CHAPTER, IX. 



LOCUST RAVAGES EAST OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 



RAVAGES OF MIGRATORY LOCUSTS IN THE ATLANTIC 

 STATES. 



We have already seen how the true Rocky Mountain 

 Locust, which rarely reaches the Mississippi, may be dis- 

 tinguished from the Red-legged species, which often mixes 

 with it and is common to a much larger extent of country, 

 and reaches to the Atlantic. We have also seen that the 

 ravages of migratory locusts between the Mississippi and 

 the Rocky Mountains, and probably to the Pacific, are 

 confined to the one, long-winged species, (spretus). " How 

 then," will naturally be asked, " do you account for the 

 ravages of migratory locusts in the Atlantic States, since 

 swarms have been known in those States to fly over the 

 country and commit sad havoc, and since you tell us 

 that the Reg-legged species is incapable of such migra- 

 tions ? " This question, which was first properly answered 

 in my 7th Report, I will now proceed to elucidate. 



As to migrating locusts doing great damage in some of 

 the Eastern States during certain years, there can be no 

 doubt of the fact. Harris, in his Treatise on Injurious 

 Insects, gives an account extracted from the Travels of 

 President D wight, wherein they are recorded as being 

 most destructive in Vermont in 1797 and 1798, and as 

 collecting in clouds, rising in the air and taking extensive 

 flights — even covering persons employed in raising a 



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