THE SPIDER'S THREAD

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Apr 23, 1896

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 22, No. 17.

THE SPIDER'S THREAD.

In a lecture at Boston, Mass., Professor Wood dealt with the phenomena of spider life. In one tribe the female is 1,300 times as large as the male. The spider's thread is made up of innumerable small threads of fiber, one of these threads being estimated to be one-two-millionth of a hair in thickness.

Three kinds of thread are spun—one of great strength for the radiating or spoke lines of the web. The cross lines, or what a sailor might call the ratlines, are finer and are tenacious; that is, they have upon them little specks or globules of a very sticky gum. These specks are put on with even interspaces. They are set quite thickly along the line, and are what in the first instance catch and hold the legs or wings of the fly. Once caught in this fashion, the prey is held secure by threads flung over it somewhat in the manner of a lasso.

The third kind of silk is that which the spider throws out in a mass of fluid, by which it suddenly envelops any prey of which it is sometimes afraid, as, for example, a wasp. A scientific experimenter once drew out from the body of a single spider 3,480 yards of thread or spider silk—a length little short of three miles. Silk may be woven of spider's thread, and it is more glossy and brilliant than that of the silkworm, being of a golden color. An enthusiastic entomologist is said to have secured enough of it for the weaving of a suit of clothes for Louis XIV.—Selected.