ver their places on the bearer's back. The living bark of
animals is reconstructed in the twinkling of an eye.

To speak here of mother-love were, I think, extravagant. The Lycosa's
affection for her offspring hardly surpasses that of the plant, which is
unacquainted with any tender feeling and nevertheless bestows the nicest
and most delicate care upon its seeds. The animal, in many cases, knows
no other sense of motherhood. What cares the Lycosa for her brood! She
accepts another's as readily as her own; she is satisfied so long as her
back is burdened with a swarming crowd, whether it issue from her ovaries
or elsewhence. There is no question here of real maternal affection.

I have described elsewhere the prowess of the Copris {25} watching over
cells that are not her handiwork and do not contain her offspring. With
a zeal which even the additional labour laid upon her does not easily
weary, she removes the mildew from the alien dung-balls, which far exceed
the regular nests in number; she gently scrapes and polishes and repairs
them; she listens to them attentively and enquires by ear into each
nursling's progress. Her real collection could not receive greater care.
Her own family or another's: it is all one to her.

The Lycosa is equally indifferent. I take a hair-pencil and sweep the
living burden from one of my Spiders, making it fall close to another
covered with her little ones. The evicted youngsters scamper about, find
the new mother's legs outspread, nimbly clamber up these and mount on the
back of the obliging creature, who quietly lets them have their way.

They slip in among the others, or, when the layer is too thick, push to
the front and pass from the abdomen to the thorax and even to the head,
though leaving the region of the eyes uncovered. It does not do to blind
the bearer: the common safety demands that. They know this and respect
the lenses of the eyes, however populous the assembly be. The whole
animal is now covered with a swarming carpet of young, all except the
legs, which must preserve their freedom of action, and the under part of
the body, where contact with the ground is to be feared.

My pencil forces a third family upon the already overburdened Spider; and
this too is peacefully accepted. The youngsters huddle up closer, lie
one on top of the other in layers and room is found for all. The Lycosa
has lost the last semblance of an animal, has become a nameless bristling