nterest. It is known that they appeared throughout the territory of Red
River a dozen years or so before the coming of the Selkirk Colonists,
also during the period we have been describing, and then not till the
period from 1868 to 1875. During the latter half of this period the
writer saw their devastations in Manitoba. The occurrence of the
grasshopper at times in all agricultural districts in America is very
different from the grasshopper or locust plague which we are describing.
The red-legged Caloptenus or the Rocky Mountain locust are provided for
lofty flight and pass in myriads over the prairies, lighting whenever a
cloud obscures the sun. At one time the writer saw them in such hordes
that they were found from Winnipeg to Edmonton, over a region about one
thousand miles in breadth. In that year they devoured not only crops and
garden products but almost completely ate up the grass on the prairie to
such an extent as to make it useless for hay. In the year 1875 they
appeared, in the main, for the last time in Manitoba, and in that year
their disappearance was as sudden as in the former case of 1821. Under
the wing upon the body of each grasshopper was to be found one or more
scarlet red parasites which drew all the juices from the body of the
insect and produced death. For a third of a century they have been
almost unknown, and the area of cultivated ground in the States of North
and South Dakota, where they may supply their hunger renders it likely
that Manitoba will know them no more. It cannot be wondered at that such
continuous disasters made the settler whether Scottish, De Meuron, or
Swiss, extremely discontented. During the period of the scourge, the
only resource was to winter at Pembina in reasonable distance from the
buffalo-herds. In one of these years a number of the Selkirk Colonists
did not return to their farms but emigrated to the United States. As we
shall see in a few years after the grasshopper scourge the flood of the
Red River took place, when the De Meurons and Swiss, with one or two
exceptions, disappeared from the Colony and became citizens of the
United States.

CHAPTER XIII.

ENGLISH LION AND CANADIAN BEAR LIE DOWN TOGETHER.

That such violence and bloodshed as that about Fort Douglas, should be
seen by British subjects under the flag which stands for justice and
equal rights made sober-minded Britons blush. While Lord Selkirk's
agents on the banks of the Red River may have be