The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-04-27
Pierre Grantaire'S Queer In
dustry in a Philadelphia
Suburb.
C0BWEBs FOR NEW CELLARS.
Made but Bearing Old
Labels.


spiders for purposes of scientific observa-
ton and investigation, just as bacilli and
other unpleasant animals are nurtured.
Here and there spider has been made a
pet of by some lonely prisoner of Chillon
or the Tombs but spider farming as a
money-making industry is yet in its in
fancy. What in the world is done with a
crop of spiders? you ask. One has only to
go four miles from Philadelphia on the old
Lancaster pike and ask for the farm of
Pierre Grantaire to see what can be found
nowhere else in this country, and abroad
only in little French village in the De-
partment of the Loire, says writer in the
Philadelphia Press.
Pierre Grantaire furnishes spiders at so
much per hundred for distribution in the
wine vaults of the merchant and the nom
veaux richie. His trade is chiefly with the
wholesale merchant, who is able to stock a
cellar with new, shining, freshly labeled
bottles, and in three months see them
yelled with flmy cobwebs, so that the eff
feet of twenty years of storage is secured at
small cost. The effect upon customer
can be imagined, and is hardly to be meas
red in dollars and cents. 1t is trifling
matter to cover the bins with dust That
effect is easy to the veriest tyro in the
wine trade. But cobwebs-that is differ
ent matter-cobwebs spun from cork to
cork, cobwebs that drape the slender neck
like delicate lace when the flask is brought
to the light-the seal of years of slow mel
lowing and fruition.
The Lancaster pike is an old, old high
way that trembled to the tramp of march
ing columns In the Revolution. In one of
the low, stone farmhouses, huge as to
chimney, lives Pierre Grantaire, veteran
of the French army, who was conscripted
as a middle-aged man from his fathers
farm in 20 to fight the Prussians. For
ten years he has lived here, rather unique
figure among the matter of fact farmers
around him. For the tricolor always flies
from his roof on the 18th of July, and the
colors are draped halfnast on the ami
versary of the day that the hated Prus-
slams marched into Paris quarter of a
century ago.
Old Grantaire has wonderful vegetable
farm, and sends in the choicest "green
stuff " that is displayed in the Philadel-
phia markets. His neighbors know that
he is a market gardener, and also raises
mushrooms, and rather envy him the re-
turns from his squads that retail at go cents
a pair this time of year. But few of them
makes substantial part of Pierre's bust
ness. 1t is not to the old mans interest
to have this advertised, and he seldom
takes a caller into the two rooms of his
dwelling where his multi-legged pets cover
the walls and weave their gossamer pat
terms everywhere.
1t was a bit shuddering for the visitor,
who had been broughtup to smash a spider
with slipper or whatever came handiest,
to be brought into room where there
were spiders in front of him, spiders to the
rear of him, myriads of spiders on every
hand.
The walls were covered by wire squares
from six inches to foot across, like mag
nitied sections of the wire fence used to in
close poultry-yards. Behind these wire
screens the walls had been covered with
rough planking. There were cracks be-
tween the boards, apparently left with de-
sign, and their weather-beaten surfaces
were dotted with knotholes and splintered
crevices Long tables running the length
of the room were covered with small wire
frames, wooden boxes and glass jars.
All of these wires in the room were COW
cred over by patterns of lace tracery, in the
geometrical outlines fashioned by the
spider artists, inspired by the mysterious
instinct which has made them weave their
fllmy SHARES in the same fashion since the
world began. The sunlight streamed
through the open door and the room
seemed hung with curtains of elfin-woven
lacework. The king of this fairy palace
raped his stubby pipe against the door,
and the webs were dotted with black spots
as the spiders scampered from their re-
treats in the wall cracks and a score of vii
demonstrating pets as big as half-dollars
emerged from their crannies on the table
and clustered against their glass roofing.
"They think 1 feed them now," said
Pierre, "but I fool them for you. They
have brains, these little creatures. All,
they are cunningl After you see them and
l tell you of them you VIII never crush
them more. You will say, The spider can
teach me something. l will watch him.
He is a diplomat, an architect mathema-
tician. His knowledge is worth having
All, there is fine fellow running on your
neck. Don't knock him off. He will not
bite you. They are harmless. He wishes
to give you bon Jour and make your &C
quaintance.
f'You wish to know of the business first ?
That is like you people-money first, then
the sentiment. There are 1000 spiders in
this room, all raising families and minding
their own business. Is not that teaching
to the world and lesson already? You
see, in these frames l breed my pets, and
when the enfants are big enough to run
about l take them in the next room, where
they can set up for themselves, as you say.
1t is from there / sell most. They are great
cannibals, my pets; they eat their children
and the children eat each other. So | must
get good price for those that survive their
childhood
at is not all kinds of spiders that make
webs. There are those that live in holes
in the ground and make for themselves
trap doors, and some make soft nests in
cracks, while others spin small homes in
the grass or in the room corner. No, in
deed; I have sought out kinds that
weave themselves fine large webs of lines
and circles. They only look artistic in the
wine-cellar or on the bouteille. They are
the selected ones. They are three families,
the names of them, the Spira Vulgaris,
the Zilla and the Nephlla Plumipes, which
the entomologists will tell you are the
grand web-spinners, the artists of the
spider world.
"But what money is there in it, you
ask. Mon Dieu, money, money-always
money. who love my pets to be always
thinking of what they sell forl l will tell
YOU now, and then you will talk no more
of money, and can show you something.
A customer comes to me. He is wine
merchant from New York or Philadelphia,
or perhaps he writes. He says that
he has just stocked cellar with
five year old port, or Burgundy, or
something else. The bottles have been
brushed clean in shipping. They look new