gossamer

James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahlを読んでいます。
"I do hope you'll find it comfortable," Miss Spider said to the Old-Green-Grasshopper. "I made it as soft and silky as I possibly could. I spun it with gossamer. That's a much better quality thread than the one I use for my own web."
"gossamer" はクモの糸を指していることは文脈から分かります。難しそうな単語ですが、子供向けの本には結構出てくる単語で、前にも取り上げた気がするのですが、記録にないので今回取り上げました。以下が辞書の説明です。
・Oxford English Dictionary: A fine, filmy substance consisting of cobwebs spun by small spiders, seen especially in autumn.: So I made a classic cross-hair from spider's gossamer and used it to pinpoint a cell in the area I wanted to watch.
・Collins Dictionary: a filmy cobweb often seen on foliage or floating in the air: Sometimes one scarcely dared breathe for fear of blowing away the gossamer thread of sound.
・Cambridge English Dictionary: the very thin thread that spiders produce to make webs