The laity partook of no religious rite, except baptism to new-born infants, and the communion to the dying: the dead were not interred in consecrated ground: they were thrown into ditches, or buried in common fields; and their obsequies were not attended with prayers or any hallowed ceremony Marriage was celebrated in the churchyards;[**] and that every action in life might bear the marks of this dreadful situation, the people were prohibited the use of meat, as in Lent, or times of the highest penance; were debarred from all pleasures and entertainments; and were forbidden even to salute each other, or so much as to shave their beards, and give any decent attention to their person and apparel.

Every circumstance carried symptoms of the deepest distress, and of the most immediate apprehension of divine vengeance and indignation.
The king, that he might oppose the temporal to their spiritual terrors, immediately, from his own authority, confiscated the estates of all the clergy who obeyed the interdict;[***] banished the prelates, confined the monks in their convents, and gave them only such a small allowance from their own estates, as would suffice to provide them with food and raiment.
[* M.Paris, p.157.Trivet, p.152.Ann.

Waverl.
p.170.

M.West.p.

268.] [** Chron.Dunst.