Suddenly she darted out her hand like a flash, making me start at the unexpected motion, and quickly withdrawing it, held up a finger before me.

From its tip a minute gossamer spider, about twice the bigness of a pin's head, appeared suspended from a fine, scarcely visible line three or four inches long.
"Look!" she exclaimed, with a bright glance at my face.
The small spider she had captured, anxious to be free, was falling, falling earthward, but could not reach the surface.

Leaning her shoulder a little forward, she placed the finger-tip against it, but lightly, scarcely touching, and moving continuously, with a motion rapid as that of a fluttering moth's wing; while the spider, still paying out his line, remained suspended, rising and falling slightly at nearly the same distance from the ground.

After a few moments she cried: "Drop down, little spider." Her finger's motion ceased, and the minute captive fell, to lose itself on the shaded ground.
"Do you not see ?" she said to me, pointing to her shoulder.

Just where the finger-tip had touched the garment a round shining spot appeared, looking like a silver coin on the cloth; but on touching it with my finger it seemed part of the original fabric, only whiter and more shiny on the grey ground, on account of the freshness of the web of which it had just been made.
And so all this curious and pretty performance, which seemed instinctive in its spontaneous quickness and dexterity, was merely intended to show me how she made her garments out of the fine floating lines of small gossamer spiders! Before I could express my surprise and admiration she cried again, with startling suddenness: "Look!" A minute shadowy form darted by, appearing like a dim line traced across the deep glossy more foliage, then on the lighter green foliage further away.