326 



THE UNIVERSE. 



Modern history lias had only too often to register these 

 disastrous visitations. One of them, which obscured the 

 sun like a hurricane, checked the passage of Charles XII. 's 



151. Migrating Locust : Acrid ium peregrinum. 



army when he was crossing Bessarabia, and compelled him 

 to arrest his march. 1 



1 The historian of Charles XII. speaks in the following terms of the invasion 

 of locusts which arrested the march of this monarch's army : " A horrible swarm 

 of locusts arose generally each day before noon on the side towards the sea; first 

 in little waves, and then in clouds, which darkened the air and made it so sombre 

 and thick that all over this vast plain the sun appeared entirely eclipsed. These 

 insects did not fly near the ground, but kept at about the same height as we see 

 the swallows, till they saw a field upon which they could alight. We often met 

 them on the way, when they rose up with a sound like that of a tempest. Sub- 

 sequently they fell upon us like a storm, threw themselves upon the very plain 

 where we were, and without any apparent dread of being crushed by the hoofs of 

 the horses they rose from the ground, and so covered our bodies and faces that 



