Connecticut western news., 1875-07-23
THE FLIGHT OF THE LOCUSTS.
An Interesting Description of tho Most Seri- Ous of Pesfa...I a0cuafa are LOMsy.

Ous of Pests.--Locusts are Lousy.
 A correspondent of the Chicago 1Ti- 6auae writes from Oregon, Holt county, Mo-, as follows: To give you some idea of the locust plague, let me describe briefly their flight. Eleven days ago they began to pass here overhead. They begin to rise up about nine o'clock, and by ten they are nearly all on wing. They go as the wind drives them. Ex- cepting one day, when we had wind from the north, their flight has been from the south northerly. Looking up, at any time between the hours of ten and four, towards the sun, they may be seen passing like large snowfakes rapid ly as their wings and the wind can make them. By large spy-glass, I judge the swarm to be about half mile deep. And so they go, day after day. By night they settle down. On the evening of the day before, we concluded the swarms were about exhausted, as not nearly so many had passed during that afternoon, and we congratulated our selves on possible future exemption. But yesterday the air was again full of them; and last evening, about six miles north of this, they came down in 8 line extending all across the country, in such tremendous clouds as to frighten people. Many persons that were out ran in doors, fearing lest they might be smothered. A gentleman, Judge Russel, who was riding along, said that for some time he regarded 1t as 8 vast storm cloud coming down over the whole land, and the sound was said by one to resemble that made by @ locomotive and 8 long train of cars. Now, to-day, with 8 southeast wind, the air is again filled with them, flying to the northwest.
 Just think, then, that, as they fly with an average velocity of fifteen miles per hour, and the width of the swarm is not less than thirty to seventy-f miles, and that this is now the sixtieth hour of continuous northerly flight, and that the swarm is at least half a mile deep, with the locusts not over four inches apart from each other in any direction just think, say, what numbers of them are here. They are the very same kind as described in the agricultural report for 1862, that many years ago afflicted Lancaster county, Pa. There is no mys- tery or peculiarity about these. An ac- cidental chance then favored their over production there, just as circumstances out West on these plains is always fa- voring them in some places, so that oc- casionally they are overproduced, swarm off, lay eggs, and die. These eggs, be- ing laid in the fall late, do not hatch till spring, and thus come such myriads of them as now. But one might imagiue their leader, if they have one, weeping like another Xerxes at the mortality of his followers, for those now matched and flying will deposit their eggs in such mistime that they must be all matched out in late October, and all perish dur ing the winter. This lot will come to an end soon after laying it's eggs: It seems to be an error about their being destroyed by the red parasites; as Mark Twain would say. they rather like them and are proud of them. I have tested that point thoroughly. Theyleave them on their old clothes when they shed of, and new ones come on them. In fact, locusts are lousy.