Casco Bay breeze. [volume] (South Harpswell, Me.) 1901-1917, 1906-08-23
STRAND FROM ABOVE.
From the Danish OF Johannes Jor-
gensen.

=
gensen.
The sun rose on 4 bright September
morning. A thousand gems OF dew
sparkled in the meadows. and upon the
breeze fioated. i'm the wake OF summer.
the shining silken strands of which no
man knowe;h tie whence or the
whittier.
One Of then caught in the loop Of
tree. and the skipper. little speck-
led yellow spider, quit his air-slip to
survey the lcafy dcmesne there. 1t
was not to his liking. and. with prompt
decision. he spun new strand and let
himself down straight into the hedge
below.
There were twiSs and shoots In
plenty there To spin Il web I'm. and he
went to work ut once. letting the
strand from above, by which lie had
come. bear the upper corner Of IL.
A fine large web 1t was when fin
islfed, and with this about 1t that set
it of from all the other webs there
abouts, that IL seemed to stand
straight up in the air. without any
thing to show what held 1t. 1t takes
pretty sharp eyes to make out single
strand Of spider-web, even q very little
way off,
The days went by. Flies grew
scarcer. as the sun rose later. and the
spider had to make his net larger that
it might reach farther and catch more.
And here the strand from above turned
out great help. With 1t to brace the
structure, the web was spun higher
and wider. until it covered the hedge
all the way across. In the wet Oc-
tober mornings. when it hung full of
slrmmerins rain drops, it was like a
veil stitched with precious pearls
The spider WAS proud Of his work.
No longer the littIe thing that lad
come drifting out of the vast with
nothing but the unspun web in it's
pocket, so to speak. lie was now big.
portly, opulcnt spider, with the largest
web in the hedge.
One mornin: lie awo,;c very much
cut of sorts. There had been a frost
in the night. ana daylight brought no
sun. The sky WAS overcast: not 4 fly
was out. All the long, gray. autumn
day the spider sat hungry and cross
in his heart. Toward evening. to kill
time, lie started OH n tour OF inspec-
ton. to see IL anything needed bracins
Or mendinG. He pulled at all the
strands; they were firm enough. But.
though he found nothing wrong, his
temper did not improve; lie waxed
:rosser than ever.
At the farther end OF the web he
came ut last to n strand that all ut
once seemed to change him. All the
rest were this way or that-the spider
knew every stick and knob they were
made fast to, every one But this pre-
posterous strand went nowhere-that
is to say. went straight up in tho air
and was lost. lie stood ND on his
hind legs and stared with all his eyes.
but he could not make il ont. TO look
at, the strand went right up into the
clouds, which was nonsense.
The longer he sat and giared to no
purpose, the ansrier the spider grew
He had quite forgotten how, OH n
bright September morning. he himself
had come down the same strand. And
he had forgotten now. in tile building
IF the web, and afterward when il had
to be enlarged. it was just this strand
he had depended upon. lie saw only
that there was Il useless strand, a
fool strand, that went nowhere in
sense or reason. only up i'm the air
where solid spiders had no CON
Germ
Away with it," and with one vic
lous snap OF his hungry jaws lie bit
the strand in two.
The instant the web collapsed. the
whole proud and prosperous structure
Tell in n heap, and when the spider
came to he lay sprawllng in the hedge
with the web all about his head like
wet rag. In one brief moment he
had wrecked 1t all-because he did
not understand the use of the strand
from above.-Jacob A. Riis.