LOCUSTID^ — LOCUSTS. 125 



with a larg:e bundle of Locusts on her head, when a serpent, 

 which had been put into the sack with them, found its way 

 out. The woman, supposing it to be a thong dangling about 

 her shoulders, laid hold of it with her hand, and, feeling that 

 it was alive, instantly precipitated the bundle to the ground 

 and fled. "1 



Pringle, in his song of the wild Bushman, has the follow- 

 ing lines : 



Yea, even the wasting Locust-swarm, 



Which mighty nations dread, 

 To me nor terror brings nor harm ; 

 I malie of them my bread. 2 



Flights of Locusts are considered so much of a blessing in 

 South Africa, that, as Dr. Livingstone states, the rain- 

 doctors sometimes promised to bring them by their incanta- 

 tions.^ 



Carsten Xiebuhr says that all Arabians, whether living in 

 their own country or in Persia, Syria, and Africa, are ac- 

 customed to eat Locusts. They distinguish several species 

 of insect, to which they give particular names. The red 

 Locust, which is esteemed fatter and more succulent than 

 any other, and accordingly the greatest delicacy, they call 

 Muken; another is called Vubbe, but they abstain from it 

 because it has a tendency to produce diarrhoea, A light- 

 colored Locust, as well as the Muken, is eaten. 



In Arabia, Locusts, when caught, are put in bags, or on 

 strings, to be dried; in Barbary, they are boiled, and then 

 dried upon the roofs of the houses. The Bedouins of 

 Egypt roast them alive, and devour them with the utmost 

 voracity. Xiebuhr says he saw no instance of unwhole- 

 someness in this article of food ; but Mr. Forskal was told 

 it had a tendency to thicken the blood and bring on melan- 

 choly habits. The former gentleman also says the Jews in 

 Arabia are convinced that the fowls, of which the Israelites 

 ate so largely of in the desert, were only clouds of Locusts, 

 and laugh at our translators, who have supposed that they 

 found quails where quails never werc^ 



The wild Locusts upon which St. John fed have given rise 



1 Quot, in Anderson's L. Ngami, p. 284. 



2 Ibid., p. 283. 



3 Trav. and Res. in S. Africa, p. 48. 



* Pinkerton's Col. of Voy. and Trav.., x, 189. 



12 



