The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-04-27

what they had brought without my pets
had dressed the bottles in the robes of long
ago.
"The merchant takes the parvenu and
the nouveau richie, who are easy to fool
and play with. He leads them down into
the dark cellar. By the light of the candle
the customer sees the rows of bottles
Their necks are deep in dust. 1t is easy to
blow over them dust. The cobwebs drape
them; they stretch from cork to cork-it is
plain that there is here great age. All my
cobWebs, mon ami. The customer has
what you call the pulling of the leg to him.
He is proud. But it is good for him. Good
wine is only meant for the man who knows
it.
perhaps man has quickly made great
wealth and keeps a grand establishment.
He must have fine wine cellar. Perhaps
he buys himself old wines, dusty and cob
webby. But the cobwebs are broken and
en- deshabille when the bottles are moved
to his cellar. They have not the tone, the
look of the real old age, of the long years of
gentle rest in the undisturbed dark n'est-
ce pas? Then he drives out to see old
Pierre, or writes from New York or Chi
cago-I do a grand business in Chicago.
Sapristi, send him nv pets. They work
for him. Soon he can take his rich friends
into his cellar, and they say, Mon Dieu,
this is superb, it is magnificent. We give
you congratulation, my boy This is what
money cannot buy. My pets stop working,
and they do what You call wink the other
eye. They then resume their toll"
"Tell us how you raise them and feed
them, Pierre" asked the visitor insinuat-
in gdorb,sr i is = science this RAISING Of
spiders. I have on hand at one time about
10000 spiders, old and young. l brought
some eggs from France, and the choicest
webmakers to be found. Here is the
queen of them all. Her children are the
superb spinners. Many hundreds of my
pets are her descendants. It is the kind
bred bv my great-uncle in France"
The old man led the way to glass dome
in the corner, beneath which a filmy web
of beautiful pattern stretched across nearly
two feet. Pierre touched one of the meshes
and huge black spider danced nimbly
out from her downy nest and ran up the
vibrating thread to the old mans finger
He gave her fly and she tripped back
within doors with her booty.
"This is Sara" said Pierre. "She has
the divine Bernhard She is the pride of
all my pets. ALL here is lola looking at
you"
A hideous, hairy monster had crawled
up the fine wire netting that kept him
within bounds and stared sardonically not
foot away from the writer's nose. A start
and an exclamation were natural, but
Pierre looked grieved.
81 do not blame you much" said he.
"Zola is good-natured and would not hurt
you, but he has the horrible look. He has
fits of bad temper sometimes. Then ventre-
bleu, look you out. He is the bird spider
of Surinam. His body is two inches long
and he catches and eats small finches and
sparrows when in his woods. His bite is
bad poison. / doubt not it would kill you.
But / tame him with kindness Yet he is
not pleasant to think of running around
room. He might have the bad temper.
He would eat all my pets in one day. But
he is king of all spiders-ie grand monarch.
Therefore I call him lola, the most superb
of writer's.
''When the mother spider wishes to lay
her eggs she makes a little web in broad
crack. See, here is one weaving her nurs-
cry. Then she lays fifty eggs, perhaps,
like petite jelly drops. Then she covers
them up in soft silk cocoon and leaves
them. In two weeks, longer in winter,
they begin to hatch. It is very difficult.
1t takes one or two days. The egg shell or
skin cracks off in rags. Mon Dieu, but
there is a great struggle for the enfants.
Then they grow and in a week look like
spiders. They mott often and shed their
skins like the snake. | must separate the
brood at a tender age. 1t is hard to break
up the family, but, Sapristi, they devour
each other until only the one is left, like
your droll tale of the cats of Kilkenny"