As this spider may be easily found in the localities we have mentioned, it may interest some of our readers to make trial of the mother's care for her eggs; but, let us hope, only in a gentle spirit. Never let us be guilty of the cruelty above narrated, and leave the disconsolate mother, after her hard struggle for her treasure, without restoring it back to her. Even in an insect, a mother's love, so faithful, self-devoted, and constant, is a sacred thing; and while, as an illustration of the care it has pleased the Creator to implant in it for its offspring, it may be lawful to put it to the trial, it is wrong and cruel to do more. Never let us, for our own amusement, give even to an insect that depth of anguish and despair so beautifully expressed in the words of Jacob, as translated in the margin of our Bibles: "And I, as I am bereaved of my children,--I am bereaved."
"In order to prove," says the author of Insect Architecture, "whether a spider of this species could distinguish her own egg-bag from that of a stranger, we interchanged the bags of two individuals which we had put under inverted wine-glasses; but both manifested great uneasiness, and would not touch the strange bags. We then introduced one of the mothers into the glass containing her own eggs and the other spider; but even then she did not take to them, which we attributed to the presence of the other, as all spiders nourish mutual enmity. Upon removing the stranger, however, she showed the same indifference to her eggs as before, and we concluded that, after having lost sight of them for a short time, she was no longer able to recognise them."
The common earwig, a name at which some, who little know the beautiful traits in her character, are apt to shudder, still more closely resembles the affection of a higher animal than does the spider just mentioned. The following most interesting notice of her proceedings was published by a writer[B] in the _Penny Magazine_ some time since. He says: "About the end of March I found an earwig brooding over her eggs in a small cell scooped out in a garden border; and in order to observe her proceedings, I removed the eggs into my study, placing them upon fresh earth under a bell glass. The careful mother soon scooped out a fresh cell, and collected the scattered eggs with great care to the little nest, placing herself over them--not so much, as it afterwards appeared, to keep them warm, as to prevent the too rapid evaporation of their moisture. When the earth began to dry up, she dug the cell gradually deeper, till at length she got almost out of view; and whenever the interior became too dry, she withdrew the eggs from the cell altogether, and placed them round the rim of the glass, where some of the evaporated moisture had condensed. Upon observing this, I dropped some water into the abandoned cell, and the mother soon afterwards replaced her eggs there. When the water which had been dropped had nearly evaporated, I moistened the outside of the earth opposite the bottom of the cell, and the mother, perceiving this, actually dug a gallery right through to the spot where she found the best supply of moisture. Having neglected to moisten the earth for some days, it again became dry, and there was none even round the rim of the glass as before. Under these circumstances, the mother earwig found a little remaining moisture quite under the clod of earth, upon the board of the mantel-piece, and thither she forthwith carried her eggs. The subsequent proceedings were not less interesting; for though I carefully moistened the earth every day, she regularly changed the situation of the eggs morning and evening, placing them in the original cell at night, and on the board under the clod during the day, as if she understood the evaporation to be so great when the sun was up, that her eggs might be left dry before night. I regret to add, that during my absence the glass had been removed and the mother escaped, having carried away all her eggs but one or two, which soon shrivelled up."