Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 March 1893 — GRASSHOPPER PLAGUE. [ARTICLE]

GRASSHOPPER PLAGUE.

A SOLID WALL OK INSECTS SIX INCHES THICK. An Old Kansan’s Account of a Sudden Invasion of Myriads of Grasshoppers and the Ruin They Wrought. An old resident of Kansas has been giving a New York Tribune correspondent a graphic account of a remarkable visitation of grasshoppers which he witnessed once upon a time in that State? He was working upon a railroad as a construction band, at the time. We quote from his narrative as follows: “I rented a house with a good-sized garden attached, and devoted my spare moments to its cultivation, taking great pleasure in watching the rapid growth of the vegetables, including sweet potatoes and watermelons, and fondly anticipating the time when they should reach a state of usefulness. Meantime we heard rumors about the approach of immense swarms of grasshoppers, and my fellowworkmen would regale me with stories of the devastation wrought by them which seemed so incredible that I merely regarded them as attempts to delude a ‘tenderfoot,’ as they called me. As the weeks passed by and the threatened invasion did not occur, a feeling of security took possession of all, and we came to the conclusion that the impefiding scourge had passed in some other direction. My garden was rapidly nearing that state of maturity when I could have my own vegetables and melons in abundance. One morning I told my wife that in another week we would have our own sweet potatoes and beets and cabbages, while the melons would not be far behind.

“We were engaged that- day in preparing to move the tracks further back from the enroaching river. The heat was intense, no rain having fallen in several weeks, and the parched and baked earth reflected the rays of the burning sun until the air seemed to come from an oven. About 4 o’clock in the afternoon, while we were working in a half-hearted, listless way,, about ready to drop from the enervating effects of the heat, we suddenly heard a rustling among the branches of the trees on the bluff near us. “ ‘Thank Gftd !’ cried one of the men dropping his shovel, ‘there comes a breeze at last.’ “We all straightened up to catch the first faint breath of the welcome stir of the superheated atmosphere, and lifted our hats to let it play upon our throbbing temples. All at once the foreman cried out in a tone of consternation, ‘Hoppers, by !’ The long-threatened visitation had come sure enough, and what w'e had fancied to be the gentle rustling of the longed-for breeze was the sound of the onward rush of the countless multitude of grasshoppers through the foliage of the forest nearby. First one settled upon the ground at our feet, then another and another, and in an incredibly short time the ground was swarming with and literally buried from sight by the ever-increasing army. Talk about a blizzard ! I have never, seen a blizzard that obliterated everything as quickly as that grasshopper blizzard did. They Swarmed all over fls—in our faces, down our necks, and we had to keep our mouths closed to keep them from getting down our throats. We could not step without crushing a mass of them under our feet. To me who had never seen them before the sight was appalling. Still they continued to come, the air being darkened by tbe oncoming hosts. And as soon ns they touched the ground they went to eating. What appetites those varmints had ! Soon the weeds and grass aud leaves on the trees and bushes began t(/disappear as if by magic. Almost everything was to their taste unless it was sweet. They would not touch sorghum or sweet potatoes or anything like that. Pretty soon a passenger train came tearing along a down-grade some distance below, but near us the grade began a sharp ascent, and as the train drew near the driving-wheels of the engine flew around at a tremendous rate and the train slackened its speed while the engineer frantically sanded the rails, trying to make them hold. Bn; it was of no use.. The grasshoppers covered the rails so densely that myriads of them had been crushed under the wheels, greasing them so thoroughly that the train was stalled. The train hands got a couple of brooms, aud, shortening the handles, fastened one on each side of the pilot of the engine so that they just swept the rails. The mass of crushed hoppers was cleaned from the driving wheels, the rails were well sanded, and after several efforts the train at last started, the brooms sweeping the insects from the rails before it. I had often been told of the hoppers stopping trains, but I had never believed it until I saw it with my own eves.

“When I reached home that night my pretty garden presented a sad sight to my sorrowful gaze. The vegetables had nearly all disappeared. A few cabbage stumps were sticking out of the ground ir. ruined loneliness. The sweet potatoes •were the only thing remaining unharmed ; while my melons, what a wreck they were ! The rinds and outer shells of white had all been eaten away, leaving the juicy red meat lying upon the ground untouched. As I gazed into the tearful eyes of my wife I was too full foruttcrance. Adjoining was a large fifty-acre cornfield. There were about a dozen rows of sorghum corn along one end, and they had not been molested. All that remained of the rest were the bare, hard stalks. Everything else was eaten off clean. The grasshoppers were in the house, in the victuals on the table—in everything. As the sun sank in the west we went out in the yard to see if there was anything left, but all we could see was the countless myriads of hoppers. They were in the air as thick as snowflakes in the driving storm; the ground was piled with them, in some places over a foot dee]). Around my lot was a high picket fence. This presented the appearance of a solid wall of grasshoppers five or six inches thick, nil the spaces between the pickets being completely filled up. The sides of the house aud the roof were buried under the clinging mass. The next raorniug when I lighted the fire, which I had prepared the night before, I heard a lively scrambling in the stove, and liftingthe lid I found it chuck full of hoppers who were trying to escape from their fiery imprisonment. “At the close of the second day the country presented the appearance of a desert. Nearly everything green had disappeared from the face of the earth. The grass and weeds and growing crops had been eaten close to the ground, and the trees aud bushes were stripped of their foliage. Such a scene of desolation I hope never to see again. Having completely destroyed everything, the grasshoppers passed on to lay in waste other portions of the country. The loss to the farmers was complete and much suffering ensued that fall and winter, but the next season the crops were bounteous and plenty, and contentment reigned once mors.”