'The Tarantula, so dreadful at first sight, especially when we are
filled with the idea that her bite is dangerous, so fierce in
appearance, is nevertheless quite easy to tame, as I have often found
by experiment.

'On the 7th of May 1812, while at Valencia, in Spain, I caught a fair-
sized male Tarantula, without hurting him, and imprisoned him in a
glass jar, with a paper cover in which I cut a trap-door. At the
bottom of the jar I put a paper bag, to serve as his habitual
residence. I placed the jar on a table in my bedroom, so as to have
him under frequent observation. He soon grew accustomed to captivity
and ended by becoming so familiar that he would come and take from my
fingers the live Fly which I gave him. After killing his victim with
the fangs of his mandibles, he was not satisfied, like most Spiders,
to suck her head: he chewed her whole body, shoving it piecemeal into
his mouth with his palpi, after which he threw up the masticated
teguments and swept them away from his lodging.

'Having finished his meal, he nearly always made his toilet, which
consisted in brushing his palpi and mandibles, both inside and out,
with his front tarsi. After that, he resumed his air of motionless
gravity. The evening and the night were his time for taking his walks
abroad. I often heard him scratching the paper of the bag. These
habits confirm the opinion, which I have already expressed elsewhere,
that most Spiders have the faculty of seeing by day and night, like
cats.

'On the 28th of June, my Tarantula cast his skin. It was his last
moult and did not perceptibly alter either the colour of his attire or