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 light 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.

Locusts are 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.