DEAR MOTHER,
I cannot exactly tell what happened before I came out of the shell; but, from circumstances, I can give you some information. When I came to life, amongst some scores of other little merry yellow creatures, I found myself, and all of us, enclosed in a thing, through which we, with our eight eyes, could see very well, but could not instantly get out. I soon perceived that we, in the egg state, wrapped in a white bag, as you left us, had been put into a thing called a bottle, by one of those great creatures whom we always call striders; but this was a particular one of that tribe, who wanted to play tricks with us - one whom they would perhaps call a philosopher. [1] Well, his own sense (if he had any) told him that we could not live without air; so he left the cork out, and went about his business; no doubt of much less consequence than the lives of all us prisoners - but that they do not mind. But how long were we prisoners? Why, as soon as ever we were out of the shell we began to spin, and linked our webs so thick together that the philosopher's bottle would hold us no longer. We climbed out in a crowd, and spread our webs over the room, up to the very ceiling. I shall never forget how the great booby stared when he saw us all climbing up our own rope-ladders! I wonder if those great creatures are not sometimes caught in webs spun by their fellow-creatures, and whether they are not sometimes put by hundreds into a bottle without possessing any means of escape? But I am but a child, and must live and learn before I talk more freely. Long life to you, dear mother, and plenty of flies.
Yours ever, & c.
[1] This part of the letter is very difficult of translation, as the plain word, in spiders' language, means merely "a deep one." - R. B.