The second effect of the wars was political. In order to carry them on, the King had to apply constantly to Parliament for money (SS217, 220). Each time that body granted a supply, they insisted on some reform which increased their strength, and brought the Crown more and more under the influence of the nation. (See Summary of Constitutional History in the Appendix, p. xii, S13.) The it came to be clearly understood that though the King held the sword, the people held the purse; and that the ruler who made the greatest concessions got the largest grants. It was also in this reign that the House of Commons (SS213, 217, 262), which now sat as a separate body, obtained the important power of impeaching, or bringing to trial before the upper House, any of the King's ministers or council who should be accused of misgovernment (1376). (See S247, and Summary of Constitutional History in the Appendix, p. xii, S13.) About this time, also, statutes were passed which forbade appeals from the King's courts of justice to that of the Pope,[1] who was then a Frenchman, and was believed to be under French political influence. Furthermore, all foreign Church officials were prohibited from asking or taking money from the English Church, or interfering in any way with its management.[2] [1] First Statute of Provisors (1351) and of Praemunire (1353) (S265). The first Statute of Praemunire did not mention the Pope or the Court of Rome by name; the second, or Great Statute of Praemunire of 1393, expressly mentioned them in the strongest terms. See Constitutionals Documents in the Appendix, p. xxxii. [2] Statute of Provisors (1351), and see S265. 244. The Black Death, or Plague, 1349. Shortly after the first campaign in France, a frightful pestilence broke out in London, which swept over the country, destroying upwards of half the population. The disease, which was known as the Black Death, had already traversed Europe, where it had proved equally fatal. "How many amiable young persons," said a noted writer of that period, "breakfasted with their friends in the morning, who, when evening came, supped with their ancestors!" In Bristol and some other English cities, the mortality was so great that the living were hardly able to bury the dead; so that all business, and for a time even war, came to a standstill. 245. Effect of the Plague on Labor, 1349. After the pestilence had subsided, it was impossible to find laborers enough to till the soil and shear the sheep. Those who were free now demanded higher wages, while the villeins, or serfs (S113), and slaves left their masters and roamed about the country asking for pay for their work, like freemen. It was a general agricultural strike, which lasted over thirty years. It marks the beginning of that contest between capital and labor which had such an important influence on the next reign, and which, after a lapse of more than five hundred years, is not yet satisfactorily adjusted.