It is true that each time that sanitary measures were relaxed by the authorities—such, for instance, as the perfect isolation of the patients—an increase in the number of lepers was noticeable. When this was observed the old-time ordinances were enforced again with vigor. It was thus in 1371 the Provost of Paris issued an edict enjoining all lepers to leave the Capital within fifteen days, under heavy corporal and pecuniary penalties; and in 1388, all lepers were forbidden to enter Paris without special permission; in 1402 this restriction was renewed, “under penalty of being taken by the executioner and his deputies and detained for a month on a diet of bread and water, and afterwards perpetual banishment from the kingdom.” Finally, in April, 1488, it was announced “all persons attacked by that abominable, very dangerous and contagious malady known as leprosy, must leave Paris before Easter and retire to their hospitals from the date of issuance of this edict, under penalty of imprisonment for a month on bread and water; and, where they had property, the sequestration of their houses and jewels and arbitrary corporal punishment; it was permitted them, however, to send things to them by servants, the latter being in health.” We can understand from this how these poor wretches, at different epochs, were accused of horrible crimes, among other things poisoning rivers, wells, and fountains. As regards this accusation, says the author of the _Dictionnaire des Mœurs des Francais_, Philip le Long burned a certain number of these poor devils at the stake and confiscated their wealth, giving it to the Order of Malta and St. Lazare. The historians and chronicalers of the eleventh and twelfth century often designated the person attacked by leprosy by the name of _mesel_, _mezel_, _meseau_ or _mesiaus_. Meantime Barbazin pretends that it is necessary to make a distinction.[29] _Mesel_, according to Barbazin, was a person covered with sores and ulcers, while the leper was an insensible man. He thinks that _mesellerie_ was at its origin a different affection than leprosy, and that these two diseases have been wrongly confounded. “They have both served,” says he, “to designate a frightful disease, that is reputed the most dangerous of all maladies.” As supporting this assertion of Barbazin, we have found in the Romanesque tongue some documents strongly confirming this point. They appear more interesting, inasmuch as they have heretofore been unknown to medical literature, as, for instance: “Seneschal, I now demand of you, said he (Saint Louis), which you love better, whether you be _mesiaus_, or whether you commit a mortal sin; and I, who never have lied, responded that rather would I commit thirty mortal sins than be _mesiaus_.” (Joinville, _Histoire de Saint Louis_.)