Lost in the Jungle; Narrated for Young People

by Paul B. Du Chaillu

There are a very great variety of spiders in the country I have explored. Some are of queer shape. Each species has its peculiar habits. I often wish I had devoted more of my time to the study of their habits, and to ascertaining the way in which they catch their prey; but what I have observed I will relate to you. I will speak to you first of the house-spiders, and what I saw of them.

In many of the little huts where I lived, the walls of which were made of the bark of trees, there were always several house-spiders, which I took good care not to kill, for they were seemingly inoffensive, only they were great enemies to the cockroaches, insects, and flies. Sometimes in the evening, when I laid down on my acoco (bed of sticks), by the light of a torch my eyes would rest upon the wall, and I would see emerging from some crack a queer-looking gray spider, and now and then cockroaches, which swarm in the African huts, or some other kind of insect, would come out on the walls. Then the spider would slyly advance toward the insect, taking great care to approach it from behind, in order not to be seen by the unsuspecting victim, with which it is soon to engage in a deadly struggle, for the spider is brave and voracious, and is not to be easily frightened by the size of its antagonist.

These house-spiders are of a dull gray, which color assists in concealing its approach. After leaving its lair and getting a good position, it remains perfectly rigid and motionless, often for half an hour, waiting for some unlucky cockroach to pass by. At last the cockroach rushes past. In an instant the spider, with great impetuosity, pounces upon him. Then ensues a tug and a battle which is of great interest—a conflict for life on the part of the cockroach, a combat for food on the part of the spider, which for the time seems more voracious and ferocious than a tiger or leopard. The battle is often prolonged for more than half an hour. The great black African cockroach grows to a large size, and is a very strong and formidable opponent for the spider. The latter, after pouncing on its victim, fastens on its back, and, to prevent being borne off, clings with two of his hairy hind legs, which seem to have little hooks, to the floor or to the wall. All the cockroach's endeavors and frantic exertions are to escape. He tugs and jerks, and generally succeeds at first in dragging its enemy off for some distance. The desperate struggle goes on, the spider using all its power and strength. It manages again to get a hold with its feet. At last it succeeds in fastening its head on the body of the cockroach, and begins sucking away at the juices of the latter, which, at the pain of the first bite, makes the greatest efforts to escape, for it knows that the deadly struggle has begun. Then there would be a tremendous fight. I sometimes thought the cockroach would escape, both being exhausted. Then would come a pause. Presently the struggle would recommence, the spider sucking away all the time, and the poor cockroach at last succumbing, whereupon his enemy drags off the body to some corner or hiding-place where it can be devoured at leisure.

Once in the daytime, a few days after seeing the fight I have been describing to you, I saw the same spider, for I knew its place of hiding, come out after an insect. It was creeping slowly toward its prey, when a wasp—one of those beautiful, long-legged, and slender wasps, with striped bodies, which are so common here—came to attack the spider. Quickly she flew over the spider, her long legs hanging down and plying between the legs of the poor spider, who was now in as bad a plight as the cockroach was a few days before. In this latter case, cunning instead of strength was to be used.

The wasp kept flying above the spider, moving her long legs with great rapidity between the legs of the spider, while her head was touching that of her opponent, and giving a bite from time to time. Then the spider tried to run away, but could not, for the long legs of the wasp moved between his legs in a backward sort of a way, which prevented the spider from advancing. The wasp all the time was hovering above the spider with very quick motions, her legs moving so fast that I could not see all their movements. Suddenly the wasp turned round, and put her head down close to the right front leg of the spider, to which it gave one or two bites, just where it is joined to the body, and the leg dropped down; then she worked away at the head for a few seconds, then again turned round and gave a bite or two to the leg next to the one that had just been cut, and this dropped down also. I had never seen any thing fly so fast. At last the poor spider seemed perfectly stunned; he could hardly move. I considered the fight over, and that the wasp was victor. Another leg dropped down, and then another, all being cut just where they are attached to the body, till at last they were all cut down. When the last hind leg dropped, the wasp seized the body of the spider, and flew away outside of my little hut to devour it.

I missed my spider very much afterwards, and the cockroaches had their own way for a few days without fear of being devoured, till another house-spider made its appearance.

In one of my little huts there were other species of spider besides the one I have spoken to you about, whose little webs would be built in places where they would be most apt to entangle the flies. After these had been caught, the spider would immediately come out and suck their blood. However small the fly might be, the spider would come, and even when only a musquito had been taken, it would come, but it would give only one or two sucks, and then would go away. You will agree that there must be very little to suck out of a musquito that has not been feeding on a human being.

In the tall grass which sometimes grows round the village, or in the large open spaces where trees have been cut down, there is found a tremendous big bright yellow and black spider, whose web spreads over a space of several feet, and so thick and strong is it that, when I have got entangled in one, I could certainly feel a slight impediment to my walk, or the moving of my arm. The threads of the web are yellow, the same color as one part of the spider. This spider belongs probably to the genus Mygale. Some of them grow to be of immense size; I have frequently seen them with a body as large as a sparrow's egg.

Happily, the bite of this spider is not dangerous, for one day, as I was pursuing a bird and was in the midst of a lot of grass, the blades of which stuck to my skin and cut me like a razor, and I was watching and pursuing the bird in order not to lose sight of it, I got entangled in one of these big webs—by far the biggest web built by any spider I have ever heard of. I looked round to see and get out of the spider's way, but before I was aware I got a bite which was almost as painful as the sting of a scorpion. In my fright I tumbled down. I had no ammonia with me, consequently I returned at once to the village, where I had some, but by the time I reached home I felt no ill effect, the pain having left me a few minutes after the bite.

These big spiders are said by the natives to make these large, spreading webs in order to catch little birds, the blood of which they suck. I never saw a bird caught, nor even any remains of feathers in the web, but from the strength of the web I am certain that many little birds, if once caught, could not get out, and that this big spider is fully equal to mastering little birds, for its strength must be very great if it is as strong in proportion to its size as other spiders are.