circles would meet. But this is not the fact in the common spider’s 
web. Instead of meeting, the circles pass by each other as they 
come round to the point of starting, and thus form, not a geo- 
• metric circle but a spiral. In the construction of this so-called 
geometric web, the guys and stays are first attached to surrounding 
objects; then the radii are made, running from a common centre 
to the circumference. The guys, stays and radii are made of a 
firm, dry, inelastic silk. When this preliminary frame-work is 
done, the spider weaves on the concentric circles, attaching each 
circle to each one of the radii by the direct application of the 
spinners so as to make them adhere. These circles, not only with 
this spider but with all spiders, is made of an elastic silk, covered 
with a viscid gum which, after the line passes into the air, gathers 
on the thread in globules so numerous and so minute that it is es¬ 
timated that on a web sixteen inches in diameter there are 100,000 
of them. 
Second. The eccentric web. The Charleston spider is known 
in the scientific books as Nephila plumipcs , meaning the feather¬ 
footed golden fleece, so-called from the fact that there are bunches 
of feathery growth on the joints of its legs, while one pair of 
spinners produces a silk of very fine quality and of the color of 
gold. It w r as discovered during the w r ar on the islands in Charles¬ 
ton harbor by an officer of our army who is a naturalist. It 
builds an eccentric web. The focus of this web is near the top, 
where the spider takes position head dowmwards, waiting for prey. 
The radii, guys, and stays of this w r eb are made of inelastic 
threads of silvery color, while the circular lines are of elastic, 
viscid silk of golden color. Though usually making one thread 
of all the spinners, it is believed that spiders may use one or all of 
the spinners at will. But why the golden spinners should pro¬ 
duce silk ordinarily dry when reeled from the body, and viscid 
when used for the concentric circles of the w r eb is not as yet un¬ 
derstood. It may be that the same spinner sends out the line and 
at the same time covers it with the viscid gum, or that one spinner 
produces the filament while another covers it with the gum. At 
all events w ith three pairs of spinners the Charleston spider spins 
four kinds of silk ; the golden dry, the golden viscid and elastic, 
the silver dry, and the pale blue. 
