GXYLLUS, 
418 
drowned in the African fea, where they caufed fuch a 
ftench that the putrifying bodies of many thoufand men 
could not have produced effluvia fo peftilential. 
The eaftern borders of the Ruffian empire, are fubjecl” 
ed fometimes tc the awful vifitations of this intact : That 
which happened in 1690, which extended from RuJJia o- 
ver a great part of Poland and Lithuania , was Angularly 
deftru&ive. In fome places the locufts were feen lying 
dead, heaped upon each other four feet deep ; in others 
they covered the Surface like a black cloth ; the trees 
were feen bending beneath their weight, and the damage 
which the inhabitants luftained was beyond computation. 
In Bat hary their numbers are alfo formidable, and 
their vifits more frequent : During the year 1724, a 
traveller from Britain, remarkable for the accuracy of his 
obfervations, witneffed the havoc they committed in that 
ill fated country *. Towards the end of March they be- 
gan to appear withafoutherly wind ; During the fucceed - 
ing months, their numbers continued to increafe fo pro- 
- digioufly, that during the heat of the day they rofe in 
f war ms fo large as to darken the fun. In the middle of 
M y they began to retire, for the purpofe of depofiting 
their eggs in the drier plains of the interior country. 
About the middle of fummer the young, already ripe 
for devaflation, made another incurfion, in feveral bodies 
of a vail extent ; although then in the form of worms 
they crawled forward, climbed the trees, walls and hou- 
fes, devouring every plant in their way: It was in vain 
that the inhabitants dug trenches through their fields 
and 
f JOr. Shaw in his travels through Africa, 
