The Florida star., 1909-07-23
the TERRIBLE u0c0ST.
eeuth African Far@srs sislpls.sashIls
crops Ars RsiRed.


crOps Ars Rsispd.
South Africa seems to be q para
disc to the farmer until the loeusts
come. The farmer has been plant
ing wheat for fVe months, begin
ming with March, and he looks for
an enormously profitable harvest in
the midsummer month Of December.
After plowing and dragging for six
days he has put in a day or two
sowing the wheat By hand and has
kept repeating the process until
hundreds of acres have been plant
ed. There are fields of wheat IN all
stages, from the young green stalks
to the yelloving heads Of grain 1t
will be convenient to reap the crop
in the successfully ripening fields,
just as it was convenient to plant it
IN installments. The farmer con-
graduates himself on a climate that
makes this method possible. He 6g-
Hres that an investment of twenty
1--WE bags of seed worth $50 win re-
turn him $50 bags of grain worth
,&s.75O.
'BaaS, die sprinkhaan komT
Tt-'Master. the lOcusts are coming J,
SAYS his KaiIir servant.
Thus is shattered the dream of
,opulence and success as the farmer
.ar0wses one hot. silent midsummer
day in his iron rooted bungalow.
On the horizon over the distant
range of hills lies a long, faint cleud.
1t rs a dust colored, narrow line,
with front perhaps seventy miles
wide. 1t blurs the sharp outline of
the hills in the African sunlight.
This Is a locust swarm as you see it
first at a distance of thirty or forty
miles. In an hour the line has be-
comes light brown fog drifting rap
idly toward you.
The farmer is helpless in face of
the advancing ruin and desolatiou.
He can only watch the approach of
inevitable disaster. The landscape
is gradually blurred by the great
brown cloud that spreads and
mounts higher in the sky. Trees
and houses a few miles off become
invisible. The cloud shifts, with
patches ,of. dark brown masses and
gaps of gray or light brown where
the lOcusts are not so thickly crowd
ed. A constant change of shape
and formation gives an appearance
Like dense smoke belching from a
forest fire. A. sound like the distant
breakers .of;the ocean steals into the
silence. It is, the whir and roar of
billions Of wings beating the air.
The whir becomes louder. Near
by green fieldssare shaded by the ap-
palling visitation. A few locusts fly
past. There is q sudden increase of
the sound to a roar as the army of
insects falls on the land and their
wings thnob like a colossal dynamo
revolving at terrific speed. The
bright sun is obscured, and the
ground is In shadow. A building a
few rods away cannot be seen. Mil
lions of locusts settle down, while
other millions continue their fight.
The ground is so packed with To-
Gusts that every square inch of earth
is alive. Every blade of grass or
wheat is attacked by as many in
sects as it will hold. A hundred To-
Gusts rush on one stalk, bend it to
earth and consume it in less than
minute. Within ten minutes the
farmers 1000 acres of wheat have
disappeared. Every blade of grass,
every flower, every leaf on the trees,
Is devoured. For hours and even
days the maddening roar Of the
wings is heard and the unnumbered
hosts continue their fight.
At last, when the plague has
passed, nothing remains but. a desert
waste, naked of every green thing
for hundreds of miles.-Grand Mag
azina