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About The Oregon daily journal. (Portland, Or.) 1902-1972 | View Entire Issue (March 21, 1920)
i The Photograph at the Left Gethsemane with Its Trees and as They Were Before the Plague of Locusts Swept It. 'At the Right Is Seen the Sacred Garden Divested by the Insect Hordes of Every Green Plant, the Cedars Being the Only Thing to Escape. R' . ECENT cabled dispatches from Jerusalem reputed the fall of the famous olive tree "El Butinl" In Under this tree, as under its seven Savior is supposed to have walked during the Night of Agony. A tradi tion has long been, held that -when "El Butini" fell the Turkish Empire would also tall. The dispatches said that the great olive tree had been blown down by the wind. It had, as a matter of fact, been pr&ctkally killed in 1915, when an unprecedented plague of locusts swept down upon Jerusalem, destroying every grfen thins for many miles around. The extraordinary facts of this locust storm, paralleling that which the bld'Testament records as having overwhelmed at Moses's command ancient Egypt, are here told for the first time by Mr. John i. Whiting. American Vice-Consul at Jerusalem. The New Plague of Locusts By John D. Whiting. , American Vice-Consul at Jerusalem. - "H1 BAR y this ye elders, and give ear. all ye inhabitants of the land hath this ever happened In your days? . . . That which was left by the creeping locust hath " the swarming locust eaten; and that which was left by the grass locust hath the corn locust eaten. Awake ... and weep and howl . . . for a nation hath come up over my land, bold and without num ber." Thus the old Biblical prophet Joel, writing some seven or eight hundred years B. C, begins his description of a locust plague, and having witnessed the destruc tion to crops and fields toy these insects la this historic land, one marvels how the ancient writer could have given so graphic and true a description of a devastation caused toy locusts in so condensed a form. The plague referred to occurred in the Spring and Summer of 1915, when Pales tine was closed to the outside world by the war. That the locust helped the Al lied cause there is no denying. They rav aged the country from the borders of Egypt to the Taurus Mountains, and were a source of anxiety for many months both to the Turkish authorities and the native population. They consumed every green thing which meant a serious shortage of food and fodder, which greatly militated against the movement of the Turkish forces on both the Egyptian and Mesopo tamian fronts. The full story of the plague, the destruc tion wrought, how the band of - American citizens in Jerusalem assisted the author ities in fighting it are here told tor the first time. It was toward the end of Feb ruary that one of our members, Mr- Lewis Larson, returned from the picturesque Ain Fara gorge, which borders on the Wilderness of Judea and is only a few miles east of Jerusalem, with word that swarms of locusts had flown overhead In such thick clouds as to obscure the sun for the time being. However, before they were seen a loud noise, "produced by the flapping ot myriads of wings, was beard, described as resembling the , distant rumble of waves, or, as the Bible has It, "the sound of their wings was as the sound of chariots of many horses running Into battle." (Immediately afterward rumors poured In from Es Salt, on the uplands east of the Jordan, and Bethlehem that similar awarms had also visited these places, causing much destruction. It was several days later, however, that the-locusts were first seen In Jerusalem. Attention was drawn to them by the sudden darkening of the (bright sunshine. At times their elevation was in hundreds of feet; at other times they came dowa quite low, detached members alighting. The clouds of them would be bo dense as to appear quite black, with the edges vignetted, till they thinned down and faded away into the clear blue sky. For several days Jerusalem was thus THE OREGON v SUNDAY JOUKNAL; POKTLAN1), SUNDAY MOKNiNU, MAKCH 21, 1920. Shows the Garden of Flowers and Shrubbery the Garden of Gethsemane. mates in the sacred place, the visited, causing much excite ment among tfhe populace. The destruction wrought by tlie8eflying cloudswas enor mous, more especially as the country was cut off from all outside supplies, and fodder and food were In great'demanld for the troops. When, there- j fore, the flying locusts left, everyone breathed a sigh of re- left, but far worse was to follow. Before the pests disappeared they laid their eggs, literally by the hun dreds of millions, all over the land. With her ovipositors the female is able to sink a hole as much as four inches deep through hard, compact soil, such as would try the strength of human muscles even with iron tools. Once the alarming extent to which these eggs were laid was realized the authorities - made a proclamation, requir ing each male person from sixteen years to sixty to gather eleven pounds weight of the eggs. It is estimated by competent authorities that as many as sixty-five to seventy-five thousand locust eggs are con centrated in a square meter of soil. Al lowing for a loss of thirty per cent in hatching, some sixty thousand destroyers can emerge from a space thirty-nine inches square. Scarcely had Jerusalem got over the ex citement of the search for eggs than word poured in that the country was teeming with the young larvae. When first hatched they were quite black and resembled large ants, having no signs of wing; but as they developed, passing through one stage Into another, they cast their little .outer skins, now no longer large enough to contain the growing body. Thus they pass- through several moults, of which, however, but three stages are plainly distinguishable the larva or wingless stage, the pupa with small wings, or properly wing sacks de veloping, and the full-fledged flying locust. Once hatched the little fellows seemed to hold together for a few days, tin a little developed and In sufficient numbers, when they start their forward march of from 400 to GOO feet per day, and clearing the ground f any vegetation "before them. It was observed that these new broods instinctively went In the reverse direction to which their flying parents had come, making practically for the northeast None but those who have seen them can imagine their countless multitudes and the destruction they wrought. Countless numbers of them 'poured Into the broad walled road leading into Jeru salem from the west, past the United States consulate to the Jaffa Gate. For three or four days an Incessant and' un ending stream filled the road from side to side like numbefless troops marching on parade, and in spite of the traffic at this junction, which to this city is like lower Broadway to New York, their ranks, at "Vfll! HUH IIV:W5a li-rTVw'k44 Ki' Tt ll1 '-jit Jf liL. Ai --tWiR "EI Butini," the Most Famous of the Garden of Gethsemane's Eight Olive Trees, Under Which the Saviour Is Supposed to Have Walked. This Great Tree, Weakened by the Locust Plague. Has Recently Col lapsed. "When 'El Butini' Falls, Then Falls the Turk," Runs the Legend. (And Above) One of the Largest Forms of the Locust Which Swept in Clouds Over the Holy Land. though thinned, entered the ancient gate way and the New " Breach. The moat . around "David's Tower" was so filled till the dry earth seemed to he a living, mass. Up and up the city walla and the castle they climbed to their very heights. It was the 28th day of May when the larvae, already transforming Itself into the pupa stage, reached the quiet of the Gar den of Gethsemane, now In its full Sum mer bloom; but scarcely had a day passed before every tender thing was consumed, and even the leaves of the' woody cypress and of the olive trees, the latter about one thousand years old, were attacked. The Garden was ravaged. The entire city of Jerusalem, with the (C) 1920. International Feature Service. Inc. ??v f exception of the portion within the walls, 'fell a prey to the ravages of -the creeping pests, while the entire land from "Dan to Beersheba" was laid desolate. . Fortunately, by the time the young broods had hatched, a large portion of the grain crops had already been harvested, but the fruit and Summer - crops were ruined. The native vineyards and orch ards are 'always planted in perfect con fusion. Between the vines one finds figs, olives, pomegranites, quinces and other trees. These were the places at which the locusts naturally halted, for the rapid ity Of their marches or their stops seemed all to be regulated by the amount of for age encountered. ' Great Britain ElfhU fieserred, " How Storms of Grasskoppers Destroyed tne Trees and Plants of the Sacred Place Wherein the Saviour Walked Did When M Them to Plague Wicked Pharoah Onca entering a "vine yard," the sprawling vines would, in the shortest time, be nothing but bare bark, the long dark stems lying flat on the ground, much resembling snakes. Fig leaves, perhaps of all things, best suited . their taste, and when once a tree fell a prey to them the ground about would be literally layers deep, and the trunk so covered with crawl ers as to make it a bright yellow color. Disastrous as they were in the country, equally obnoxious they became about the homes, crawling up thick upon the walls, and, squeezing in through cracks of closed , doors or windows, entered the very dwell ing rooms. When unable to find an en trance they often scaled the walls to the roofs and then getting into the houses by throwing themselves into the open courts such as most priental houses are built around. Women frantically swept the walls and roofs of their homes, but to no avail. In Nazareth it required several hundred men busily sweeping the locusts together and destroying them, and eight donkeys to carry away to near-by fields the miniature carcasses. Stores were closed and .some houses even abandoned. About our homes in Jerusalem the pests became so thick that one could not help crushing them with every step. They even fell into one's shirt collar from the walls above, and crawled up onto one's person. Women were especially troubled with them, and on one occasion a lady, after being away from home for half a day, re turned with one hundred and ten of the creatures concealed within her skirts. Whenever touched, or especiallyjphen find ing themselves caught within one's clothes,, they exuded from their mouth a dark fluid, an irritant to the skin and soil ing the garments in a most disgusting manner. Imagine the feeling, and I speak from experience, with a dozen or two such creatures, over an Inch long, with saw like legs and rough bodies, making a race course of your back! While In the pupa stage, that is, with their wings only partially developed and unable to fly, it was comparatively easy to trap them as they marched over the coun try in long, endless columns. In their path would be sunk a bottomless box with the Inside lined with shining tin up which the locusts cannot crawl. The fighters now make two long lines, one on each side of the trap. To noise and racket the locusts seemed only to turn a deaf ear, but a large flag the darker the better with which to cast a deep shadow apia the ground, proved to be1 the most formidable tool one could employ to make them move in the desired direction. After two weeks' steady and relentless work the fight to save the fields was given Just They as Sent oses upland efforts concentrated upon protect ing our homes and garden plots. Was it a losing fight? The natives, who pre dicted that it was useless to combat "Allah's army," surely would have said it was. Frdm the standpoint of dollars and cents' worth saved to ourselves, it cer tainly was. But when we calculated the tons' weight and countless numbers of the pests eliminated from the coming stages of disaster, to say nothing of the value of a good example and the engros- ing interest in observing their habits and development, we fert that the results more than outweighed the costs and efforts. In the early days of June a few scat-. tered locusts were- seen about the tree tops 'of a decided , red color. Some sup posed them to be a kind of graHsbopper, for they were so different in color to the fliers that first came and laid tbeir eggs that it was difficult to detect in them the resemblance to the parents. A few days . later the air was filled with xjiantities of , these new flying locusts with the thin transparent wings, producing the effect of a large-flaked snowstorm. It was at first hard-to realize that these had not, as most supposed, flown in from' elsewhere, but right under our eyes had been transformed from the small creeping locusts, millions of which we bad de stroyed. During the day they kept busily hovering about from tree to tree, or alight ing on some green patch, while toward evening they settled for the night by myr lads upon the olive trees, almost covering them and, transforming the dark green foli age into a distinctive red appearance. Up to this time the olive orchards bad suffered comparatively little. The creep ing locusts had not seemed to care for the tough titter leaves while better things were at hand, and as a rule only severely damaged individual trees where other food was scarce. But now that these raven- ously hungry, freshly moulted fliers ap peared, food had already become scarcer, obliging the creepers to seek the hereto fore desfftsed olive, crawling up the trunks layers deep. Between the two they stripped every leaf, berry and even the tender bark, leav ing only, where such existed, the green tufts of the poisonous mistletoe. It was then that the famous olives ot the Garden of Gethsemane were ravaged. Likewise, every variety of tree was at tacked and stripped, with the sole excep tion of the Persian lilac and the oleander bushes. , The devastation was complete, and only those resident in the country at the time can appreciate the sufferings and hard ships the locusts caused. All vegetables and fruits virtually disappeared as by magic. Olives and olive oil were almost unobtainable. Were It not for the arrival of a ship load of flour and other food com modities from America the condition of the populace would have been serious.
