And Peter Martyr, in his History of the West Indies, makes the following statement: “The Chiribichenses (Caribbeans)
eate Spiders, Frogges, and whatsoever woormes, and lice also without loathing, although in other thinges they are so queasie stomaked, that if they see anything that doth not like them, they presently cast upp whatsoever is in their stomacke.”[1205]
Reaumur tells us of a young lady who when she walked in her grounds never saw a Spider that she did not take and eat upon the spot.[1206] Another female, the celebrated Anna Maria Schurman, used to crack them between her teeth like nuts, which she affirmed they much resembled in taste, excusing her propensity by saying that she was born under the sign Scorpio.[1207] “When Alexander reigned, it is reported that there was a very beautiful strumpet in Alexandria, that fed alwayes from her childhood on Spiders, and for that reason the king was admonished that he should be very carefull not to embrace her, lest he should be poysoned by venome that might evaporate from her by sweat. Albertus Magnus also makes mention of a certain noble mayd of Collen, that was fed with Spiders from her childhood. And we in England have a great lady yet living, who will not leave off eating of them. And Phaerus, a physician, did often eat them without any hurt at all.”[1208]
La Lande, the celebrated French astronomer, we are told by Disjonval, ate as delicacies Spiders and Caterpillars. He boasted of this as a philosophic trait of character, that he could raise himself above dislikes and prejudices; and, to cure Madame Lepaute of a very annoying fear of, and antipathy to Spiders, it is said he gradually habituated her to look upon them, to touch, and finally to swallow them as readily as he himself.[1209]
A German, immortalized by Rösel, used to eat Spiders by handfuls, and spread them upon his bread like butter, observing that he found them very useful, “um sich auszulaxiren.”[1210]
The satirist, Peter Pindar, records the same of Sir Joshua Banks:
How early Genius shows itself at times,
Thus Pope, the prince of poets, lisped in rhymes,
And our Sir Joshua Banks, most strange to utter,
To whom each cockroach-eater is a fool,