154 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



when desolation and devastation stared us in the face 



The wheat, which was at first thought to be out of harm's 

 way, was cut oflf about one-fourth by the destroying angels ; 

 a statement in our country paper says the average will be 

 about eight or nine bushels per acre. After the grasshoppers 

 stopped their depredations there were several damp, cloudy 

 days that brought out new tassels and silks on the corn, but 

 more than a week of hot, dry weather, with scorching winds, 

 checked its growth ; so there will be none, excepting a very few 

 fields that partially escaped. Turnips have been grown since 

 the rain ; and it is to be hoped there will yet be some 

 potatoes; sweet potatoes were not hurt so badly as the 

 common potato. Broom corn, cane, and Hungarian grass, 

 were unscathed.' A writer from St. Paul, Minnesota, to the 

 paper above mentioned, says that the locusts ' have undoubt- 

 edly destroyed five hundred thousand bushels of wheat, and 

 are likely to destroy another half million of bushels.' Later 

 on in the season the St. Paul 'Press' publishes the following 

 statement in reference to the plague of locusts in Minnesota : — 

 ' It is safe to estimate the tilled area in the ravaged district at 

 two hundred and seventy-five thousand acres, and of the area 

 in wheat in that district at two hundred thousand acres: of 

 this area probably not less than one hundred and fifty 

 tliousand acres have been destroyed. This represents not 

 less than two millions five hundred thousand bushels of 

 wheat devoured in the germ by the grasshoppers, or about 

 one-twelfth of the wheat crop of the state. Add to this area 

 fifty thousand acres of oats, at thirty-three bushels per acre, 

 or one million three hundred and twenty thousand bushels in 

 all, or one-twelfth of the oat crop of the state ; twenty 

 thousand acres of corn, at thirty-two bushels per acre, three 

 hundred and forty thousand bushels, or one-twelfth of the 

 corn crop of the state; and perhaps twenty thousand acres 

 more in rye, buckwheat, barley, potatoes, and other crops; 

 and the full extent of the grasshopper havoc cannot be easily 

 estimated.' Our readers n)ay further judge of the extent of 

 the calamity and sufferings consequent upon it from the 

 following pastoral letter, issued by the Bishop of Minnesota, 

 and appointed to be read in all the churches in his diocese: 

 — 'To the clergy and congregations of the diocese of Minne- 

 sota. You are aware that several counties of the State have 



