confinement in the Bastile for refusing to betray to the government
certain secrets intrusted to him by a friend who was a leading
politician at the court of Louis XIV., which consisted in feeding a
Spider, which he discovered forming its web across the only air-hole of
his cell. For some time he placed his flies at the edge of the window,
while a stupid Basque, his sole companion, played on a bagpipe. Little
by little the Spider used itself to distinguish the sound of the
instrument, and issued from its hole to run and catch its prey. Thus
calling it always by the same sound, and placing the flies at a still
greater distance, he succeeded, after several months, to drill the
Spider by regular exercise, so that at length it never failed appearing
at the first sound to seize on the fly provided for it, at the extremity
of the cell, and even on the knees of the prisoner.[1133]
At a ladies’ school at Kensington, England, an immense species of
Spider is said to be uncomfortably common; and that when the young
ladies sing their accustomed hymn or psalm before morning and evening
prayers, these Spiders make their appearance on the floor, or suspended
overhead from their webs in the ceiling, obviously attracted by the
“concord of sweet sounds.”[1134]
The following lines “to a Spider which inhabited a cell,” are from the
Anthologia Borealis et Australis:
In this wild, groping, dark, and drearie cove,
Of wife, of children, and of health bereft,
I hailed thee, friendly Spider, who hadst wove
Thy mazy net on yonder mouldering raft:
Would that the cleanlie housemaid’s foot had left
Thee tarrying here, nor took thy life away;
For thou, from out this seare old ceiling’s cleft,
Came down each morn to hede my plaintive lay;
Joying like me to heare sweete musick play,
Wherewith I’d fein beguile the dull, dark, lingering day.[1135]
“When the great and brilliant Lauzun was held in captivity, his only joy
and comfort was a friendly Spider: she came at his call; she took her
food from his finger, and well understood his word of command. In vain
did jailors and soldiers try to deceive his tiny companion; she would
not obey their voices, and refused the tempting bait from their hand.
Here, then, was not only an ear, but a keen power of distinction. The
despised little animal listened with sweet affection, and knew how to
discriminate between not unsimilar tones.”[1136]
Quatremer Disjonval, a Frenchman by birth, was an adjutant-general in
Holland, and took an active part on the side of the Dutch patriots when
they revolted against the Stadtholder. On the arrival of the Prussian
army under the Duke of Brunswick, he was immediately taken, tried, and,
having been condemned to twenty-five years’ imprisonment, was
incarcerated in a dungeon at Utrecht, where he remained eight years.
During this long confinement, by many curious observations upon his sole
companions, Spiders, he discovered that they were in the highest degree
sensitive of approaching changes in the atmosphere, and that their
retirement and reappearance, their weaving and general habits, were
intimately connected with the changes of the weather. In the reading of
these living barometers he became wonderfully accurate, so much so, that
he could prognosticate the approach of severe weather from ten to
fourteen days before it set in, which is proven by the following
remarkable fact, which led to his release: “When the troops of the
French republic overran Holland in the winter of 1794, and kept pushing
forward over the ice, a sudden and unexpected thaw, in the early part of
December, threatened the destruction of the whole army unless it was
instantly withdrawn. The French generals were thinking seriously of
accepting a sum offered by the Dutch, and withdrawing their troops, when
Disjonval, who hoped that the success of the republican army might lead
to his release, used every exertion, and at length succeeded in getting
a letter conveyed to the French general in 1795, in which he pledged
himself, from the peculiar actions of the Spiders, of whose movements he
was enabled to judge with perfect accuracy, that within fourteen days
there would commence a most severe frost, which would make the French
masters of all the rivers, and afford them sufficient time to complete
and make sure of the conquest they had commenced, before it should be
followed by a thaw. The commander of the French forces believed his
prognostication, and persevered. The cold weather, which Disjonval had
predicted, made its appearance in twelve days, and with such intensity,
that the ice over the rivers and canals became capable of bearing the
heaviest artillery. On the 28th of January, 1795, the French army
entered Utrecht in triumph; and Quatremer Disjonval, who had watched the
habits of his Spiders with so much intelligence and success, was, as a
reward for his ingenuity, released from prison.”[1137]
In Bartholomæus, De Proprietatibus Rerum (printed by Th. Berthelet, 27th
Henry VIII.), lib. xviii. fol. 314, speaking of Pliny, we read: “Also he
saythe, spynners (Spiders) ben tokens of divynation and of knowing what
wether shal fal, for oft by weders that shal fal, some spin and weve
higher or lower. Also he saythe, that multytude of spynners is token of
moche reyne.”[1138]
Willsford, in his Nature’s Secrets, p. 131, tells us: “Spiders creep out
of their holes and narrow receptacles against wind or rain; Minerva
having made them sensible of an approaching storm.”[1139]
Hone, in his Every Day Book, also mentions that from Spiders
prognostications as to the weather may be drawn; and gives the following
instructions to read this animal-barometer: “If the weather is likely to
become rainy, windy, or in other respects disagreeable, they fix the
terminating filaments, on which the whole web is suspended, unusually
short; and in this state they await the influence of a temperature which
is remarkably variable. On the contrary, if the terminating filaments
are uncommonly long, we may, in proportion to their length, conclude
that the weather will be serene, and continue so at least for ten or
twelve days. But if the Spiders be totally indolent, rain generally
succeeds; though, on the other hand, their activity during rain is the
most certain proof that it will be only of short duration, and followed
with fair and constant weather. According to further observations, the
Spiders regularly make some alterations in their webs or nets every
twenty-four hours; if these changes take place between the hours of six
and seven in the evening, they indicate a clear and pleasant
night.”[1140]
Pausanias tells us that after the slaughter at Chæronea, the Thebans
were obliged to place a guard within the walls of their city; but which,
however, after the death of Philip, and during the reign of Alexander,
they drove out. For this action, this historian continues, it was that
Divinity gave them tokens in the webs of Spiders of the destruction that
awaited them. For, during the battle at Leuctra, the Spiders in the
temple of Ceres Thesmophoros wove white webs about the doors; but when
Alexander and the Macedonians attacked their dominions, their webs were
found to be black.[1141]
It was thought by the Classical Ancients and the old English unlucky to
kill Spiders; and prognostications were made from their manner of
weaving their webs.[1142] It is still thought unlucky to injure these
animals.
Park has the following note in his copy of Bourne and Brande’s Popular
Antiquities, p. 93: “Small Spiders, termed _money-spinners_, are held by
many to prognosticate good luck, if they are not destroyed or injured,
or removed from the person on whom they are first observed.”
In Teviotdale, Scotland, “when Spiders creep on one’s clothes, it is
viewed as betokening good luck; and to destroy them is equivalent to
throwing stones at one’s own head.”[1143]
In Maryland, this superstition is thus expressed: If you kill a Spider
upon your clothing, you destroy the presents they are then weaving for
you.
In the Secret Memoirs of Mr. Duncan Campbell, p. 60, in the chapter of
omens, we read that “others have thought themselves secure of receiving
money, if by chance a little Spider fell upon their clothes.”[1144]
“When a Spider is found upon your clothes, or about your person,” says a
writer in the Notes and Queries,[1145] “it signifies that you will
shortly receive some money. Old Fuller, who was a native of
Northamptonshire, thus quaintly moralizes this superstition: ‘When a
Spider is found upon your clothes, we used to say some money is coming
toward us. The moral is this: such who imitate the industry of that
contemptible creature may, by God’s blessing, weave themselves into
wealth and procure a plentiful estate.’”[1146]
A South Northamptonshire superstition of the present day is, that, in
order to propitiate money-spinners, they must be thrown over the left
shoulder.[1147]
It is most probable that Euclio, in Plautus’ Aulularia, would not
suffer the Spiders to be molested because they were considered to bring
good luck.
_Staphyla._ Here in our house there’s nothing else for thieves to
gain, so filled is it with emptiness and cobwebs.
_Euclio._ You hag of hags, I choose those cobwebs to be watched for
me.[1148]
A superstition prevails among us that if a Spider approaches, either by
crawling toward or descending from the ceiling to a person, it forebodes
good to such person; and, on the contrary, if the Spider runs hurriedly
away, it is an omen of bad luck. But if the Spider be a poisonous one,
or a Fly-catcher, and it approaches you, some evil is about to befall
you, which to avert you must cross your heart thrice.
If you kill a Spider crossing your path, you will have bad luck.
A Spider should not be killed in your house, but out of doors; if in the
house, our country people say you are “pulling down your house.”
If a Spider drops down from its web or from a tree directly in front of
a person, such person will see before night a dear friend.
A variety of this superstition is, that, if the Spider be white, it
foretells the acquaintance of a friend; and if black, an enemy.
In the Netherlands, a Spider seen in the morning forebodes good luck; in
the afternoon, bad luck.[1149]
There is a common saying at Winchester, England, that no Spider will
hang its web on the roof of Irish oak in the chapel or cloisters;[1150]
and the cicerone, who shows the cathedral church at St. David’s, points
out to the visitor that the choir is roofed with Irish oak, which does
not harbor Spiders, though cobwebs are plentifully seen in other parts
of the cathedral.[1151] This superstition (for it certainly is nothing
more)[1152] probably originated with the old story of St. Patrick’s
having exorcised and banished all kinds of vermin from Ireland.
The same virtue of repelling Spiders is attributed also to chestnut and
cedar wood;[1153] and the old roof at Turner’s Court, in
Gloucestershire, four miles from Bath, which is of chestnut, is said to
be perfectly free from cobwebs;[1154] hence also are the cloisters of
New College, and of Christ’s Church, in England, roofed with
chestnut.[1155]
A small Spider of a red color, called a Tainct in England, is accounted,
by the country people, a deadly poison to cows and horses; so when any
of their cattle die suddenly and swell up, to account for their deaths,
they say they have “licked a Tainct.” Browne thinks this is, most
probably, but a vulgar error.[1156]
It is a very ancient and curious belief that there exists a remarkable
enmity between the Spider and serpents,[1157] and more especially
between the Spider and the toad; and many curious stories are told of
the combats between these animals. The following, related by Erasmus,
which he asserts he had directly from one of the spectators, is probably
the most remarkable, and we insert it in the words of Dr. James: “A
person (a monk)[1158] lying along upon the floor of his chamber in the
summer-time to sleep in a supine posture, when a toad, creeping out of
some green rushes, brought just before in to adorn the chimney, gets
upon his face and with his feet sits across his lips. To force off the
toad, says the historian, would have been accounted death to the
sleeper; and to leave her there, very cruel and dangerous; so that upon
consultation, it was concluded to find out a Spider, which, together
with her web and the window she was fastened to, was brought carefully,
and so contrived as to be held perpendicularly to the man’s face; which
was no sooner done but the Spider, discovering his enemy, let himself
down and struck in his dart, afterward betaking himself up again to his
web: the toad swelled, but as yet kept his station. The second wound is
given quickly after by the Spider, upon which he swells yet more, but
remained alive still. The Spider, coming down again by his thread, gives
the third blow, and the toad, taking off his feet from over the man’s
mouth, fell off dead.”[1159]
The following cosmogony is found in the sacred writings of the Pundits
of India: A certain immense Spider was the origin, the first cause of
all things; which, drawing the matter from its own bowels, wove the web
of this universe, and disposed it with wonderful art; she, in the mean
time, sitting in the center of her work, feels and directs the motion of
every part, till at length, when she has pleased herself sufficiently in
ordering and contemplating this web, she draws all the threads she had
spun out again into herself; and, having absorbed them, the universal
nature of all creatures vanishes into nothing.[1160]
Among the Chululahs of our western coast, Capt. Stuart informs me there
is a vague superstition that the Spider is connected with the origin of
the world. To what extent this curious notion prevails, or anything more
concerning it, I have been unable to learn.
The natives of Guinea, says Bosman, believe that the first men were
created by the large black Spider, which is so common in their country,
and called in their jargon “Ananse;” nor is there any reasoning,
continues this traveler, a great number of them out of it.[1161] Barbot
also remarks that, in the belief of the Guinea negroes, the black Ananse
created the first man.[1162]
That the Spider should be connected with the origin of the world and man
in the several beliefs of the Hindoos, Chululahs, and negroes, races so
widely different and separated from one another, is a coincidence most
remarkable.
A large and hideous species of Spider, said to be only found in the
palace of Hampton Court, England, is known by the name of the
“Cardinals.” This name has been given them from a superstitious belief
that the spirits of Cardinal Wolsey and his retinue still haunt the
palace in their shape.[1163]
In running across the carpet in an evening, with the shade cast from
their large bodies by the light of the lamp or candle, these “Cardinals”
have been mistaken for mice, and have occasioned no little alarm to some
of the more nervous inhabitants of the palace.[1164]
The story of the gigantic Spider found in the Church of St. Eustace, at
Paris, in Chambers’ Miscellany, is related as follows: It is told that
the sexton of this church was surprised at very often discovering a
certain lamp extinguished in the morning, notwithstanding it had been
duly replenished with oil the preceding evening. Curious to learn the
cause of this mysterious circumstance, he kept watch several evenings,
and was at last gratified by the discovery. During the night he observed
a Spider, of enormous dimensions, come down the chain by which the lamp
was suspended, drink up the oil, and, when gorged to satiety, slowly
retrace its steps to a recess in the fretwork above. A similar Spider is
said to have been found, in 1751, in the cathedral church of Milan. It
was observed to feed also on oil. When killed, it weighed four pounds!
and was afterward sent to the imperial museum at Vienna.[1165]
The following remarkable anecdote is translated from the French: “M.
F---- de Saint Omer laid on the chimney-piece of his chamber, one
evening on going to bed, a small shirt-pin of gold, the head of which
represented a fly. Next day, M. F---- would have taken his pin from the
place where he had put it, but the trinket had disappeared. A
servant-maid, who had only been in M. F----’s service a few days, was
solely suspected of having carried off the pin, and sent away. But, at
length, M. F----’s sister, putting up some curtains, was very much
surprised to find the lost pin suspended from the ceiling in a Spider’s
web! And thus was the disappearance of the _bijou_ explained: A Spider,
deceived by the figure of the fly which the pin presented, had drawn it
into his web.”[1166]
In the Treasvrie of Avncient and Moderne Times, it is stated that
“Spiders do shun all such wals as run to ruine, or are like to be
ouerthrowne.”[1167]
A Spider hanging from a tree is said to have made both Turenne and
Gustavus Adolphus shudder![1168]
M. Zimmerman relates the following instance of antipathy to Spiders:
“Being one day in an English company,” says he, “consisting of persons
of distinction, the conversation happened to fall on antipathies. The
greater part of the company denied the reality of them, and treated them
as old women’s tales; but I told them that antipathy was a real disease.
Mr. William Matthew, son of the Governor of Barbados, was of my opinion,
and, as he added that he himself had an extreme antipathy to Spiders, he
was laughed at by the whole company. I showed them, however, that this
was a real impression of his mind, resulting from a mechanical effect.
Mr. John Murray, afterward Duke of Athol, took it into his head to make,
in Mr. Matthew’s presence, a Spider of black wax, to try whether this
antipathy would appear merely on the sight of the insect. He went out of
the room, therefore, and returned with a bit of black wax in his hand,
which he kept shut. Mr. Matthew, who in other respects was a sedate and
amiable man, imagining that his friend really held a Spider, immediately
drew his sword in a great fury, retired with precipitation to the wall,
leaned against it, as if to run him through, and sent forth horrible
cries. All the muscles of his face were swelled, his eye-balls rolled in
their sockets, and his whole body was as stiff as a post. We immediately
ran to him in great alarm, and took his sword from him, assuring him at
the same time that Mr. Murray had nothing in his hand but a bit of wax,
and that he himself might see it on the table where it was placed. He
remained some time in this spasmodic state, and I was really afraid of
the consequences. He, however, gradually recovered, and deplored the
dreadful passion into which he had been thrown, and from which he still
suffered. His pulse was exceedingly quick and full, and his whole body
was covered with a cold sweat. After taking a sedative, he was restored
to his former tranquillity, and his agitation was attended with no other
bad consequences.”[1169]
In Batavia, New York, on the evening of the 13th of September, 1834,
Hon. David E. Evans, agent of the Holland Land Company, discovered in
his wine-cellar a live striped snake, about nine inches in length,
suspended between two shelves, by the tail, by Spiders’ web. From the
shelves being two feet apart, and the position of the web, the witnesses
were of opinion the snake could not have fallen by accident into it, and
thus have become inextricably entangled, but that it had been actually
captured, and drawn up so that its head could not reach the shelf below
by about an inch, by Spiders, and of a species much smaller than the
common fly, three of which at night were seen feeding upon it, while it
was yet alive.
Hon. S. Cummings, first Judge of the Court of Common Pleas in his
county, and also Postmaster of Batavia, and Mr. D. Lyman Beecher have
described this phenomenon, and given the names of quite a number of
gentlemen who witnessed it, and will testify to the accuracy of their
accounts. Says Mr. Cummings: “Upon a critical examination through a
magnifying glass, the following curious facts appeared. The mouth of the
snake was fast tied up, by a great number of threads, wound around it so
tight that he could not run out his tongue. His tail was tied in a knot,
so as to leave a small loop, or ring, through which the cord was
fastened; and the end of the tail, above this loop, to the length of
something over half an inch, was lashed fast to the cord, to keep it
from slipping. As the snake hung, the length of the cord, from his tail
to the focus to which it was fastened, was about six inches; and a
little above the tail, there was observed a round ball, about the size
of a pea. Upon inspection, this appeared to be a green fly, around which
the cord had been wound as a windlass, with which the snake had been
hauled up; and a great number of threads were fastened to the cord
above, and to the rolling side of this ball to keep it from unwinding,
and letting the snake down. The cord, therefore, must have been extended
from the focus of this web to the shelf below where the snake was lying
when first captured; and being made fast to the loop in his tail, the
fly was carried and fastened about midway to the side of the cord. And
then by rolling this fly over and over, it wound the cord around it,
both from above and below, until the snake was raised to the proper
height, and then was fastened, as before mentioned.
“In this situation the suffering snake hung, alive, and furnished a
continued feast for several large Spiders, until Saturday forenoon, the
16th, when some persons, by playing with him, broke the web above the
focus, so as to let part of his body rest upon the shelf below. In this
situation he lingered, the Spiders taking no notice of him, until
Thursday, eight days after he was discovered, when some large ants were
found devouring his body.”[1170]
At a recent meeting of the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia,
Mr. Lesley read the following extract from a letter written by Mr. E. A.
Spring, of Eagleswood, N. J.:
“I was over on the South Amboy shore with a friend, walking in a swampy
wood, where a dyke was made, some three feet wide, when we discovered in
the middle of this ditch a large black Spider making very queer motions
for a Spider, and, on examination, it proved that he had _caught a
fish_.
“He was biting the fish, just on the forward side of the dorsal fin,
with a deadly gripe, and the poor fish was swimming round and round
slowly, or twisting its body as if in pain. The head of its black enemy
was sometimes almost pulled under water, but never entirely, for the
fish did not seem to have had enough strength, but moved its fins as if
exhausted, and often rested. At last it swam under a floating leaf at
the shore, and appeared to be trying, by going under that, to scrape off
the Spider, but without effect. They then got close to the bank, when
suddenly the long black legs of the Spider came up out of the water,
where they had possibly been embracing a fish (I have seen Spiders seize
flies with all their legs at once), reached out behind, and fastened
upon the irregularities of the side of the ditch. The Spider then
commenced tugging to get his prize up the bank. My friend stayed to
watch them, while I went to the nearest house for a wide-mouthed bottle.
During the six or eight minutes that I was away, the Spider had drawn
the fish entirely out of the water, when they had both fallen in again,
the bank being nearly perpendicular. There had been a great struggle;
and now, on my return, the fish was already hoisted head first more than
half his length out on the land. The fish was very much exhausted,
hardly making any movement, and the Spider had evidently gained the
victory, and was slowly and steadily tugging him up. He had not once
quitted his hold during the quarter to half an hour that we had watched
them. He held, with his head toward the fish’s tail, and pulled him up
at an angle of forty-five degrees by stepping backward.... The Spider
was three-fourths of an inch long, and weighed fourteen grains; the fish
was three and one-fourth inches long, and weighed sixty-six
grains.”[1171]