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Updated: June 21, 2025
Nothing stops her; she keeps on climbing, to a height of six feet or more, without selecting her path, without seeing her goal, since she goes backwards. A lodge appears no doubt reconnoitred beforehand and reached, despite the difficulties of an ascent which did not allow her to see it. The Pompilus lays her prey on it.
The fact that the householder does not show herself at the first vibration of the neighbouring threads is a certain proof that the tube is vacant; and the Pompilus enters in full security. I would recommend future observers not to take the present investigations for hunting-tactics. I have already remarked and I repeat: the Pompilus never enters the silken ambush while the Spider is there.
The Segestria, from time to time, catches hold of the Pompilus, who gathers herself up as best she can, without attempting to use her sting; the Spider rolls the insect between her legs and even between her mandibles, but appears to dislike doing it.
Far from fleeing before the terrible apparition, she watches the watcher, fully prepared to prey upon her enemy. Before this intrepid demeanour the Pompilus draws back. She examines the coveted game, walks round it for a moment, then goes away without attempting anything. When she has gone, the Segestria retires indoors, backwards. For the second time the Wasp passes near an inhabited funnel.
Shall I surprise the reader if I tell him that this problem filled me with the most eager interest, that it held me for weeks in contemplation before that cheerless wall? Nevertheless, my tale will be a short one. On several occasions I see the Pompilus suddenly fling herself on one of the Spider's legs, seize it with her mandibles and endeavour to draw the animal from its tube.
It is easy for me to obtain the Tarantula at the desired moment: the part of the plateau in my neighbourhood left untilled by the vine-growers provides me with as many as are necessary. To capture the Pompilus is another matter. I have so little hope of finding her that special quests are regarded as useless. To search for her would perhaps be just the way not to find her.
Here craft triumphs over strength; and this craft is not inferior to mine, when, wishing to capture the Tarantula, I make her bite a spike of grass which I dip into the burrow, lead her gently to the surface and then with a sudden jerk throw her outside. For the entomologist as for the Pompilus, the essential thing is to make the Spider leave her stronghold.
If the Pompilus has perfected her method of attack, why has not the Segestria perfected her method of defence? Is it possible that centuries upon centuries should have modified the one to its advantage without succeeding in modifying the other? Here I am utterly at a loss.
The very sight of them makes my flesh creep. In this terrible attitude, presenting her powerful thorax and the black velvet of her belly to the enemy, the Spider overawes the Pompilus, who suddenly turns tail and moves away.
While the Pompilus is at work on the burrow, I seize the prey and place it in an exposed spot, half a yard away from its original position. The Pompilus soon leaves the hole to enquire after her booty and goes straight to the spot where she left it. This sureness of direction, this faithful memory for places can be explained by repeated previous visits.
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