124 REPORT UNITED STATES ENTOMOLOGICAL COMMISSION. 



receives is much greater than it would be if, by long experience, the 

 people had become accustomed to such visitations. 



The struggling i^ioneer who has managed, with his limited means and 

 with no force but himself and family, to break the sod of a forty-acre 

 tract and plant his corn, and then sees it swept away in a single day by 

 a swarm of hungry locusts, is necessarily greatly discouraged. If this 

 is repeated for two or three years in succession, or even in the course of 

 a few years, he is forced to give up the contest and seek a home in some 

 other section. 



Hundreds and thousands of exactly such cases as this were to be 

 found in the border States during the series of locust visitations which 

 occurred between 1873 and 1877. The tales of their hardships told m 

 letters sent back to their friends had their effect, and for a time the tide 

 of emigration not only ceased but turned back, and hundreds, perhaps 

 thousands, of homes were left untenanted, and fields uncultivated. Nor 

 is it strange that such should be the casej the only wonder is that, 

 under the circumstances, so many continued to struggle so long and so 

 bravely. 



As a natural consequence, business of all kinds was in a great degree 

 suspended, improvements stopped, and the development of the country 

 checked. Although rich in material and life-sustaining resources, and 

 abounding in fertility and productive forces, they were in a great degree 

 negatived or rendered valueless for these four years by the visitations 

 of an insect scarcely more than an inch in length. So widespread was 

 the devastation and so severe the scourge that State and national aid 

 was deemed necessary to assist in staying it. As a result of this feeling 

 the legislatures of some of the western States were convened, and the 

 meeting of governors at Omaha, heretofore mentioned, was called. The 

 following extract from Governor Pillsbury's address at the Omaha meet- 

 ing sets forth in strong colors the distress and uneasiness we have al- 

 luded to : 



.. I shall not attempt any details of the prolonged visitation of the destructive insects, 

 from which several States are now suffering. Most of you are doubtless familiar with 

 the sad experience of many localities in your several States, where the people have suf- 

 fered continuously, to the last extremity of endurance. In my own State the ravages 

 have thus far been confined to a comparatively small belt along our western and north- 

 ern borders, but within this area many localities have suffered an almost total loss 

 of crops for four years in succession, and with these people the question is fast assum- 

 ing the vital alternative of exterminating the pests, or being exterminated by them. 



The following brief extracts from the committee report, resolutions, 

 &c., of that meeting indicate the general feeling and views of those 

 present on this point : 



The Rocky Mountain locust, or grasshopper, by its migrations from Territory to Ter- 

 ritory and from State to State, destroying millions of dollars' worth of the hard earn- 

 i'-'gs of the western farmers, crippling the progress of the border States, and retarding 

 the settlement of the Territories, has become a national plague. Its injuries are of such 

 magnitude that no effort should be left untried that will be likely to diminish or avert 

 them. (From committee report.) 



