85 



skeleton left." Compare with this the statement of Geo. Emmerling, 

 of Walhalla, Dakota, " We have had them every year, from 1863 to 1875 ; 

 they came one year and left us the next, when the young had acquired 

 wings, and so they came and went all the time." 



Again, in 1864 swarms appeared early in July, along the Upper Min- 

 nosota Eiver, and spread eastward gradually during the season, and 

 reached about as far east as in 1874, i. e., to the third tier of towns in 

 Le Sueur County. Scattering swarms also visited Manitoba in the same 

 year, and probably some portions of these reached ^N'orthw^estern Min- 

 nesota, for w^e hear of slight appearances of them in the Eed Eiver and 

 the Sauk Yalleys in 1864 and 1865. But the greater portion of the in- 

 jury was done in the Minnesota Valley, and was followed by a general 

 departure to the southwest in 1865. The injury in Colorado also was 

 very severe in the same years, but there seems to have been no large 

 movement to the eastward, such as occurred later, in 1866 and 1867. 



It seems very likely that the swarms which entered Minnesota in 1864 

 were hatched at no great distance, and were the offspring of swarms 

 that had alighted in Eastern Dakota in the preceding year. This may 

 perhaps be inferred from the following letter of the Eev. S. E. Eiggs, 

 missionary at the Sisseton Indian agency, dated September 9, 1875: 



" In 1863, it will be remembered, that on General Sibley's expedition to the Missouri 

 we met with the ravages of the grasshoppers in various parts of Dakota, particularly, 

 as I remember, near Skunk Lake (in Minnehaha County), where the large grass had 

 been eaten to the bare stalks, and our animals fared badly. 



" In 1865, I visited a camp of Dakota scouts, near the ' Hole in the Mountain,' at the 

 head of the Redwood. That was in the month of August. The valley of the Minne- 

 sota clear out to the Coteau was so full of grasshoppers as to make it unpleasant trav- 

 eling. For the next four years I traveled every summer on the Missouri River, com- 

 ing over to and from Minnesota. Every season I met with grasshoppers at some point 

 on the east side of the Missouri. In 1867, and also in 1868, we found them near Fort 

 Randall. In 1869, in August, we met them above Fort Sully, near Grand River. In 

 all these cases they were only in small battalions, and appeared to have come there 

 from other parts." 



" The invasions of 1871 and 1872 were very scattering, and almost entirely harmless. 

 'In 1871 they came across the Union River southwest of here, dropping in Pope and 

 Stevens counties (they appeared in several others too), do;ng some damage, but leav- 

 ing no eggs save on sandy soil. I do not think their track was more than ten miles 

 wide. In the following spring, 1872, their destruction of crops was total when hatched 

 — perhaps twenty-five or thirty farms twelve miles west of here were cleaned out. 

 They also hatched in considerable numbers between here and Melrose, but left before 

 doing much damage. These came from the southwest and returned.' (J. M. McMas- 

 ters, M. D.) Bat they were severe in parts of Becker and Clay counties, as may be 

 inferred from the Detroit (Becker County) Record of August 3, 1872." Last week the 

 great herd of grasshoppers which hatched in and devastated the country north and 

 west of us, came upon xhis country by gradual approaches, at times greatly increased 

 in numbers by a gentle breeze. Ttiey did no particular damage to crops until Satur- 

 day, July 27 last, when they took hold as if laying in rations for a four days' march. 

 On Sunday afternoon (July 28), the intense heat of the morning was relieved by a fresh 

 breeze from the northwest. As if by a preconcerted signal every individual grasshop- 

 per just got up and shook the dust of Detroit from his feet. * * * The wind did 

 not blow steadily, and they in consequence, wandering and hovering about, settled 

 down for the night. On the following day a steady wind blew from the same quarter 

 as on Sunday, which took them steadily to the southwest and high in the air. Those 

 who witnessed the flight will never forget it; looking toward the sun they seemed 

 like drifting snow from 100 to 500 feet upward. * * * -^q-^ a grasshopper remains 

 and they have left no eggs behind. ' 



1873. — The invasion of this year was something unusual in its charac- 

 ter from the earliness of its arrival ) the direction from which it came, 



