JERUSALEM'S LOCUST PLAGUE 



547 



be a signal, as usually was the case, for 

 dozens more to pounce on it, consuming 

 the entire insect in a few moments. 

 Sometimes a mightier one happened by 

 and carried off the entire prey to devour 

 by itself. 



Similarly scarcely had a locust been 

 hurt or crushed before its fellows would 

 be found fighting over it like dogs with a 

 bone. At times injured locusts would be 

 found eating away at their own bruised 

 bodies, and not uncommon was it to find 

 a locust minus its annuli and entrails, 

 running about seemingly unmindful of its 

 deficiencies. 



Nor was the craving for flesh restrict- 

 ed to locusts themselves, for they entered 

 into beehives, and are reported to have 

 spoiled them by eating both bees and 

 honey. They likewise were seen eating 

 ants. 



Still more remarkable was a story told 

 by a doctor friend who personally treated 

 the case in question. It ran thus : A 

 peasant woman on the plain of Sharon, 

 during the locust pest, employed herself 

 in trying to drive the creeping locusts out 

 of her orchard. She took a tiny baby 

 with her, and laying it in the shade of a 

 tree, proceeded to her work. Returning 

 shortly after, she found the child literally 

 covered with the insects and its eyes al- 

 ready consumed out of the sockets. The 

 writer's little boy also was bitten on the 

 throat by one sufficiently to draw the 

 blood. 



LOCUSTS AS HUMAN FOOD 



Since in Palestine and Syria locust 

 visitations are very rare, the eating of 

 them is practically unknown by the Arabs, 

 while in Arabia, where the locusts make 

 their appearances frequently, locust flesh 

 is even found among the articles of trade. 



The natives dismember the insects, 

 pulling off legs and wings, but not the 

 head, and while still alive roast theni in 

 a pan over a hot fire; and after being 

 thoroughly dried in the sun, they can be 

 stored away in sacks. The taste is said 

 by them to be akin to that of fish. 



In the Levitical law locusts are men- 

 tioned among the clean and edible ani- 

 mals, as follows : "These ye may eat, of 

 all creeping things that fly, that go on all 

 fours, such as have legs above their feet 



to leap therewith (i. e., jointed hind 

 legs). . . . These of them ye may 

 eat : the swarming locust after its kind," 

 etc. (Lev. ii : 21, 22). 



It will be recalled that John the Baptist 

 is pictured as in the desert subsisting 

 upon "locusts and wild honey" (Matt. 3 : 



1-4). 



LOCUSTS IN ARABIC HISTORY AND 

 FOLK-LORL 



In "Hiyat el Hiwan" (Life of the Ani- 

 mals), by Sheik Kamal el Din el Damari, 

 written in the year 773 of the Hegira 

 (560 years ago), we find many a novel 

 anecdote about the locusts, their medical 

 properties, sayings of Mohammed and his 

 caliphs concerning them, with primitive 

 description of the locust itself. The fol- 

 lowing are selected quotations from this 

 old writer, translated to preserve, as far 

 as possible, the original author's style : 



"Jarad (locust, from ujrud, meaning 

 to scrape clean). 



"When locusts come out of their eggs 

 they are called debbi; when their wings 

 appear they are called gowga, and when 

 the color begins to appear in them, and 

 the males become yellow and the females 

 black, they are termed jarad. They are 

 of different kinds — some large, some 

 small, some red, some yellow, some white. 

 When they want to lay eggs they choose 

 hard places and rocks where cultivation 

 is impossible. It strikes the place with 

 its tail and the place opens, and in there 

 it lays its eggs and here they are hatched 

 and reared. The locust has six legs — two 

 arms in the chest, two supports in the 

 middle, and two legs on the body — and 

 the edges of its legs are two saws. And 

 they are of the animals that are led by a 

 leader, and collect themselves like sol- 

 diers, and follow those which go first, 

 whether up or down ; and their spittle is 

 pure poison for the plants ; whatsoever it 

 falls on it destroys.* 



MADE OF THL SAMK CLAY AS ADAM 



"It was also said of Omar Ibn el Khat- 

 tabf (may Allah be pleased with him!), 



* Much of the above is quoted by Sheik 

 Kamal el Din from the Koran. 



t Omar, the second caliph, who in 637 con- 

 quered Syria and Palestine and received the 

 keys of Jerusalem. 



