it that the Wasp may gradually have acquired, as being highly
beneficial to her posterity, the instinct by which she first of all so
judiciously drags the victim from its refuge, in order there to paralyse
it without incurring danger, provided that you will explain why the
Segestria, possessing an intellect no less gifted than that of the
Pompilus, does not yet know how to counteract the trick of which she
has so long been the victim. What would the Black Spider need to do to
escape her exterminator? Practically nothing: it would be enough for her
to withdraw into her tube, instead of coming up to post herself at the
entrance, like a sentry, whenever the enemy is in the neighbourhood. It
is very brave of her, I agree, but also very risky. The Pompilus will
pounce upon one of the legs spread outside the burrow for defence
and attack; and the besieged Spider will perish, betrayed by her own
boldness. This posture is excellent when waiting for prey. But the Wasp
is not a quarry; she is an enemy and one of the most dreaded of enemies.
The Spider knows this. At the sight of the Wasp, instead of placing
herself fearlessly but foolishly on her threshold, why does she not
retreat into her fortress, where the other would not attack her? The
accumulated experience of generations should have taught her this
elementary tactical device, which is of the greatest value to the
prosperity of her race. If the Pompilus has perfected her method of
attack, why has not the Segestria perfected her method of defence? Is it
possible that centuries upon centuries should have modified the one
to its advantage without succeeding in modifying the other? Here I am
utterly at a loss. And I say to myself, in all simplicity: since the
Pompili must have Spiders, the former have possessed their patient
cunning and the other their foolish audacity from all time. This may
be puerile, if you like to think it so, and not in keeping with the
transcendental aims of our fashionable theorists; the argument contains
neither the subjective nor the objective point of view, neither
adaptation nor differentiation, neither atavism nor evolutionism. Very
well, but at least I understand it.

Let us return to the habits of Pompilus apicalis. Without expecting
results of any particular interest, for in captivity the respective
talents of the huntress and the quarry seem to slumber, I place
together, in a wide jar, a Wasp and a Segestria. The Spider and her
enemy mutually