INDIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 219 



which entered Transylvania in August, was several hun- 

 dred fathoms in width, (at Vienna the breadth of one of 

 them was three miles,) and extended to so great a length 

 as to be four hours in passing over the Red Tower ; and 

 such was its density that it totally intercepted the solar 

 light, so that when they flew low one person could not 

 see another at the distance of twenty paces a . A similar 

 account has been given me by a friend of mine b long resi- 

 dent in India. He relates that when at Poonah he was 

 witness to an immense army of locusts which ravaged the 

 Mahratta country, and was supposed to come from Ara- 

 bia (this, if correct, is a strong proof of their power to 

 pass the sea under favourable circumstances). The co- 

 lumn they composed, my friend was informed, extended 

 five hundred miles; and so compact was it, when on the 

 wing, that like an eclipse it completely hid the sun, so 

 that no shadow was cast by any object, and some lofty 

 tombs distant from his residence not more than two 

 hundred yards were rendered quite invisible. This was 

 not the Locusta migratorza, but a red species ; which cir- 

 cumstance much increased the horror of the scene ; for, 

 clustering upon the trees after they had stripped them of 

 their foliage, they imparted to them a sanguine hue. The 

 peach was the last tree that they touched. 



Dr. Clarke, to give some idea- of the infinite numbers 

 of these animals, compares them to a flight of snow when 

 the flakes are carried obliquely by the wind. They co- 

 vered his carriage and horses, and the Tartars assert that 

 people are sometimes suffocated by them. The whole 



* Philos. Trans, xlvi. 30. 



" Major Moor, author of The Narrative of Captain Little's De- 

 tachment, The Hindu Pantheon, &c. 



