284 THE MIGRATORY LOCUST. 



obliterated till the succeeding year *. In their long 

 flights to this part of the world, from the extent of 

 their journey, they are also nearly famished, and 

 therefore more voracious wherever they happen to 

 alisrht. 



We are told that nearly as much damage is occa- 

 sioned by what they touch as by what they devour. 

 Their bite is thought to contaminate the plants, and 

 cither to destroy or greatly to weaken their vegeta- 

 tion. To use the expression of the husbandmen, 

 " They burn wherever they touch, and in some 

 countries leave the marks of their devastation for 

 three or four years afterwards." When dead, they 

 infect the air in such a manner that the stench is 

 frequently insupportable. Orosius tells us that, in 

 the year of the world 3800, Africa was infested 

 with a multitude of Locusts. After having eaten 

 up every thing that was green, they flew ofF and 

 were drowned in the sea ; wdiere they caused such 

 a stench as could not have been equalled by the 

 putrefying carcases of a hundred thousand men. 



In the year 1650 a cloud of locusts were seen to 

 enter Russia in three different places ; and from 



* " One thing which always surprized me," says Mr. Adanson in 

 his Voyage to Senegal, " is the amazing rapidity with which the sap 

 of trees in this country repairs any loss they happen to sustain ; and I 

 was never more astonished than when, four days after a terrible invasion 

 by the Locusts, in which every green thing was devoured, I saw the 

 trees covered with new leaves, and not appear to have suffered very 

 greatly. The herbaceous plants bore marks of the devastation some- 

 what longer ; but a few days were sufficient to repair every mischief." 



