THE MIGRATORY LOCUST. 



483 



and then carried away on the backs of oxen to the place where the process of drying 

 takes place. During the transit the living cargo makes a great buzzing inside the 

 sacks. Herodotus, in Book IV. c. 172, mentions the fact that Locusts are used for 

 food : " When they have caught Locusts, they dry them in the sun, reduce them to 

 powder, and, sprinkling them in milk, drink them." The flavor of the Locust is rather 

 variable, and is regulated by the food on which the insect has lately lived. 



WALKING-STICK INSECT. Bacteria trophlaus. COCKROACH. Blatta orlentalls. 



MIGRATORY LOCLST.-Locuste mlgratoria. 



In Southern Africa, the herds of larval Locusts are little less to be dreaded than 

 their mature and winged hosts. They pass over the ground in a broad torrent, several 

 inches in depth, and are popularly known by the title of " voet-gangers," /. e. foot- 

 goers. At night they crawl up trees and hang like clusters of grapes from the boughs. 

 Nothing seems to impede their march. Wide and deep trenches are overpassed as if 

 the ground were quite level ; should they come to a stream or canal, the vast hosts 

 which form the van march boldly into it and with their dead bodies form a bridge over 

 which their companions can march ; and should fires be lighted across their course, 

 the flames are quickly stifled by the dense masses of insects that fling themselves un- 

 hesitatingly into the burning heap. 



In such vast numbers do the Locusts assemble, that after a severe storm, which is 

 always fatal to these insects, a continuous bank of dead Locusts has been formed, three 

 or four feet in height, nearly fifty miles in length, and exhaling a most pestilential odor 

 from the decomposing bodies. 



There are so many and so familiar accounts of these Locust armies that little need 

 be said upon the subject. The following passage, however, taken from Cumming's 

 well-known work on Southern Africa, will give the reader a just and vivid idea of the 

 multitudinous hosts that pass through the air : 



" On the following day I had the pleasure of beholding the first flight of Locusts that 

 I had seen since my arrival in the colony. We were standing in the middle of a plain 

 of unlimited length, and about five miles across, when I observed them advancing. 



