The burden of the locusts—Classical nonsense—Address
to Mahomet—Locusts in Europe—Succumb to the English
climate—Described by Darwin—Locusts in Africa—The wingless
host do greatest damage—Hoppers and jumpers—“An army on the
march.”
LOCUSTS are insects famous in story, and when one reads about them in
various entomological or other writings, one might imagine that the
whole world had been doing little else, ever since it began, than play a
losing match with these creatures. It is only after one has gone a
little about the world, and lived for some time in regions noted as
their head-quarters without seeing anything whatever of them, that one
begins to doubt this view, and lean towards another one, viz. that they
are fabulous animals; but truth, as in other cases where two extreme
views are held, lies somewhere betwixt and between. The whole matter is
this, that when one reads one narrative after another, with its burden
of a darkened sun, devastated territories, strong winds, drownings in
the sea, and pestilences engendered by innumerable carcases cast up
along hundreds of miles of beach, the intervals, as well as the
countries, between each one of these occurrences, are annihilated in the
imagination, and the dates, if seen, are forgotten. Thus, to use the
Kaffir expression—which has not yet lost its meaning for a civilised
European—one sees everything red; locusts are very convincing—“you may
almost hear the beating of their wings.”
However, there is no doubt that these insects, in relation to man, have
played what the Germans call “_eine bedeutende Rolle_” in the world, and
are worth saying something about, if only one has something not too
desperately antique to say, and this, by virtue of a work which I, at
any rate, have never seen quoted, and a paper in a certain Antipodean
organ, which for the majority of people here might as well be in the
_Faerie Queene_ or _Paradise Lost_, I think I may have. But first let us
turn to what, though it be antique, is also classical, and—though this
would not be a corollary for everyone—very delightful: “To look,” say
the authors of the famous _Introduction_, “at a locust in a cabinet of
insects, you would not, at first sight, deem it capable of being the
source of so much evil to mankind as stands on record against it. ‘This
is but a small creature,’ you would say, ‘and the mischief which it
causes cannot be far beyond the proportion of its bulk. The locusts so
celebrated in history must surely be of the Indian kind mentioned by
Pliny, which were three feet in length, with legs so strong that the
women used them as saws. I see, indeed, some resemblance to the horse’s
head, but where are the eyes of the elephant, the neck of the bull, the
horns of the stag, the chest of the lion, the belly of the scorpion, the
wings of the eagle, the thighs of the camel, the legs of the ostrich,
and the tail of the serpent, all of which the Arabians mention as
attributes of this widely dreaded insect destroyer, but of which, in the
insect before me, I discern little or no likeness?’” Personally, I do
not for a moment imagine that even in 1815, the date of the first
edition of the work in question, any reasonably educated person would
have spoken or thought in this way, without any conception, apparently,
of what numbers can effect, but it is interesting to know what the Arabs
think, or say, about the locust, and especially that they represent
it—as we are told a few lines on—as thus addressing Mahomet: “We are the
army of the Great God; we produce ninety-nine eggs; if the hundred were
completed, we should consume the whole earth and all that is in it.”
The authors then proceed to give a short résumé of the various locust
plagues under which the earth, over a large part of its surface, has at
different times groaned. The first and best authenticated goes back to a
very early period—about 4000 B.C.—after which the evidence does not
conform quite so strictly to the test demanded of it by the modern
scientific spirit. Pliny, however, we are told, “mentions a law in
Cyrenaica by which the inhabitants were enjoined to destroy the locusts
in three different states, three times in the year—first their eggs,
then their young, and lastly the perfect insect. And not without reason
was such a law enacted; for Orosius tells us that in the year of the
world 3800 Africa was infested by such infinite myriads of these animals
that having devoured every green thing, after flying off to sea they
were drowned, and being cast upon the shore, they emitted a stench
greater than could have been produced by the carcases of 100,000 men (a
very confident statement, surely). St. Augustine also mentions a plague
as having arisen in that country from the same cause, which destroyed no
less than 800,000 persons (_octingenta_ _hominum millia_) in the kingdom
of Masanissa alone, and many more in the territories bordering upon the
sea.” After this we make a jump to A.D. 591, and find the locusts in
Europe. In that year “an infinite army of them, of a size unusually
large, grievously ravaged part of Italy; and, being at last cast into
the sea, from their stench arose a pestilence which carried off near a
million of men and beasts. In the Venetian territory also, in 1478, more
than 30,000 persons” (but this seems pitiful) “are said to have perished
in a famine occasioned by these terrific scourges.”
Many other instances of their devastations in Europe, in France, Spain,
Italy, Germany, etc., are recorded by the same authors. “In 1650 a cloud
of them was seen to enter Russia in three different places, which from
thence passed over into Poland and Lithuania, where the air was darkened
by their numbers. In some places they were seen lying dead, heaped one
upon another to the depth of four feet; in others they covered the
surface, like a black cloth, the trees bent with their weight, and the
damage they did exceeded all computation.” Nay, “even this happy island
(_lucus a non lucendo_), so remarkably distinguished by its exemption
from most of those scourges to which other nations are exposed (as fog,
sunshine, etc.), was once alarmed by the appearance of locusts. In 1748
they were observed here in considerable numbers, but providentially they
soon perished without propagating”—the “happy island” apparently having
been too much for them. These unfortunates would appear to have been
stragglers from far vaster numbers which a year before had devastated
Eastern Europe, one swarm of which, “entering Transylvania in August,
was several hundred fathoms in width. At Vienna the breadth of one of
them was three miles, and extended to so great a length as to be four
hours in passing over the Red Tower: and such was its density that it
totally intercepted the solar light, so that when they flew low one
person could not see another at the distance of twenty paces.” Another
host that appeared in India is said to have formed a column five hundred
miles long, and “so compact was it when on the wing that, like an
eclipse, it completely hid the sun, so that no shadow was cast by any
object, and some lofty tombs not more than 200 yards off were rendered
quite invisible.”
Dr. Clarke in his _Travels_ speaks of locusts covering “his carriage and
horses, and says the Tartars assert that people are sometimes suffocated
by them.” He mentions two species, “the first of which is almost twice
the size of the second, and, because it precedes it, is called by the
Tartars the herald or messenger.” From 1778 to 1780 a dreadful curse of
locusts, alluded to by Southey in his “Thalaba”—or, perhaps, forming the
subject of that poem—I really don’t know—fell upon the Empire of
Morocco. “Everything green was eaten up, not even the bitter bark of the
orange and pomegranate escaping. A most dreadful famine ensued. The poor
were seen to wander over the country deriving a miserable subsistence
from the roots of plants; and women and children followed the camels,
from whose dung they picked the undigested grains of barley, which they
devoured with avidity; in consequence of which numbers perished, and the
roads and streets exhibited the unburied carcases of the dead.” Again,
“From Mogador to Tangier, before the plague of 1799, the face of the
earth was covered by them. At that time a singular incident occurred at
El Araiche. The whole region from the confines of the Sahara was ravaged
by them; but on the other side of the river, El Kos, not one was to be
seen, though there was nothing to prevent their flying over it. Till
then they had proceeded northwards; but upon arriving at its banks they
turned to the east, so that all the country north of El Araiche was full
of pulse, fruits, and grain—exhibiting a most striking contrast to the
desolation of the adjoining district.” Lastly—that is to say, to make a
last quotation from the classics—“The Arabs of the Desert, whose hands
are against every man, and who rejoice in the evil that befalls other
nations, when they behold the clouds of locusts proceeding from the
north, are filled with gladness, anticipating a general mortality, which
they call _El Khere_ (the benediction), for when a country is thus laid
waste they emerge from their arid deserts and pitch their tents in the
desolated plains.”
Darwin, in his _Journal of Researches_, gives the following account of a
flight of locusts: “Shortly before we arrived at the village of Luxan we
observed to the south a ragged cloud of a dark reddish-brown colour. At
first we thought that it was smoke from some great fire on the plains;
but we soon found that it was a swarm of locusts. They were flying
northward, and with the aid of a slight breeze they overtook us at a
rate of ten or fifteen miles an hour. The main body filled the air from
a height of twenty feet to that, as it appeared, of two or three
thousand above the ground; ‘and the sound of their wings was as the
sound of chariots of many horses running to battle,’ or rather, I should
say, like a strong breeze passing through the rigging of a ship. The
sky, seen through the advanced guard, appeared like a mezzotinto
engraving, but the main body was impervious to sight; they were not,
however, so thick together but that they could escape a stick waved
backwards and forwards. When they alighted, they were more numerous than
the leaves in the field, and the surface became reddish instead of being
green: the swarm having once alighted, the individuals flew from side to
side in all directions.” At that time—the year was 1835—locusts were
“not an uncommon pest in this country: already during this season
several smaller swarms had come up from the south, where, as,
apparently, in all other parts of the world, they are bred in the
deserts. The poor cottagers in vain attempted by lighting fires, by
shouts, and by waving branches to avert the attack.” This locust, Darwin
tells us, closely resembled the famous _Gryllus migratorius_ of the
East—the one that spoke to the Prophet—if, indeed, it was not identical
with it.
Though these accounts are all interesting in their way, they none of
them tell us much—or, indeed, anything—about the locusts themselves, for
which reason I will supplement them with some which have that advantage,
and are also, in some sort, a check or commentary upon the others. It is
to be noted that, in all these, we hear only of flying locusts, and
anyone would imagine by reading of them that it was by such, and no
others, that all the damage was done. In Africa, however, and also in
Cyprus—from which we may assume that it is the same elsewhere—the case
is widely different. Writing evidently as a locust expert of the former
country, Dr. Æneas Munro tells us that it is in their early wingless
state—answering to the caterpillar one, though far less differentiated
from the perfect form—that the most terrible, the overwhelming, injury
is inflicted by these insects. Of the full-grown flying locusts he says,
“To a certain extent, they do injure here and there, where they select
to settle and feed; but they do not devour everything clean before them,
like the army of the larval stage or jumpers.”[18] Of the latter and its
doings _ab ovo_ we have the following interesting account: “When the
tiny creatures issue from their nest they are of a greenish white or
creamy colour, about an eighth of an inch in length,” and on the day
that they do so “the very dust of the ground, which was so still before,
now seems to waken into life. They begin to move by a process of
twisting or rolling over one another, so that, for the first few days,
they receive the name of twisters. Within eight or ten days, however,
they can jump four or six inches, and at the age of three or four weeks
a new characteristic makes its appearance. A desire to explore manifests
itself, and in a surprising manner. The whole company moves in a body in
one general direction, and more or less in a straight line, as if by one
common instinct, without apparently having any recognised leader or
commander,”[18] which is just the way, in my opinion, that rooks and
starlings move.[19]
Marching in this way they spread themselves out over the country,
“eating everything that comes in their way—wheat (if sufficiently young
and tender), maize (even if strong and old), corn, sugar-cane, linseed,
alfalfa (lucerne), pasture of all kinds, vegetables of all kinds
(tomatoes and celery), and all garden produce, potatoes (ordinary and
sweet), the leaves and sometimes even the bark of the trees, causing
their ruin. The fruit, of course, is lost for the season. Orange,
willow, poplar, palm, banana, peach, pear, plum, vine, acacia, roses,
etc., are stripped,” but not “the gum and paradise trees, which seem to
be poisonous to them. They make everything ‘clean bare’; sometimes they
will enter houses, and eat the very clothes and curtains at the
windows.”[20] They will even eat the wool off the backs of the sheep,
and “last stage of all that ends this strange, eventful history,” on a
pressing occasion they will eat one another. Continuing his interesting
account—the graphic and convincing one of an eye-witness— Dr. Munro
tells us that “when these hoppers and jumpers (_voetgangers_, as the
Boers call them) are on the march, they sometimes appear so determined
and bent on the fearful execution of their work, that they resemble and
have got the name of ‘an army on the march.’ They move in open file, and
carry themselves in a proud, haughty way, with heads high up and fixed.
It is beautiful and interesting to see them on the march, if we only
divest ourselves for the moment of the idea of their devastating
object.”[20] And again, “The whole of the company begin to walk at the
same time, as if by order; the head is kept erect, and the neck is as if
stiffened. They go straight on, irrespective of danger,”[20] and are
deterred, as is well known, by hardly any obstacle. “The sight of this
army is a very impressive one, and once seen will never be forgotten. In
some respects it is an awful sight; the spectacle strikes you with pity
and sorrow to see at once before you that the toil and the labour for
the season, or, indeed, the year, is lost.”[20]
“It is in this marching stage,” continues Dr. Munro, “that the
_voetgangers_ do enormous damage and eat every edible thing in their
path, and completely destroy the work of the husbandman. They are not
content with levying toll merely, but they will have all, and will leave
nothing behind but desolation. They are therefore unlike the flying
company of locusts, which only levy toll here and there, but these, when
they pass, leave nothing.”
Some curious facts are then given in regard to the uniform
direction—varying according to the country—in which these wingless
locusts march. The account will be remembered of how a flying host came
to the banks of a river which they refrained from crossing. One might
almost think that a mistake had here been made, and that the locusts
were really _voetgangers_, but had they been so, the river, unless a
large one, need not have deterred them—at least, they will pass streams,
though doubtless great numbers are sacrificed in doing so. If, however,
the stream had run parallel to the direction in which the swarm was
advancing, we can understand, in the light of what seems to be now
established, their not crossing it.
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Footnote 18:
Dr. Æneas Munro, The Locust Plague and its Suppression.
Footnote 19:
E. Selous, Bird Watching, pp. 213-15, 271, etc.
Footnote 20:
Dr. Æneas Munro, The Locust Plague and its Suppression.
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