The Portland daily press., 1892-10-29
BUILDING SPIDERS WEBS.
Method OF Two Pet Insects That Did Not
EEind Being Observed.


AS the webs which my spiders-Lucy
and Eliza-spun were several times
broken or mutilated during the year,
either by accident or the gardener, we
had plenty of chances for seeing how
they proceeded in making them. The
lines were in both cases stretched be-
tween white rose bush that climbed up
one side of the window and purple
clematis that occupied and draped the
opposite mullion. But Lucy and Eliza
didn't live in the webs-those were only
their snares or traps for their prey. Each
of them had in addition private home
or apartment of her own under shelter
of rose leaf at some distance from the
treacherous geometrical structure.
The house itself consisted merely of a
silken cell, built out from the rose leaf,
and connected with the snare by single
stout cord of very solid construction.
On this cord the spider kept one foot
had almost said one hand-constantly
fixed. She poised it lightly by its claws,
and whenever an INSECT got entangled in
the web subtle electric message, so to
speak, seemed to run along the line to
the ever watchful carnivore. In one
short second Lucy or Eliza, as the case
might be, had darted out upon her
quarry and was tackling it might and
main, according to the particular way
its size and strength rendered then and
there advisable.
In building their webs, as in many
other small points, Lucy and Eliza
showed from the first no inconsiderable
personal differences. Lucy began hers
by spinning a long line from her spin
nerets, and letting the wind carry it wher-
ever it would; while Eliza, more archi-
tectural in character, preferred to take
her lines personally from point to point,
and see herself to their proper fastening.
In either case, however, the first thing
done was to stretch some eight or ten
stout threads from place to place on the
outside of the future web, to act as
points d'appui for the remainder of the
structure. To these outer threads, which
the spiders strengthened SO as to- bear
considerable strain by doubling and
trebling them, other thinner single
threads were then carried radially at ir-
regular distances, like the spokes of
wheel, from point in the center, where
they were all made fast and connected
together.
AS soon as this radiating framework
or scaffolding was finished, like the wool
on loom, the industrious craftswoman
started in the middle and began the task
of putting in the crosspieces or welt
which were to complete and bind to-
gether the circular pattern. These she
woye round and round in continuous
spiral, setting out at the center and
keeping on in ever widening circlets,
till she arrived at last at the exterior or
foundation threads. How she fastened
these crosspieces to the ray lines 1 could
never quite make out, though then fol-
lowed the work closely from inside
through the pane of glass with laty-
scopic lens; for, strange to say, the
spiders were not in the least disturbed
by being watched at their work, and
never took the slightest notice of any,
thing that went on at the other side of
the window.
Ny impression is, however, that she
gummed them together, letting them
harden into one as they dried, for the
thread itself is always semiliquid when
first xuded.--Grant Allen in Longman's
Magazine.