Some account of what happened in Ireland may be [p119] gathered from the relation of friar John Clyn, a Minorite of Kilkenny, who himself apparently perished in the epidemic. "Also this year (_i.e._, 1349),"[210] he writes, "and particularly in the months of September and October, bishops, prelates, ecclesiastics, religious, nobles and others, and all of both sexes generally, came from all parts of Ireland in bands and in great numbers to the pilgrimage and the passage of the water of That-Molyngis. So much so, that on many days you could see thousands of people flocking there, some through devotion, others (and indeed most) through fear of the pestilence, which then was very prevalent. It first commenced near Dublin, at Howth[211] and at Drogheda. These cities—Dublin and Drogheda—it almost destroyed and emptied of inhabitants, so that, from the beginning of August to the Nativity of our Lord, in Dublin alone, 14,000 people died." Then after speaking of the commencement of the plague and its ravages at Avignon, the author continues:—"From the beginning of all time it has not been heard that so many have died, in an equal time, from pestilence, famine, or any sickness in the world; for earthquakes, which were felt for long distances, cast down and swallowed up cities, towns, and castles. The plague too almost carried off every inhabitant from towns, cities and castles, so that there was hardly a soul left to dwell there. This pestilence was so contagious that those touching the dead, or those sick of it, were at once infected and died, and both the penitent and the confessor were together borne to the grave. Through fear and horror men hardly dared to perform works of piety and mercy; that is, visiting the sick and burying the dead. For many died from abscesses and from impostumes and pustules, which appeared on the [p120] thighs and under the arm-pits; others died from affection of the head, and, as if in frenzy; others through vomiting of blood. "This year was wonderful and full of prodigies in many ways; still it was fertile and abundant, although sickly and productive of great mortality. In the convent of the Minorites of Drogheda 25, and in that of Dublin 23, friars died before Christmas. "The pestilence raged in Kilkenny during Lent, for by the 6th of March eight friars Preachers had died since Christmas. Hardly ever did only one die in any house, but commonly husband and wife together, with their children, passed along the same way, namely, the way of death.