Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1882-12-29

There are few sights at which the traveller
in South Africa is more surprised than at a
| flight Of locusts. a iul-gIown locust is from
| three to nearly five inches in length, and
| looks like giant grasshopper. In fact, our
common grasshopprr belongs to the true To-
Gust family The body is gaily tinted, and
the insect is very pretty. Its powerful jaws
or nippers are well fitted for vegetable feed
| er; these jaws will cut through stout leaves
| like razors, and have found locust able to
draw blood from my fingers by his bite.
| There are many birds which follow flight Of
| locusts just as hycnas will hang about herd
| of antelope Some Of these birds are termed
| the locust bird, because they seem to live ON
| nothing else, and are always seen flying about
| after them. Cattle eat locusts freely; 50 also
will autclopes. The bushman too, considers
| them Il dclicacy; and, from personal eX-
| perencc, ! can affirm that griled locusts and
wild honey form by no means bad meal.
! The way we cooked them was to string them
on a wire, and toast them over n fire, then
drop some honey ON them and eat them like
| shrimps.
The largest fight of locusts we ever saw
was about Is miles inland from Natal. We
were riding at the time and moderate
breeze was blowing. As we rode onward we
saw a cloud in front Of us, looking like "A
| snow storm; it was so dense that it quite OBJ
structed our view of distant objects, and at
| first we thought it was very heavy hail
| storm or thunder shower, but as we rode
| toward it we saw some of the advanced guard
coming down on the ground, and then we
| found we were approaching flight of To-
! Gusts
This flight, as far as we could Judge, was
| four or five miles in breadth, and was about
one hundred and fifty yards in height; the
| locusts were so close to each other that with
their irregular flight they frequently knocked
against each other and fell to the ground
| Hundreds and thousands were ON the ground
and rose in a wild guideless course as we
rode over them, but as they were flying in the
| opposite direction to that in which we were
riding they struck against our horses head,
aud so annoyed him that he would not face
! them, and actually turned his back on these
| pigmies. As for ourselves, we were struck
over the face and ears by the creatures, and
! had to protect our eyes with our hands to pre-
vent being blinded by successive blows in the
eyes from these reckless insects. AS we stood
| with our back to the storm of insects, we
could compare it to nothing but tremendous
snow storm, where each flake of snow is rep
resented by locust they must have been in
millions, as the flight was quite half a mile
| deep. The ground little in advance, and
ON which the flight had settled, was almost
bare, the grass was nearly all eaten, and the
trees were denuded of leaves.
When flight of locusts settles anywhere,
those who are behind soon clear off all the
vegetation, and finding it useless to follow
where others have eaten, they fly off, usually
| going in the same direction as that in which
the wind is blowing. They soon alight and
commence feeding again, whilst those left be-
kind soon clear the ground and adopt the
same plan. If the weather is very calm and
the vegetation plentiful, the locusts will stop
several days in the same locality, but if much
wind is blowing they are soon off to distant
feeding grounds. A severe storm of hail is
fatal, and destroys them in millions Heaps
of dead locusts are often seen after a storm,
which are of such a size that it is impossible
to remain in their neghborhood in consequence
of the offensive smell. Locusts and wild
honey were the food of the ancient people in
the East, and in our memory the two stand
together.
Let us quit this land of ours and fly off to
the far south of Africa let us clothe our
selves in pair of rough leather shoes, dark
flannel shirt, cast off our coat, arm ourselves
with trusty double-barreled rifle, call our
trusty Catfre servant to follow u.s. and off for
a day in the bush We want meat, our dogs
are hungry, and ration beef, followed by ra-
tion beef, and again by beef, tires u.s. Now
in yonder long line of forests there are buck (;
beautiful, graceful antelope are these buck,
some species not larger than hare and very
good eating, others as tall as donkey and
dangerous when wounded, Even more no
Bile game may be encountered there; leopards
prowl about in this forest, buffalo lurk in the
secluded giens, and even the monarch of the
forest, the lordly elephant, treads on his ST.
lent march at certain periods of the year,