The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1898-05-11
THREE CHASTISERS.
Faminine. Pestilence and War.

India. India came to our doors we
felt that there was really country OF
that came across the waters that 1T
was not merely a map picture in our
biographies. The famine of India
made our world bigger. In other
words, we were broadened, and to
broaden the perspective is not only an
intellectual good, but it can scarcely
escape being moral good.
And, individually, it touched and
ennobled every single heart in every
land that listened to that pitiful cry
coming up from the stricken plains OF
the Gapges; whether they listened to
it and gave, or whether they listened
and only sighed. That cry turned the
eyes of sympathy for moment from
the selfish concerns of our individual
household, or our city, or our nation.
We looked beyond ourselves, we felt
the touch of nature that makes the
whole world kin. And from the mo-
ment one does that the world becomes
contracted for him; no part of it is
any longer barbarian f; we all become
brothers. We feel and know from
that good time forth that there are
others in the world as we'll as our
selves, and those others have claim
on US. i believe America, individu-
ally, is little broader, little nobler,
a little nearer brotherly love than she
was before any of the famines she has
responded to from time to time.
Every great ship she has sent out
loaded with food to the frozen Siber-
ian, the prosecuted Armenian. or the
starving Indian, has brought back on
its return double and triple loads Of
the invisible coin Of nobility which
lies increasing in the deep vault of
national character.
Ravages have likewise been ordain-
ed to bring good in their wake. A
golden harvest lies incipient in every
plowing. The Black Death may be
called one of the seven wonders Of
calamity. It was stupendous. 1t was
to all other diseases their Napoleon !;
it had neither fear nor remorse. Once
It's course began, like Napoleon, only
the annihilation of people stopped
it. 1t had no more to feed on, as Ma
poleon no longer had an army. Be-
hind it was clean path it ate its
way on to the edge Of England and
stopped only at the North Sea. Lon
don was the Austerlitz Of the Black
Death there, as no where else, it
rained it's torrents of invisible skulls
that bent down the people like wheat
under hailstorm. 1t ragged through
the streets, it swept through the by
ways, whole blocks aud almost whole
streets were leftunowned. Itincreas-
ed SO rapidly and grew SO deadly that
at last the people did not so much as
put out its sign ordered by the Mayor,
q red cross on the door with the legend,
Lord be merciful to our souls!" 1t
became too common to necessitate a
sign. When thousands of the cursed
inhabitants fed into the country and
surrounding towns for refuge the
Black Death. with a tenacity and
inexorableness that characterizes only
Destiny, followed them, found them
out, aud in spite of every subterfuge,
precaution or defiance gave the sting
it came to give. Not only to these,
possibly bringing the poison with them
from the city, but also to all those
who had harbored the miserable
wretohes. But the eloquent historian
Of those dark days describes them as
they have never since been described,
Turn to Daniel DeFoe for the story Of
London in the time of the plague.
The greatest good result Of this
sacrifice, a result that increases in
good to England always, was the i'm
provemcnt of the condition of the
laborer. So many thousands died Of
the plague Gf I have not forgotten, as
many as thousand died in day
when the disease was at its worst)
there were practically but a few left to
till the land and to do the other man
ual work of the country. The mortal
ity among the lower classes was greater
than among the upper, because of
their habits Of life and their inability
to get away. Consequently after the
plague labor became dear, and as their
necessity to employers became more
and more evident to the laborers they
made demands for certain honest
rights that had heretofore been de-
MED. The circumstances compelled
oa.aA..:a IA 4Ia.a louanda Exor.