LOCUSTS AND GRASSHOPPERS. 201 



belongiug to Coleoptera Avould not be inti-oduced between 

 two species of the tribe Orthoptera, namely, the bald locust 

 and the grasshopper. Wliat is doubtless intended is some 

 other kind of locust. In the Hebrew the Avord is " Chargol," 

 and in the Greek Septuagint 6<pL0fid-)(U<; — as the beetle has 

 not legs abov^e its feet to leap withal, and the locust both 

 Avas and is a common article of food in the East. Thus in 

 St. Mark i, 6, we read of St. John the Baptist, " He did eat 

 locusts and wild honey." Such locusts constitute a chief 

 article of diet in the case of the modern Arab, as in the days 

 of old. The head and tail are pulled off as Avith shrimps, 

 and the creatures are frequently dried and grated to powder. 

 What is the grasshopper after his kind? It may have 

 been rightly rendered by the translators of the A.V. "grass- 

 hopper," but it may also mean another kind of locust Avhich 

 Avonld prove fully as serviceable for diet as any grasshopper, 

 and the same HebrcAv Avord "Arbeh," here translated 

 (jrasshopper, is rendered " locust" in 2 Chronicles Aai, 13. 



Again, the locust after his kind in LcAnticus xi, 22. Though, 

 as I stated, it almost certainly designated Acridiwn peregrinum, 

 " the locust of the plague," it may have included other species 

 also, e.g., Acridiuin tataricum, a smoky brown species probably 

 more Avidely distributed than peregrin inn throughout the 

 JMediterranean, but not occurring in such appalling hordes. 



The Kabbis assert that tliere are 800 species of Orthoptera 

 in Palestine. Modo'ii travellers compute Avitli far greater 

 likelihood 40. Possibly some of tlie larvte have been 

 regarded as other species instead of the same kinds in an 

 early and undeveloped state. 



One other passage occurs in the Pentateuch relating to the 

 locust, Deuteronomy {ipvaL/37], Ixx) xxviii, 42, " All the trees 

 and fruit of thy laud shall the locust consume." The trees 

 are likely to be dcA^oured by the locust in its perfect or mature 

 state, Avlien its Avings are fully deA^eloped. The fruit of the 

 land would be liable to the ravages of its larva3 likcAvise. 



Respecting Acridium peregrinum, " the locust of the plague," 

 once more, I captured male and female of this species at 

 Tangiers m a A'ineyard on June 1st, 1891, and dead ones 

 in Avorn and dilapidated condition in the hedgeroAVs, 

 doubtless benumbed and killed by a recent change in the 

 Aveather. Cf. Nahum iii, 15 to 17, "As the great grass- 

 hoppers, Avhich camp in the hedges in the cold day." That 

 there had been three incursions of the locust hordes already 

 that year at Tangiers, and that a fourth was expected. 



