The royal mandate of 1346 reiterated the stipulation that men of knowledge should inquire into suspected cases. It therefore seems unlikely that a London baker ejected in 1372 was merely suffering from an inveterate eczema, as has been suggested. Careless as were the popular notions of disease, medical diagnosis was becoming more exact; four kinds of leprosy were distinguished, of which “leonine” and “elephantine” were the worst.
There is an interesting document extant concerning a certain woman who lived at Brentwood in 1468. She was indicted by a Chancery warrant, but acquitted on the p063 authority of a medical certificate of health. The neighbours of Johanna Nightingale petitioned against her, complaining that she habitually mixed with them and refused to retire to a solitary place, although “infected by the foul contact of leprosy.” A writ was therefore issued by Edward IV commanding a legal inquiry. Finally, Johanna appeared before a medical jury in the presence of the Chancellor. They examined her person, touched and handled her, made mature and diligent investigation, going through over forty distinctive signs of disease. She was at length pronounced “utterly free and untainted,” and the royal physicians were prepared to demonstrate this in Chancery “by scientific process.”[53]
6. TREATMENT OF THE BODY
Alleviation was sometimes sought in medicinal waters. Here and there the site of a hospital seems to have been selected on account of its proximity to a healing spring, e.g. Harbledown, Burton Lazars, Peterborough, Newark, and Nantwich. In various places there are springs known as the Lepers’ Well, frequented by sufferers of bygone days.
Tradition ascribes to bathing some actual cures of “leprosy.” Bladud the Briton, a prehistoric prince, was driven from home because he was a leper. At length he discovered the hot springs of Bath, where instinct had already taught diseased swine to wallow: Bladud, too, washed and was clean. The virtue of the mineral waters, well known to the Romans, was also appreciated by the Saxons; possibly the baths were frequented by lepers p064 from early days, for there was long distributed in Bath “an ancient alms to the poor and leprous of the foundation of Athelstan, Edgar and Ethelred.” A small bath was afterwards set apart for their use, to which the infected flocked. Leland notes that the place was “much frequentid of People diseasid with Lepre, Pokkes, Scabbes, and great Aches,” who found relief. A story similar to that of Bladud, but of later date, comes from the eastern counties: a certain man, sorely afflicted with leprosy, was healed by a spring in Beccles, near which in gratitude he built a hospital.
[♦ ] 8. ELIAS, LEPER MONK
There was rivalry between the natural water of Bath and the miraculous water of Canterbury; the latter consisted of a drop of St. Thomas’ blood many times diluted from the well in the crypt of the cathedral.[54] William of Canterbury, a prejudiced critic, is careful to relate how a leper-monk of Reading, Elias by name, went with his abbot’s approval to Bath desiring to ease his pain, and there sought earnestly of the physicians whatever he was able to gather from them. “He set his hope in the warmth of the sulphur and not in the wonder-working martyr,” says William. After forty days in Bath, Elias set out for Canterbury, but secretly, pretending to seek medicine in London; because (adds the chronicler) the abbot honoured p065 the martyr less than he ought to have done, and might not have countenanced the pilgrimage. On his way, Elias met returning pilgrims, who gave him some of the water of St. Thomas (Fig. 8); he applied this externally and internally and became well.[55] Lest any should doubt the miracle, Benedict of Canterbury tells us that many who were especially skilled in the art of medicine used to say that Elias was smitten with a terrible leprosy, and he proceeds to detail the horrible symptoms. In the end, however, William declares that he who had been so ulcerated that he might have been called another Lazarus, now appeared pleasant in countenance, as was plain to all who saw him. What the Bath doctors and Bath waters could not do, that the miraculous help of St. Thomas had achieved.
We see from the story of the monk Elias that the ministrations of the physician and the use of medicine were sought by lepers. Bartholomew says that the disease, although incurable “but by the help of God” when once confirmed, “may be somewhat hid and let, that it destroy not so soon”; and he gives instructions about diet, blood-letting, purgative medicines, plasters and ointments. Efficacious too was (we are told) the eating of a certain adder sod with leeks.
There is no information forthcoming as to the remedial treatment of lepers in hospital. The only narrative we possess is Chatterton’s lively description of St. Bartholomew’s, Bristol, the Roll of which he professed to find; it satisfied Barrett, a surgeon, and a local, though uncritical, historian. A father of the Austin Friary came to shrive the lepers (for which he received ten marks) and to dress p066 their sores (for which he was given fifty marks) saying, “lette us cure both spryte and bodye.” When barber-surgeons came for an operation—“whanne some doughtie worke ys to bee donne on a Lazar”—friars attended “leste hurte ande scathe bee done to the lepers.” The friars’ knowledge was such that barber-surgeons were willing to attend “wythoute paye to gayne knowleche of aylimentes and theyr trew curis.”