44 
ORTHOPTERA. 
The Oedipoda Migrcitoria, or migratory locust, is the 
species which sometimes visits Europe. In the year 
1748 these insects visited Europe in immense multitudes. 
Charles XII. and his army, then in Bessarabia, were 
stopped in their course. It is said that the swarms were 
four hours passing over Breslau. Nor did England 
escape, for a swarm fell near Bristol and ravaged the 
country in the month of July of the same year. Here 
in Shropshire and Staffordshire they did great damage 
by eating the leaves of the apple trees and the oaks, 
which latter looked as bare as at Christmas. The rooks 
did good service in this case. Locusts have been seen 
in Yorkshire in 1845, 1846, and 1847 ; in 1846 near 
London, and in many parts of England, and even in 
Scotland. The Acridium peregrinum (see figure 5) of 
Arabia, Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Persia, which, together 
with the migratory locust, is, I believe, the species 
more especially alluded to in the Bible, occasionally 
visits the South of Europe, and a writer remarks upon 
the occurrence of this species in various parts of Eng¬ 
land in October, 1869. In the South of France much 
damage is frequently done by these pests, but in Asia 
and Africa, whence they chiefly abound, their armies 
are fearfully numerous. The Locustidae have no visible 
ovipositor, and no sound-producing organ as drum and 
file, the chirping sounds being produced by rubbing the 
legs and wing-cases ; their antennae are short. The 
family is represented in England by the well-known 
grasshoppers, whose shrill chirping is so familiar to all 
wanderers in the meadows in hot summer weather. 
The Grijllidce have long antennae, and a long oviposi¬ 
tor in the female; the wing-covers of the males are 
