TFTE BEETLE. 189 



Remarkable visit of cock-chafers to Galway. 



the numbers, that, in particular districts, they do 

 considerable damage. 



We read in the Philosophical Transactions, 

 in 1668, that cock-chafers appeared on the hedges 

 and trees of the south-west coast of the county 

 of Galway, in clusters of thousands, clinging to 

 each other's backs in the manner of bees when 

 they swarm. During the day they continued 

 quiet, but towards sun-set the whole were in 

 motion ; and the humming noise of their wings 

 sounded like distant drums. Their numbers 

 were so great, that, for the space of two or three 

 square miles, they entirely darkened the air. 

 Persons travelling on the roads, or who were 

 abroad in the fields, found it difficult to find 

 their way home, as the insects were continually 

 beating against their faces, and caused great 

 pain. In a very short time the leaves of all the 

 trees for some miles round were destroyed, leav- 

 ing the whole country, though it was near mid- 

 summer, as naked and desolate as it would have 

 been in the middle of winter. The noise that 

 these enormous swarms made in seizing and de- 

 vouring the leaves, was so loud as to have been 

 compared to the distant sawing of timber. 

 Swine and poultry destroyed them in vast num- 

 bers. These waited under the trees for the clus- 

 ters dropping, and devoured such swarms as to 

 become fat from them alone. Even the native 

 Irish, from the insects having eaten up the whole 

 of the produce of the ground,, adopted a mode 



