tag="{http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml}a">110

The Enemies of Spiders. Cannibalism. Egg parasites. Moulting. Starvation. Body parasites. Solitary wasps. A gruesome fate

Concluding Reflexions. The “use” of spiders. Wide range of habits. Complexity of instincts. The mystery of the egg. The storage of energy. Economy in diet. Conclusion

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

CHAPTER I

A SURVEY OF THE FIELD

There are certain days of the year when the immense wealth of spider industry going on all around us is revealed in a way calculated to strike even the least observant. We all know—and derive no peculiarly pleasant thrill from the knowledge—that we can, if so minded, find abundance of cobwebs and their occupants by visiting the cellar or the tool-house; and probably we have all at times noticed, with a languid interest, large circular webs on our favourite rose-bushes, with a spider motionless in the centre.

But some spring or autumn morning, when the night has been foggy and the sun has only just succeeded in dispersing the mists, every bush and hedge is seen to be draped, every square foot of lawn and meadow to be carpeted with spiders’ silk. There has been no special activity in the domain of these creatures, but every silken line is beaded with drops perhaps fifty times its diameter, and what yesterday required careful observation to detect is now visible yards away, and we realise for once something of the prodigious activity constantly going on though ordinarily unnoted.

And it never entirely ceases. True hibernation, if it ever occurs, is not the rule among spiders, and there is no time of the year when some species may not be found at work. Beat trees or bushes over an old umbrella, or sweep grass and herbage with a sweeping net in summer, and you will never draw a blank—some spiders are sure to be found. In winter such measures are profitless, but if you take the trouble to grub among ground vegetation, or shake fallen leaves over a newspaper, or search under stones or logs of wood you will have no difficulty in finding spiders enough, and by no means dormant. I have even seen an enthusiastic collector remove inches of snow and disinter rare species from among the roots of the grass beneath!

Spiders, then, are plentiful enough, and it is not only individuals that are numerous but there are vastly more kinds or species than most people dream of. The Rev. O. Pickard-Cambridge, in a book under the modest title of The Spiders of Dorset indispensable to all British collectors, quaintly observes that most of his friends claim acquaintance with three kinds of spiders—the garden spider, the harvest spider and the little red spider—two of which, as it happens, are not spiders at all. Yet the British List contains about five hundred and fifty species, and the spiders of the world, though only very partially investigated, already include many thousands of known and described forms.

In this little work we shall not at all consider the spider tribe from the collector’s point of view. We shall concern ourselves rather with habits and modes of life and such structural modifications as are correlated therewith. Certain