THE BROKEN SPEAR TIMES
March, 2010 MISSY ALLEN brokenstimes@gmail.com
London: 1665-1666 (School report I thought was interesting)
London had to many rats. Holland also had to many rats. The rats had flees that carried the plague, or in other words, the black death. Trade between London and Holland stopped. Both countries were afraid that they would get the plague from the other country, however both countries already had the plague.
Now, close your eyes. Imagine London in 1665. We are going to take a little trip there right now.
It is July of 1665. Open your ears. You can hear the people yelling to one and other, the vendors shouting for you to come by their wears, the wagons on the cobblestone street. As you walk down the narrow street you notice how close the buildings, made of mud and hay, are. If a house has a second story it reaches over the street, seeming as if there is a ceiling. You see a man painting the words, ‘Lord have mercy’ at the top of a door frame.
You ask “What are you doing that for?”
“The family has the plague” a gruff man beside you answers.
It is getting dark, you walk to an inn that has a sign outside advertising rooms for $.03 a night. You get a room, lie down on a mattress on the floor and soon, very soon, drift off to sleep.
We are going to transport you to August of 1665. You wake up right where you went to sleep. You stand up and look out the window. Remember, this is three months later. You walk outside and see words on many, many of the houses that say ‘Lord have Mercy’.
A wagon comes rumbling down the street, with the wagon master shouting “Bring out your dead, bring out your dead!” (Dick, 143)
Many doors open and dead bodies are thrown into the wagon. You walk down the street and see many dead dogs and cats lying along the road. You are told the cats and dogs had flees which the people believed carried the plague. To this point there have been 40,000 dogs and 200,000 cats killed. You also find out the death wagon is picking up 6,000 dead bodies a day. (Ross, 7)
You are transported now to September 2, 1666. You find yourself in a comfortable nice house where the family is packing their belongings. Next, you find yourself in a little shack with people scurrying about. You wonder what is going on. You keep finding yourself in different houses and mansions where everyone is scurrying around. It gets more chaotic with every stop. In one house you heard the mention of fire.
That’s right a fire. It started the morning of September 2, at 1 a.m. when the baker woke up to find his house on fire. He got his family out of the house without harm, but his maid died in the blaze. The fire spread rapidly, from house to house. There was no fire brigade just a few men with leather buckets. The fire raged for four days. To stop the fire buildings were blown up ahead of the fire to make a fire wall.
According to Ross, eighty percent of London was burned including 13,200 houses, 89 churches, The Royal Exchange, 52 Guild Halls, and St. Paul’s Cathedral. Six people were burnt in the fire but many, many more died from such things as smoke inhalation, starvation, loss of homes. (Ross, 1)
Although many people died because of the fire, many lives where saved. You see, people died from the black death because of the plague carrying flee that only lived on rats. When the fire burned the city, it killed the rats and their flees.
HAPPY uh, love DAY!
1 John 4:7-8 says “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.”
We say we love one another, but do we really? I mean I’m sure you do but how much? Would we be willing to give up our computer, cell phone, TV, internet, part of our house, all of our house, things of this life, for people we ‘love’? I have problems with that.
Rom 5:9 “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
Think about that. Would you be able to give up (If you’re a dad) your only son for someone that had sinned against you? I’m sure that’s way more then a computer! Or if you’re a mom, give up your only daughter for someone who had someone who had hurt you? Or watch your only child die on the cross for someone who hated you and your child? It still would be hard to give up your only child to help someone you loved! So, think about how God loves you, and sent His only son to die for YOU!
THE LAST ISSUE???!!! (printed and emailed)
No way! It can’t be? Due to the amount of time the Broken Spear Times takes, and the amount of time I have, this will be the last issue. With rodeos starting and school and all of the other things I should be doing, I just don’t have time. I am starting a BST blog though so if you would like to keep up with me and the Broken Spear Ranch you can subscribe to it and read a little bit every once and a while! brokenstimes.blogspot.com Thanks so much for all of your support I have enjoyed writing the Broken Spear Times very much, I hope you have enjoyed reading it just as much as I have enjoyed publishing it!
Quick up-to-date on ME: I have been good, rodeos will be starting soon! In fact the first one will be the last weekend of March, in Cortez, CO! Wow that’s a long ways! My sister Lindy is coming this week so I am excited to see her and the boys! I am playing the quitar quite a bit, although, I’m not sure how good I am doing!
