202 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



vegetation of Mexico and Yucatan, and as having produced 

 famine and suffering among the people, especially in California. 

 The Jesuit, Father Michael del Barco,who lived as a missionary 

 in that country for thirty years, relates that from the arrival 

 of the Jesuits, in J 697 to the year 1722, the inhabitants were 

 free from the plague ; but in the latter year the sufferings of 

 the people were awful. In 1746 and the three years following 

 locusts swarmed without intermission, and after this were 

 absent until 1753 and 1754 ; and finally, before the expulsion 

 of the Jesuits in 1765; and the plague continued during the 

 two following years. Clavigero, in his 'History of Cali- 

 fornia,' gives a very interesting account of these several 

 invasions, and describes the appearance and natural history 

 of the insect with great minuteness : — 



" The birth of these new grasshoppers has no particular 

 time, but is dependent upon the early or late appearance of 

 the rains, but they generally hatch during the latter part of 



September or early in October Their life, from birth 



to death, lasts ten months, during which they cast their coats 

 twice, and change their colours five times. When the wings 

 have become of sufficient strength and the body at its 

 maturity, they then begin to ascend into the air and fly like 

 birds, and commence their ravages in every direction, deso- 

 lating the fields of every green thing. Their numbers become 

 so extraordinary that they soon form clouds in the atmo- 

 sphere, of which the rays of the sun cast a shadow as they 

 fly. They unite in masses of ten to twelve thousand, always 

 following their conductors, and flying in a direct line without 

 falling behind, for they consume every growing thing before 

 them. To whatever height their guides conduct them to 

 obtain a sight of their food, they follow; and as soon as 

 growing crops or any verdure is sighted, instantly the swarm 

 will alight, and speedily devour and devastate the fields 

 around to that extent, and with that promptitude, that when 

 they are seen by a new swarm of their fellows there is not 

 anything more left to injure or consume. This lamentable 

 insect-plague is bad enough in old and cultivated countries, 

 but in the miserable peninsula of California, where they eat 

 up the crops, green trees, fruits, and pastures, they cause 

 great mortality in the domestic animals of the missions, and, 

 with the effect of their ravages on the cereals and other 



