GliYLLtJS. 
world, where the havock they commit is al- 
most incredible: whole provinces are in a 
manner desolated by them in the space of a 
few days, and the air is darkened by their 
numbers : nay even when dead they are still 
terrible; since the putrefaction arising from 
their inconceivable number is such that it 
has been regarued*as one of the probable 
causes of pestilence in the Eastern regions. 
This formidable locust is generally of a 
brownish colour, varied with pale red, or 
flesh-colour, and the legs are frequently 
bhreish. In the year 1748, it appeared in 
irregular flights in several parts of Europe, 
as in Germany, France, and England; and 
in the capital itself and its neighbourhood 
great numbers were seen : they perished, 
however, in a short time, and were happily 
not productive of any material mischief, 
having been probably driven by some ir- 
regular wind out of their intended course, 
and weakened by the coolness of our 
climate. 
From a paper published in the 1 8th vo- 
kime of the Philosophical Transactions we 
find, that in the year 1693, swarms of this 
species of locust settled in some parts of 
Wales. Two vast flights were observed in 
the air not far from the town of Dolgalken, 
in Merionethshire : the others fell in Pem- 
brokeshire. From a letter published in the 
38th volume of the same work, it appears, 
that some parts of Germany, particularly in 
the march of Brandenbrrgh, &c. suffered 
considerable injury from the depredations of 
these animals. 1 hev made their appearance 
in the spring of the year 1732, from flights 
which had deposited their eggs in the ground 
the preceding year. They attacked and de- 
voured tiie young spike of the wheat, &c. 
and this chiefly by night, and thus laid waste 
many acres at a time beyond all hope of re- 
covery. In the 46th volume of the same 
Transactions we find a description of the 
ravages of these animals in Wallachia, Mol- 
davia, Transylvania, Hungary, and Poland, 
in the years 1747 and 1748. 
“ The first swarms entered into Transyl- 
vania in August 1747 : these were succeeded 
by others, which were so surprizingly nu- 
merous, that when they reached the Red 
Tower, they were full four hours in their 
passage over that place ; and they Hew so 
close that they made a sort of noise in the 
air by the beating of their wings against one 
another. The width of the swarm was some 
hundreds of fathoms, and its height or den- 
sity may be easily imagined to be more con- 
siderable, inasmuch as they hid the sun and 
darkened the sky, even to that degree, when 
they Hew low, that people could not know 
one another at the distance of twenty paces ; 
but as they were to tly over a river that 
runs in the valleys of the Red Tower, and 
could find neither resting-place nor food; 
being at length tired of their (light, one part 
of them lighted on the unripe corn on this 
side of the Red Tower, such as millet, 'Pin k- 
ish wheat, kc . ; another pitched on a low 
wood, where, having miserably wasted the 
produce of the land, they continued their 
journey, as if a signal had actually been 
given tor a march. The guards of the Red 
Tower attempted to stop their irruption 
info Transylvania by firing at them; and 
indeed, where the balls ami shot swept 
through the swarm, they gave way and di- 
vided; but having filled lip their- ranks in a 
moment, they proceeded on their journey. 
In the month oi September, some troops of 
them were thrown to the ground by great 
rains and other inclemency of the w eather, 
and thoroughly soaked with wet: they crept 
along in que.t of holes in the earth, dung, 
and straw ; where being sheltered from the 
rains, they laid a vast number of eggs, 
which stuck together by a viscid juice, and 
were longer ajid smaller than what is com- 
monly called an ant’s egg (the chrysalis of 
tiie formica) very like grains of oats. In the 
spring of 1748, certain little blackish' worms 
were seen lying in the fields and among the 
bushes, sticking together, and collecting in 
clusters, not unlike the hillocks of moles or 
ants. As nobody knew what they were, so 
there was little or no notice taken of them, 
and in May they were covered by tiie shoot- 
ing of the corn sown in winter ; but the sub- 
sequent June discovered what tiiose worms 
were ; for then, as the corn sown in spring 
was pretty high, these creatures began to 
spread over the fields, and become destruc- 
tive to the vegetables by their numbers. At 
that time they differed little or nothing from 
our common grasshoppers ; having their head, 
sides, and back, of a dark colour, with a yel- 
low belly, and the rest of a reddish hue. 
About the middle of June, according as they 
were hatched sooner or later, they were ge- 
nerally a finger’s length, or somewhat longer, 
but their shape and colour still continued. 
Towards the end of June they cast off their 
outward covering, and then it plainly ap- 
peared that they had wings ; and as soon as 
any of them found themselves able to use 
their wings, they soared up, and by flying 
round the others, enticed them to join them. 
Wherever those troops happened to pitch, 
they spared no sort of vegetable: they ate 
up the young corn, and the very grass; but 
nothing was more dismal than to behold the 
lands in which they were hatched ; for they 
so greedily devoured every tiling green, be- 
fore they could fly, that they left the ground 
quite bare. 
“ There is nothing to be feared in those 
places to which this plague did not reach be- 
fore the autumn; for the locusts have not 
strength to fly to any considerable distance 
but in the months of July, August, and the 
beginning of September ; and even then, in 
changing their places of residence, they seem 
to tend to warmer climates. 
“ Different methods are to be employed, 
according to the age and state of these in- 
sects ; for some will be effectual as soon as 
they are hatched, others when they begin 
to crawl, and others when they begin to 
fly. It would be of great service to seek out 
the places where the females lodged ; for 
nothing was more easy than carefully to visit 
those places in March and April, and to de- 
stroy their eggs or little worms with sticks or 
briars ; but in the summer, when they have 
marched out of their spring-quarters, and 
have invaded the corn-fields, &c. it is almost 
impossible to extirpate them without tho- 
roughly thrashing the whole piece of land 
that harbours them with sticks or Hails, and 
thus crushing the locust with the produce of 
the land. Finally, when the corn is ripe or 
nearly so, there is no other method of getting 
rid of them, or even of diminishing their 
numbers, than to surround the ground with 
11 
a multitude of pedplc, who might fright them 
away with bells, brass vessels, and all other 
sorts of noise. But even this method will 
not succeed till the sun is pretty high. 
“ It will likewise be of use, where a large 
troop of them has pitched, to dig a long 
trencii, of an ell width and depth, and place 
several persons along its edges, provided 
with brooms, while another numerous set of 
people form a semicircle that takes in both 
ends of the trench, and encompasses the lo- 
custs ; and by making the noise above-men- 
tioned, drive them into the trench, out of 
which if they attempt to escape, those on 
the edges are to sweep them back, and then 
crush them with their brooms and stakes, 
and bury them by throwing in the earth 
again. But when they have begun to fly, 
there should be horsemen upon the watch 
in the fields, who, upon atq\ appearance of 
the swarm taking wing, should immediately 
alarm the neighbourhood by a certain signal, 
that they might come and fright them from 
their lands by all sorts of noise ; and if, tired 
with Hying, they happen to pitch on a waste 
piece of land, it will be very easy to kill 
them with sticks and brooms m the evening 
or early in the morning, while they are wet 
with the dew; or any time of the day in 
rainv weather, for then they are not able to 
fly/ 
We have before observed, that the locusts 
which fell in several parts of England, and 
in particular in the neighbourhood of the me- 
tropolis, in the year 1748, were evidently 
some straggling detachments from the vast 
flights whieii in that year visited many of the 
inland parts of the European continent. 
The ravages of locusts in various parts of 
the world, at different periods, are recorded 
by numerous authors. In the year 593 of 
the Christian era, after a great drought, 
these animals appeared in such vast legions 
as to cause a famine in many countries. In 
677 Syria and Mesopotamia were overrun by 
them. In 852, immense swarms took their 
flight from the Eastern regions into the West, 
flying with such a sound that they might 
have been mistaken for birds : they destroyed 
all vegetables, not sparing even the bark of 
trees and the thatch of houses ; and devour- 
ed the corn so rapidly, as to destroy, on 
computation, a hundred and forty acres in 
a day: their daily marches or distances of 
flight were computed at twenty miles; and 
these were regulated by leaders or kings, 
who flew first, and settled on the spot which 
was to be visited at the same hour the next 
day by the whole legion : these marches 
were always undertaken at sunrise. The*: 
locusts were at length driven by the force of 
winds into the Belgic ocean, and being 
thrown back by the tide and left on the 
shores, caused a dreadful pestilence by their 
smell. In 1271, all the corn-liefds of Milan 
were destroyed; and in the year 1339 all 
those of Lombardy. In 1541, incredible 
hosts afflicted Poland, 'Wallachia, and all the 
adjoining territories, darkening the sun with 
their numbers, and ravaging all the fruits of 
the earth. 
2. One of the largest species of locust yet 
known is the gryllus crisfatus of Einnauis, 
which is live or six times the size of the gryl- 
lus migratorius, and, together with some 
others of the larger kind, is made use of in 
some parts of the world as an article of food : 
