CHAPTER XXVII
THE IBOBOTI, OR SPIDER
A big yellow and black spotted iboboti, with a body as large as a sparrow’s egg, and with very strong long legs, who was much given to philosophic reflection, said one day to himself: “Our kin is very numerous. We spiders are of many kinds, of different shapes and sizes, and of varied colors. We also lead different lives. Some of us like to live in the sun, others in the shade; some in the forest, others in houses of human beings. Strange to say, there are some of us who live in burrows. Some of our kin are day spiders; others belong to the night. Some make webs to entrap their prey; others do not. Some have short legs, others very long ones; the latter spin webs. We are all very voracious and spring upon our prey with great fury. We are brave; if we were not, we should starve.”
Then, looking at his web, the iboboti said: “I do not wonder that I have been starving for the last few days, and that my victims—the flies and other insects—have escaped from my meshes. My web has become dilapidated. It is full of holes. I am tired of repairing it. Time, rain, and the sun have done their mischievous work. The threads have become brittle. It is time for me to leave this spot and the old web, which I have spun and constructed with so much care and ingenuity, and go to some other place and spin a new one.
“To begin a web and leave it unfinished, without proper reason, is waste; but sometimes it is necessary, and now is one of those times. We web spiders have to use great judgment in the selection of the place we choose to build our webs in.”
He pondered the matter awhile and then exclaimed:—
“How wonderful indeed are our gifts! This semi-liquid secretion contained in our bodies we force out, when we spin, through the minute tubes which cover our spinnerets. This, after being forced out, becomes hard by contact with the air, and turns into threads, which after they are united make the web much stronger than if it had been made of a single strand.”
Saying this, he decided to depart at once, and began to creep along, spider fashion, and travel on trees in search of a good place to build another web in, looking all round as he went along, and thinking to himself: “My life is not an easy one. I have to work hard for my living. The webs we spiders build with so much care and skill are often destroyed by passing animals, or birds flying through them, or by limbs of trees falling upon them.”
After a tedious journey, the spider saw a nice open space in the forest between two shrubs. He stopped, and, looking at it carefully from above, said: “I think this spot is a good place. Flies, insects, and even small birds will pass through one way or another, for the trees and jungle are thick all around this spot. I will spin my web here.”
The spider felt that a storm was coming, and said: “When it rains I never spin my web. I will wait for fine and seasonable weather, which, if I am not mistaken, we shall have to-morrow.” The web spiders have the gift of knowing when the weather is going to be stormy or fine.
The rain came as he feared, but the following day the weather was fine, and the spider made preparations to begin spinning his web. Then he began work with his head downward, forcing the secretion and working the spinnerets, attaching the beginning of the thread to a branch of a tree first, then lowering himself by this thread. Then, when he reached the bottom, he ascended, spinning another thread as a support with one of his legs. The thread was of a bright orange yellow like the color of his body.
The spider built a network of very strong threads to support the whole structure; these were the supporting beams. Between these, he spun smaller delicate threads, using fewer spinnerets, directing his legs to do the work as the threads were spun.
After several days’ work the web was finished, and the yellow and black spotted spider looked at it and was pleased. It was a wonderful and delicate piece of work done with great skill, judgment, and thought. It was very elastic, so as to resist the power of the wind.
[Illustration: [Spider]]
Then the spider said with great delight: “Now I shall not starve, for my web is new. I hope that I have chosen a good spot, and that flies, insects, and even small birds will fly blindly into my meshes. Now I shall live well.” Then he took a good place of vantage, and stood motionless as if dead, on the outer border of his web, and listened intently, and looked round with his ferocious-looking eyes, waiting for prey. Suddenly he said: “Oh, how hungry I am! I am so created that I have to live as I do, for I am only powerful when I walk on my web. I am unlike all the other creatures that fly or walk, for they go and seek prey to satisfy their hunger, while I, on the contrary, have to stand still and wait for my victims to come blindly into the web. If they do not come, then I starve. No wonder that I attack with such fierceness those who get entangled in my meshes. I have to be very patient. Still I have reason to be; for sometimes when I am despairing, a big fly or insect flies into my web and provides me with a bite. But I require many a bite to make a good meal.”
Then he made himself ready, stretched his long legs, and lay as flat as he could, and waited. Soon his web shook, and the trembling made him look up. He saw a very large iboco fly struggling to get out of the meshes of the web; but its struggles were in vain, for the more the poor fly struggled, the more entangled it became. The spider ran with his long legs over the threads of his web, and soon pounced upon the poor iboco and sucked the life out of him.
After this, he went back to his place of vantage, and said: “I think I hear the buzzing of a horrid wasp. If this wicked creature sees me, she will come and attack me, and carry me away and eat me, as I have just done the fly that came into my net. How I hate the wasp!”
So this spider spent his days in killing creatures to sustain his own life, which was not such a happy one, for he had many enemies and was in constant dread of them, besides going hungry often when no insects strayed into his web.