9 8 History of Animal Plagues. 



mountain Tsinchovv fell in^ and vast clefts were formed in the 

 earth. On the succeeding year (1334), passing over fabulous 

 traditions, the neighbourhood of Canton was visited by inunda- 

 tions; whilst in Tche, after an unexampled drought, a plague 

 arose, which is said to have carried off 5,000,000 people. A few 

 months afterwards an earthquake followed, at and near Kiangsi ; 

 and subsequent to the falling in of the mountains of Ki-ming- 

 shan, a lake was formed of more than a hundred leagues in cir- 

 cumference, where, again, thousands found their grave. In 

 How-kwang and Honan a drought prevailed for five months, 

 and iimumerable swarms of locusts destroyed the vegetation; 

 while famine and pestilence, as usual, followed in their train. 

 Connected accounts of the condition of Europe are not to be ex- 

 pected from the writers of the fourteenth century. It is remark- 

 able, however, that simultaneously with a drought and renewed 

 floods in China, in 1336, many uncommon atmospheric pheno- 

 mena, and in the winter frequent thunder-storms, were observed 

 in the north of t'rance ; and so early as the eventful year of 

 1333 an eruption of Etna took place. According to the Chinese 

 Annals, about 4,000,000 people perished by famine in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Kiang in 1337; and deluges, swarms of locusts^ 

 and an earthquake which lasted six days, caused incredible de- 

 vastation. In the same year the first swarms of locusts ap- 

 peared in Franconia, which were succeeded in the following vear 

 by myriads of these insects. In 1338, Kiangsi was visited by an 

 earthquake of ten days^ duration ; at the same time France 

 suffered from a failure in the harvest ; and thenceforth, till the 

 year 1342, there was in China a constant succession of inunda- 

 tions, earthquakes, and famines. In the same year great floods 

 occurred in the vicinity of the Rhine and in France, which could 

 not be attributed to rain alone ; for everywhere, even on the 

 tops of mountains, springs were seen to burst forth, and dry 

 tracts were laid under water in an inexplicable manner. In the 

 following year the mountain Hong-tchang, in China, fell in, 

 and caused a destructive deluge; and in Pien-chow and Leang- 

 chow, after three months' rain, there followed unheard-of in- 

 undations, which destroyed seven cities. In Egypt and Syria 

 violent earthquakes took^place ; and in China they became, from 



