Tárogató, 1944-1945 (7. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1944-10-01 / 4. szám
14 TÁROGATÓ The spiders produce during a two months’ spinning season thousands of yards of web, which is wound upon metal frames and stored away until needed- A spider “at work” dangles in the air by its invisible thread, the upper end being attached to a metal wire frame whirled in the hands of a girl. The girl first places the spider on her hand until the protruding end of the thread has become attached. When the spider attempts to leap to the ground this end is quickly attached to the centre of the whirling frame, and as the spider pays out thread, this line is wrapped around the frame. Several hundred feet of thread can be removed from a spider at one time. During the winter months the spider colony usually dies, so that an entirely new corps of workers must be recruited. Not every spider will do—only large, fat fellows that spin a tough, round thread are suitable. -—Our Dumb Animals. —Canadian Boy. A SISSY WOLF Our northern wolf is often accused of being a coward unless he has his whole pack to back him up, but he is a brave animal compared to the African Aard Wolf or Earth Wolf who is a downright sissy. Although it is as big as a dog, it is a slow weak and cowardly creature that would never dream of attaking an animal near its own size. It is too timid to show itself in the daytime and hides in the safety of its underground burrow. This is generally made by enlarging an anteater den, after the antéater has abandoned it of course. Possibly the dangers of the Dark Continent have scared all the courage out of the wolf. The Aard Wolf is a native of South Africa and parts of East Africa, wherever it finds an open treeless country as it avoids the forests. It has large pointed ears and looks much like striped hyena with its dark stripes and the same general shape and colour. Its voice is a kind of a roar that ends with a yell- It feeds mostly on locusts and white ant larvae, but also takes other insects and eggs and is sometimes brave enough to tackle young birds and some of the smaller animals. The animal will try to defend the entrance of its burrow against dogs, but if the hunters start digging it out, it becomes too frightened to think of digging itself in deeper. If caught out in the open, it puts up no sort of a fight at all and is said to never use its teeth. However its teeth are really too weak to be much good to it. Perhaps that' may be the whole trouble. If the animal just had a set of strong, sharp teeth, it wouldn’t need to be afraid of its own shadow, and might be an altogether different creature. In captivity this sissy wolf becomes quite tame and makes an affectionate and interesting pet. It is a little hard at first to overcome the animal’s extreme timidity but once this is done, it becomese as friendly and playful as any dog. ACCEPT THE FACTS It is doubtful if anyone acquires any real mastery of life till he has learned to take things as they are. However one may cherish the edeal of an exquisite and perfect life of beauty, the part of wisdom is to accept the facts of life as they are; not to rebel against them nor cast over them a veil of romantic illusion, but to take them in their homely and prosaic and sometimes grim reality and out of them create whatever of strength or beauty or romance the soul desires. There is a certain rightness in making the best of things as they are and not as a romantic imagination wishes them to be. Life has to be lived and it cannot be lived sanely and wisely without an acceptance of the facts of life. There are some things in every life that are settled and fixed, and, when all is said and done, unalterable. A man’s stature is a simple case in point, “Which of you,” said Jesus, “by being anxious about it can add one cubit unto his stature?” Every life is circumscribed by its own limitations. One may look upon them as cruel barriers against which the soul beats in futile rebellion or in envious frettings; or one may look upon them as the lines that mark out one’s sphere of responsibility and may determine to find out all the possibilities of life that lie within that sphere. Some of the deepest secrets of life have been learned by those whose energies wrere doomed to run in a very narrow groove- One thinks of George Matheson, the writer of the immortal hymn, “O Love that wilt not let me go.” He lost his sight in early manhood but went on to turn his necessitiese into glorious gain and lived a life of brilliant intellectual achievement. He mote, “My fetters became my wings,” and again, “My incomplete voyage has been my farthest travel. No journey
