The Natural History of Selborne

My Nephew Edmd White’s tank at Newton runs over.  On the first of August, about half an hour after three in the afternoon the people of Selborne were surpried by a shower of Aphides which fell in these parts.  I was not at home; but those who were walking the streets at that juncture found themselves covered with these insects, which settled also on the trees, & gardens, & blackened all the vegetables where they alighted.  My annuals were covered with them; & some onions were quite coated over with them when I returned on Aug. 6th.  These armies, no doubt, were then an a state of emigration, & shifting their quarters; & might come, as far as we know, from the great hop-plantations of Kent or Sussex, the wind being that day at E.  They were observed at the same time at Farnham, & all along the vale to Alton.  Of the conveyance of Insects from place to place, see Derhams’s Physico-Theology. p. 367.