16 LOCUSTS AND WILD HONEY 



centre, and the swarm revolving around her as a 

 pivot, — over meadows, across creeks and swamps, 

 straight for the heart of the mountain, about a mile 

 distant, — slow at first, so that the youth who gave 

 chase kept up with them, but increasing their speed 

 till only a foxhound could have kept them in sight. 

 I saw their pursuer laboring up the side of the moun- 

 tain; saw his white shirtsleeves gleam as he entered 

 the woods; but he returned a few hours afterward 

 without any clew as to the particular tree in which 

 they had taken refuge out of the ten thousand that 

 covered the side of the mountain. 



The other swarm came out about one o'clock of a 

 hot July day, and at once showed symptoms that 

 alarmed the keeper, who, however, threw neither 

 dirt nor water. The house was situated on a steep 

 side-hill. Behind it the ground rose, for a hundred 

 rods or so, at an angle of nearly forty-five degrees, 

 and the prospect of having to chase them up this 

 hill, if chase them we should, promised a good trial 

 of wind at least; for it soon became evident that . 

 their course lay in this direction. Determined to 

 have a hand, or rather a foot, in the chase, I threw 

 off my coat and hurried on, before the swarm was 

 yet fairly organized and under way. The route soon , . • 

 led me into a field of standing rye, every spear of 

 which held its head above my own. Plunging reck- * 

 lessly forward, my course marked to those watching , 

 from below by the agitated and wriggling grain, I 

 emerged from the miniature forest just in time to sea 

 the runaways disappearing over the top of the hill. 



