218 INDIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 



beasts. In the Venetian territory, also, in 1478 more than 

 30,000 persons are saicl to liave perished in a famine oc- 

 casioned by tliese terrific scourges. Many other instances 

 of their devastations in Europe, in France, Spain, Ital}', 

 Germany, &c.% are recorded by the same author. In 

 1650 a cloud of them was seen to enter Russia in three 

 different places, which from thence passed over into Po- 

 land and Lithuania, where the air was darkened by their 

 numbers. In some places they were seen lying" dead 

 lieaped one upon another to the depth of four feet ; in 

 others they covered the surface like a black cloth, the 

 trees bent with their weight, and the damage they did ex- 

 ceeded all computation''. At a later period in Languedoc 

 when the sun became hot they took wing and fell upon 

 the corn, devouring both leaf and ear, and that with such 

 expedition that in three hours they would consume a 

 whole field. After having eaten up the corn they attacked 

 the vines, the pulse, the willows, and lastly the hemp not- 

 withstanding its bitterness'^. Sir H. Davy informs US'* 

 that die French government in 1813 issued a decree with 

 a view to occasion the destruction of grasshoppers. 



Even this happy island, so remarkably distinguished 

 by its exemption from most of those scourges to which 

 other nations are exposed, was once alarmed by the ap- 

 pearance of locusts. In 1 Y'iS they were observed here in 

 considerable luimbers, but providentially they soon pe- 

 rished without {)ropagating. These were evidently strag- 

 glers from the vast swarms which in the preceding year 

 did such infinite damage in Wallachia, Moldavia, Tran- 

 sylvania, Hungary, and Poland. One of these swarms, 



=> MouHet, \23. " Binglcy, iii. .^')8. ' Vhilos. Trnn.'i. 1686. 



^ Elements of Agricullural C/icmis/rt/, i?33. 



