INSECTS AND PLANTS 39 



ductory remarks, one or two noted locust swarms have 

 been mentioned, but these were of exceptional magnitude ; 

 it is quite a common occurrence, however, for a South 

 African locust swarm to have a frontage of fifteen to 

 twenty miles, and a length of sixty to seventy miles, 

 taking several days to pass a given point. One of these 

 swarms is a sight never to be forgotten : the air is alive with 

 a seething mass of insect life ; now the sky is blackened 

 and the sun almost blotted out, now the light, reflected 

 from a myriad wings, resembles nothing so much as a 

 violent snowstorm. As these insects pass over the country 

 they devour practically every living green leaf. The veldt 

 is stripped of grass in the dry season, and every winter 

 crop cut down ; trees are weighed down and broken by 

 the sleeping locusts, and even washing hung out to dry 

 has been devoured by these insects with insatiable appetites. 

 Every inch of ground is covered with a thick carpet of 

 their excrement; trains are stopped and delayed by the 

 grease their crushed bodies exude on the rails; horses as 

 a rule refuse to face a swarm. One swarm is capable of 

 doing immense damage, but when there are dozens of such 

 swarms in a country, the results to agriculture can easily 

 be imagined in the winter of 1906 the locust damage in 

 South Africa was estimated at 1,000,000. 



The adult, or flying locusts, usually appear in the dry 

 season, when there are few growing crops and when the 

 majority are in small plots and so easily protected ; with 

 the first rains come the immature forms, or "hoppers," 

 called by the Dutch " voetgangers," a word meaning 

 infantry. The " hoppers " often appear in swarms of some 

 miles in extent, and so thick as to make the veldt appear 

 brown. Nothing will turn them from their course; they 

 go their way, like a relentless army, devouring every green 

 thing in their path. There are two species of locust in 

 South Africa, differing widely from one another in habits 

 and distribution. The more destructive of the two is the 



