The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1899-07-14

J ULY 1 4, 1899.
then sends another sikcn bridge float |
inc, off in another direction. Another
failure is followed by several other |
similar attempts, until all the points
of the compass have been tried But /
neither the resources nor the reason
ing powers of the spider arc exhaust
ed. He climbs to the top of the rolc
and energetically goes to work to con-
struct a silllcn balloon. He has no hot
air with which to initiate it. but hc has
the power of making it buoyant. When
he gets his balloon finished, he does
not 90 off upon the mere supposition
that it will carry him, as men often do,
but he fastcns it to q guy rope, the
other end of which he attaches to the
island pole upon which he is a prison
cr. lie then gets into his aerial vehi-
Gle, while it is made fast. and tests it
to see whether its dimensions are capa-
ble of bearing him away. He often
finds that he has made it too small in
which case he hauls it down, takes it
all apart, and constructs it on larger
and better plan. a spider has been
seen to make three different balloons
before he became satisfied with his ex-
pertinent. Then he will get in, snap
his guy-rope, and sail away to land as
gracefully and as supremely indcpcn-
dent of his surroundings as we'll as
could be imagined.
WATER SPIDERS.
Most people have seen or heard of
the diving g-bell which is considered to
be 4 great invention of man. And yet,
long before man thought of his diving
bell, the water-spider had hers, in which
she reared her numerous family. There
are several remarkable things about
this nest: one of them is the manner in
which it is made. Man makes a great
dealof fuss when he wants q diving
bell; there is metal to be got and melt
ed down, casting and riveting to be
done, and then the great bell has to be
swung down through the water. The
water-spider makes no fuss at all, and
asks for no help-not even her hus-
bands. In that business-like manner
which characterizes all spiders, she
boldly plunges into the water and
walks down to the stem of 4 pond
weed. When she has selected suit
able position for her silkcn palace, she
fixes number of strong lines in all
directions for anchorage Then in the
midst of these she constructs bcanti-
full web, somewhat in the shape of
thimble, but not quite so large. 1t is
full of water, and therefore not like Il
diving-bell How is the water to be
got out and replaced with air!
The old naturalists explained the
difficulty in this way. They said that
the spider so arranged her web on the
stems of the plants that the little bub-
bles Of oxygen gas which all green
plants give off should be caught in
this trap and retained. The true OK
PLANTATION is tar more wonderful; she
carries the whole of the air required
from the surface! Now, look at this
spider resting on the leaf before us.
Her body and legs are covered with
gray i,h hairs. When | touch her, she
plunges quickly into the water. The
movement is so quick that the air has
not time to escape from her hairy coat,
and she goes down surrounded by
globule of air When across the thrcs-
hold of her home, size carefully dis
lodges this air 10y rubbing herself with
her legs The liberated bubble immedi-
ately rises to the roof of her house, and
there remains. In this way she at
length fills the whole bell, and takes up
her position in it, always head down
wards. Here she passes the winter,
keeping snIg and quiet until the warm
days of spring invite her to the surface
in quest OF flies and other small insects
About this time the spiders come to i'll
spect the house, and, finding it hardly
enough for two, they bring down more
air, which expands the elastic walls,
and gives the requisite space.
Soon the lady of the house constructs
4 ncat and comfortable little cocoon,
which she fixes in the roof of her nest
and deposits about one hundred eggs
in it. In due time they hatch, and the
swarm of tiny spiders make themselves
happy, until each is large enough to
set up a separate establishment.
SPIDERS THREADS.
DR.. II. G.. McCook, the wcll-knovn
naturalist, has been studying the mode
of constructing webs prevailing among
the orb-weaving spiders, and he seems
to have confirmed his previous opinion
that the silk-line framework or founda- |
tion of their web is laid, in the first in
stance, by the help Ola current Of air
carrying the thread. In a great num-
Der of cases DR.. McCook observed the |