The whole period during which the Black Plague raged with destructive violence in Europe, was, with the exception of Russia, from the year 1347 to 1350. The plagues, which in the sequel often returned until the year 1383,[98] we do not consider as belonging to “the Great Mortality.” They were rather common pestilences, without inflammation of the lungs, such as in former times, and in the following centuries, were excited by the matter of contagion everywhere existing, and which, on every favorable occasion, gained ground anew, as is usually the case with this frightful disease. [98] _Gobelin Person._ Loc. cit. _V. Chalin_, p. 53. The concourse of large bodies of people was especially dangerous; and thus, the premature celebration of the Jubilee, to which Clement VI. cited the faithful to Rome, (1350), during the great epidemic, caused a new eruption of the plague, from which it is said, that scarcely one in an hundred of the pilgrims escaped.[99] [99] _Guillelm de Nangis._ Loc. cit. Italy was, in consequence, depopulated anew; and those who returned, spread poison and corruption of morals in all directions.[100] It is, therefore, the less apparent, how that Pope, who was in general so wise and considerate, and who knew how to pursue the path of reason and humanity, under the most difficult circumstances, should have been led to adopt a measure so injurious; since he, himself, was so convinced of the salutary effect of seclusion, that during the plague in Avignon, he kept up constant fires, and suffered no one to approach him;[101] and, in other respects, gave such orders as averted, or alleviated, much misery. [100] _Spangenberg._ fol. 337. b. Limburg. Chronic. p. 20. “Und die auch von Rom kamen, wurden eines Theils böser als sie vor gewesen waren.” [101] _Guillelm de Nangis._ Loc. cit. and many others. The changes which occurred about this period in the north of Europe, are sufficiently memorable to claim a few moments attention. In Sweden, two princes died--Häken and Knut, half-brothers of King Magnus; and in Westgothland alone, 466 priests.[102] The inhabitants of Iceland and Greenland, found in the coldness of their inhospitable climate, no protection against the southern enemy who had penetrated to them from happier countries. The plague caused great havoc among them. Nature made no allowance for their constant warfare with the elements, and the parsimony with which she had meted out to them the enjoyments of life.[103] In Denmark and Norway, however, people were so occupied with their own misery, that the accustomed voyages to Greenland ceased. Towering ice-bergs formed at the same time on the coast of East Greenland, in consequence of the general concussion of the earth’s organism; and no mortal, from that time forward, has ever seen that shore or its inhabitants.[104] [102] _Dalin’s_ Svea Rikes Historie, Vol. II. c. xii. p. 496.