tters burst out. Objects which plunderers had not been able to
carry off lay scattered on the floor in wild confusion. Further on they
found a dead body lying at a little distance from one of the roads to
the fields. Where death had overtaken him, there lay the miserable
being. The physicians gazed in horror at the wild distorted features of
the corpse. "Death caused by the bite of a poisonous viper, or a rabid
blood-hound appears in the form of an angel of peace as compared with
that effected by the plague," said Erastus. In the next farm they saw a
peasant sitting before his door on a bundle of straw. His face was
flaming from the inner heat, the eyes gleamed feverishly, he shaded
them continually with his hands to avoid the light. "Why do you sit
here, instead of being in bed?" asked Erastus.

"I have no one who will bring me water."

"Where are your laborers?"

"Gone."

"Your wife?"

"Dead."

"Have you no one to help you?"

"All are dead."

Erastus fastened the spunge dipped in vinegar once more to his mouth,
and entered the dwelling with his colleagues who took the like
precautions. The windows were still fastened up, as there was nothing
the patient hated so much as light. The commissioners hastily threw
them open, so as to dispel by a draught of fresh air the horrible
odors. The sunlight disclosed a neatly ordered clean room. The evening
meal still stood on the table, a proof, of how quickly the horrible
pestilence had seized the various members of the family at the same
moment. A child's catechism and slate lay near the window ready for the
morning school. A wild confusion was however disclosed in the adjoining
rooms. The floors were strewn with rags, bandages, and straw, which
proved how terrible the ravages of the plague had been. Two dead
children lay in the same bed convulsively grasping each other. On
another bed was seen the body of a woman, to which still clung a child,
whose waxy little hand hung stiff outside the bed. Erastus himself set
to work and with the aid of his assistants carried the bodies outside.
The neighboring houses presented the same appearance. The more distant
farmyards had all been plundered. The healthy occupants had taken to
flight, the plague-stricken had gathered together in the villages,
where the houses were nearer at hand, and where they might possibly
render each other a little help. All round were heard sighs, shouts of
delirium, and the death-rattle. Convalescents