One of the correspondents quoted a medieval verse today concerning St. Roch:

Exempt de blame
rendit son ame
en bon chretien
dans les bras de son chien

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I had to look him up.

St. Roch was reportedly born 1295 in Montpellier to a rich merchant family. He became a hermit, and spent most of his life on pilgrimage. In Piacenza, he caught the plague while tending the sick, and survived miraculously, having been fed in the woods by a dog. He is consequently a patron of the plague-stricken. Often represented attended by a dog bearing a loaf of bread in his mouth. Feast: 16 August.