This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1877 Excerpt: ...deep. To rake up the earth and shovel it away, it has a row of hard points on its head, like the teeth of a rake. As soon as it has scooped out tho soil, it lines the tunnel with silk, through which no damp can penetrate; and no drawing-room was ever so beautifully plastered, and papered with damask, as the mason ...
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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1877 Excerpt: ...deep. To rake up the earth and shovel it away, it has a row of hard points on its head, like the teeth of a rake. As soon as it has scooped out tho soil, it lines the tunnel with silk, through which no damp can penetrate; and no drawing-room was ever so beautifully plastered, and papered with damask, as the mason spider's sitting-room. 3. But the door is the most wonderful part of this mansion. The spider does not like draughts, and cannot bear having the door left open, so it contrives that it shall shut itself. The door is perfectly round and flat, about the size of a sixpence, but very thick, made of thin layers of fine earth moistened and worked together with fine silk, so that it is very tough and elastic, and cannot crumble; with a wonderful silk hinge at the top. The hinge is elastic silk, very springy, and so tight that when the door is opened it closes immediately with a sharp snap. 4. But the door does not fit on to the house, but into it. It has a beautifully hard socket, bound with silk, into which it fits very tightly, while the outside is covered with bits of moss or other things glued on, so that no one can possibly detect it. The only way of opening it from without is by a pin, but even then I have often seen the spider keeping tight hold of the bottom of the door with her claws, while holding on to the walls of her cell with her whole force. 5. Here the little architect remains all day, and at night spins a few threads among the grass near her home, in which she catches her prey; but she also hunts for food by leaping upon beetles, and carrying them into her tunnel. So attached is she to her cellar, that I have often cut the nests out of the earth and brought them away in my pocket with the inhabitant within; and I have now before me a row ...
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