Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1882-10-12
A TERRIBLE EXPERIENCE.

! One rainy day. as the children were
amusing themselves by ransacking their
uncle Harry's closets, Tom pulled his
hand out suddenly from the back part
Of a deep drawer. and shouted triumph
antly: Presertes!' at the same time
holding out large glass jar for inspec-
ton. A Cry, of disgust followed. for in
stead of preserves there was nothing in
| the bottle but a strange looking animal
| floating in some brown liquid. bs.i
| II fah! 1t s q horrid bug, said Alice,
| turning up her nose in disgust. =. -.
| ~. Tain IT, contradicfed Charlie, re
gardless Of !, his grammar am 1Fls 60. It's
| tarantula." 'T't''9 2'-AI i4@ ho q
'ot' And what is that but 4 btig?'' re-
piled Alice "aa 7Atstais bEa ,d5as st-o.
'ht. It's spider" said Charlie. zo.' You
ask Uncle Harry il it ism t. 'bna z1eza aaT
| In the mean time Tom and Alice had
| taken the jar6oyer to the desk where
Uncle. Harry was writing. a., bss.s..t,s ,a.t
| ..as'What lis this, Uncle Harry?' said
Alice. M asgss,e..r t.g-, f..~,,~..
sit is a tarantula brought it home
from, California with me. y, IS,
g told you sonr' exclaimed Charlie,
from the closet. L'.s''i8 i'3'2'I9''' gt'4m"fT
]" It is Kind Of, spider, and one Of the
largest that lives in this country They
don't make webs like ordinary spiders,
but dig q hole in the ground and line it
with a sort of silky webf'likeothe cocoon
of q silklworn1. Their hole is about six
inches deep, and is closed by d funny
little trap-door made OF the same silky
lining, and covered on the outside with
sticks and gravel so cleNerlys that one
can rarely find q tarantula's burrow un-
less you see him going IA; and even if
you do see him going in. it is Very diff
cult TO get him to come. out, as he pulls
his trap door shut after him. and holds
it tight from the inside.'' t5h "a nH7'H1,
q If he don't build a Web, how does
he catch tiles and things?" inquired
Charlie "a = -t5""2 81" h"s t5-"f Z.
<.s1sHe Jumps after them. A lively
tarantula can jump from three to five
feet, and when he once catches hold of
any kind of a bug orysmal bird with
those great hairy legs, it has but little
chance to get away
IS Is their bite really so poisonous?''
asked Alice, cycling the jar rather tint
idly, as if she was afraid the terrible in
sect would getaway. rfy tun .rag,4o -
B.. .. That question is a hard one to an
swer. Some people who have lived in
countries where they are common eli claim
that it is only fatal in a few cases, While
poison r~, .'.' is si'''G
90" What are you laughing at, Uncle
Harry" demanded Charlie. -a@afl9 !.
% az was thinking of the most horrible
night ever experienced,'' replied his
uncle. You know" trhe continued,
i"while was in the West [ spent some
|, two weeks camping out in the mount
aims withIa party of four, young men,
We had an old cabin, where we, slept at
night, and we spent our days delight
fully, fishing, hunting, geologizing, and
botanizing- We had not Been in camp
long before we discovered tarantnla
Village not far from our cabin, and we
all determined to catch some specimens
to take home with us. At first we had
considerable trouble in catching them;
they were so lively and so ugly that we
always ended in killing them in self
defense. p At last brilliant member of
the party discovered that by placing q
wide-mouthed bottle over the mouth of
the tarantula's burrow, and then thunlp
ing on the ground around it, the animal
would crawl out into the bottle, and the
captor could turn the bottle over, clap
a piece of board over the top, and secure
his prisoner. 'As'soon as the discovery
was made known all the old pickle jars
were called into reqlisition,z and as the
former occupants of the cabin had left
number, we were soon lucky, Or I'M
lucky enough to have about twenty-five
large specimens. We covered the jars
with bits of single. and set them on a
shelf which was nailed to one side of the
cabin. Everything went well, and we
determined that as soon as we had
leisure we would Kill. them with chloro7
form and preserve! them in spirits as
that one is But one night, after we
had all got comfortably settled for
sleep, one of the party thought that he
was thirsty, SO rising carefully from his
bunk, he CROPPED his way over to the
corner, under the shelf, where the water
pail stood; he had his drink, and forget
| ting the existence of the shelf, raised
| his head. Crash! down came the rot
ten old shelf, and down came the jars
with the tarantulas in them. The party
| heard the fall, and like one man sprang
from their beds and rushed for the
| door, but before they had got halfway
across the floor they remembered that
the tarantl1las were loose, and they
stopped: moment more and twas too
|
fear that we would put our feet on a
farantula; so there we stood as it turned
into statues. In a short time our posi-
tons became strained and cramped, but
we did not dare to change them. Our
nerves became excited, and I'VE mag
ined that we could feel them crawling
up our, backs and walking over our
bare feet. The minutes seemed length
ened to hours, and the hours seemed
months. At last the day began to
break, but we had manufactured cur
.iitains out of old newspapers, that we
might sleep undisturbed by the light.
Oh, how we bemoaned our laziness!
Finally it grew light enough to see. and
we carefully opened the door and went
out One of the party went back into
the cabin aud got our clothes, and after
examining them carefully we dressed
ourselves. t
s'And nobody was bitten2'' said
Alice, with sigh Of relief.
| s.No =, ropliad har rneie riSino from