THE CATERPILLAR PLAGUE. 19 



"We went out and found the fence rails literally covered with 

 caterpillars. You could not set your foot down on the walks 

 without crushing the worms. We took shingles and scraped 

 quantities off the trunks of the big street elms. People used to 

 scrape them off into piles and then burn them with kerosene. 

 (Ex-Selectman W. C. Craig.) 



The caterpillars covered one side of my house so thickly that you 

 could not have told what kind of paint was on it. It was impos- 

 sible to keep them entirely out of the house. The women had to 

 shake their clothing when they went into the house. People used 

 to come from other parts of Medford to Myrtle Street just to see 

 the ravages of the insect. (J. C. Clark, 11 Myrtle Street.) 



The caterpillars were so thick in the trees that you could hear 

 them eating. They would get on the fences, until they made them 

 fairly black. They would crawl upon and into the houses. They 

 would get inside somehow, and it was a common thing to see them 

 crawling on the table, and we have even found them on the beds. 

 They would get under steps, stones, and into old stove-pipes, old 

 cans, boxes, in short, any place which afforded a shelter. They 

 crawled into the cellar windows. They were so thick on the street 

 trees that people would walk out in the middle of the street, where 

 there were fewer dropping down. It is no exaggeration to say 

 that I have raked quarts of caterpillars off a tree. ... I have 

 seen them crawling in great numbers on the rails of the Medford 

 branch track. After a train had gone along, the rails would be all 

 green with their crushed bodies. (William Taylor.) 



In the old days, when the caterpillars were so bad, the houses 

 and fences were blackened with them. We used to sweep them oft' 

 into a basin of kerosene. As you went up and down the street 

 you would see no foliage except on pear trees. If you carried a 

 sunshade down the street, the caterpillars would get all over it. 

 (Miss R. A. McCarty, 26 Myrtle Street.) 



I recollect one elm tree in particular on Park Street which stood 

 against the fence. There was an inked band around the tree, and 

 about two quarts of gypsy-moth caterpillars had collected below 

 the band. Some of the caterpillars had got over the band, and 

 they had spun threads which served as ladders by which the others 

 were crossing. (F. M. Goodwin.) 



We could not sit under the Porter apple tree, the caterpillars 

 were so thick on it. They swarmed on the ground at the foot of 

 the Baldwin. We poured boiling water on them. The fence was 

 one mass of caterpillars, and they lay thickly under the clapboards 

 and gutters. Our apple trees were stripped two years in succession. 

 (Mrs. John Benson, 3 Cross Street.) 



