709 
PER 
gales, which are heard all the year, but chiefly in the 
fpring ; martlets, which learn whatever words are taught 
them; and a bird called noura, which chatters inceffantly, 
and repeats whatever it hears. Of birds of a larger fize, 
the molt remarkable is the pelican, by the Perlians called 
tacab, or water-carrier; and alfo mifc, i. e. “ Iheep,” be- 
caufe it is as large as one of thefe animals. There are in 
Perlia various birds of prey. Their falcons are the lar- 
gelt and fined in the world : the people take great pains 
to teach them to fly at game; the Perfian lords being 
great lovers of falconry, and the king having generally a 
great quantity of them, (fome fay 800,) with officers or 
keepers, of courl'e, to attend upon and train them, the 
chief of whom is called iaoos - kaneh-agafee, or head-keeper 
of the birds of prey. 
The feas on the fouth of Perfia are, the Gulf of Perfia 
or Bafi'ora, the Gulf of Ormus, and the Indian Ocean. 
The only fea on the north is the Cafpian or Hyrcanian 
fea ; which is more properly a lake, having no communi¬ 
cation with any other fea. Thefe feas, together with the 
lakes and rivers, fupply Perfia with plenty of fifli. The 
Cafpian Sea contains very fine fith on one fide; and the 
Perfian Gulf, on the other, is believed to have more fifh 
than any other fea in the world. On the coafts of this 
gulf is taken a fort of filh, for which they have no parti¬ 
cular name: its fleffi is of a red colour, very delicious, 
and it fometimes weighs 200 pounds. The river-filh are 
chiefly barbels; but far from being good ; thofe of the 
lakes are carps and fliads. In the river at Ifpahan 
are a great number of crabs which crawl up the trees, 
and live night and day under the leaves, whence they 
are taken ; and are efteemed very delicious food. 
But few kinds of infedts occur in this country; which 
may be afcribed to the drynefs of the climate. In fome 
provinces, how ever, there is an infinite number of locufts, 
which fly about in fuch clouds as to darken the air. Mr. 
Morier, in his Second Journey, gives the following cu¬ 
rious account of them. “ On the 11th of June, vvhilft 
feated in our tents about noon, we heard a very unufual 
noife, that founded like the rufiling of a great wind at a 
diftan^e. On looking up we perceived an immenfe 
Cloud, here and there femi-tranfparent, in other parts 
quite black ; that fpread itfelf all over the fky, and at in¬ 
tervals fhadowed the fun. This we foon found to be lo¬ 
cufts, whole fwarms of them fallingabout us : but their 
paffage was only momentary; for a frefli wind from the 
fouth-weft which had brought them to us, fb completely 
drove them forwards, that not a veftige of them was to 
be feen two hours after. The locufts which we faw at 
Bufhire were like thofe which Shaw faw in Barbary in 
1724, with legs and body of a bright yellow, and the 
wings fpotted brown. Thefe were larger, and of a red 
colour; and, I fhould fuppofe,. are the real predatory lo- 
cuft, one of the Egyptian plagues: (fee Gryllus migra- 
torius, vol. ix. p. 57.) They are alfo the great grnjs/wp- 
per mentioned by the prophet Nahum, no doubt in con- 
tradiftindfion to the lefler, (iii. 17.) As foon as they ap¬ 
peared, the gardeners and hufbandmen made loud fhouts, 
to prevent their fettling on their grounds. The ftrength 
and agility of thefe animals made me fuppofe that this 
was their firft flight, and that they could not have come 
from any great diftar.ee. They feemed to be impelled by 
one common inftindf, and moved in one body, which had 
the appearance of being organized by a leader. As all 
was dry in the plain of Shiraz, the fame inftindf feemed 
to propel them forwards to countries of more vegetation ; 
and, with a fmall flant of the wind to the weftward, they 
would get into the mountains of Lourifton, where the 
corn was not ripe; and where, as the prophet Joel fays 
after comparing them to a great army, they had the gar¬ 
den of Eden before them 5 ii. 3. Their ftrength mult be 
Very great, if we confider what immenfe journeys they 
have been known to make. Pliny fays they came from 
Africa to Italy: they have been known in Scotland. 
Mandelfloe faw them in the ifland of Madagafcar, the 
S I A. 
neareft point of which, from Mofambique, on the conti¬ 
nent, is 120 leagues. This proves them to exift in th® 
fouthern hemifphere; and, if Arabia be their native coun¬ 
try, as naturalifts affirm, they do not always travel north¬ 
ward, as Shaw feems to think; but, perhaps, take the 
impulfe which the firft wind may give them after they are 
ready to fly. 
“ I have had opportunities, from time to time, to make 
obfervations on the locuft, particularly at Smyrna, where, 
in 1800, they committed great depredations. About 
the middle of April the hedges and ridges of the fields 
began to fwarm with young locufts; which then wore a 
black appearance, had no wings, and were quite harmlefs. 
About the middle of May they had increafed triple the 
fize, were of a grey cindery colour, and had incipient 
wings about half an inch long. They ftill continued to 
be harmlefs : but, at the end of June, they had grown to 
their full fize, which was three inches and a half in 
length ; the legs, head, and extremities, red ; the body a 
pale colour, tending to red. They appear to be created 
for a fcourge; fince to ftrength incredible, for fo fmall a 
creature, they add faw-like teeth, admirably calculated 
to eat up all the herbs in the land, and devour the fruit of the 
ground. Pfalm cv. 34. They remained on the face of 
the country during the months of July and Auguft; 
fometimes taking their flight in vaft clouds, and, impelled 
by a ftrong wind, were either loft in the fea, or were dri¬ 
ven into other countries. It was during their ftay that 
they (bowed themfelves to be the real plague deferibed 
in Exodus. They feemed to march in regular battalions, 
crawling over every thing that lay in their paflage, in one 
ftraight front. They entered the inmoft recedes of the 
houfes, were found in every corner, ftuck to our clothes, 
and infefted our food. It is an extraordinary circum- 
ftance, that the barn-door fowls eat them before they are 
quite full grown ; and'that, when fuch was the cafe, the 
yolk of the eggs which the hens laid was of a dark red- 
difh colour, partaking of that of the locuft. The locufts 
lay their eggs in the autumn, which they do frequently 
before they take their flight. Sometimes they depofit 
them in countries where they alight after their flight; 
geflation and generation going on during their excurfion : 
for, even on the w ing, the male and female locuft are fre¬ 
quently found together. 
“ The operation of the female locuft in laying her eggs 
is highly interefting: (he choofes a piece of light earth, 
well protected by a bufii or hedge, where (he makes a 
hole for herfelf, fo deep that her head juft appears above 
it. She here depofits an oblong fubftance, exactly the 
(hape of her own body, which contains a confiderable 
number of eggs, arranged in neat order, in rows againft 
each other, which remain buried in the ground, raoft 
carefully and artificially protected from the cold of 
winter. The eggs are brought into life by the heat of 
the fun. If the heats commence early, the locufts early 
gain ftrength ; and it is then that their depredations are 
moft feared; becaufe they commence them before the 
corn has had time to ripen, and they attack the ftem 
when it is ftill tender. Harmer would probably have 
derived fome help from what lias happened to fall under 
my obfervation on this fufajedt in his illuftration of the 
17th verfe of the 3d chapter of prophet Nahum; fori 
conjedf ure, that camping in the hedges in the cold dap, may 
be explained by the eggs being depofited during the win¬ 
ter ; and, when the fun arifeth they flee away, may alfo be 
illuftrated by the flying away of the infect as foon as it 
had felt the fun’s influence.” 
The Population of Perfia, very much dimlniflied by 
the civil wars of 1722 (the epoch of the overthrow of 
the dynafty of Ifmael Sophi), and of 174.3 (the year of the 
afl'affination of the celebrated Shah Nadir), iseftimatedat 
twenty-two millions of fouls. But, as Perfia has been 
overrun alternately by the Gaznevides, the Carizmians, 
the Seljuks, the Moguls, Tartars, Turcomans, Ufbeks, 
Afghans, Gourds, &c. thefe fucceffive invafions could 
not 
