The western Democrat. [volume] (Charlotte, N.C.) 1852-1870, 1866-11-06
THE PLAGUE OF LoCUsTs.

THE PLAGUE OF LOCUSTS.
For our sketch this week we shall endeavol
to make our readers acquainted with the re-
searches of VI Ysabeau, of Paris, concerning the
ravages of those terrible insect warriors, the
Locusts, at different periods of the worlds his
tory. The subject derives peculiar interest
from the fact that, at this moment, the French
provinces Of Algeria and, in our own country
the States of Kansas and Missouri are suffering
from this remarkable kind of visitation
The plague of locusts has been known since
the earliest~times 10 we'll cultivated countries
they cause no great damage to the crops but
are often carried in numberless swarms by the
winds. They alight upon the harvest fields
and devour all their produce; ravage the mead
ows and the pastures; destroy the garden plants
and the leaves and fruit Of the orchard trees,
thus bringing about famine in the countries
whittier they have been carried in such enor-
nous numbers After their death, their bodies,
falling into putrefaction, poison the atmosphere
and give rise to contagious maladies which de.
climate men and cattle. Orosus states that in
the year $500 there was SO many ocusts in
Africa that they devoured every green thing
and then drowned themselves in the sea whence
they spread so infectious an odor that in short
space of time 800, 900 men perished
The loeusts of Egypt mentioned in Exodus
surpassed every other kind in size. Pliny, in
speaking Of the loeusts of India, which are also
large, says that their legs when dried we're used
for saws. There is certainly some exaggeraton
in this statement. However that may be, it is
q weR established fact that the Pagan nations
offered up prayers and sacrifices for deliverance
from the iocusts
In 1890, the locusts spread themselves in
such vast numbers throughout Poland and Lith-
uania, that the air was quite obscured with them
and the ground covered as with a black
cloth. They were found in certain places where
they had died one upon the other and their
corpses were heaped up to the height of four
feet in depth; those who were alive perched up
on the trees and made the branches bend to the
ground with their weight, SO numerous were
they. The people believed that there were
sort of Hebrew letters on their wings, and rab
bi even pretended to read on them words that
signifed the anger of God. This was accord
ing TO the Able G. Ussans, the author or the re-
port, an unfortunate omen, for the rain killed
these insects, they infected the air, and the OK.
en- and other animals that ate of them died at
once.
Mezerai, after having set forth the disagree
able effects of a tempest that occurred in the
mouth of January, 1913, says that the damage
was nothing In comparison with what was
caused by the locusts in the neis hborhood of
Aries, in Providence about the month of May
So vast number of these insects were engen-
dered in the country that, in less than eight
hours, they devoured everything, even to the
roots of the grass and grain, over a space of
more than Is, 900 acres of territory. They
penetrated to the very barns aud store-rooms
and ate up everything they found there. When
the locusts got together in swa-ms and rose into
the air, these formidable hosts, swept onward
by the winds, made sort of cloud that hid the
sun. When they had devastated all the region
around Aries, they passed the Rhone and came
to Tarascon and next to Beaucaire, and finding
no more grain to devour, they destroyed the
garden herbs that had been planted.
From there they went to Bourbon and to
Valabergues, to Monirin and to Aramon, where
they made the same havoc. At length, they
in their turn, were eaten by the hedge-hogs.
Those that survived formed in the ground, par
ticularly in the sandy places, a sort of pipe or
long oriice like tube, filled with so large a
Quantity Of eggs that the whole country would
have been laid waste by them, had they been
allowed to develop; but, through the excellent
measures recommended by the Consuls of Aries,
Beaucaire and Taraseon, they were delivered
from them in short time. Something like
C,OUU QlDtalS Va tucu "eTc Duflcu UT LnTU%D III
to the river Rhone. They were hunted down
and killed with fire and sword A calculation
was then made of the number of locusts that
these eggs would have produced, and, counting
only rs to each tube orifce, it was computed
that there were 100000 to the quintal This
would give total of $50, ,000, 100000 of Iocusts
that would have been hatchcd in the ensuing
year.
A historian of Charles XII, King Of Sweden,
relates OF that prince that when travelling in
Bessarabia he was greatly annoyed by locusts.
"These insects came" says the historian, "pour-
ing in upon US like whirlwind, ehting up
on the same plain where We were, and without
mantesting any fear Of being trampled under
foot By our horses, they rose from the ground
and covered our bodies and countenances so
that we could not see in front of US until We had
passed the place where they we're. Wherever
these locusts alighted, they made the most fear
ful ravages, consuming the grass down to the
roots, 80 that, instead of the beautiful verdure
with which the country bad previously been
covered, there was nothing to be seen but the
dry and sandy soil"
Hungary, Bohemia and Germany, already in
Tested and ravaged as early as 1912, were
equally unfortunate in 1747 and 1748. In
1856, swarming iocusts, as it were from the sky,
devastated the fields in many places.
The Count c. de Gourcy, on one of his scien-
tifc journeys saw, ia 1852, 10 aportion of Hun