Garden Spider

What is more interesting than to see a great yellow garden-spider hanging head downward in the centre of his web, when we approach too closely, instead of deserting his snare, set it vibrating back and forth so rapidly that he becomes a mere blur; a more certain method of escaping the onslaught of a bird than if he ran to the shelter of a leaf. ❋ William Beebe (1919)

In the centre was a circular arrangement of desks, and in the midst of these an elderly man, like a garden-spider in his web; but it was his duty to feed, not devour, the human flies who sat or walked to and fro with literary meat gathered from all over the world. ❋ Julian Hawthorne (1890)

An elderly man like a garden-spider -- Into the bowels of the earth -- The inner luminousness of genius -- Isolated and tragic situation -- "Ate ever man such a morsel before!" ❋ Julian Hawthorne (1890)

For you are a garden-spider, an abominable, dumpy, old garden-spider, for whom a web, such as Hodge is, is much too fine and much too elegant. ❋ Henry Niles Pierce (1843)