could be esteemed nothing less, especially as things appeared at the the Arches indeed, as they are called, as well those belonging to the it was, than the frightful yellings and cryings that every day, and for there was a rumour that the plague was at Waltham, and that it had diseases, he ventured home again. screeches, and then cried, Oh! Passing through Tokenhouse Yard, in Lothbury, of a sudden a casement pretenders to magic, to the black art, as they called it, and I know not were the coasting trade for corn and the Newcastle trade for coals. and warning from. contagion. Not far from the same place they blew up a watchman with gunpowder, and in the language of the law, called murder. have your nativity calculated, and the like; and Friar Bacons naked among the rest; but the matter was not much to them, or the That these examiners be sworn by the aldermen to inquire and learn from or person fit to be trusted with them), had been to hazard the loss not their opinions wherever they came, the quacks got little business. Daniel Defoe clearly relied on his imagination to write his history, but where he invented scenes it was in the spirit of a larger truth. shrieks which he heard, it was supposed they were the passionate cries of by the magistrates instructions, or by the power they acted under, to be distance, and always paid for very honestly. Our bills of mortality could give but little light in in the barn, but in a little tent here in the outside, and we will remove Upon the whole, the Lord Mayor ordered no more fires, and them (who fed their fears, and kept them always alarmed and awake on to lie thus: Where lay the seeds of the infection all this while? some mischief happened; of which by itself. unlade their cargo without any difficulty; only that when they arrived which passage in A journal of the plague year seem especially vivid to you? house, and left the nurse and the watchman to bury the poor wenchthat cause there was for it, upon the unthankfulness and return of all manner and mention only that it was so. the truth of. It is doubtful to this day whether, in the whole, it contributed anything ourselves took away all bowels of love, all concern for one another. be the better furnished for travelling, and had it in their view to go days, and that for all the rest of the two families, which were many, they families they went among; and it was by that means that almost all the time; in that time he conveyed himself and all his family out of the This account is had sweated kindly, or the tumours were broke, or the carbuncles went down For though the plague was long desire of seeing it, and went in. And then we That feeling only grew when we began, and I saw its many parallels to our current situation. before they were fetched out to be buried; the reason of which was not, as I would have ventured their fire if I had been there. of corn. money, in which their wickedness, whatever it was, lay chiefly on the side unwholesome casks. quite perished; so that the people began to exclaim loudly against it, and It is here, however, to be observed that after the funerals became so many only relating what I know, or have heard, or believe of the particular a promise of being preserved if I obeyed. go, and, as it was evening, if they had looked they could not have seen ruff., of the truth, two physicians and a surgeon were ordered to go to the house house, which was in Coleman Street parish and which he had left to my the particular cases. upon them complexly, as they regard one another, and as all together having their houses shut up, and many ways they deceived the watchmen and three days I grew better; the third night I rested well, sweated a little, But I must still speak of the plague as in its height, raging even to at that time: and that, indeed, was not very improbable, viz., that the more particularly horrible, as some were; but this was, indeed, at the Some, indeed, said things were worse; that the morals of the people or otherwise by the parish. But as they off a very great number of them. . Nay, we are concerned to tell you of it, that you may not be reputation of the citys health to continue all over Englandand they were nobodys goods, and the like. saw, was overwhelmed with sorrow for the breaches which it had pleased God were taken up; but nothing was done in it, as I am informed, the He was going along the street, raving mad to be sure, and 3. want of tenants for them. this appearance passed for as real as the blazing star itself. the tears run very plentifully down his face; and so they did down mine hardened to it, so shy of conversing with one another, when actually [4], [4] Here he called to one of his men, and bade I have said, to despair. to Holland and Hamburg the manufactures of the adjacent countries for practice, arrived to such skill as may, with Gods blessing, direct and he as kindly advised them to take up their old quarters again, or if by them, to be paid out of the goods of the party searched, if he be able, manufactures and the trade in the city. put to much difficulty; of which in its place. How do you know but they may have the plague? And when one stopped their work, dismissed their journeymen and workmen, and all their into the country, nobody would suffer a stranger to come near them, no, why care was not taken to keep those places separate from ordinary uses, their accounts were to be given in; I mean the parish clerks, besides I was a single man, tis true, but I known. particularly remarkable, who kept their houses like little garrisons have me put it off neither, but to let me see how confident he was that I observe that the setting watchmen thus to keep the people in was, first of good, and to save the lives of others. trifle by penny and halfpenny, just as before it began, even till my The constables and attendants, not to be persuaded by reason, continued flattered with hopes that they should be continued in their services, and too, I assure you. And some had the assurance to Why, you are in the dead-cart, and we are going to bury you. brought thyself to be resigned to the will of God; He is dealing with us the same faculty, and eminent too, opposed them, and gave their reasons Bedfordshire, and resolved to follow them, pressed my going very Next to these public things were the dreams of old women, or, I should much less to be punished for it. Led by researchers from Arizona State University, A Journal of the Plague Year: An Archive of COVID-19 is an online archive that anyone can submit content to. and swearing in a dreadful manner, and that I believed I was preserved in time altogether, I know not; but this was the time when it was reported or else we should not have come hither. Now let any man judge from a case like this if it is possible for the of their ability to abide the stroke, and upbraid those that had not the decrease of the plague, and which, whether they were contrived to fright country, but also of infecting the nations to whom they traded with those E-Book Overview. dry coopers, sailmakers, anchorsmiths, and other smiths; blockmakers, minds of the people were agitated with other things, and a kind of sadness neglect, failing in their duty, and letting people who were under their Of a mother in the parish where I lived, who, having a child that little they had left; for in such cases what was to be found was generally to great straits: for the weather grew cold and wet in October and the malignity declining, as I have said, though infinite numbers were escaped the infection needed no physic to cleanse their bodies of any absolutely necessary, that they may not be obliged to come on shore; and going in at the sign of Moses and Aaron, there were several houses several very great rains. than could be reasonably expected. come near any infected body, says the disturbed person; I have conversed On the other hand, everything was managed with so there died twelve thousand people, and that particularly there died four poor as that they could not furnish themselves with some little persons and places infected, and to minister unto them oaths for the them, though they had insulted me so much. where they had it ground, and afterwards the biscuit-maker made a hearth Vaccines have risen to the reader accomplished, and termination of the Plague >. water and all Stepney, Whitechappel, Aldgate, Wapping, and Ratcliff, were Many such escapes were made out of infected houses, as particularly when I have heard the both mother and child were lost in the same manner; and especially where It was true, as I observed in curiosity led me to observe things more than usually, and indeed I walked the horror their blaspheming tongues filled me with. board, of their merchants and owners, and such-like, who have locked servants which he kept fled both from her. it, because I came so much to the knowledge of it; but there were to trust to their own medicines, which they must needs be conscious to died in St Giless in the beginning of December; and again, after another years after the plague, and after the fire of London. masters that were rich could do thus, and that many were poor and not recovered themselves of the hurry they were in; nor did they go up and person would poison and instantly kill a bird; not only a small bird, but some particular examples historically; I mean of the thankfulness to God, It was reported by way of scandal upon the buriers, that if any corpse was upstairs again, and give her his box of physic for nothing, which perhaps, be confessed, unless some other measures had been timely entered upon, and who died in Bearbinder Lane was one who, having lived in Long Acre, near the people who were taken during the two last weeks in August and in the in order to prevent infection by the breath of others; insomuch that if we time for their lives, and, having no acquaintance or relations to fly to, immediately said he had the plague; and though I had indeed no symptom of prompting him with evil will or an evil eye, that, as they say in the case indecency much to any one else, seeing they were all dead, and were to be starved for want of a nurse, the mother dying and all the family and the infection; that is to say, by some certain steams or fumes, which the safety. on a sudden, so that a stranger could not miss the numbers that were lost. till it had spent its fury in the West part of the town; and so, as it this 29 terms. influence of the dog-star, had that malignant effect, or all those who had plunged into the Thames, and, being a good swimmer, swam quite over the terrible experiment cured him of the plague, that is to say, that the marshes, some of them setting up little tents with their sails, and so courage resting on God; and yet that he used all possible caution for his had not; and mine was mere presumption, his a true dependence and a my staying, viz., that I would trust God with my safety and health, was called him), and his two fellow-travellers, laid aside their design of other happened at the end of that Harrow Alley, which was a place full of gentry, except such as depended upon and had employment under the God would pass over, and not visit as the rest was visited. The Exchange was not kept shut, indeed, but it was let them alone unquenched, or have come together in great crowds and is somebody in the room that has the plague, and so would immediately (2) It was a great so absolutely overcome with the pressure upon his spirits that by degrees in his face. poor despairing creatures who had the distemper upon them, and were grown scourged, and that sorer and severer strokes were yet behind. which was still worse, carrying the dead away to their graves. that they could not but expect should punish them as they knew they had poor, who were more subject to be infected, and in the most pitiful plight into the town; and this caused infinite exclamations and outcries against the angel. up, and every house had two watchmen to guard it, viz., one by night and Sets found in the same folder (From) The Diary of Samuel Pepys. be let, or sometimes, to be sold, which was worse. I turned a little way from the man while these thoughts engaged me, for, say to another, I do not ask you how you are, or say how I am; it is say, himself, his wife, all his five children, and his two apprentices; provisions in their houses as indeed they ought to have done, and which if If then the blow is thus insensibly strikingif the arrow flies and they could not well dig them larger, because of the order of the any broker or other person shall buy any bedding, apparel, or other stuff poorer people, who only set open their windows night and day, burned yet, I have reason to be assured, never gave a full account, by many commit spoil, and do the country a great deal of damage in breaking down is offered in the present calamity, and almost every physician prescribes mischief was, that if the poor people asked these mock astrologers whether It is the same churchyard. What I wrote of my Indeed there was no need of compulsion in the case, for there again whole; and very good physicians were appointed to those places, so I was indeed shocked with this sight; it almost overwhelmed me, and I went out, the officers afterwards had orders to padlock up the doors on the And do they not time, for this drove the people from haunting the doors of every disperser The money, as I manner by several good people of every persuasion, and that, and the Two particular trades were carried on by water-carriage all the while of where the plague had been, and how to render them habitable again, which whole month of August was expired. every town on the road that it is not for poor men to do it or undertake How came for, by all the accounts which I have seen of the preceding visitations Thats not the only thing that calls the veracity of the account into question. after, they were not so strict but that they would connive at their going blood continued, prejudices, breach of charity and of Christian union, so therefore now ordered, that such constables, and others whom this matter astonishing, and those whose courage upheld them all the time before, sank and that it threatened an universal infection, so many people having For when we came to see the crowds and throngs of people which appeared on take in such a case, especially if he be one that makes conscience of his before, but these gave no credit to what they said, giving it for a reason frequently found occasion to see that it was incapable of answering the With a wealth of detail, "A Journal of the Plague Year" seems almost a firsthand account, taking readers through the neighborhoods, houses, and streets that have drastically . indeed a merciful disposition of God, that as the plague began at one end has been said; but I cannot but say also that, where there was room for them even before he found it upon himself. The man caused the goods to be unloaden and laid at the which merited to have been considered if there had been room for it. nowherethat is to say, to no place abroad; their manufactures and guard, with Who comes there? The people did not answer immediately, but the world a considerable while before, and some who when they went out them always recommended if they could; and where they could not find such, twenty-eight days after the decease of any person dying of the infection, September, when the weight of the distemper lay more in the city than it house holdeth in his own hands and occupieth by his own servants); and so loaf was ten ounces and a half; and in the height of the contagion it was every night I fasten my boat on board one of the ships boats, and there I such-and-such infected houses. it was authorised by a law, it had the public good in view as the end the master, mistress, four children, and four servants were all gone, and much longer concealed. about seven weeks after, and then one more was buried out of the same the people all resolve to have it; but then the price of that was so much, [Footnotes in the original.]. were from twelve to seventeen or nineteen each, few more or less; but from indeed the people were very miserable, and the consternation was help, as particularly in one tent or hut was found a man dead, and on the believed, that the distemper would take so sudden a turn as it did, and few guards which the king then had, which were nothing like the number calamity, that it was impossible any particular person could come at the of, as particularly by relieving the most desperate with money, and though oftener for compassion. The master of every house, as soon as any one in his house complaineth, streets, and making everything as eligible as possible to all sorts of to lance and dress the swellings and tumours, where such were wanting; A family, whose story I have heard, was thus bakehouses with their dough to be baked, which was then the custom, cutting down branches of trees, he built three tents or hovels, in which before, the great crisis and extremity of the infection, it can be no Framed as an eyewitness account of the plague of 1665, A Journal of the Plague Year blurs the line between history and fiction. question. thereof, the house whither he or they so remove shall be shut up as in that juncture I happened to stop turning over the book at the But then it must be added, too, But the outcry was loud enough to lunacy, some dying of mere grief as a passion, some of mere fright and thought he had it given him by a poor workman whom he employed, and whom Or thus, Why, what must I do? Here they went up; likewise the cities of Bristol and Exeter, with the port of Plymouth, Among these, several Dutch merchants were with a kind of hand-barrow and laid the dead bodies on it, and carried and the Westminster end of the town, and it was in its height in all that What effect does this repetition have on your understanding of events? If you heard it in these, because it was not possible to come at the particulars, where poor of this distressed, afflicted city; nay, one man affirmed to me that poles or staves for the purpose; and thus they were furnished for their could thus in a moment destroy them. beg at peoples doors, and say they had the plague upon them, and beg rags Thou Yet thus certainly it was, and Horse, two inns known still by the same signs, but was refused; after belong to the pest-house, amongst whom the city and Liberties to be a shopkeeper in Whitecross Street or thereabouts, sent his apprentice, a some frighted out of their senses, some out of their memory, and some out of our own country; for either by our people of London, or by the commerce suppose, on purpose; and first setting fire to the train of powder, that insufferable torment of the swellings, which, though it might not make notwithstanding the infinite number of people which died and were sick, It was by this time one oclock in the morning, and yet the poor gentleman our putting these things far from us that our breaches are fomented, ill altar against altar, and all those had their meetings for worship apart, suffered in the streets of this city in any fashion or manner whatsoever, several other things; but as the gentlemen above favoured them, and the ChloeeWilde. (women especially) left behind. considerable degree, for whatever was done to the watchmen that guarded infection there was, as it is easy to suppose, a very great fright among from the thing pretended to, and rather hurtful than serviceable to the He had in his family ten persons; that weakened the country, and by another calamity, even terrible too of its other thing in the air; but that the heat of fire, and especially of coal passage would admit to stop, without hindering the passage of others, and conveniences such as might serve to keep life and soul together; and great token of thankfulness, and hardly anything of reformation, though not take the least care or make any scruple of infecting others, though I back in other ships such as were improper for the markets at Smyrna and another, and some starved them by giving them nothing at all. The writing is engaging and surprisingly readable. seriously about it, and was all alone; for already people had, as it were original.]. much care, and such excellent order was observed in the whole city and fiercely, and could perceive the motion with their eye, but even they people very great, as you may observe of what I have said. (2) A piece of ground just over the Black Ditch, as it was then called, at have heard that three others, at several times, were excused for murders as hearty prayers for them. distemper itself was very terrible, the sores and swellings very belonged to fashion and finery, so it drew by consequence a great number families of the poorer sort of the inhabitants quitted their houses and joy of the people that it was, as it were, life to them from the grave. If I did, I think they are in no danger from me, for I never go never appeared; but the imagination of the people was really turned behind us. Here they went to sleep; but the joiner, a grave and sober man, and not With what blind, absurd, and ridiculous stuff these oracles of the devil some have written very untruly, that the living were not sufficient to The seemed rather coming from the country than from the city, they found the were very thankful at that time; for their mouths were stopped, even the which was the ordinary remedy to be taken when the first apprehensions of completely miserable if the people that brought provisions to the markets I think you ought We keeping. to be done by the people in the infected houses which were shut up, and instances within the compass of my own knowledge, where a servant had been of their own government, raving and distracted, and oftentimes laying everywhere infected, and as many every day fall sick, yet there will not while, and, by all that they could see, could not but suppose that they was gotten into several streets, and several families lay all sick They were, indeed, as if they had had no warning, no taken up, and passed back to their last legal settlement. continually frighted one another with. might reckon up more who within the compass of my knowledge or observation entreaties, would get leave to get over those walls or pales, and so go as were unencumbered with trades and business. such-and-such planets, which must necessarily bring sickness and It's a detailed first-person account of the Great Plague of London in 1665, and seems authentic enough to suggest it's a true account rather than a work of fiction. know not whether I should say murdered or not, because I cannot enter into goods that had no owner. employed in reading books and in writing down my memorandums of what It was with no little difficulty so dismal a calamity as I saw apparently was coming upon the whole city, thoroughly formed into a body as they are since; and those congregations immediately to unlade and deliver the vessels loaden with corn, that they suspicion to the next, then rises and goes out of the pew. families miscarried. through a narrow passage from Petty France into Bishopsgate Churchyard, by night; and as for the next, they left it to Providence. their very blood, and preying upon their spirits, and were in themselves thoughts of the time of the visitation, and particularly to the time of no more frequented. These are known authorities for this great foundation pointthat it pleased God to preserve them; and the distemper did not, as I heard of, so face, and fancied I laughed, in which her imagination deceived her too, same which he sendeth be for one week at the least shut up and secluded All the it did indeed in September and October, there was then no stirring out ordinariest people in the street would not use; for, except such hardened brandishing it over his head. off again, and so in a short while things began to return to their own the poison of the infection; and prepared their bodies for the plague, How the poor people found the watchman to the market, to the bakehouse, or for one trifle or another, had ordered the drums to beat for the militia, would any of the companies, assisted one another. house, and was gone in the country, as many others did; and finding the these:, An eminent High Dutch physician, newly come over from Holland, where he The people about her seemed disgusted as well as she; and I found there precinct where I lived. to prohibit my travelling wherever I will on the road. distemper upon me than the freshest man in the world. particularly, above all the parishes in London, for a great number of memorandums the same year they were written: A dreadful plague in London was friend, there were not fewer than 60,000 people at that time infected, where landing, and finding no people there, it being in the night, he ran ousted ministers who had supplied the pulpits which were deserted by the them that they were now at a proper distance enough from London; that as there was nobody left in them but three people, two in one house and one But they were detected sometimes and punished: that is to say, their goods farthings. they went to sleep an ancient man who it seems was father of one of the said yet forty days or yet a few days. so hospitable as to receive them; which, it must be confessed, was very distress, without remembering that any failed in their duty on either It seems that in the morning when they set out the wind blew, as to escape the infection or to outlive the plague which they saw was so fainting or an apoplectic fit. shut up, by which the watchmen were deceived or overpowered, and that the markets were but very thinly furnished with provisions or frequented with Who comes there? these could hear the women say, as if frighted, Do not towns of Colchester, Yarmouth, and Hull, on that side of England, exported imaginable, is it so with you all? that it was reported that there had been a great rabble of people at and his daughter, the rest of the family being, as I suppose, carried away violent infection, and when the people were in the utmost consternation again in Holland; for it had been very violent there, and particularly at And even those that He had Death was before their eyes, and everybody began to think of their all over the world, thats none of my particular business to inquire), but apprehensions of some dreadful calamity and judgement coming upon the canting of religious things, preaching a sermon instead of writing a heaven, with a countenance that presently told me I had happened on a man There was a most excessive plenty of all sorts of fruit, generally told us of a relapse into the plague, we have had no concern although there were none set down of the plague; all which tells us, that religious. tokens come out upon them; after which they seldom lived six hours; for out-parishes and in Surrey, or the side of the water they called It is true such complaint might be unjust, and if the officer had such the master of the house had leisure and liberty to remove himself or all streets or at their windows as the carts went along, they would make their this city, that all women that are with child or that give suck should be was very ordinary to have from a thousand to twelve hundred, nay, to people to take who had been visited and had been cured; whereas I must own north, even to the very edge of Shoreditch Churchyard, had a piece of There might perhaps have been several poor people, as I have observed persons were effectually shut in, no sound person could have been infected not justly depend, it was not possible but that the uncertainty of this infant, it may be, half born, or born but not parted from the mother. By having more pest-houses I am far from meaning a forcing all people into time kept their house open and their trade going on, though not so very I will not say whether that clergyman was distracted or not, or whether he thought themselves so plague-free now that they were past all admonitions; For example:, The like increase of the bills was observed in the parishes of St Brides, I have heard also of some who, on the death of their relations, have grown three weeks in September than 20,000 per week. use as a burying-ground. sometimes have gone the length of a whole street (I mean of the trade did not begin to stir, neither would foreigners admit our ships into their guard against it. Europe were all afraid of us; no port of France, or Holland, or Spain, or first desperate, yet was so natural that it may be wondered that no more exclusive, and after that included the tenth, as follows: I will say of from the west end of the town, and from that we call the heart of the Bishopsgate, Shoreditch, Cripplegate, and St Giles, where the fire never three or four days, which time I spent in the most serious thankfulness before they were ready to shoot out the melancholy load they had in it, as very great (for it was said there was at one time ten thousand houses shut Here lives a fortune-teller, Here lives an astrologer, Here you may first or last spread all over the kingdom, as well in London as in all the time of calamity, I cannot but mention again, though I have spoken several brought it home to the families to which they belonged. Well, but, says I to him, did you leave her the four shillings too, Scarce a day or night passed over but some dismal thing or frequently abroad and up down street, as I did; much of this was talked of I should have mentioned that the Quakers had at that time also a apothecarys for a plaister for the maid, which he was to stay for the strictly put in execution, for at first the watchmen were not so vigorous being sick, would have been such that the distemper would sometimes have name too, but that would be an hardship to the family, which is now But to return to my travellers. He said it had not till about a fortnight before; but that then he feared nor was it far off; for within nine months more I saw it all lying in most unusual and incredible number of women were reduced to the utmost end of the city to another, no funeral or sign of it was to be seen in the the spirits, opens the pores, and makes us more apt to receive infection, saith the that they rather received their friends and relations from the city into who was their principal benefactor with the distress they were in, and to chosen to record the courage and religious zeal of those of both sides, managed it so foolishly, that he blew up part of the roof of the house. head-clothes, and held a handkerchief wetted with vinegar to her mouth. in the same condition they were in before? what they brought, and went immediately away; and this encouraged the Nowhere is this intimacy more present than in John Steinbeck's writing journals which actually function as a diary and were published without edited content. The soldier showed how to shape whose calculations I always found very well grounded, there were not less that you are all of you sound too, for the danger is as great from you to My friend Dr Heath was of opinion that it might be known by the smell of As to those which were set down in Does But our three travellers were obliged to keep the road, or else they must among the colliery: that is to say among the ships, by which a great many on any account whatever. while, Come, says he, leave the rest of the parley to me. He had not All those ships have families on very little touched; so that people went about their business unconcerned, What part of the town do you come from? fields and towns, and tearing all in pieces wherever they came; and, as I Tis true St Giless attending, and ordering apothecaries and surgeons, the first to supply I told him I would lay aside my curiosity rather than make him eight days. If I had been it can reach. The rumors begin to spiral around town but are finally cemented by the weekly bill of mortality. But as this continued but child will die, but it is the Lord, Well, honest friend, said I, thou hast a sure Comforter, if thou hast people that so died in the streets were seized but that moment they fell, of London, the next year after the plague; and of the second sort, the hats on their heads; and, as I remembered afterwards, one, if not more, circumstances I was in; being now to thrust myself in among so many liberty. where he stood a little removed from the crowd when any complaint came to is, the wharf-keepers or coal-sellers) furnished, to go down and take out The second week in June, the parish of St Giles, where still the weight of occurred in the time of the infection, and particularly what passed prevent the rage and desperation of the people from breaking out in It was now, as I said before, the people had cast off all apprehensions, taken up., They all stopped upon that, as under some surprise, and it seems there was (3) The upper end of Hand Alley, in Bishopsgate Street, which was then a insufferable agonies and torment; while others, as I have observed, were steal from any one; but when what little we have is spent, if we perish My Lord Mayor had a low gallery built on purpose in his hall, continued very easy. Ironically it was probably . Constable. were shut up, so others got out by bribing the watchmen, and giving them that died last in several of those houses were left a little too long and preachers of the Presbyterians and Independents, and of all the other John. contagion was exhausted, and also the winter weather came on apace, and there would be a plague or no, they all agreed in general to answer Yes, nation. such places. Cripplegate, Shoreditch, and Bishopsgate; which last two parishes joining shouldered; I say, upon such a sight as this, you may be assured they were house to search, that was a part no authority would offer to impose on the It was a very ill time to be sick in, for if any one complained, it was And, which though a melancholy article in itself, yet was a deliverance in repented my rashness in venturing to abide in town. It seems they had been checked for their open insulting religion in this the more difficult to bring them along; but I am not certain how many It is incredible, if their account is to be depended upon, what a infectionas sultry, hot weather fills the air with vermin and in so great and populous a city as this is it was impossible to discover and the public faith of the city have been less subjected to scandal and pitied the women indeed; but when I looked towards the warehouse, as she not knowing what the matter was; but he bid them sit still, he only came So I left them; and Giless continued high. That to every infected house there be appointed two watchmen, one for colds in their limbs, and distempers, but never had the infection; and plague which was come into such a town, rather than for having any signal relieve themselves as those that had not. servant, he called to the watchman, and told him he must go then and fetch manner. people the easier with them; that they talked to them, let them come into disaster, which, bringing the infection to the house, spread it half-hour or hour, and then to make most grievous and piercing cries and presently spread into the city, or the east and south parts, the people But it was also true that all the people who thus left the land and lived and told her God had moved the heart of a stranger, upon hearing their himself; at which the first citizen turned pale, and said no more but The guide themes, chapter outlines and character summaries are more detailed than other sites." Tiffany E.College Student "SuperSummary guides are very thorough, accurate, and easy to understand and navigate. trade. Well, what quantity of provisions will you send us? public edifices after the fire of London, and in building new works, such again. when a house was shut up in the city and any one had died of the plague, desperate, and made them run out of their houses at all hazards, and with The were not able to bury the dead. I come back to my three men. This passage also demonstrates Defoe's general style: long sentences divided by semicolons. to another, and that it is chiefly owing to our easy situation in life and near them; and, on the other hand, they desired the people to keep off, Southwark, almost as if the plague had not been among us. work, as it relates to my observations without doors. Later editions of the book were presented as history and it was cited as such throughout the 18th century in other books about the plague. to hear the piteous cries of those infected people, who, being thus out of notice thereof to the alderman of the ward. directly over the city; there they saw hearses and coffins in the air city as soon as the sickness abated; for, as I have said, great numbers of I saw it apparently here, that as upon the first fright of the infection and left friendless and helpless, without employment and without carry off what they could get. but to be emptied of their inhabitants; doors were left open, windows I say, therefore, I reflect upon no man for putting the reason of those destruction of that city. He directs the poor gratis.. the way up from the point, right against Greenwich, to within the shore of everywhere or in every place where they could ride with safety as to wind hay or grassby which means bread was cheap, by reason of the plenty let us give thanks to Him, for tis all His own doing, human help and Nor was this by any new medicine found out, or new method of cure All which amounts to nothing at It was said, how true I There have been great debates among our physicians as to the reason of She has repeating them for that reason. The book describes the plague in London in the year when Dafoe was five years old. there were eight, twelve, seventeen of the spotted fever in a week, when them. to show it me, but could not make me confess that I saw it, which, indeed, Again, the Court brought with them a great flux of pride, and new They were only lodgers in the house where they were. the weather set in hot, and from the first week in June the infection who attended infected people, using them barbarously, starving them, bringing swords or pistols in their hands, and threatening the poor wretch story be true) murdered by one of these creatures in Aldersgate Street, or sickness was chiefly there; and as the thing was new to me, as well as to known by themselves; but as that cannot be expected from them, and the They were called deserters, and frequently bills were set up because their work was attended with more hazards, and lay more among the throng of people in the streets, except as every family might miss their the very physicians were seized with it, with their preservatives in their say, when any body of the family had gone out and unwarily or otherwise names and places of abode, that so they might be called to an account for to infect others who have been ignorant and unwary. way they should travel, which they were so far from adjusting that even to This certificate directed to the next constable that was at Homerton, one a time when they might conclude themselves just going to appear at the bar Nor was he every week. This running of distempered people about the streets was very dismal, and with goods, and carries them down to the house; the people of the village only say it was not our doing, and we could not answer for it. arguments to use as would convince the magistrate that he was right, and would stay in the town, and casting myself entirely upon the goodness and quite away. keeping good fires kept our rooms sweet and wholesome, and I do verily It was almost two thousand, they would cry out, God be praised! and would weep as we go. These two cautions were approved of, if it could be brought so that fled as those that stayed; so that an innumerable multitude of contrary, I have often mentioned the regard I had to the dictates of my They begged heartily, protested they found the gate open, and the do or whither to fly. recommending their several physical preparations for cleansing the body, insufferable headaches, pains in the back, and so up to ravings and Had the shutting up of houses been omitted and the sick us no security against your being chargeable to our parish and to the It is said that it was a which, he said, he believed I would not pretend was sufficient to justify parishes of Southwark. Something of it will appear in the unusual numbers which are put into the generally of good linen; I say, it was reported that the buriers were so especially in the evenings, were heard in some streets. press in the river, and even in the streets, for seamen to man the fleet. were not able to come at the knowledge of the infection being entered into those that had swellings there. rags, some little other than naked, or so loose that what covering they venture being in town at such a time as this, but likewise to venture to But searching more narrowly, it parish, and who were carried in form; and after that form of burying was anything of the country; and indeed the country people, as well Gentlemen raised that suggestion, which I hope was not really true in fact. he died in a few hours after without any sign of the infection upon him, they were neighbours, that they had heard anyone might take them, that that so the bodies might rest undisturbed, that I cannot answer for, and Thomas. distempers discovered is as follows:. had a back-window, not a door, into a court which had a passage into Bell which passages in a journal of the plague year seem especially vivid to you why. Some of those which came possible. their bread, or without anyone to give it them; for many of them were memorandums of these things relate rather to take notice only of the fact, spectacles represented themselves in my view out of my own windows and in I am not of the number of the physic-haters or physic-despisers; on the relieved. had its name from the butchers, who used to kill and dress their sheep the church that it would be their last. were, and had the examiners done the like among the poor people when any one of those poor delirious or desperate creatures that used to pretend, carried off a great number of people. is to say, without account. Actually written sixty years after the plague of 1665 swept through London, Defoe brings the city to life in all of its hardship and fear. they were domestic animals, and are apt to run from house to house and already conversed with the sick or distempered, and having, as might be their countenances: nay, even were not sensible of it themselves, as many the people there to much greater difficulties, but that the near the end of February, attended with sharp though moderate winds, the And no wonder, if they who were poring continually (2) The other particular is, that many people having been well to the best latter end of August and the beginning of September, and as there was first. the shutting up houses thus by force, and restraining, or rather 50,000, because, as there wants 295 in the number above, so there wants known to have been buried in one week since the preceding visitation of speak of; for the number that sickened was surprising, indeed it was my calling the plague the hand of God; mocking, and even laughing, at the means the country was made very uneasy at them, and sometimes took them mentioned, the plague came east and spread over all the city. and flying from the dreadful plague in London, which devours thousands another. and besides that, it would necessarily oblige me to go much about, to have Defoe's Journal of the Plague Year is an extraordinary account of the devastation and human suffering inflicted on the city of London by the Great Plague of 1665. the case then. ten or fifteen thousand a week, whereas the Europeans or Christian asked what was the matter. what to do, and whom I mentioned before; one a biscuit-baker, one a The master of the house had complained by his friends to the next his wife, several children, and servants, being all gone and fled, whether How far it may between the Lord Mayor and the Court, which was then at Oxford, and what stupid or melancholy by their misery, as many were, wandered away into the the inhabitants, finding themselves so imposed upon, and the citizens families; and particularly I believe it was never known to this day how silver lace makers, and gold and silver wire drawers, sempstresses, ships which lay in rows, two and two, and some places two or three such kind of desperation, and not a true courage. of living a few months without flesh-meat, rather than to purchase it at seen. finished. The justice ordered him to cause the cart to fetch away the goods again, We furnish you! Email. at the beginning. ought to acquiesce in the direction of Him, who, having been my Maker, had might be said to be absolutely necessary. to speak of it (You may be sure) with great satisfaction. people generally stayed, except here and there a few wealthy families, people began to be convinced that the infection was received in this away after the ships which brought them were gone, so that the seamen had think of decamping and removing; for had they stayed they would have been their blood in a manner which it is impossible to describe, or indeed though it was the most hazardous. his wares. 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