410 FOOD OF INSECTS. 



which may be compared to the tackling of a ship, flies 

 seem unable to avoid directing their flight. The certain 

 consequence is, that in striking against these ropes they 

 become slightly entangled, and, in their endeavours to 

 disengage themselves, rarely escape being precipitated 

 into the net spread underneath for their reception, where 

 their doom is inevitable. 



But the net is still incomplete. It is necessary that 

 our hunter should conceal her grim visage from the 

 game for which she lies in wait. She does not there- 

 fore station herself upon the surface of her net, but in a 

 small silken apartment constructed below it, and com- 

 pletely hidden from view. " In this corner," to use the 

 quaint translation of Pliny by Philemon Holland, Doctor 

 in Physic a , "with what subtiltie doth she retire making 

 semblance as though she meant nothing less than that 

 she doth, and as if she went about some other business ! 

 nay, how close lieth she, that it is impossible to see 

 whether any one be within or no !" But thus removed 

 to a distance from her net and entirely out of sight of it, 

 how is she to know when her prey is entrapped ? For 

 this difficulty our ingenious weaver has provided. She 

 has taken care to spin several threads from the edge of 

 the net to that of her hole, which at once inform her by 

 their vibrations of the capture of a fly, and serve as a 

 bridge on which in an instant she can run to secure it. 



You will readily conceive that the geometrical spiders, 

 in forming their concentric circled nets, follow a process 

 very different from that just described, than which in- 

 deed it is in many respects more curious. As the net is 

 a L. xi. c. 24. 



