ded to be found. England sent an
ample testimony of their piety and morals; but as the order was now
annihilated, the knights were distributed into several convents, and
their possessions were, by command of the pope, transferred to the
order of St. John.[*] We now proceed to relate some other detached
transactions of the present period.

The kingdom of England was afflicted with a grievous famine during
several years of this reign. Perpetual rains and cold weather not only
destroyed the harvest, but bred a mortality among the cattle, and raised
every kind of food to an enormous price.[**] The parliament in 1315
endeavored to fix more moderate rates to commodities! not sensible that
such an attempt was impracticable, and that, were it possible to reduce
the price of provisions by any other expedient than by introducing
plenty, nothing could be more pernicious and destructive to the public.
Where the produce of a year, for instance, falls so far short as to
afford full subsistence only for nine months, the only expedient for
making it last all the twelve, is to raise the prices, to put the people
by that means on short allowance, and oblige them to save their food
till a more plentiful season. But in reality the increase of prices is
a necessary consequence of scarcity; and laws, instead of preventing
it, only aggravate the evil, by cramping and restraining commerce. The
parliament accordingly, in the ensuing year, repealed their ordinance,
which they had found useless and burdensome.[***]

The prices affixed by the parliament are somewhat remarkable: three
pounds twelve shillings of our present money for the best stalled ox;
for other oxen, two pounds eight shillings; a fat hog of two years old,
ten shillings; a fat wether unshorn, a crown; if shorn, three shillings
and sixpence; a fat goose, sevenpence halfpenny; a fat capon, sixpence;
a fat hen, threepence; two chickens, threepence; four pigeons,
threepence; two dozen of eggs, threepence.[****]

* Rymer, vol. iii. p. 323, 956; vol. iv. p. 47. Ypod. Neust.
p. 606

** Trivet, Cont. p. 17, 18.

*** Walsing p. 107.

**** Rot. Parl. 7 Edw. II. n. 35, 36. Ypod. Neust. p. 502.

If we consider these prices, we shall find that butcher's meat, in this
time of great scarcity, must still have been sold, by the parliamentary
ordinance, three times cheaper than our middling prices at present;
poultry somewhat lower, because, being now considered as