MISCELLANEOUS. 89 



question therefore of the breeding habits of these locusts requires further inves- 

 tigation. 



The eggs laid by the original flights at the end of the hot weather were distri- 

 buted throughout the whole of Central Rajputana, and a vast amount of injury 

 was done in Marwar, Ajmere, Kishengurh, Tonk, Sirobi, and the northern part of 

 Meywar, the crops being damaged, in the first instance, by the young locusts 

 before they acqnired wings, and afterwards by the winged swarms which flew 

 about the country and settled at intervals to eat. what had escaped the ravages of 

 the young wingless locusts. 



In the Punjab, flights of locusts from the Suliman Range (Afghanistan), ap- 

 peared in the western border (Dehra Ismail Khan) in the end of April and in May. 

 Eggs and young locusts were also found about this time near the hills in the 

 sandy tracts of the same district. The flights seem generally to have moved from 

 west to east, and by July to have spread themselves throughout the Punjab (Mul- 

 tan, Amritsar, Sirsa, Ludhiana, &c.) ; but the laying of eggs and the hatching out 

 of young went on, at least in the south-east (Sirsa, Hissar, Delhi) throughout 

 August and September. 



In Bombay, locusts were noticed in May and June 1882 in the south-west of 

 the Presidency (Dharwar and Kanara Collectorates) ; but they attracted little 

 attention, such swarms being annual visitors of the Kanarese forests, and neither 

 in Kanara nor in Dharwar did they cause any material injury. With the setting 

 in of the south-west monsoon, however, they spread in flights over the Presi- 

 dency to the north and north-east(Satara, Poona, Nasik, Amednagar, and Khandesh), 

 and early in the rains proceeded to lay their eggs and die. These eggs hatched 

 in the end of July and beginning of August, and the young locusts did a large 

 amount of damage over a wide area, through the months of August and Septem- 

 ber. In the early part of October, with the setting in of the north-east monsoon, 

 the young locusts which had by this time acquired wings, took flight, and tra- 

 velled with the prevailing wind in a south-westerly direction, doing some injury 

 in the Poona Collectorate as they passed. They then struck the Western Ghats and 

 spread slowly over the Konkan iu November, and thence travelled into the native 

 States of Sawantvadi and the Kanara district. During the remainder of the cold 

 season and the following hot weather (December 1882 to the end May 1883), the 

 flights clung to the Ghauts, occasionally venturing inland into Belgaum, Dharwar, 

 the Kolhapur State and Satara, and devouring the spring crops in the Coast 

 Districts ; but ordinarily keeping in the vicinity of the hill ranges. With the 

 commencement of the south-west monsoon, however (in the latter part of May 

 1883), the flights began to move in a north-easterly direction, as they had done 

 the preceding year, but in larger numbers. 



At the commencement of the rains they began to alight in vast numbers over 



an immense tract of country, comprising the six Deccan Collectorates of Sholapur, 



Poona, Khandesh, Ahmednagar, Satara, and Nasik, and also in the three Coast 



Collectorates of Ratnagiri, Kolaba, and Thana. They deposited their eggs and died, 



12 



