"
How happy it was for his parents to read these words in their dear boy's
own writing, after they had laid his body to rest in the grave which had no
terror for him!
But to return to our Spider, or Spinner, as his name means. You have not
only watched him coming down from the ceiling upon his own strong rope,
spinning it longer and longer as he travels, but have seen him crawling
along the ceiling head downwards, and perhaps wondered that he did not
fall. If you were to look at one of those eight feet of his through a
microscope, your wonder would be turned into admiration, as you saw the
beautiful little brushes by which he is enabled to cling fast to the smooth
surface, and walk along the ceiling as securely as you do on the floor.
And now I will leave you to read in some interesting book how prisoners
have tamed House-spiders, and about the Water-spider which has been known
to spin its nest in a tumbler of water, and the great Americans, as large
as sparrows, which catch tiny birds; for it is time to pass on to the
Insect family. But I must first tell you a story about a Tarantula, a very
large spider, which lives in the south of Europe, as well as in tropical
countries, and makes holes for itself about four inches deep in the ground.
Two officers from India agreed to spend their furlough together in a visit
to Australia, the one for the sake of making researches in natural history,
the other for any chance interest or amusement that might offer itself in a
new country.
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