THE PLAGUE OF FLORENCE
Not under circumstances the most joyous did King Edward reach England,
after having baffled the ambition of Geoffrey de Chargny, and saved
Calais from falling into the hands of Philip of Valois. Even while
the tidings of his exploit on the morning of New Year's Day rang over
England, and ministered to the national pride, Englishmen were in the
utmost alarm at the approach of an enemy not so easily dealt with
as the continental foe, so often trampled in the dust. Already that
terrible pestilence, commonly known as "the plague of Florence," where,
perhaps, its ravages were most terrible, had reached the shores no
longer in danger from invaders in human form.
Never within the memory of man--never, perhaps, since the waters of the
Flood subsided, and the Ark rested on the mountains of Ararat, and Noah
and his sons came forth to repeople the earth, has Heaven so severely
punished the sins of the nations as at the terrible period of which I
write. From East to West an epidemic malady of unprecedented virulence
ravaged the world, taking a wider range, and proving infinitely more
destructive, than any calamity of the kind recorded in history, and
spreading terror and desolation wherever it went.
It was in Asia, and in the year 1346, the year of Cressy, that this
pestilence first appeared. But to Asia its ravages were not long
confined. Entering Europe, it travelled rapidly westward, and, sweeping
off Saracens, Jews, and Christians in its course, visited country after
country and city after city. Already exhausted by war and humiliated by
defeat, France suffered dreadful horrors. One-third of the inhabitants
are said to have perished; and, in Paris alone, fifty thousand human
beings fell victims.
Nor was victorious and prosperous England exempt from the visitation
which fell so heavily on her vanquished and impoverished foe. Far
different was the case. At first the pestilence made its presence
felt on the coasts of Dorset and Devon; but on the coast it did not
long linger. Finding its way, on the one hand, to Norwich, and, on
the other, to Bristol and Gloucester--all three seats of the woollen
manufactures, flourishing under Queen Philippa's patronage--it
wrought terrible havoc in these hives of industry, and finally,
taking possession of London, caused such mortality that the living
could scarce bury the dead. In one churchyard--that of the Charter
House--several hundred funerals took place daily.
All over Christendom there seemed to hang a curse. In many places the
pestilence swept away a fourth of the population; in others a third
disappeared during its prevalence; and, in several, not more than one
inhabitant out of ten survived its inroads. Even the beasts of the
field yielded to its influence. Sheep and cattle perished as well as
human beings; and in some places the air was so polluted that it was
all but impossible to inhale it without catching the infection. Under
such circumstances every bond of attachment seemed to burst asunder.
Servants fled from their masters, wives from their husbands, and
children from their parents. Nothing could exceed the awe which was
inspired by the invisible destroyer.
At length the calamity, after passing through various stages, reached
the worst, and gradually a change took place, and men began to look
around them, and once more breathe freely. Forthwith a great reaction
took place: people said, "Let us eat, drink, and be merry"; and many
who but lately, when their danger appeared imminent, had been calling
on the rocks to fall on them and cover them, now hastened to break
loose from all restraint, set all laws at defiance, rushed into excess
without scruple, and fearlessly ate the bread of wickedness and drank
the wine of violence.
At the same time, fanaticism, raising her head, sent forth her
votaries, and the consequences were fatal and unfortunate in more ways
than one.
A fierce persecution of the Jews at once commenced in France and other
countries where they were to be found. Accused by the populace of
having caused the plague by poisoning the rivers and fountains, the
unhappy Hebrews were hunted, burnt, and massacred by thousands. Never
has the multitude been animated by so savage a spirit as then urged
them on to cruelty and bloodshed. Every Jew appeared to be marked
out for destruction; and the spirit of persecution, spreading daily,
became so fierce and general that the Jews, having no hope of escape
elsewhere, crowded towards Avignon, and sought safety--nor in vain--in
the territories of the Church and under the protection of the Pope.
Meanwhile it was prophesied that, for one hundred years, people with
iron scourges were to come to destroy the Jews; and now there appeared,
in Germany, a sect of enthusiasts, of both sexes, who carried the
iron scourges, but who, instead of applying them to the backs of the
Jews, applied them to their own. Finding their way from Germany into
Flanders, and from Flanders into England, these men and women--known
as Flagellants--travelled in companies, and set reason and decency at
defiance. Believing, or pretending to believe, that their sufferings
were agreeable to the Divinity, they appeared in the squares and
public places of cities and towns, naked to the girdle, and, while
chanting, in a piteous tone, canticles of the nativity and passion of
the Redeemer of Mankind, scourged themselves with their iron hoops, to
expiate, as they said, the sins of the world.
In the midst of all this confusion, and persecution, and fanaticism, an
event occurred which produced consequences of importance. One August
day that pale spectre, which visits the castles of kings as impartially
as the cottages of the poor, appeared at Nogent-le-Roi, where Philip of
Valois then was. In his palace at that town, which is situated on the
Eure, five leagues from Chartres, Philip, at the age of fifty-eight,
breathed his last. Immediately his eldest son, John, previously known
as Duke of Normandy, was hailed as King of France, and a new scene
opened.