Arachnids

‘Will you walk into my parlour?’ said a spider to a fly,
‘Tis the prettiest little parlour that ever you did spy.
— Mary Howitt (1799-1888) The Spider and the Fly.

Many people, children and adults, men and women, brave and fearful, are deeply repelled by spiders, and if they are asked why spiders in particular, they usually answer: ‘Because they have eight legs.’
— Primo Levi (1919 – 1987), ‘The Fear of Spiders’ in Other People’s Trades, 141.

It is proven today that the tarantula is innocuous, as are almost all spiders in our country; but there is not a child, especially in the country, whose mother does not say: ‘Don’t touch it, it’s a spider, it’s poisonous’; and childhood memories are indelible.
— Primo Levi (1919 – 1987), ‘The Fear of Spiders’ in Other People’s Trades, 144.

My father chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with scorpions
— Holy Bible, 1 Kings, 12:11.

The insect I am now describing lived three years; every year it changed its skin, and got a new set of legs. I have sometimes plucked off a leg, which grew again in two or three days. At first it dreaded my approach to its web; but at last it became so familiar as to take a fly out of my hand, and upon my touching any part of the web, would immediately leave its hole, prepared either for defence or an attack.
— Oliver Goldsmith (1728 – 1774), ‘The Philosopher and the Spider’, in Animated Nature.

Long before the Great Age of Dinosaurs, creatures of humbler build called arthropods began to leave the sea and adopt a life on the land. Not only were arthropods, which include all those animals with an external skeleton and jointed limbs such as insects, ticks, scorpions and centipedes, the first animals to colonize the land but according to many zoologists they will also be the last survivors.
— Barbara York Main, Spiders, Collins, 1984, 13.

A Bite from a Black Spider.—On Sunday morning last, Mr Phillips, a chemist, of Brooke-street, entered the closet at the rear of his present residence, Whilst there he felt something strike him, and afterwards experienced some pain. On going into the house he complained to Dr King, who fortunately happened to be there at the time of the circumstance [oc]curred, when he at once repaired to the closet with & candle, and saw crawling along the seat, a small black spider—flat body, with a red mark on its back, After this he returned and examined Mr Phillips, who was seized with strong pains in the abdomen, which presently extended all through the bowels, passing to the spine and to the muscles on the back of the thigh. He was then taken with spasms, approaching to convulsions. Dr King administered ether, ammonia, and opium. The doctor ordered cloths dipped in turpentine, to be constantly kept applied. On the wound itself liq. ammon. diluted. Towards two a m on Monday morning the patient became light-headed and delirious, and a shivering rigor approaching to collapse, came over him. No sleep whatever could be induced by the opium, although administered in strong doses and large draughts of brandy were given for the purpose of producing sleep, which had, after a time, the desired effect, although not the least sym[p]tom of drunkenness was perceptible on him. I am happy to add that Mr Phillips (who was a large sufferer by the late fire) is now progressing favorably.
— Bendigo Advertiser (Victoria), 24 December 1862, 3, http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/87904557

Poor Ernie [Ernest Favenc] was bitten by a red spot black spider on Wednesday night & since then has been suffering frightfully. This morning & afternoon, he has been frantic with the pain. It bit him on the nape of the neck & it swelled down his shoulder, & both that & his head is dreadful. The first night he was bad nearly all night, & they had to sit up with him (I was too ill), the next day until lunch time he was better, but in the middle of the day & at night the pain came on as bad as ever for 3 or 4 hours. On Friday he had no attack until 5 in the evening, when it was more severe than ever until he went to sleep after 2 doses of laudanum at 10. I & the girls took it in turns to sit & take his hand. He nearly wrenched them off at times. Today he has been very bad all day. Mrs. Shadforth put an Epicacuana [Ipecacuanha] poultice on the bite the first night which they say must have done him good as he is not as bad as others who were suffering in the same way.
— Peter Monteath (ed.), The Diary of Emily Caroline Creaghe, Explorer, Corkwood Press, 2004, 30 March 1883, 35 – 6.

Araneus niger, Offic. The Black Spider. It is common in Woods, Thickets and Pastures. Among the approved Remedies of Sir Matthew Lister, I find, that the distill'd Water of Black Spiders is an excellent Cure for Wounds, and that this was one of the choice Secrets of Sir Walter Raleigh.
— Pharmacopoeia Universalis, or, a New Universal English Dispensatory, 1747, 484.

[For Ague] Or make six middling Pills of Cobwebs. Take one a little before the cold Fit, two a little before the next Fit, (suppose the next day,) the other three, if need be, a little before the third Fit. This seldom fails.
— John Wesley, Primitive Physic, 1785, 22.

Only beware of the fever, my friends! Beware of the fever!
For it is not, like that of our cold Acadian climate,
Cured by wearing a spider hung round one's neck in a nutshell.
Tis true, a scorpions oil is said
To cure the wounds the vermine made;
And weapons, drest with salves, restore
And heal the hurts they gave before;
— Samuel Butler, Hudibras, Part III, Canto II 1029–1032.

…bruised and applied to the Place, they cure the Poison of their own Stings, others take it bruised in Wine, others instil Oil of Scorpions into the Wound. The Oil of Scorpions, is by some recommended as effectual in a Suppression of Urine, the Bladder being anointed with it hot, or before a Fire.
— Pharmacopoeia Universalis, or, a New Universal English Dispensatory, 1747, 527–8. 

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