History of the Plague in London by Daniel Defoe
objects that appeared among us every day,--thedreadful extravagances which the distraction of sick people drove theminto; how the streets began now to be fuller of frightful objects, andfamilies to be made even a terror to themselves. But after I have toldyou, as I have above, that one man being tied in his bed, and finding noother way to deliver himself, set the bed on fire with his candle (whichunhappily stood within his reach), and burned himself in bed; and howanother, by the insufferable torment he bore, danced and sung naked inthe streets, not knowing one ecstasy[248] from another,--I say, after Ihave mentioned these things, what can be added more? What can be said torepresent the misery of these times more lively to the reader, or togive him a perfect idea of a more complicated distress?
I must acknowledge that this time was so terrible that I was sometimesat the end of all my resolutions, and that I had not the courage that Ihad at the beginning. As the extremity brought other people abroad, itdrove me home; and, except having made my voyage down to Blackwall andGreenwich, as I have related, which was an excursion, I kept afterwardsvery much within doors, as I had for about a fortnight before. I havesaid already that I repented several times that I had ventured to stayin town, and had not gone away with my brother and his family; but itwas too late for that now. And after I had retreated and staid withindoors a good while before my impatience led me abroad, then they calledme, as I have said, to an ugly and dangerous office, which brought meout again; but as that was expired, while the height of the distemperlasted I retired again, and continued close ten or twelve days more,during which many dismal spectacles represented themselves in myview,[249] out of my own windows, and in our own street, as thatparticularly, from Harrow Alley, of the poor outrageous creature whodanced and sung in his agony; and many others there were. Scarce a dayor a night passed over but some dismal thing or other happened at theend of that Harrow Alley, which was a place full of poor people, most ofthem belonging to the butchers, or to employments depending upon thebutchery.
Sometimes heaps and throngs of people would burst out of the alley, mostof them women, making a dreadful clamor, mixed or compounded ofscreeches, cryings, and calling one another, that we could not conceivewhat to make of it. Almost all the dead part of the night,[250] the deadcart stood at the end of that alley; for if it went in, it could notwell turn again, and could go in but a little way. There, I say, itstood to receive dead bodies; and, as the churchyard was but a littleway off, if it went away full, it would soon be back again. It isimpossible to describe the most horrible cries and noise the poor peoplewould make at their bringing the dead bodies of their children andfriends out to the cart; and, by the number, one would have thoughtthere had been none left behind, or that there were people enough for asmall city living in those places. Several times they cried murder,sometimes fire; but it was easy to perceive that it was all distractionand the complaints of distressed and distempered people.
I believe it was everywhere thus at that time, for the plague raged forsix or seven weeks beyond all that I have expressed, and came even tosuch a height, that, in the extremity, they began to break into thatexcellent order of which I have spoken so much in behalf of themagistrates, namely, that no dead bodies were seen in the streets, orburials in the daytime; for there was a necessity in this extremity tobear with its being otherwise for a little while.
One thing I cannot omit here, and indeed I thought it was extraordinary,at least it seemed a remarkable hand of divine justice; viz., that allthe predictors, astrologers, fortune tellers, and what they calledcunning men, conjurers, and the like, calculators of nativities, anddreamers of dreams, and such people, were gone and vanished; not one ofthem was to be found. I am verily persuaded that a great number of themfell in the heat of the calamity, having ventured to stay upon theprospect of getting great estates; and indeed their gain was but toogreat for a time, through the madness and folly of the people: but nowthey were silent; many of them went to their long home, not able toforetell their own fate, or to calculate their own nativities. Some havebeen critical enough to say[251] that every one of them died. I dare notaffirm that; but this I must own, that I never heard of one of them thatever appeared after the calamity was over.
But to return to my particular observations during this dreadful partof the visitation. I am now come, as I have said, to the month ofSeptember, which was the most dreadful of its kind, I believe, that everLondon saw; for, by all the accounts which I have seen of the precedingvisitations which have been in London, nothing has been like it, thenumber in the weekly bill amounting to almost forty thousands from the22d of August to the 26th of September, being but five weeks. Theparticulars of the bills are as follows: viz.,--
Aug. 22 to Aug. 29 7,496 Aug. 29 to Sept. 5 8,252 Sept. 5 to Sept. 12 7,690 Sept. 12 to Sept. 19 8,297 Sept. 19 to Sept. 26 6,460 ------ 38,195
This was a prodigious number of itself; but if I should add the reasonswhich I have to believe that this account was deficient, and howdeficient it was, you would with me make no scruple to believe thatthere died above ten thousand a week for all those weeks, one week withanother, and a proportion for several weeks, both before and after. Theconfusion among the people, especially within the city, at that time wasinexpressible. The terror was so great at last, that the courage of thepeople appointed to carry away the dead began to fail them; nay, severalof them died, although they had the distemper before, and wererecovered; and some of them dropped down when they have been carryingthe bodies even at the pitside, and just ready to throw them in. Andthis confusion was greater in the city, because they had flatteredthemselves with hopes of escaping, and thought the bitterness of deathwas past. One cart, they told us, going up Shoreditch, was forsaken bythe drivers, or, being left to one man to drive, he died in the street;and the horses, going on, overthrew the cart, and left the bodies, somethrown here, some there, in a dismal manner. Another cart was, it seems,found in the great pit in Finsbury Fields, the driver being dead, orhaving been gone and abandoned it; and the horses running too near it,the cart fell in, and drew the horses in also. It was suggested that thedriver was thrown in with it, and that the cart fell upon him, by reasonhis whip was seen to be in the pit among the bodies; but that, Isuppose, could not be certain.
In our parish of Aldgate the dead carts were several times, as I haveheard, found standing at the churchyard gate full of dead bodies, butneither bellman, or driver, or any one else, with it. Neither in theseor many other cases did they know what bodies they had in their cart,for sometimes they were let down with ropes out of balconies and out ofwindows, and sometimes the bearers brought them to the cart, sometimesother people; nor, as the men themselves said, did they troublethemselves to keep any account of the numbers.
The vigilance of the magistrate was now put to the utmost trial, and, itmust be confessed, can never be enough acknowledged on this occasion;also, whatever expense or trouble they were at, two things were neverneglected in the city or suburbs either:--
1. Provisions were always to be had in full plenty, and the price notmuch raised neither, hardly worth speaking.
2. No dead bodies lay unburied or uncovered; and if any one walked fromone end of the city to another, no funeral, or sign of it, was to beseen in the daytime, except a little, as I have said, in the first threeweeks in September.
This last article, perhaps, will hardly be believed when some accountswhich others have published since that shall be seen, wherein they saythat the dead lay unburied, which I am sure was utterly false; at least,if it had been anywhere so, it must have been in houses where the livingwere gone from the dead, having found means, as I have observed, toescape, and where no notice was given to the officers. All which amountsto nothing at all in the case in hand; for this I am positive in, havingmyself been employed a little in the direction of that part of theparish in which I lived, and where as great a desolation was made, inproportion to the number of the inhabitants, as was anywhere. I
say, Iam sure that there were no dead bodies remained unburied; that is tosay, none that the proper officers knew of, none for want of people tocarry them off, and buriers to put them into the ground and cover them.And this is sufficient to the argument; for what might lie in houses andholes, as in Moses and Aaron Alley, is nothing, for it is most certainthey were buried as soon as they were found. As to the first article,namely, of provisions, the scarcity or dearness, though I have mentionedit before, and shall speak of it again, yet I must observe here.
1. The price of bread in particular was not much raised; for in thebeginning of the year, viz., in the first week in March, the pennywheaten loaf was ten ounces and a half, and in the height of thecontagion it was to be had at nine ounces and a half, and never dearer,no, not all that season; and about the beginning of November it was soldat ten ounces and a half again, the like of which, I believe, was neverheard of, in any city under so dreadful a visitation, before.
2. Neither
I must acknowledge that this time was so terrible that I was sometimesat the end of all my resolutions, and that I had not the courage that Ihad at the beginning. As the extremity brought other people abroad, itdrove me home; and, except having made my voyage down to Blackwall andGreenwich, as I have related, which was an excursion, I kept afterwardsvery much within doors, as I had for about a fortnight before. I havesaid already that I repented several times that I had ventured to stayin town, and had not gone away with my brother and his family; but itwas too late for that now. And after I had retreated and staid withindoors a good while before my impatience led me abroad, then they calledme, as I have said, to an ugly and dangerous office, which brought meout again; but as that was expired, while the height of the distemperlasted I retired again, and continued close ten or twelve days more,during which many dismal spectacles represented themselves in myview,[249] out of my own windows, and in our own street, as thatparticularly, from Harrow Alley, of the poor outrageous creature whodanced and sung in his agony; and many others there were. Scarce a dayor a night passed over but some dismal thing or other happened at theend of that Harrow Alley, which was a place full of poor people, most ofthem belonging to the butchers, or to employments depending upon thebutchery.
Sometimes heaps and throngs of people would burst out of the alley, mostof them women, making a dreadful clamor, mixed or compounded ofscreeches, cryings, and calling one another, that we could not conceivewhat to make of it. Almost all the dead part of the night,[250] the deadcart stood at the end of that alley; for if it went in, it could notwell turn again, and could go in but a little way. There, I say, itstood to receive dead bodies; and, as the churchyard was but a littleway off, if it went away full, it would soon be back again. It isimpossible to describe the most horrible cries and noise the poor peoplewould make at their bringing the dead bodies of their children andfriends out to the cart; and, by the number, one would have thoughtthere had been none left behind, or that there were people enough for asmall city living in those places. Several times they cried murder,sometimes fire; but it was easy to perceive that it was all distractionand the complaints of distressed and distempered people.
I believe it was everywhere thus at that time, for the plague raged forsix or seven weeks beyond all that I have expressed, and came even tosuch a height, that, in the extremity, they began to break into thatexcellent order of which I have spoken so much in behalf of themagistrates, namely, that no dead bodies were seen in the streets, orburials in the daytime; for there was a necessity in this extremity tobear with its being otherwise for a little while.
One thing I cannot omit here, and indeed I thought it was extraordinary,at least it seemed a remarkable hand of divine justice; viz., that allthe predictors, astrologers, fortune tellers, and what they calledcunning men, conjurers, and the like, calculators of nativities, anddreamers of dreams, and such people, were gone and vanished; not one ofthem was to be found. I am verily persuaded that a great number of themfell in the heat of the calamity, having ventured to stay upon theprospect of getting great estates; and indeed their gain was but toogreat for a time, through the madness and folly of the people: but nowthey were silent; many of them went to their long home, not able toforetell their own fate, or to calculate their own nativities. Some havebeen critical enough to say[251] that every one of them died. I dare notaffirm that; but this I must own, that I never heard of one of them thatever appeared after the calamity was over.
But to return to my particular observations during this dreadful partof the visitation. I am now come, as I have said, to the month ofSeptember, which was the most dreadful of its kind, I believe, that everLondon saw; for, by all the accounts which I have seen of the precedingvisitations which have been in London, nothing has been like it, thenumber in the weekly bill amounting to almost forty thousands from the22d of August to the 26th of September, being but five weeks. Theparticulars of the bills are as follows: viz.,--
Aug. 22 to Aug. 29 7,496 Aug. 29 to Sept. 5 8,252 Sept. 5 to Sept. 12 7,690 Sept. 12 to Sept. 19 8,297 Sept. 19 to Sept. 26 6,460 ------ 38,195
This was a prodigious number of itself; but if I should add the reasonswhich I have to believe that this account was deficient, and howdeficient it was, you would with me make no scruple to believe thatthere died above ten thousand a week for all those weeks, one week withanother, and a proportion for several weeks, both before and after. Theconfusion among the people, especially within the city, at that time wasinexpressible. The terror was so great at last, that the courage of thepeople appointed to carry away the dead began to fail them; nay, severalof them died, although they had the distemper before, and wererecovered; and some of them dropped down when they have been carryingthe bodies even at the pitside, and just ready to throw them in. Andthis confusion was greater in the city, because they had flatteredthemselves with hopes of escaping, and thought the bitterness of deathwas past. One cart, they told us, going up Shoreditch, was forsaken bythe drivers, or, being left to one man to drive, he died in the street;and the horses, going on, overthrew the cart, and left the bodies, somethrown here, some there, in a dismal manner. Another cart was, it seems,found in the great pit in Finsbury Fields, the driver being dead, orhaving been gone and abandoned it; and the horses running too near it,the cart fell in, and drew the horses in also. It was suggested that thedriver was thrown in with it, and that the cart fell upon him, by reasonhis whip was seen to be in the pit among the bodies; but that, Isuppose, could not be certain.
In our parish of Aldgate the dead carts were several times, as I haveheard, found standing at the churchyard gate full of dead bodies, butneither bellman, or driver, or any one else, with it. Neither in theseor many other cases did they know what bodies they had in their cart,for sometimes they were let down with ropes out of balconies and out ofwindows, and sometimes the bearers brought them to the cart, sometimesother people; nor, as the men themselves said, did they troublethemselves to keep any account of the numbers.
The vigilance of the magistrate was now put to the utmost trial, and, itmust be confessed, can never be enough acknowledged on this occasion;also, whatever expense or trouble they were at, two things were neverneglected in the city or suburbs either:--
1. Provisions were always to be had in full plenty, and the price notmuch raised neither, hardly worth speaking.
2. No dead bodies lay unburied or uncovered; and if any one walked fromone end of the city to another, no funeral, or sign of it, was to beseen in the daytime, except a little, as I have said, in the first threeweeks in September.
This last article, perhaps, will hardly be believed when some accountswhich others have published since that shall be seen, wherein they saythat the dead lay unburied, which I am sure was utterly false; at least,if it had been anywhere so, it must have been in houses where the livingwere gone from the dead, having found means, as I have observed, toescape, and where no notice was given to the officers. All which amountsto nothing at all in the case in hand; for this I am positive in, havingmyself been employed a little in the direction of that part of theparish in which I lived, and where as great a desolation was made, inproportion to the number of the inhabitants, as was anywhere. I
1. The price of bread in particular was not much raised; for in thebeginning of the year, viz., in the first week in March, the pennywheaten loaf was ten ounces and a half, and in the height of thecontagion it was to be had at nine ounces and a half, and never dearer,no, not all that season; and about the beginning of November it was soldat ten ounces and a half again, the like of which, I believe, was neverheard of, in any city under so dreadful a visitation, before.
2. Neither