Locusts are produced only in champaign places, that are full of chinks and crannies. In India, it is said that they attain the length of three[196] feet, and that the people dry the legs and thighs, and use them for saws. Sometimes the winds carry off these creatures in vast swarms, upon which they fall into the sea or standing waters, and perish. Some authors have stated, that they are unable to fly during the night, in consequence of the cold, being ignorant of the fact that they travel over lengthened tracts of sea for many days together, a thing the more to be wondered at, as they have to endure hunger all the time as well, for this it is which causes them to be thus seeking pastures in other lands. Such a visitation is looked upon as a plague inflicted by the anger of the gods; for as they fly they appear to be larger than they really are, while they make such a loud noise with their wings, that they might be readily supposed to be winged creatures of quite another species. Their numbers, too, are so vast, that they quite darken the sun; while the people below are anxiously following them with the eye, to see if they are about to make a descent, and so cover their lands. After all, they have the requisite energies for their flight; and, as though it had been but a trifling matter to pass over the seas, they cross immense tracts of country, and cover them in clouds which bode destruction to the harvests. Scorching numerous objects by their very contact, they eat away everything with their teeth, even the very doors of the houses.