In attacking the spider, the mason-fly his a choice of his
antagonist, and he takes good care to have a preponderance of
weight on his own side. His reason for choosing this in
preference to other insects for a preserved store may be that the
spider is naturally juicy, plump and compact, combining
advantages both for keeping and packing closely.
There are great varieties of spiders in Ceylon, one of which is
of such enormous size as to resemble the Aranea avicularia of
America. This species stands on an area of about three inches,
and never spins a web, but wanders about and lives in holes; his
length of limb, breadth of thorax and powerful jaws give him a
most formidable appearance. There is another species of a
large-sized spider who spins a web of about two and a half feet
in diameter. This is composed of a strong, yellow, silky fibre,
and so powerful is the texture that a moderate-sized walking-cane
thrown into the web will be retained by it. This spider is about
two inches long, the color black, with a large yellow spot upon
the back, and the body nearly free from hair.
Some years ago an experiment was made in France of substituting
the thread of the spider for the silk of the silkworm: several
pairs of stockings and various articles were manufactured with
tolerable success in this new material, but the fibre was
generally considered as too fragile.
A sample of such thread as is spun by the spider described could
not have failed to produce the desired result, as its strength is
so great that it can be wound upon a card without the slightest
care required in the operation. The texture is far more silky
than the fibre commonly produced by spiders, which has more
generally the character of cotton than of silk.
Should this ever be experimented on, a question might arise of
much interest to entomologists, whether a difference in the food
of the spider would affect the quality of the thread, as is well
known to be the case with the common silkworm.
A Ceylon night after a heavy shower of rain is a brilliant sight,
when the whole atmosphere is teeming with moving lights bright as
the stars themselves, waving around the tree-tops in fiery
circles, now threading like distant lamps through the intricate
branches and lighting up the dark recesses of the foliage, then
rushing like a shower of sparks around the glittering boughs.
Myriads of bright fire-flies in these wild dances meet their
destiny, being entangled in opposing spiders' webs, where they
hang like fairy lamps, their own light directing the path of the
destroyer and assisting in their destruction.
