134 THE LIFE OF AN INSECT. 



road-side had not a single leaf that was not 

 withered up." The engraving represents one of 

 these mischievous larvse ; it also shows the winter- 

 nest into which they creep, and a leaf which a 

 regiment of them have already attacked. 



Securely protected from the severity of the 

 winter of 1731, in their warm nests, these larvae 

 quitted them again early in April of 1732, to set 

 forth upon another mission of destruction. They 

 had now multiplied to a degree calculated to 

 excite the most serious public alarm. It began to 

 be feared that the leaves of the trees would not be 

 sufficient for the support of the devouring millions ; 

 and that if, during that year, the larvse multiplied 

 in the same proportion as in the preceding year, a 

 famine more terrible than any recorded in history 

 as produced by insect destroyers would be the 

 result. These fears were in some measure ground- 

 less, as, in all probability, so soon as the larvae had 

 devoured all the leaves, they would rather have 

 perished of hunger than have attacked the grass 

 and other plants. But the matter was sufficiently 

 serious as it was. The French parliament took the 

 alarm, and determined to resist the threatened in- 

 vasion of these small but formidable enemies. An 



