The record-union., 1896-08-14
MYRIADS OF UGLY SPIDERS.
The Multi-Lesged PetS-The Only Spider
Farm In America.
A Queer Industry Located Only Four
Miles From Philadelphia on the
Old Lancaster Pike.

United States. AS far as the writer can
learn there are only two in the world.
Entomologists have collected and raised
spiders for purposes of scientific obSer-
walton and investigation, just as bacilli
and other unpleasant animals are nur-
tured. Here and there spider has
been made a pet of by some lonely
prisoner of Chillon or the Tonlbs, but
spider farming as money-making in
dustry is yet in its infancy. What in
the world is done with 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 coun-
try, and abroad only in a little French
village in the Department Of the Loire,
says the Philadelphia Times"
Pierre Grantaire furnishes spiders at
so much a hundred for distribution in
the wine vaults of the merchant and
the nOuveau richie. His trade IS chiefly
with the wholesale merchant. who is
able to stock cellar with new, shining,
freshly labeled bottles and in three
months see them yelled with filmy cob
webs, so that the effect of twenty years
of storage is secured at a small cost.
The effect upon a customer can be i'm
agined, and is hardly to be measured in
dollars and cents. 1t is a trifing mat
ter to cover the bins with dust. That
effect is easy to the veriest tyro in the
wine trade. But cobwebS-that is diff
ferent-cobwbes spun from cork to
cork, cobwebs that drape the slender
neck like delicate lace when the flask is
brought to the lght-the seal of years
Of slow mellowing and fruition.
SPIDER RAISING.
The Lancaster Pike is an old, old
highway that trembled to the tramp
of marching columns in the revolution.
In one of the low, stone farmhouses,
huge as the chimney, lives Pierre Gran
taire, a veteran of the French army,
who was conscripted as middle-aged
rnan from his fathers farm in 1870 TO
fight the Prussians. For ten years he
has lived here, a rather unique figure
among the matter of-fact farmers
around him. For the tricolor always
flies from his roof on the 14th of July,
and the colors are draped half mast on
the anniversary of the day that the
hated Prussians marched into Paris a
quarter of century ago.
Old Grantaire has a wonderful vege-
Ia BILE farm, and sends in the choicest
green stuff that is displayed in the
Philadelphia markets. His neighbors
know that he is a market gardener, and
also raises mushrooms, and rather envy
him the returns from his squads that
retail at 60 cents a pair this time of
year But few of them know of the
spiderraising industry, which makes a
substantial part of Pierre'S BUSINESS.
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 gossa-
mer patterns everywhere.
1t was bit shuddering for the visitor,
who had been brought up to smash spi-
der with slipper or whatever came the
handiest, to be brought into a room
where there were spiders in front of
him, spiders to the rear of him, myr-
lads of spiders on every hand.
The walls were covered with wire
squares from six inches to foot across
like magnified sections of the wire fence
used to inclose poultry yards. Behind
these wire screens the walls had been
covered with rough planking. There
We're cracks between the boards, ap-
parently left with design, and then
weather-beaten surfaces were dotted
with holes and splintered crevices. Long
| tables running the lengths of the room
were covered with small wire frames
wooden boxes and glass jars.
| CURTAINS OF LACEWORK.
All of these wires in the room were
| covered over by patterns of lace tracery
| III the geometrical outlines fashioned by
| the spider artists, inspired by the mys-
terious instinct which has made them
weave their filmy snares in the same
fashion since the world began. The
sunlight Streamed through the open
door and the room seemed hung with
| curtains OF fine 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
villainous looking pets as big as half
dollars emerged from their crannies on
the table and clustered against their
glass roofing
They think I feed them now" said
| Pierre, "but I fool them for you. They
have brains, these little creatures. All
| they are cunning. After you see them
and L tell you of them you will not
crush them more. You will say. The
| spider can teach me something. 1 will
| watch him. He is a diplomat, an arch
itect, mathematician His knowl-
| edge is worth having All, there is a
| fine ,i11cr
| knock him off. He viii not bite YOU
| They are harmless He wishes to give
| you a bon jour and make your ac-
| quaintance.
| 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 raisina
families and minding their own busi-
ness. Is not that teaching of the
world and a lesson already? You see
| in these frames / breed my pets. and
when the infants are big enough to run
| about / take them iii the next room
where they can set up for themselves
as you say. 1t is from there I sci
| mcst. They are great cannibals. m,
pets; they eat their children and the
| children eat each other. SO l must ge
a good price for those that survive
| their childhood
'It is not all kinds of spiders tha
make webs. There are those that live
| in holes in the ground and make fol
| themselves trap doors, and some max,
scft nests in cracks, While others spir
| small homes in the grass or in tn,
room corner. No, indeed: I have sough
out kinds that weave themselves fin,
| large webs of lines and circles They
only look artistic in the wine cellar O.
on the bouteille. They are selected