History of Animal Plagues. 03 



people were constrained throngh famine to eat the flesh of horses, 

 dogs, and other vile beasts, which is wonderful to believe, and 

 yet for default there died a great multitude of people in divers 

 places of the land. Fourpence in bread of the coarsest sort 

 would not suffice a man a day. Wheat was sold in London for 

 four marks the quarter, and even more. Then after this dearth 

 and scarcity of victuals ensued a great death and mortality of 

 people.' ^ ' In that same year was great murrain of beasts, 

 which began in Essex, and after it spread through the land. It 

 reio;ned most in oxen, and when the beasts were dead doffs 

 would not eat of the flesh.' ^ 



A.D. 1318". 'A great murrain of kine happened, which were 

 so mortallv infected, that dogs and ravens eatinsi; of the carrion 

 of the kine, were poisoned, and did swell to death, so that no 

 man durst eat any beef.' ^ Mr Rogers reports that in this year, 

 at Southampton, there was "^ murrain among oxen. Hav 

 scarce.' * 



A.D. 1319. Mn this season, to wit, 1319, a great murrain 

 and death of cattle chanced through the whole of the realm, 

 spreading from place to place, but especially this year it raged 

 most in the north, whereas in the years before it began in the 

 south j)arts.' ^ The carrion still poisonous." ' In the same 

 year there was an unheard-of pestilence among animals in 

 Ensrland, but from what cause is doubtful. It besran in Essex 

 about Easter, and spread itself in a short time through the 

 whole island, lasting throughout the whole year, and con- 

 taminatin<j; almost all the cattle of the realm. It is rumoured, 

 what is most unusual, and what will be perhaps incredible to 

 future ages, that dogs died from eating the dead bodies of the 

 cattle, and crows were swollen immediatelv after fecdintr on 

 them, and were as though intoxicated with poison, and fell 

 d(jwn dead, on account of which circumstance, no man dared 

 to eat the flesh of oxen, because this pest prevailed chiefly in 

 oxen. It was said that the whole of Gaul was infected with 



' Holinshcd. Op. cit. 



- Capgravc. Chnjnicles of Englaiui. 



^ Stow. Op. cit., ]). 219. ■* Rogers. Op. cit , vol. ii. 



* Ilolins/icd. Op. cit. " T. Short. Op. cit.. p. 163. 



