Then the spider said with great delight: “Now I shall not starve, for my web is new. I hope that I have chosen a good spot, and that flies, insects, and even small birds will fly blindly into my meshes. Now I shall live well.” Then he took a good place of vantage, and stood motionless as if dead, on the outer border of his web, and listened intently, and looked round with his ferocious-looking eyes, waiting for prey. Suddenly he said: “Oh, how hungry I am! I am so created that I have to live as I do, for I am only powerful when I walk on my web. I am unlike all the other creatures that fly or walk, for they go and seek prey to satisfy their hunger, while I, on the contrary, have to stand still and wait for my victims to come blindly into the web. If they do not come, then I starve. No wonder that I attack with such fierceness those who get entangled in my meshes. I have to be very patient. Still I have reason to be; for sometimes when I am despairing, a big fly or insect flies into my web and provides me with a bite. But I require many a bite to make a good meal.”
Then he made himself ready, stretched his long legs, and lay as flat as he could, and waited. Soon his web shook, and the trembling made him look up. He saw a very large iboco fly struggling to get out of the meshes of the web; but its struggles were in vain, for the more the poor fly struggled, the more entangled it became. The spider ran with his long legs over the threads of his web, and soon pounced upon the poor iboco and sucked the life out of him.
After this, he went back to his place of vantage, and said: “I think I hear the buzzing of a horrid wasp. If this wicked creature sees me, she will come and attack me, and carry me away and eat me, as I have just done the fly that came into my net. How I hate the wasp!”
So this spider spent his days in killing creatures to sustain his own life, which was not such a happy one, for he had many enemies and was in constant dread of them, besides going hungry often when no insects strayed into his web.
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE TRAP-DOOR IBOBOTI, OR BURROW SPIDER
One day an ashen-gray trap-door spider, while in the dark recesses of his home, mused as follows: “What great intelligence I have been gifted with! I can make a burrow, and close its entrance with a door of my own making, that prevents my enemies from getting in to attack me. When I am inside, and my door is closed, I feel absolutely safe.”
The spider then thought how cosey and comfortable his home was, and, looking round, saw many heads, legs, and wings of the insects he had brought in to consume at his leisure.
This sight reminded him of the numerous feasts he had enjoyed, and of the tussles he had had before capturing his victims. This recollection gave him an appetite and a longing for more fights and more meals.
This trap-door spider had strong, short legs, and a head armed with powerful nippers, between which was his ugly mouth, ready to suck the life of his prey.