FOOD or INSECTS. 



359 



The last of the tribe of hunters that it is necessary to 

 particularise are those which, like the tigers amongst the 

 larger animals, seize their victims by leaping upon them. To 

 this division belongs a very pretty small banded species, 

 Salticus scenicus, which in summer may be seen running on 

 every wall. 



To Walckenaer's swimmers^ the last of his grand tribes of 

 spiders, including the single genus and species, Argyroneta 

 aquatica, the first line of the above quotation from Dr. Darwin 

 is particularly applicable ; for these actually seize their food 

 by diving under the water, their bodies being kept unwet by 

 a coating of air which constantly surrounds them. — Thus 

 one single race of insects exemplify in miniature almost all 

 the modes of obtaining food which prevail amongst preda- 

 ceous quadrupeds — the audacious attack of the lion, the wily 

 spring of the tiger, the sedentary cunning of the lynx, and 

 the amphibious dexterity of the otter. 



This general view of the stratagems by which the spider 

 tribe obtain their food, imperfect as it is, will, I trust, have 

 interested you sufficiently to drive away the associations 

 of disgust with which you, like almost every one, have pro- 

 bably been accustomed to regard these insects. Instead of 

 considering them as repulsive compounds of cruelty and 

 ferocity, you will henceforward see in their procedures 

 only the ingenious contrivances of patient and industrious 

 hunters, who, while obeying the great law of nature in 

 procuring their sustenance, are actively serviceable to the 

 human race in destroying noxious insects. You will allow 

 the poet to stigmatise them as 



" . . . . cunning and fierce, 

 Mixture abhorred !" 



but you will see that these epithets are in reality as unjustly 

 applied to them (at least with reference to the mode in which 

 they procure their necessary subsistence) as to the patient 

 sportsman who lays snares for the birds that are to serve for 

 the dinner of his family ; and when you hear 



"... . the fluttering wing 

 And shriller sound declare extreme distress," 



A A 4 



