lS2 THE MIGRATORY LOCUST. 



succeeds in an instant to the rich scenery of the 

 spring. — When these clouds of locusts take their 

 flight, to surmount any obstacle, or to traverse more 

 rapidly a desert soil, the heavens may literally be said 

 to be obscured by them. Happily this calamity is not 

 frequently repeated, for it is the inevitable forerun- 

 ner of famine, and all the maladies it occasions. 

 The inhabitants of Syria have remarked that locusts 

 are always increased by too mild winters, and that 

 they constantly come from the desert of Arabia. 

 From this observation it is easy to conceive that the 

 cold, not having been rigorous enough to destroy 

 their eggs, they multiply suddenly ; and, the herbage 

 failing them in the immense plains of the desert, 

 innumerable legions issue forth. When they make 

 their first appearance on the frontiers of the culti- 

 vated country, the inhabitants attempt to drive them 

 off, by raising large clouds of smoke; but frequently 

 their herbs and wet straw fail them. They then 

 die: trenches, where numbers of the insects are bu- 

 ried : but the most efficacious destroyers are the 

 south and south-easterly winds, and the Locust- 

 eating thrushes*. These birds follow them in nu- 

 merous flocks like starlings, and not only greedily 

 devour them, but kill as many as they can : acord- 

 ingly they are much respected by the peasants, and 

 nobody is ever allowed to shoot them. As to the 

 southerly and south-easterly winds, they drive with 



■* TurJus gryllimorus of Barrow. 



