In 1724, Dr. Shaw was a witness of the devastations of these insects in Barbary. He has given us a description of their habits.[333] For four successive years, from 1744 to 1747, Locusts ravaged the southern provinces of Spain and Portugal.[334] In a letter from Transylvania, dated August 22d, 1747, a graphic description is given of two vast columns that overswept that country. “They form,” says the writer, “a close compact column about fifteen yards deep, in breadth about four musket-shot, and in length about four leagues; they move with such force, or rather precipitation, that the air trembles to such a degree as to shake the leaves upon the trees, and they darkened the sky in such a manner, that when they passed over us I could not see my people at twenty feet distance.”[335] This flight was four hours in passing over the Red Tower. The guards here attempted to stop them, by firing cannon at them; and where, indeed, the balls and shot swept through the swarm, they gave way and divided; but, having filled up their ranks in a moment, they proceeded on their journey.[336] In an item dated Hermanstadt, July 24, 1748, it is stated that on the day before, a hussar, coming from the plague committee, saw such a host of these insects near Szanda, that they covered the country for a mile round, and were so thick, that he was obliged to dismount from his horse, and halt for three hours, until the inhabitants of the district, coming with all sorts of instruments, beat about and forced with loud cries these pests to quit the spot.[337] In another item, dated Warsaw, August 15, 1748, it is stated that a certain prince sent out soldiers against the Locusts, who fired upon them not only with small arms, but with cannons. They succeeded in dividing the Locusts, but unluckily with the noise frightened away the storks and cranes which daily consume many of these insects.[338] Some stragglers from these swarms which so desolated Wallachia, Moldavia, Transylvania, Hungary, and Poland, in the years 1747 and ’48, made their way into England, where they caused some alarm.[339] During this grand invasion of Europe, they even crossed the Baltic, and visited Sweden in 1749. Charles the Twelfth, in Bessarabia, imagined himself, it is said, assailed by a hurricane, mingled with tremendous hail, when a cloud of these insects suddenly falling, and covering both men and horses, arrested his entire army in its march.[340] During the devastations committed by the Locusts in Spain in 1754, ’55, ’56, and ’57, a body of them entered the church of Almaden, and devoured the silk garments that adorned the images of the saints, not sparing even the varnish on the altars.[341] In 1750 and ’53 Poland was again devastated by Locusts.[342] In June, 1772, there were several swarms of “large black flies of the Locust kind,” that did incredible damage to the fruits of the earth, seen in England. Salt water, it is said, was found effectual in destroying them.[343]