00 STATISTICS OF MINNESOTA. 



were not the •• common grasshopper," but something different. 



Why should they happen to appear in England the same season 

 they had so extensively overspread the southeastern portion of 

 Europe? Es there, or may there not he. after all, certain occult, 

 influence's at work, he it climatic, atmospheric, or something else, 

 whereby the native species may suddenly become gregarious and 

 destructive, passing in a single season through phases of metamor- 

 phosis or transformation which in higher organizations can only 

 be effected gradually through a long space of time? Or rather, 

 may not the countless myriads which we see in locust years be but 

 the result of a fortuitous concurrence of accidents favorable to 

 insect life and unfavorable to that of their natural enemies? 



It is quite possible that all years would he locust years like 1747 

 and 1748 in Europe and 187;>-4-5-6 here, were the same meteoro- 

 logical conditions to continue, and the causes of their destruction 

 still he held in abeyance. 



The question of the origin of the locusts as they appeal- in dif- 

 ferent localities is more interesting and important than any other 

 connected with the subject : for how are we going to contend with 

 an enemy when we know not from what quarter he may assail us, 

 or whifher or not there he any limit to his power of levy. To 

 give the supposed origin of the Russian Black Sea locust, I quote 

 Sieur Beauplan'a History of Ukraine. He says: "I have seen 

 the plague for several years, one after another, particularly in L045 

 and 164b', (just 1<>1 years earlier than the one above described.) 

 Those creatures do not come in legions, hut in whole clouds, five 

 or six leagues in length, and two or three in breadth, and generally 

 come from toward Tartary, which happens in a dry spring ; for 

 'I'artanj anil the countries rust of it, as Circassia, Bassa, and Min- 

 grelia, are seldom free from them." 



While desiring to avoid overloading these pages with long quo- 

 tations, yet the following from Mouffet is, in several respects, so 

 valuable and suggestive that I cannot refraiitfrom introducing it 

 here. It contains, in a short space, more information about locust 

 invasion in Europe, in the beginning of the Christian era, partic- 

 ularly in Italy, than any I have met with. This is the more inter- 

 esting to us as the countries mentioned bear a pretty close resem- 

 blance to our own, not only in climate and latitude, lying as it 

 does between the 38th and 47th parallel, but also in reference to 

 the supposed native homes of the locust. I call particular atten- 

 tion to the origin of the swarms as given by this author. 



" In what manner God, by means of those insignificant inserts 

 punished the stubbornness and hardness of heart of King Parrho 



