160 LITTLE FOLKS 
" Fancy his terror and fright, as he saw the monster creeping 
stealthily after him ! He dropped the leg and ran for his hole, 
half scared out of his wits, and never looked back once." 
The great enemy of the small Cockroach is a spider ; a little 
larger than our common house spider, and much stronger. They 
have a very ingenious way to capture the Roach. When a spider 
wants fresh meat, he comes out from his web, attaches one thread 
to a beam in the roof, and another a little further down, and then 
goes down and waits. By-and-by some unwary Roach crawls along 
over this thread. Instantly the spider rushes out, makes a half 
circle around him, lets go the second attachment of thread, which 
is now entangled in the leg of the Roach, and by some peculiar 
movement he is swung off, and hangs by the feet in the air. The 
spider stands coolly by and looks at his struggles. 
Soon the spider runs back to the first attachment, and goes 
down the tiny rope to his victim. He first kills him by eating a 
hole in his head between the eyes. The next thing is to bring him 
home, and the manner of this is truly wonderful. A thread is 
attached to the lower side of the Roach. The spider then climbs 
up his rope with this thread and attaches it so high that the Roach 
is turned upside down. He then hauls on the other thread and 
turns the body again. Again he attaches the thread, and so he 
goes on till the Cockroach is by degrees hoisted to the wall and 
deposited in a corner. 
But in this hot country it would soon spoil, so the spider pro- 
ceeds to hermetically seal it up for future use. He encloses the 
body in a case of glutinous substance, so that, in fact, it lasts the 
spider a week. At one end he leaves a little hole which is closed 
up after each meal. 
