748 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1294-1517.
England, the return of plagues was frequent, as in 1406, 1439, 1464, 1477. The famine of 1438, called the Great Famine, was followed the next year by the Great Pestilence, called also the pestilence sans merci. In 1464, to follow the Chronicle of Croyland^ thousands " died like slaughtered sheep." The sweating sickness of 1485 reappeared in 1499 and 1504. In the first epidemic, 20,000 died in London and, in 1504, the mayor of the city succumbed. The disease took people suddenly and was marked by a chill, which was followed by a fiery redness of the skin and agonizing thirst that led the victims to drink immoderately. Drinking was succeeded by sweating from every pore.^
Provision was made for the sick and needy through the monasteries, gilds and brotherhoods as well as by individual assistance and state collections. The care of the poor was in England regarded as one of the primary functions of the Church. Archbishop Stratford, 1342, ordered that a portion of the tithe should be invariably set apart for their needs. The neglect of the poor was alleged as one of the crying omissions of the alien clergy.
Doles for the poor, a common form of charity in England, were often provided for on a large scale. During the 40 days the duke of Gaunt's body was to remain unburied, 50 marks were to be distributed daily until the 40th day, when the amount was to be increased to 500 marks. Bishop Skirland wanted 200 given away between his death and his interment. A draper of York gave by will 100 beds with furniture to as many poor folk. A cloth-maker made a doubtful charity when he left a suit of his own make to 13 poor people, with the condition that they should sit around his cofiin for 8 days. There were houses, says Thorold Rogers, where doles of bread and beer were given to all wayfarers, houses where the sick were treated, clothed and fed, particularly the lepers. One of the hospitals that survives is St. Cross at Winchester for old and indigent people. ^ The cook Ketel, a Brother of the Common
1 See C. Creighton in Social England, II. 412, 475, 501.
2 Rogers : Work and Wages, p. 417. Stubbs : Const. Hist., cb. XXI. Capes: Engl. Ch. Hist, in the Uth and 15th Cent., pp. 276 sq., 300 sq.
§ 79. WORKS OF CHARITY. 749
Life, whose biography Thomas a Kempis wrote, said it would be better to sell all the books of the house at Deventer and give more to the poor.
Hospitals, in the earlier part of our j)eriod, were the special concern of the knights of the Teutonic Order and continued throughout the whole of it to en^-age the attention of the Beguines. It became the custom also for the Beguines to go as nurses to private houses as in Cologne, Frankfurt, Treves, Ulm and other German cities, receiving pay for their services. ^ The Beguinages in Bruges, Ghent, Antwerp and other cities of Belgium and Holland date back to this period. Tbp. I.^th century also witnessed the growth of municipal hospitals, a product of the civic spirit which had developed in North- Europe. Cities like Cologne, Liibeck and Augsburg had several hospitals. The Hotel de Dieu^ Paris, did not come under municipal control till 1505. In cases, admission to hospitals was made by their founders conditional on ability to say the Lord's Prayer, the Creed and the Ave Maria^ as for example to St. Anthony's, Augsburg. In this case, the founder took care to provide for himself, requiring the inmates on entering to say 100 Pater nosters and 100 Ave Marias over his grave and every day to join in saying over it 15 of each.^ Damian of Lowen and his wife, who endowed a hospital at Cologne, 1450, stipulated that " the very poorest and sickest were to be taken care of whether they belonged to Cologne or were strangers."
Rome had more than one hospital endowipent. The foundation of Cardinal John Colonna at the Lateran, made 1216, still remains. In his History of the Popes (III. 51), Pastor has given a list of the hospitals and other institutions of mercy in the different states of Italy and justly laid stress upon this evidence of the power of Christianity. The English gilds, organized, in the first instance, for economic and industrial purposes, also pledged relief to their own sick and indigent members. The gild of Corpus Christi at York provided 8 beds for poor people and paid a woman by the year 14 shillings and
1 Uhlhorn, p. 383 sq,
2 Uhlhorn, p. 333. For the conditions of admission to hospitals and medical treatment, Allemand, III. 192 sqq. is to be consulted.