random, often falls into the trap. One imagines that
his strength ought to frighten the Spider; the kick of his spurred levers
should enable him to make a hole, then and there, in the web and to get
away. But not at all. If he does not free himself at the first effort,
the Locust is lost.

Turning her back on the game, the Epeira works all her spinnerets,
pierced like the rose of a watering-pot, at one and the same time. The
silky spray is gathered by the hind-legs, which are longer than the
others and open into a wide arc to allow the stream to spread. Thanks to
this artifice, the Epeira this time obtains not a thread, but an
iridescent sheet, a sort of clouded fan wherein the component threads are
kept almost separate. The two hind-legs fling this shroud gradually, by
rapid alternate armfuls, while, at the same time, they turn the prey over
and over, swathing it completely.

The ancient _retiarius_, when pitted against a powerful wild beast,
appeared in the arena with a rope-net folded over his left shoulder. The
animal made its spring. The man, with a sudden movement of his right
arm, cast the net after the manner of the fishermen; he covered the beast
and tangled it in the meshes. A thrust of the trident gave the quietus
to the vanquished foe.

The Epeira acts in like fashion, with this advantage, that she is able to
renew her armful of fetters. Should the first not suffice, a second
instantly follows and another and yet another, until the reserves of silk
become exhausted.

When all movement ceases under the snowy winding-sheet, the Spider goes
up to her bound prisoner. She has a better weapon than the _bestiarius_'
trident: she has her poison-fangs. She gnaws at the Locust, without
undue persistence, and then withdraws, leaving the torpid patient to pine
away.

Soon she comes back to her motionless head of game: she sucks it, drains
it, repeatedly changing her point of attack. At last, the clean-bled
remains are flung out of the net and the Spider returns to her ambush in
the centre of the web.

What the Epeira sucks is not a corpse, but a numbed body. If I remove
the Locust immediately after he has been bitten and release him from the
silken sheath, the patient recovers his strength to such an extent that
he seems, at first, to have suffered no injury. The Spider, therefore,
does not kill her capture before sucking its juices; she is content to
deprive it of the power of motion by producing