Men  of  influence  and  discernment,  and  prelates  of  deep

reasoning,  said,  that  never  since  the  times  g£  Mahomet,  had

such  a  fearful  pestilence  crept  into  the  Church  of  Christ,

especially  as,  owing  to  the  nusfortune  which  had  happened

to  the  fVench  king,  the  fiaith  began  to  totter  in  the  kingdom

of  France.
How  Ikametta  was  razed  to  the  grotmd.
About  this  same  time,  the  sultan  of  Babylon  ordered  the
city  of  Damietta  to  be  levelled  to  the  ground,  as  he  found
that  it  had  twice  been  a  prey  to  the  Christians.
Of  the  new  decretals  made  by  the  pope.
About  the  same  time,  too,  the  pope  arranged  certain  new
decretals^  which  the  careful  searcher  will  find  in  the  book  of
Additaments.
Of  the  appearance  qfsome  remarkable  birds  in  England.
In  the  course  of  this  year,  about  the  fruit-season,  there
appeared,  in  the  orcharcb  chiefly,  some  remarkable  birds,
which  had  never  been  before  seen  in  England,  somewhat
larger  than  larks,  which  ate  the  kernel  of  the  fruit  and
nothing  else,  whereby  the  trees  were  fruitless,  to  the  loss  of
many.  The  beaks  of  these  birds  were  crossed,  so  that  by
these  means  they  opened  the  fruit  as  if  with  pincers  or  a
knife  ;  and  that  part  of  the  fruit  which  they  left  was  as  it
were  infected  with  poison.
How  the  pope  absolved  many  f(f  the  nobles  whom  he  had  before

excommunicated.
