by Daniel Defoe
buried by heaps;that is to say, without account. And if I might believe some people whowere more abroad and more conversant with those things than I (though Iwas public enough for one that had no more business to do than Ihad),--I say, if we may believe them, there was not many less buriedthose first three weeks in September than twenty thousand per week.However the others aver the truth of it, yet I rather choose to keep tothe public account. Seven or eight thousand per week is enough to makegood all that I have said of the terror of those times; and it is muchto the satisfaction of me that write, as well as those that read, to beable to say that everything is set down with moderation, and ratherwithin compass than beyond it.
Upon all these accounts, I say, I could wish, when we were recovered,our conduct had been more distinguished for charity and kindness, inremembrance of the past calamity, and not so much in valuing ourselvesupon our boldness in staying; as if all men were cowards that fly fromthe hand of God, or that those who stay do not sometimes owe theircourage to their ignorance, and despising the hand of their Maker, whichis a criminal kind of desperation, and not a true courage.
I cannot but leave it upon record, that the civil officers, such asconstables, headboroughs, lord mayor's and sheriff's men, also parishofficers, whose business it was to take charge of the poor, did theirduties, in general, with as much courage as any, and perhaps with more;because their work was attended with more hazards, and lay more amongthe poor, who were more subject to be infected, and in the most pitifulplight when they were taken with the infection. But then it must beadded, too, that a great number of them died; indeed, it was scarcelypossible it should be otherwise.
I have not said one word here about the physic or preparations that wereordinarily made use of on this terrible occasion (I mean we thatfrequently went abroad up and down the streets, as I did). Much of thiswas talked of in the books and bills of our quack doctors, of whom Ihave said enough already. It may, however, be added, that the College ofPhysicians were daily publishing several preparations, which they hadconsidered of in the process of their practice; and which, being to behad in print, I avoid repeating them for that reason.
One thing I could not help observing,--what befell one of the quacks,who published that he had a most excellent preservative against theplague, which whoever kept about them should never be infected, orliable to infection. This man, who, we may reasonably suppose, did notgo abroad without some of this excellent preservative in his pocket, yetwas taken by the distemper, and carried off in two or three days.
I am not of the number of the physic haters or physic despisers (on thecontrary, I have often mentioned the regard I had to the dictates of myparticular friend Dr. Heath); but yet I must acknowledge I made use oflittle or nothing, except, as I have observed, to keep a preparation ofstrong scent, to have ready in case I met with anything of offensivesmells, or went too near any burying place or dead body.
Neither did I do, what I know some did, keep the spirits high and hotwith cordials and wine, and such things, and which, as I observed, onelearned physician used himself so much to, as that he could not leavethem off when the infection was quite gone, and so became a sot for allhis life after.
I remember my friend the doctor used to say that there was a certain setof drugs and preparations which were all certainly good and useful inthe case of an infection, out of which or with which physicians mightmake an infinite variety of medicines, as the ringers of bells makeseveral hundred different rounds of music by the changing and order ofsound but in six bells; and that all these preparations shall[340] bereally very good. "Therefore," said he, "I do not wonder that so vast athrong of medicines is offered in the present calamity, and almost everyphysician prescribes or prepares a different thing, as his judgment orexperience guides him; but," says my friend, "let all the prescriptionsof all the physicians in London be examined, and it will be found thatthey are all compounded of the same things, with such variations only asthe particular fancy of the doctor leads him to; so that," says he,"every man, judging a little of his own constitution and manner of hisliving, and circumstances of his being infected, may direct his ownmedicines out of the ordinary drugs and preparations. Only that," sayshe, "some recommend one thing as most sovereign, and some another.Some," says he, "think that Pill. Ruff., which is called itself theantipestilential pill, is the best preparation that can be made; othersthink that Venice treacle[341] is sufficient of itself to resist thecontagion; and I," says he, "think as both these think, viz., that thefirst is good to take beforehand to prevent it, and the last, iftouched, to expel it." According to this opinion, I several times tookVenice treacle, and a sound sweat upon it, and thought myself as wellfortified against the infection as any one could be fortified by thepower of physic.
As for quackery and mountebank, of which the town was so full, Ilistened to none of them, and observed often since, with some wonder,that for two years after the plague I scarcely ever heard one of themabout the town. Some fancied they were all swept away in the infectionto a man, and were for calling it a particular mark of God's vengeanceupon them for leading the poor people into the pit of destruction merelyfor the lucre of a little money they got by them; but I cannot go thatlength, neither. That abundance of them died is certain (many of themcame within the reach of my own knowledge); but that all of them wereswept off, I much question. I believe, rather, they fled into thecountry, and tried their practices upon the people there, who were inapprehension of the infection before it came among them.
This, however, is certain, not a man of them appeared for a great whilein or about London. There were indeed several doctors who publishedbills recommending their several physical preparations for cleansing thebody, as they call it, after the plague, and needful, as they said, forsuch people to take who had been visited and had been cured; whereas, Imust own, I believe that it was the opinion of the most eminentphysicians of that time, that the plague was itself a sufficient purge,and that those who escaped the infection needed no physic to cleansetheir bodies of any other things (the running sores, the tumors, etc.,which were broken and kept open by the direction of the physicians,having sufficiently cleansed them); and that all other distempers, andcauses of distempers, were effectually carried off that way. And as thephysicians gave this as their opinion wherever they came, the quacks gotlittle business.
There were indeed several little hurries which happened after thedecrease of the plague, and which, whether they were contrived to frightand disorder the people, as some imagined, I cannot say; but sometimeswe were told the plague would return by such a time; and the famousSolomon Eagle, the naked Quaker I have mentioned, prophesied eviltidings every day, and several others, telling us that London had notbeen sufficiently scourged, and the sorer and severer strokes were yetbehind. Had they stopped there, or had they descended to particulars,and told us that the city should be the next year destroyed by fire,then, indeed, when we had seen it come to pass, we should not have beento blame to have paid more than common respect to their propheticspirits (at least, we should have wondered at them, and have been moreserious in our inquiries after the meaning of it, and whence they hadthe foreknowledge); but as they generally told us of a relapse into theplague, we have had no concern since that about them. Yet by thosefrequent clamors we were all kept with some kind of apprehensionsconstantly upon us; and if any died suddenly, or if the spotted feversat any time increased, we were presently alarmed; much more if thenumber of the plague increased, for to the end of the year there werealways between two and three hundred[342] of the plague. On any of theseoccasions, I say, we were alarmed anew.
Those who remember the city of London before the fire must remember thatthere was then no such place as that we now call Newgate Market; but inthe middle of the street, which is now called Blow Bladder Street, andwhich had its name from the butchers, who used to kill and dress theirsheep there (and who, it seems, had a custom to blow up their meat withpipes, to make it look thicker and fatter than it was, and were punishedthere for it by the lord ma
yor),--I say, from the end of the streettowards Newgate there stood two long rows of shambles for theselling[343] meat.
It was in those shambles that two persons falling down dead as they werebuying meat, gave rise to a rumor that the meat was all infected; whichthough it might affright the people, and spoiled the market for two orthree days, yet it appeared plainly afterwards that there was nothing oftruth in the suggestion: but nobody can account for the possession offear when it takes hold of the mind. However, it pleased God, by thecontinuing of the winter weather, so to restore the health of the city,that by February following we reckoned the distemper quite ceased, andthen we were not easily frighted again.
There was still a question among the learned, and[344] at firstperplexed the people a little; and that was, in what manner to purge thehouses and goods where the plague had been, and how to render them[345]habitable again which had