my 

 death-warrant." j 



My friend, however, was more fortunate,', for the belle 

 advanced towards him, whilst he waited for | her in visible 

 ajQxiety; but whether he perceived in her behaviour any 

 unsatisfactory sign, or whether the coquette had not suf&oient 

 skill to compose her countenance, which I could not dis- 

 tinguish from the smallness of its proportions, or whether she 



