THE SPIDER AND THE FLY.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR.")
SIR,—It is strange that the writer of the article on spiders (November 27th) should have remembered Wordsworth's lines to the fly and forgotten the more famous " Busy, curious, thirsty fly " of the older poet. Ho might have recalled also
Blake's " Am not I A fly like thee ? "
But the best answer to his assertion that poets have neglected flies is given by Shakespeare, and you will allow me, perhaps, to quote it, as it may be unfamiliar to some of your readers. I have been coming to the conclusion for some time that people do not read Shakespeare now. The play in which the lines occur is believed not to be by him, but I cannot but think that this was one of the touches which ho added to it :- " What dost thou strike at, Marcus, with thy knife ? — At that that I have kill'd, my Lord : a fly. Out on thee, murderer ! thou kill'st my heart ; Mine eyes are cloy'd with view of tyranny ; A deed of death done on the innocent Becomes not Titus' brother ; get thee gone, I see thou art not for my company. — Alas ! my Lord, I have but kill'd a fly.
— But how if that fly had a father and mother ? How would ho hang his slender gilded wings, And buzz lamenting doings in the air ?
Poor harmless fly
That, with his pretty buzzinn.'s melody, Came hero to make us merry! and thou !last killed him."
There is a kind of lovely madness in this, but under it there lies a meaning which ho who runs may read. Is the " view of tyranny " to make us callous ? Rather should it make us the more sensitive to every " deed of death done on the innocent."
The soldiers in the trenches who expressed their simple sorrow for the poor cats and dogs in abandoned homes, for the bird that was disturbed while sitting on her nest--these should be our teachers, and I may say that I hope the day is distant when the monitors of science teach the child to become a fly-killer. If flies and many other insects and animals must be killed, they must, but not by the child. In another disputed play words which I am sure wore Shakespeare's tell us what every nice child should feel and say :- " I never spake bad word or did ill-turn
To any creature : believe me, la, I never killed a mouse nor hurt a fly : I trod upon a worm once 'gainst my will, But I wept for it."
Salb, Largo di Garda.
—I am, Sir, &c., EVELYN MARTINENGO CESARESCO,
Previous page
