238 FOOD OF INSECTS. 
in the centre with their head downwards, and retire to a little apartment 
formed on one side under some leaf of a plant, only when obliged by 
danger or the state of the weather, or as before stated, constantly hide 
themselves in a similar retreat. ‘The moment an unfortunate fly or other 
insect touches the net, the spider rushes towards it, seizes it with her 
fangs, and if it be a small species at once carries it to her little cell, and, 
having there at leisure sucked its juices, throws out the carcass. If the 
insect be larger, and struggle to escape, with surprising address she en- 
velopes it with threads in various directions, until both its wings and legs 
being effectually fastened, she carries it off to her den. If the captured 
insect be a bee or a large fly so strong that the spider #s sensible that it is 
more than a match for her, she never attempts to seize or even entangle 
it, but on the contrary assists it to disengage itself, and often breaks off 
that part of the net to which it hangs, content to be rid of such an un- 
manageable intruder at any price. — When larger booty is plentiful, these 
spiders seem not to regard smaller insects. I have observed them in 
autumn, when their nets were almost covered with the Aphides which 
filled the air, impatiently pulling them off and dropping them untouched 
over the sides, as though irritated that their meshes should be occupied 
with such insignificant game.— A species of spider described by Lister 
(2Epeira conica), more provident than its brethren, suspends its prey in the 
meshes above and below the centre, and it is not uncommon to see its 
larder thus stored with several flies. 
You must not infer that the toils of spiders are in every part of the 
world formed of such fragile materials as those which we are accustomed 
to see, or that they are everywhere contented with small insects for their 
food. An author in the Philosophical Transactions asserts, that the spiders 
of Bermudas spin webs between trees seven and eight fathoms distant, 
which are strong enough to ensnare a bird as large as a thrush.? And 
Sir G. Staunton informs us, that in the forests of Java, spiders’ webs are 
met with of so strong a texture as to require a sharp cutting instrument 
to make way through them.’ The nets of a large geometric spider, Nephila 
(Zpeira) clavipes, are sufficiently strong to arrest and entangle the smaller 
species of humming-birds; but Mr. W. S. MacLeay, in whose garden at 
Cuba these nets abounded, never saw or heard of any birds being caught 
in them.* On the other hand, however, he observed in the grounds of 
Elizabeth Bay, near Sydney (Australia), in the beginning of 1840, a 
young bird (Zosterops dorsalis), which had been apparently dead some 
days, suspended in the geometrical net of an enormous undescribed spider 
of the same family (Zpeiride), which was in the act of sucking its juices; 
and his father, Alexander MacLeay, Esq., informed him that he had also 
been witness to a similar occurrence; but he considers these facts as ex- 
ceptions to the general rule of this spider’s insectivorous habits and to be 
of rare occurrence, since, as far as he could learn, no other persons had 
observed them.® 
Nor must you suppose that all the spiders of this country which catch 
their prey by means of snares follow the same plan in constructing them 
as the weavers and geometricians whose operations I have endeavoured to 
describe, The form of their snares and the situation in which they place 
1 Lister, Hist. Anim. Ang. 32, tit. 4, 2 Phil. Tr. 1668, p. 792. 
5 Embassy to China, i. 843. s ‘A 
+ Trans. Zool, Soc. Lond. i. 198, 5 Ann, Nat. Hist, viii. 324, 
