28 ESSAYS ON WHEAT 



XVIII. Another Plague of Grasshoppers 



In the spring of 1852 and 1861, tlie colony was again 

 flooded by an overflow from the Red River, and scenes were 

 witnessed recalling those of 1826. Grasshoppers laid 

 waste the crops in 1857, 1858, 1864, 1867, and 1868.^* 



The devastation caused by the grasshoppers in 1868 

 was as complete as in 1819. The insects arrived in 1867 

 at the beginning of the harvest and, after greatly injuring 

 the wheat and entirely destroying the oats and barley, de- 

 posited their eggs just as they had done in 1818.^^ In 

 1868 the eggs hatched and the larvse which emerged cleared 

 the flelds of every vestige of vegetation. " The multitude 

 of insects," says Hargrave, " was so great as to render 

 it difficult to convey an appreciable idea of their numbers 

 to the minds of those absent from the scenes of their devas- 

 tations. Piled in heaps about the walls of Fort Garry, 

 they were carted away and burned up to prevent the 

 effluvia from their decaying bodies contaminating the at- 

 mosphere during the stifling heats of an unusually warm 

 summer." Threatened with absolute starvation, the colo- 

 nists were obliged to appeal for help ; and the appeal was 

 not in vain. Letters were written to the Times with the 

 result that the British public sent to the succor of the 

 colony the sum of £3,000. In addition, $12,000 were col- 

 lected in Canada and £900 in the United States of Amer- 

 ica. In the meanwhile, the Council of Assiniboia voted a 

 sum of £1,600 for immediate expenditure as follows: 

 £600 to purchase seed wheat, £500 to procure flour from 

 the United States, and £500 for fishing tackle and ammu- 

 nition. The flour to be conveyed to the colony was re- 

 ceived by an agent at St. Paul and then transported over 



5* J. J. Hargrave, Red River, Montreal, 1871, pp. 175-176, 446. 

 66 Ibid., p. 419. 



