FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132  
133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   >>   >|  
CHAPTER 10. THE BANDED EPEIRA. BUILDING THE WEB. The fowling-snare is one of man's ingenious villainies. With lines, pegs and poles, two large, earth-coloured nets are stretched upon the ground, one to the right, the other to the left of a bare surface. A long cord, pulled at the right moment by the fowler, who hides in a brushwood hut, works them and brings them together suddenly, like a pair of shutters. Divided between the two nets are the cages of the decoy-birds--Linnets and Chaffinches, Greenfinches and Yellowhammers, Buntings and Ortolans--sharp-eared creatures which, on perceiving the distant passage of a flock of their own kind, forthwith utter a short calling note. One of them, the Sambe, an irresistible tempter, hops about and flaps his wings in apparent freedom. A bit of twine fastens him to his convict's stake. When, worn with fatigue and driven desperate by his vain attempts to get away, the sufferer lies down flat and refuses to do his duty, the fowler is able to stimulate him without stirring from his hut. A long string sets in motion a little lever working on a pivot. Raised from the ground by this diabolical contrivance, the bird flies, falls down and flies up again at each jerk of the cord. The fowler waits, in the mild sunlight of the autumn morning. Suddenly, great excitement in the cages. The Chaffinches chirp their rallying cry: "Pinck! Pinck!" There is something happening in the sky. The Sambe, quick! They are coming, the simpletons; they swoop down upon the treacherous floor. With a rapid movement, the man in ambush pulls his string. The nets close and the whole flock is caught. Man has wild beast's blood in his veins. The fowler hastens to the slaughter. With his thumb he stifles the beating of the captives' hearts, staves in their skulls. The little birds, so many piteous heads of game, will go to market, strung in dozens on a wire passed through their nostrils. For scoundrelly ingenuity, the Epeira's net can bear comparison with the fowler's; it even surpasses it when, on patient study, the main features of its supreme perfection stand revealed. What refinement of art for a mess of Flies! Nowhere, in the whole animal kingdom, has the need to eat inspired a more cunning industry. If the reader will meditate upon the description that follows, he will certainly share my admiration. In bearing and colouring, Epeira fasciata is the handsomest of the Spiders of the South. On h
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132  
133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
fowler
 

string

 

Epeira

 

Chaffinches

 

ground

 
treacherous
 
captives
 

skulls

 
rallying
 

hearts


staves

 

piteous

 
coming
 

excitement

 
market
 

strung

 
beating
 
simpletons
 

caught

 

ambush


movement

 

dozens

 

slaughter

 

happening

 

hastens

 

stifles

 

surpasses

 

industry

 

reader

 

meditate


description

 
cunning
 

kingdom

 

animal

 

inspired

 
Spiders
 

handsomest

 
fasciata
 

colouring

 
admiration

bearing
 

Nowhere

 
comparison
 
ingenuity
 

passed

 

nostrils

 
scoundrelly
 

patient

 
refinement
 

revealed