[68] REPORT UNITED STATES ENTOMOLOGICAL COMMISSION. 
have read in an aucieut Spanish romance this question: "What animal is that which 
resembles all the animals I Answer. The locust; because he has the horns of a stag, 
the eyes of a cow, the face of a horse, the talons of a stork, the tail of a serpent, and 
the wings of a dove." The tracing out of these resemblances proves that the locust 
has been for a long time known and observed in Spain. Many old men have assured 
me, when questioned upon the locust plague of 1754, that that was the third which 
they had seen in their day, and that they existed always in the uncultivated lands of 
Estromadura, whence they wandered from time to time to lay waste other regions. 
Certainly they must be indigenous in Spain, because these are of a very different spe- 
cies from those which are found in the north and in the Levant,* as can easily be seen 
by comparing them with the insects of those countries which are preserved in the 
cabinets of natural history. The locust of Spain is the only one which has wings of 
rose color. Besides this, it is not possible that he should come from other regions, 
because he certainly has not come from the north, as the observation of so many ages 
demonstrates; nor can ho have come from the south without crossing the sea, which 
is impossible for him to have done because of his short flight; and this passage can 
be observed like that of the quails and of other migratory birds. I have seen a troop 
of locusts pass through Malaga and enter for a quarter of a league over the sea; but 
when the people began to take pleasure in tho hope that they would disappear and 
be drowned, they gave a sweep toward the left, flew straight to the earth, and paused 
to deposit their eggs in an uncultivated held surrounded by vines, such as they usually 
choose for their nests. The great number of dead bodies of the locusts which are ob- 
served floating on the shores of the Mediterranean, and which are drowned in rivers, 
which transport them into the sea, afford familiar examples of their troops or swarms 
which are precipitated into the sea on their journeys. 
I have referred to the injuries which this insect occasions. I may now anticipate 
the remedy which the superintendents and the magistrates of Estremadura and of La 
Mancha enjoin upon the countrymen, and especially upon the shepherds: to discover 
the places where they have deposited their eggs, and unitedly to join in destroying 
them, without waiting for the time when they have developed and have begun to hop. 
However great may bo the number thus destroyed, there remains always an immense 
army. But it were better to annihilate this horrible scourge where it is produced, and 
■where it always exists in a greater or less degree, by exterminating it from the roots. 
I have seen in San Clemente multitudes of locusts destroyed in two months, which, 
perhaps, left only in all Estremadura a few who were not able to fly ; and nevertheless 
the effect was like taking a drop of water out of the sea, nor was there observed in the 
following year any diminution in the number of locusts. It appears that it would be 
attended with less labor and expense if the end were aimed at of making war upon 
them in their own country and preventing their fatal eruptions. 
* It is very important not to confound the locust of Spain with those described by other authors. 
These furnish a fine occasion to display erudition upon the species of known locusts, of which we find 
mention in Exodus, and which St. John the Baptist fed upon in tho desert, like the people called "Acri- 
dofapos" or locust-eaters ; but all this is not to our pnrpose, and can be found in the books of the nat- 
uralist. 
