Locust Ravages East of the Mississippi. 189 



Their next attack was upon the Indian corn and potatoes. They 

 I stripped the leaves and ate out the silk from the corn, so that it was 

 I rare to harvest a full ear. Among forty or fifty bushels of corn 

 spread out in the corn-room, not an ear could be found not mottled 

 with detached kernels. 



While these insects were more than usually abundant in the 

 town generally, it was in the field I have described that they 

 appeared in the greatest intensity. After they had stripped every- 

 thing from the field, they began to emigrate in countless numbers. 

 They crossed the highway and attacked the vegetable garden. I 

 reniember the curious appearance of a large, flourishing bed of 

 red onions, whose tops they first literally ate up, and not content 

 with that, devoured the interior of the bulbs, leaving the dry exter- 

 nal covering in place. The provident care of my mother, who 

 covered the bed with chaff from the stable floor, did not save them, 

 while she was complimented the next year for so successfully sow- 

 j ing the garden down to grass. The leaves were stripped from the 

 apple trees. They entered the house in swarms, reminding one of 

 ; the locusts of Egypt, and, as we walked, they would rise in count- 

 J less numbers and fly away in clouds. 



As the nights grew cooler they collected on the spruce and hem- 

 lock stumps and log fences, completely covering them, eating the 

 moss and decomposed surface of the wood, and leaving the surface 

 clean and new. They would perch on the west side of a stump, 

 where they could feel the warmth of the sun, and work around to 

 the east side in the morning as the sun reappeared. The foot-paths 

 in the fields were literally covered with their excrements. 



During the latter part of August and the first of September, when 

 the air was still dry, and for several days in succession a high wind 

 prevailed from the northwest, the locusts frequently rose in the air 

 to an immense height. By looking up at the sky in the middle of 

 a clear day, as nearly as possible in the direction of the sun, one * 

 may descry a locust at a great height. These insects could thus be 

 seen in swarms, appebring like so many thistle-blows, as they 

 expanded their wings and were borne along toward the sea before 

 the wind; myriads of them were drowned in Casco bay, and I 

 remember hearing that they frequently dropped on the decks of 

 coasting vessels. Cart loads of dead bodies remained in the fields, 

 forming in spots a tolerable coating of manure. 



Mr. I. S. Smith says that he has seen " hackmatack trees 

 almost covered w r ith them, and entirely stripped of their 

 leaves." * 



All these accounts agree in referring the injury to the 

 common Red-legged Locust ; but as I am fully persuaded 

 that this species, as found in Illinois and Missouri, is inca- 



* Rep. Connecticut State Bd. of Agr., 1872, p. 363. 



