When they are a little older, it is true, the spider is held up to them as a wonderful example of perseverance in that story of King Robert the Bruce, who, when he was banished from his country, lying in concealment in a miserable hovel, and considering whether it would not be well to give up the struggle to secure his own, and with it restore freedom to his country, was attracted by the sight of a spider hanging at the end of a thread and trying to swing from one part of the cabin roof to another in order there to fix its line. Six times whilst the King watched it attempted to do this and failed. The Bruce remembered then that he also had made just six attempts--that is, fought six battles with his enemies, and without success. "Now," thought he, "if that spider tries a seventh time and succeeds, I will take it as a good omen for myself, and will also try my fortune a seventh time." The spider reached the beam, and Bruce went forth to victory after victory. The disgust aroused by the spider is by no means a just one, and the fear some people have of these insects is most unreasonable and absurd. In tropical countries the bites of some are dangerous, but not nearly so much so as is supposed. Our own spiders are harmless enough. I never destroy the webs they make in my garden, the circular nets which they stretch from one branch to another, which are considered by experts to show a perfection of weaving, whilst those webs which are woven in odd corners of our dwellings reveal an intelligence in their arrangement which is perfectly marvellous. I heard a clever man say lately that spiders were the greatest engineers in the world. In some corner of your room you may study the horizontal net, covered with dust, perhaps, which is the base of the structure. Irregularly-crossed threads above this cause the prey to become entangled, and its end is inevitable. Most ingenious is the den in which the hunter is hidden in waiting. It consists of a circular tunnel with a double outlet. One of these, being horizontal, opens on to the web. The other is vertical, with a passage below, which serves as a trapdoor, whilst from the former the spider darts out on his prey. As soon as a fly has been destroyed--its blood sucked--it is seized by its captor and dragged to the tunnel to be thrown out at the trapdoor. This is no doubt lest the _débris_ should alarm other flies. The hunter can also escape itself, when necessary, by this exit. This does not often happen, perhaps, and the main use of the trapdoor, says M. Pouchet, an interesting French naturalist, is to get rid of the remains of the spider's repasts.