ORIGIN OF THE PLAGUE.

SYMPTOMS.

295

been had at two pounds with his diet, and men would hardly accept of a vicarage at twenty marks per annum.

Let Fabyan, Walsingham, Cantacuzenus, and other historians be consulted as to the origin, progress, and their account of the nature of the disease, which quite puzzled the astrologers. What has been communicated of the ravages of the disease at Newenham Abbey will gain credit for Walsingham's assertion, that in some parts scarce a tenth part of the people remained alive; that in many towns all the inhabitants died besides those who fled, and that houses fell down and were never rebuilt. In London 50,000 perished; Avignon, then the residence of the Pope, was nearly depopulated.

In the East a bleeding at the nose preceded the pestilential attack, and certain death. At Florence a swelling in the groin or arm-pits larger than an egg marked the disease, which, without fever in most cases, terminated fatally without benefit from medical skill on the third day. Boccacio attributes the plague to something corrupt in the air, while the history of the time is replete with accounts of curious atmospheric phenomena, of comets, meteors, fiery beams, and other coruscations.

The disease fell upon the brute creation, while great numbers of animals perished from inattention, their owners having died.

A

The mere disease, however dreadful, is but a part of the evils of such a time. These were found to be famine, &c., and a raising of their wages by the labouring population. statute was passed for the old rate of wages, which was disregarded. Abbots, friars, and other great men were fined for disobedience in this particular. The subject is, however, left for the general reader.

We cannot refrain from exhibiting a proof how completely man in every relation of life is influenced and affected by the atmosphere, the phenomena, the medium in which his lot is cast. Great natural disturbances on the surface of our planet are felt through numerous ramifications. So many of the

clergy fell victims to the great plague, that for want of learned masters English began to be used in schools in the teaching of young persons instead of French.

Remarks upon Domestic Architecture, Materials, Price, &c.

In the south-west of England, where the red marl abounded, mud houses, or mud mixed with chopped straw, called cob, were constructed upon a stone foundation. In other parts a stone foundation carried up of the same material was succeeded by a wooden framework with mud between, and the whole whitewashed.

The expense

The

In towns few houses were built of stone. was so much greater than was incurred for those of wood or timber framework, as oak was very cheap. The latter were to be found in Bristol and most of our country towns. stories projected, so that the upper rooms were the longest; and in narrow streets persons could almost shake hands out of the topmost windows. The plasterers filled up the space between the framework. The souterrain or cellar had no groined roof, as in the more costly buildings of cities; it was entered from the street by steep steps which encroached upon the roadway. Low doors and a trap secured the entrance. The shop was on the ground floor, with stalls or bulkheads (a word often contracted into bulks) open to the street, in which were no glass windows-another reason why our ancestors hailed the return of summer. The framework of the Vicarage of Lyme, destroyed in the siege of 1644, was rebuilt at a cost of 127.

When houses were constructed of wooden framework, we can understand why aldermen were provided with a proper hook and cord. In case of fire these were used to pull down the wooden framework buildings in flames.

CONSTRUCTION OF HOUSES.

297

Norway planks were known in England, doubtless, by the 12th century; but in small boroughs oak timber was, I may say, solely used for the construction of houses, and also of floors. In ordinary residences there was no ceiling. The under side of the planking of the floors was whitewashed, and this was the ceiling, so to speak, of the lower room. A ceiling to rooms raised the character of the house.

The plaster was spread upon reeds as well as upon laths, and was mainly composed in the towns near the greensand formation of Fox mould sand or earth. Near Lyme people dug pits close to the king's highway, which were very dangerous, and the material thrown about made the way almost impassable. Presentments of juries followed which tried the Latin of the town clerk; i.e.:

Item, presentant quod Thomas Case de Hole effodit terram rubram Anglice Fox mould in Regia alta via ducente vers' Threelegged Cross.

Chimneys were rare in the country towns in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. Leland had expressed some wonder at a chimney in Bolton Castle. Fire-places and chimneys were built very often of plaster only. Some allusion to this subject has been made elsewhere.

The burning of limestone in a kiln was not practised. Neither coal nor culm was used for the purpose. A skilful lime-burner used wood and frith upon the hills to calcine a mass of stone, very ingeniously disposed so that all should feel an equal degree of heat. Lime-burning was a tradean art. Very little lime was used.

They

The Somersetshire churches have been famed. were constructed of an inferior oolite from Hamden Hill, commonly called Ham-hill, near Crewkerne. Beer-stone for interiors, a freestone where the chalk and greensand pass insensibly the one into the other, was much used. Portland, Purbeck, and Petworth quarries were early known; but the expense of conveying the material to a distance, except for churches and great houses, kept the use of it within very

narrow limits. Caen-stone was imported, as its excellence justified. The use of stucco as a protection to buildings constructed of perishable stone is very recent.

Healing or healm stones, indurated flags used by helliers for covering roofs, were from well-known localities, such as Horsham, where the quarries are said to be worked out. Slates may occasionally be meant; they were, however, generally called slatt-stones.

The fashion of building towers about the middle and close of the fifteenth century extended into the country. A merchant named Borough built a goodly one in the Butter market of Lyme. The merchants in the towns had their merchandize stored in their own residences, the country not being so secure as to warrant storehouses being away from the owner's own eye. The tower was at the entrance, and had to do with the security of the building, as we may suppose. A portcullis let down at night shut out the public from the inner court.

There was a great fondness for these towers, which honest Stow viewed and felt offended at. He judged some afflictions into which the possessors had fallen to have been judgments sent for their desire to overlook their neighbours. Thus in almost every instance we find a novel introduction, however useful and harmless, to have been designated by one class or the other as positively sinful.

Oak Timber in the West of England, the Price, Labour about it, &c. -Notice of the wooden-framed Houses, Healingstones, &c.

In the reign of Henry VIII., and for many years after, oak timber was that principally in demand, as fir timber from the Baltic was very sparingly imported. The roofs of churches in many instances display a lavish expenditure

VALUE OF OAK TIMBER.

299

of oak timber. It was much used for piers and sea defences; the great consumption about Lyme Regis was for the construction of the Cobb and the sea defences of the town against the inroads of the stormy element. Oaks set upright in rows round great rocks had been the mode of constructing the harbour from the reign of Edward I.

The value of oak timber was very inconsiderable. More must have grown on the borders of Dorset and Devon than could well have been used in that vicinity. The vessels then in use were small craft. The material required for them was trifling, and cost, like the beams for the roofs of churches, a small sum.

Some years after, in 1614, when Mr. Brooke tendered a bill against extravagance in apparel, he observed that women carry manors and thousands of oak trees on their necks."*

66

A brief illustration of this subject from ancient accompts of mayors in 1545 is here offered. May not the page of history be changed or even enlivened by our sturdy oaks?

Many at first inexplicable entries appear in the reign of Edward VI., about the mayor and his brethren "going to the wood," and of their expenses "in the wood." In 1652 the sum of 3s. 4d. is charged for "engrossing the indenture of the wood called Chickeradge, between Mr. Pole and the Town." This was the ancestor of Sir John Pole of Shute House, near Axminster, the proprietor of a locality on the north side of the road between Hunter's Lodge Inn and Lambart's Castle, in the parish of Hawkchurch, now called Chackeridge. The mayor used to meet Mr. Pole at the wood, and buy okys (oaks) from him.

Many localities on the hills around Lyme were at this time covered with oak timber, such as Trinity Hill, &c., where the soil is either bare or lately planted with firs.

A separate heading in the mayor, John Tudboll's account

* The Progress of Machinery and Manufactures in Great Britain : Weale's Quarterly Papers in Engineering, vol. v.