ENEMIES OF THE SPIDER— USJiS OF THE SPIDER. 



613 



and remains motionless, while the Thorinsa covers it with its body, and when robbed 

 of it, wanders about disconsolate. In a forest of the Sooloo Islands, Mr. Adams 

 found the ground literally overrun with a small black agile species of Lycosa, many 

 of which had a white flattened globose cocoon affixed to the ends of their abdomen. 

 It was most amusing to watch the care with which these jealous mothers protected the 

 cradles of their little ones, allowing themselves to fall into the hands of the enemy 

 rather than be robbed of the silken nests that contained them. 



If the spiders are at war with all other insects, and contribute to keep them within 

 bounds by the destruction they cause among their ranks, they in their turn have to 

 suffer from the attacks of many enemies. Several species of monkeys, squirrels, liz- 

 ards, tortoises, frogs, and toads catch and devour them wherever they can. In Java 

 and Sumatra, we even find several birds belonging to the order of sparrows that have 

 been named Arachnotherce, from their living almost exclusively on spiders. Armed 

 with a prodigiously long recurved and slender beak, they know how to pursue them 

 and drag them forth from the most obscure recesses. 



It is amongst the insects themselves, however, that the spiders have to fear their most 

 numerous and formidable enemies. Independently of those which they find in their 

 own class, the centipedes seize them beyond the possibility of escape ; while several 

 species of philanthus, pompilius, and sphex, more savage and poisonous than themselves, 

 will rush upon spiders eight times their size and weight, and benumbing them with a 

 stino-, bear them off to their nests, to serve as food for their larvae. But the insects 

 which in appearance are the tiniest and most delicate, are perhaps those which most 

 .cruelly wound the spiders, by attacking them in their eggs, which they watch over 

 with such affection, as to be ever ready for them to make the sacrifice of their own 

 lives. The Pimpla Arachnitor pierces with its invisible gimlet the tender skin of the 

 spider's egg, and, without tearing it, introduces its own eggs into the liquid. The 

 pimpla's egg soon comes to maturity, and the larva devours the substance of that of 

 the spider, from whence a winged insect bursts forth — a phenomenon which made 

 some naturalists, too hasty to judge from appearances, believe that spiders were able 

 to procreate four-winged flies. 



Notwithstanding the disgust or horror which they generally inspire, the spiders are, 

 with very rare exceptions, by no means injurious to man. However promptly their 

 venom may act upon insects, even that of the largest species of Northern Europe pro- 

 duces, on coming into contact with our skin, no pain or inflammation equalling in 

 virulence that of the wasp, the bee, the gnat, or other insects of a still smaller size. 

 The giant spiders of a sunnier sky, armed with more formidable weapons, naturally 

 produce a more painful sting ; but even here the effects have been much exaggerated, 

 and the wonderful stories about the Sicilian tarantula's bite, which we read of in Brydone 

 and other authors, are nothing but fables raised upon a very slender foundation of truth. 

 Azara mentions that several of his negroes having been bitten by the large Avicular 

 mygale {M. avicalaria) of South America, a slight ephemeral fever was the only result. 



If thus, among the many species of spiders, hardly a single one may be said to be 

 formidable to man, the indirect services which they render him — by diminishing the 

 number of noxious insects, or keeping in check the legions of gnats which irritate and 

 annoy him by their attacks — are far from inconsiderable. Nor are they entirely with- 

 out direct use. Several savage nations eat spiders, and the inhabitants of New Cale- 



