Jabir b. `Abdallah told that no locusts were seen in one of the years of `Umar's Caliphate, the year in which he died, and becoming very anxious on this account he sent a rider to the Yemen, another to `Iraq and another to Syria to enquire whether any locusts had been seen. The rider who came from the Yemen brought him a handful and scattered it in front of him, and when `Umar saw it, he said, "God is most great," and told that he had heard God's messenger say, "God who is great and glorious created a thousand species, six hundred in the sea and four hundred on the land. The first species to perish will be the locusts, and when they perish the species will follow one another like beads on a string." Baihaqi transmitted it in Shu'ab al-iman