Democratic Sentinel, Volume 5, Number 30, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 September 1881 — Ruined by a Spider. [ARTICLE]

Ruined by a Spider.

Spiders crawling more abundantly and conspicuously than usual upon the indoor walls of our houses indicate the near approach of rain; but the following anecdote intimates that some of their habits are equally certain indication ot frost being at hand. Quartermaster Disjonval, seeking to beguile the tedium of his prison hours at Utrecht, had studied attentively the habits of the spider, and eight years of imprisonment had given him leisure to be well versed iu its ways. In December, 1794, the French army, on whose success his liberty depended, was in Holland, and the victory seemed certain if the frost, then of unprecedented severity, continued. The Dutch envoy had failed to negotiate a peace, and Holland was despairing, when the frost suddenly broke. The Dutch were now exulting and the French Generals prepared to retreftt, but the spider warned Disjonval that the thaw would be of short duration, and he knew that his weather monitor never deceived. He contrived to communicate with the army of his countrymen and its Generals, who duly estimated his character, and relied upon his assurance that within a few days the water would again be passable by troops. They delayed their retreat. W thin twelve days frost had returned —the French army triumphed. Disjonval was liberated ; and a spider had brought down ruin on the Dutch nation.