Another Swedish historian states that in the country of West-Gotland alone 466 priests were swept away by the plague. In that district then there were about 479 churches, many of which were served by more than one priest, so that the number given may not be altogether improbable.[114] It is stated that in Norway there long existed what were called _Find-dale_—wildernesses—in which were unmistakable traces of cultivation, and after the plague there is evidence of a state of exhaustion and a dearth of inhabitants, which lasted for several generations, so that forests grew where there had once been churches and villages. Some interesting particulars may be gathered about the town of Wisby, on the Isle of Gotland. The annals of the Franciscan convent note that the plague raged in 1350. In the necrology of the same house are entered the names of a great number of friars and many novices who died in this fatal year, and the comparison of one portion of the necrology with another, in which the names are collected into groups, shows that the worst time at Wisby was in July, August, and September, 1350.[115] In all twenty-four friars, a very large proportion of the convent, appear to have been carried off by the epidemic. In [p069] the Cathedral of Wisby five sepulchral slabs are still preserved with the date 1350, whilst of such memorials as have escaped destruction not more than a single one remains for any other year. The King of Sweden, Magnus II., in 1350 addressed letters patent to his people, wherein he says that "God for the sins of man has struck the world with this great punishment of sudden death. By it most of the people in the land to the west of our country (_i.e._, Norway) are dead. It is now ravaging in Norway and Holland, and is approaching our kingdom of Sweden." The king therefore summons them to abstain on every Friday from all food but bread and water, or "at most to take only bread and ale," to walk with bare feet to their parish churches, and to go in procession round about the cemeteries attached to them, carrying with them the holy relics. In the capital of Sweden, when the plague burst upon the country, it is recorded that "the streets were strewn with corpses," and among the victims are named Hacon and Knut, two brothers of the king.