188 The Rocky Mountain Locust. 



church steeple, who, in such position, still saw the insects 

 flying far above their heads. He also quotes from Wil- 

 liamson's History of Maine, that in 1749 and 1754 they 

 were very numerous and voracious; that "in 1743 and 

 1756 they covered the whole country and threatened to 

 devour everything green." Among the communications 

 which I received in 1874 was the following, descriptive of 

 locust ravages in New Hampshire : 



Dear Sir: I see a note in the New York Tribune requesting 

 those from the locust regions to send you specimens of the variety. 

 I send you a vial of them to-day by mail. They have been quite 

 plenty in the Merrimack Valley on some farms. They have eaten 

 all of our garden vegetables; in others they left us a small share. 

 The small ones are the most plenty and the ones that have done the 

 most mischief. I should like to know if they are of the same 

 variety that infested the West. 



Yours truly, LEWIS COLBY. 



Boscawen, Merrimack Co., N. H., Sept. 17, 1874. 



The following account by Dr. U. T. True of the appear- 

 ance of these insects in Cumberland county, Maine, in 1821, 

 is so circumstantial that I give it in full, as quoted by Mr. 

 S. H. Scudder:* 



During the haying season the weather was dry nnd hot, and these 

 hungry locusts stripped the leaves from the clover and herds-grass, 

 leaving nothing but the naked stems. In consequence, the hay- 

 crop was seriously diminished in value. So ravenous had they 

 become that they would attack clover, eating it into shreds. Rake 

 and pitchfork handles, made of white ash and worn to a glossy 

 smoothness by use, would be found nibbled over by them if left 

 within their reach. 



As soon as the hay was cut and they had eaten every living thing, 

 they removed to the adjacent crops of grain, completely stripping 

 the leaves: climbing the naked stalks they would eat off the stems 

 of wheat and rye just below the head, and leave them to drop to 

 the ground. I well remember assisting in sweeping a large cord 

 over the heads of wheat after dark, causing the insects to drop to 

 the ground, where most of them would remain during the night. 

 During harvest time it was my painful duty, with a younger brother, 

 to pick up the fallen wheat heads for threshing; they amounted to 

 several bushels. 



* Hayden's Report on the Geological Survey of Nebraska; and " The Distri- 

 bution of Insects in New Hampshire/' p. 375. 



