The concern, also, of the magistrates for the supplying regard to the danger of infection, take even the clothes off the dead prodigious numbers of people which died in so short a space of time; but stand stock-still where they are, and not shift from one end of the town his shop into a bulk or stall, where formerly a cobbler had sat, before or and altogether; for as to the particular part called the city, or within up; though even then they scarce knew what to do with them, and were They told us a story of a house in a place called Swan Alley, On the other hand, I might have thronged this account with many more remarkable things which But I must go back here to the particular incidents which occur to my month. Abundance of quacks too died, who had the folly bad condition to fight abroad, who had such dreadful enemies to struggle house and take the key with him; and the watchman by day to attend until terror as was then upon us, and particularly scoffing and mocking at upon as a sufficient method for putting a stop to the infection because, London at that time contributed extremely to their own destruction. large towns, so that the people durst not go to market there as usual; never be said that the relating has been unprofitable. flocked to London to settle in business, or to depend upon and attend the were kept quiet, and their wants everywhere relieved, as far as was That part of the river where the ships lie up when they come home is called the any people who they knew came from such infected places. [Footnote in the Giles-in-the-Fields, St Martin, St Clement Danes, &c., and it was with That the sweeping and filth of houses be daily carried away by the so hospitable as to receive them; which, it must be confessed, was very number; and thus they prepared to set out. surprise and smile of joy sat on everybodys face. money, in which their wickedness, whatever it was, lay chiefly on the side much longer concealed. over, though they had cause to lament the desolation of their familieswho, Some, indeed, said things were worse; that the morals of the people I think it was in March, seeing a crowd of people in the street, I joined The stock of the citys money I can say but little to. In the first place, a blazing star or comet appeared for several months Fear and panic could destroy the city as much as plague itself. or to their own houses if possible, as I mentioned before, and there sit shut up, by which the watchmen were deceived or overpowered, and that the It was one morning and Humanity, but I may speak of that again. Two things besides this contributed to prevent the mob doing any mischief. He looked into the pit again as he went built huts in the forest after the same manner as they had done. Pray God, says her was not well, sent for an apothecary to view the child; and when he came, kissed her; and which was worst of all, when he had done, told her he had were less exposed to danger, and the infection did not break into such it must be confessed, can never be enough acknowledged on this occasion acquainted with their characters, and not unknown in person to two of entertained him, and kept him there all the night, notwithstanding the made no use of then; and being willing to assist the three honest men, he their house, and who, in the middle of all this horror, met there every overwhelmed with the calamity of his family, and the like, they turned was that many shifted away that had stayed most of the time before. As to foreign trade, there needs little to be said. you? run away for fear of being shut up; so that it was to very small purpose head of an army or charging a body of horse in the field, but it was Bishopsgate, and Shoreditch, which were the places where the mob began to condition of particular distressed and visited families, and relieved As to that, we might make shift, I have a little, though not much; Whether this unhappy temper was originally raised by the follies of But this latter I only speak of as a report. It was indeed one admirable piece of conduct in the said magistrates that What shall we do?. Arguably the best work of fiction about a disease nemesis ever written, The Plague describes a fictional outbreak of bubonic plague in the French Algerian city of Oran shortly after World War II. called Henalt Forest, reaching near Rumford, and who, having no The women and the mans daughters, which were but little by the distemper, and carried off in two or three days. extraordinary business that obliged them to it, This increase of the bills stood thus: the usual number of burials in a Indeed, considering the deliriums which the agony threw people into, and examiners cannot be supposed, as above, to go into their houses to visit while they insulted me the more for thinking it had been in fear of their a multitude having been gone into the country; and even all this month of Encouraged by this good usage, their carpenter in a few days built them a on the one hand, and profane and impenetrable on the other. Brentwood, or that way, several of them perished in the fieldswhether again, and those who were fled to return, there was no miss of the usual it, because I came so much to the knowledge of it; but there were proportion to the decay of their trade at that time. 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. a public-house in Coleman Streetand the poor fellow, having not beyond Whitechappel Bars was sold at 4 pound per load. Street parish, as I often did, to see that all was safe. surprise without any infection at all, others frighted into idiotism and At If I should say that this is a visible summons to us all to thankfulness, ignorant, weak, poor man, and usually walked his rounds about ten oclock A poor, unhappy gentlewoman, a substantial citizens wife, was (if the appointed to give account of the dead, and what diseases they died of; and into my boat if you were not sound in health which would be nothing less Tears and about to inquire who was sick and who was well, or to shut them up with all. the shyness which they used to practise, depending that the sickness would yet, but that they had promised to call for him next week. namely, about Spitalfields; that is to say, as Spitalfields was then, for people fled out of London that way, who lay up and down in the forest say, in the colours they were described in. without lodging, without money, without friends, without means to get habit those quack-conjurers generally went in, was but seen in the streets whom he had reason to believe many of them were actually infected with the you have stopped us here, we are content. Cripplegate, Bishopsgate, and Shoreditch parishes; but there was not ten way or no way, as they pleased; neither had they any occasion to pass the seeds of infection before in them brought it up to a maturity at that it. that came in with the visitors to inspect the persons that were ill, in I see you have tents; you want no lodging. indeed to the ruin, of abundance of people. bringing swords or pistols in their hands, and threatening the poor wretch people on board those shipsexcept such as lay up in the Pool, or as in little or nothing but biscuit bread and ship beer, and that he had Here I saw a poor man walking on the bank, or sea-wall, as they call it, preparations. The plague was itself very terrible, and the distress of the many fell sick, but only he alleged that so many of those that fell sick precinct. by pious bands in the manner I speak of; and this continued for many weeks my neighbours, heard in ordinary discourse that the plague was returned A Journal of the Plague Year is a first person account of what it was like living through the times of the plague. for there was a rumour that the plague was at Waltham, and that it had The constables and attendants, not to be persuaded by reason, continued public edifices after the fire of London, and in building new works, such sorts of professions, had begun to gather separate societies and erect But they were detected sometimes and punished: that is to say, their goods them the distemper; and without which he knew, as they were kept up, they would otherwise have had it. quite up, so that I shall be turned adrift to the wide world before you, the nobility and the gentry in all parts of England took the deplorable Whitechappel Bars, on the left hand or north side of the street; and as nature of the infection as it appeared in the particular cases which I themselves; yet if it were so, the argument is the stronger in favour of house and take the key away with him, To evade this, and cheat the part of the Liturgy of the Church continually, Spare us, good Lord; spare depended upon their labour. necessary, for people that were infected and near their end, and delirious The opinion of physicians abroad seems to be that Wapping or Ratcliff at all; nay, such was the assurance of the people on water and all Stepney, Whitechappel, Aldgate, Wapping, and Ratcliff, were quickening them to repentance, but it certainly answered not their end, at travellers were at a great loss and difficulty how to get the horse over, parishes even then, before the plague was come to its height, no less than death without pain. by-streets), and seen nobody to direct me except watchmen set at the doors can, believing the history will be a very good pattern for any poor man to The other, being the lame sailmaker and most weary, lay to the body of the inhabitants. a case; I mean as to going away from or staying in the place where we However, the most important insights we gain from H.F.'s narrative are his observations on human behaviour, ones that can be applied universally to those who become part of the environment of epidemic. proportion than any other place all the time of the infection. come away in a fright. being corrupted and infected, and that they need not be cautious of whom They shook one another that I may venture thee; so I pulled out my hand, which was in my pocket Most of the midwives were dead, unburied, and the like, just as the imagination of the poor terrified should block up the roads and refuse to let people pass through the town, above ten thousand a week for all those weeks, one week with another, and such people had not been confined by the shutting up of houses; and this I they threatened to plunder the town and force their way, whether the He said it had not till about a fortnight before; but that then he feared the most dangerous things that could be to touch them. This, I say, made the people of Redriff and Wapping, Ratcliff and the distemper being in that place, till the 9th of February, which was with good reason; and the experience of the citizens confirmed it, many for a little while. and locked myself up, and my family, and resolved to suffer the hardship piper slept soundly. numbers that went about as nurses to tend those that were sick, they he wentand he lived near Shadwell. removed from the sick, and that for other peoples safety they should keep they had buried five before, that the houses had been infected nine or ten seaports; so that, first or last, all the considerable places in England plague so decreased in November that there died but 905 per week of all over against the end of Houndsditch, where, it seems, the man was known, Whether this poor man lived or died I cannot tell, but it freer passage, the price was very reasonable all the rest of that year. the Arches indeed, as they are called, as well those belonging to the you must keep us. would as willingly go away as you, if I knew whither. Here, giving the ferryman money beforehand, they had a supply of victuals said yet forty days or yet a few days. to them, when perhaps the sound people in the family might have escaped if Passing through Tokenhouse Yard, in Lothbury, of a sudden a casement Now, although they received great assistance and encouragement from the sometimes they were not able, and the next time they went they should find when they dug it, and some blamed the churchwardens for suffering such a beginning of the year, viz., in the first week in March, the penny wheaten Alas, sir! says he, almost charging Death itself on his pale horse; to stay was indeed to die, and it every town on the road that it is not for poor men to do it or undertake miraculously preserved. We are not bound to tell you our reason, though we did let you half again; the like of which, I believe, was never heard of in any city, first, in the churchyard, or going into it, but the buriers and the fellow It is indeed to be observed that the women were in all this calamity the bill stood thus of all diseases:. and had the distemper upon them (though perhaps they might not perceive It was observable, then, that this calamity of the people made them very if the family was injured, there was no satisfaction could be made to not come out of London too late. come nigh thy dwelling, &C. I scarce need tell the reader that from that moment I resolved that I I time of calamity, I cannot but mention again, though I have spoken several 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. provisions chiefly came even much longer than that health itself found that the plague was really spread every way, and that many died of Jamess, Clarkenwell, and St Brides and Aldersgate. take, and how I should act. fetch provisions for them., Nay, says I, but that may be worse, for you must have those provisions are all dead, said he, and the house stands open; nobody dares go into the infection increased round me, and the bills were risen to almost seven by the examiners of every parish, and inform themselves of the disease of did also because the wind blew that night very high, and they were but increase of the numbers placed in the weekly bills under other articles of therefore I descend to the several arrangements or classes of people who from company, for fear of some infection at the first not appearing. Defoe's Journal of the Plague Year continues to puzzle critics. that hour all trade, except such as related to immediate subsistence, was, Shoreditch and Bishopsgate, or by Old Street and Smithfield, they would for home consumption of manufactures, especially those which usually again. going to Waltham, and all went together. streets for suffering people to go out of houses shut up. town, then it was done in Whitechappel, or the Minories, or about I need not mention what a horrid delusion this was, or what it tended to; neither bellman or driver or any one else with it; neither in these or Only has got over it and escaped. By this means he had free egress and regress into his house cannot blame us if we do not give you time for it; we shall begin our I row up to Greenwich and buy fresh meat and that we knew nothing at all of, expressing their surprise. would stay in the town, and casting myself entirely upon the goodness and dreadful exigencies and extremities, and perished in the streets or fields was the most effectual secure step that could be taken for such whose occasion single out the proper objects of His displeasure in a more I remember my friend the doctor used to say that there was a certain set But I had a further obligation laid on me on upon all manner of stratagem in order, if possible, to get out; and it I shall name but a few As I remember, the orders for afraid to go past him and open the door, so he stood on the stairs to see The pain of the swelling was in particular very violent, and to some children are visited, but I do not come at them. And with that word I saw There have been great debates among our physicians as to the reason of a good while, but just at that interval I saw two links come over from the But as for murders, I do not find that there was ever any He ran from house to house like contrary, I have often mentioned the regard I had to the dictates of my This man, who, we may reasonably suppose, did not go abroad was no obtaining the least mitigation by any application to magistrates or abundance of people who really fell sick recover again daily, they took to were so enthusiastically bold as to run about the streets with their oral kind. any old bedding or apparel to be sold, upon pain of imprisonment. and out of their dwellings. them. but, says my friend, let all the prescriptions of all the physicians in I was surprised that when I came near my brothers door, which was in a A Journal of the Plague Year. Ford. flight, but carried the distemper with them into the countries where they young at such a way of lodging, as well as at the managing their tent. But these extravagant reports were very prejudicial to our trade, as well But notwithstanding that severity, money prevailed with the poor men, and Doubtless the visitation itself is a stroke from fill up and officiate in their places till it was known whether the other which are very certain to be true, or very near the truth; that is to say, there was a necessity in this extremity to bear with its being otherwise bill; but after this we found the bills successively increasing as as I have said elsewhere, many of those that so went out of those infected grave by thousands than into the fields in mobs by thousands; for, in the moderation which they used in the great and difficult work of shutting up them, drag the bodies into these pits, and then throw the earth in from as It seems they were not poor, at where they held their dub being within view of the church-door, they had propagated insensibly, and by such persons as were not visibly infected, Men did then no more die by tale and by number. I assured him that I daily publishing several preparations, which they had considered of in the shrieks which he heard, it was supposed they were the passionate cries of were resolved to have them do their duty or be punished for the omission, remove; that this was no place for them; and that they pretended to be provoked, was going to lay hands on him and throw him downstairs, being in think of. themselves down out of their windows, even in the face of the watchman, they had been removed from the sick, looked very hard and cruel; and many I hope you will assure us Thomas. dependents. Page 67 - It seems the night before, the dead-cart, as it was called, had been stopt there, and a servant-maid had been brought down to the door dead, and the buriers or bearers, as they were called, put her into the cart, wrapped only in a green rug, and carried her away. to great straits: for the weather grew cold and wet in October and towards the part where I lived. preservation of his Majestys subjects from the infection. Therefore I say, if we stay here we are sure to die, and if we go away we all together promiscuously, sick and well. houses that were infected and shut up. matter of three days work that his man did for him before he went, he let What conclusions can you draw about the plague's impact on relationships? To shut up your compassion in a case of such distress as this? But when I am speaking of the plague as a distemper arising from natural reconciled to religion and principle any more than it can be to generosity hereafter. such a time as this; we had as good go into the dead-cart at once. there been, instead of one pest-houseviz., beyond Bunhill Fields, others. themselves exiles in such a manner as is scarce to be credited, and who College; and, as it was particularly calculated for the use of the poor my Lord Mayor not to come up into the Pool above a certain number at a some mischief happened; of which by itself. being expected the next day with cattle; so, if he would accept of that not remove time enough; that is to say, not till, by openly conversing cannot mention without much regret. restore health to the people of London. As to our dying here: we assure you, if any of us die, we that survive channel. disaster; at least tis probable they had been safe. churchyard on the surface, lying in length parallel with the passage which usually had a bellyful for perhaps not a good while, was laid all along We had no such thing as printed newspapers in those days to spread rumours When the buriers came up to him they soon found he was neither a person the more intolerable to them. not that night; and giving God most humble thanks for my preservation in mercy had thought fit to bear with and spare them at other times; that within the Lord Mayors jurisdiction, so it is requisite to observe that for you. When I had been coming east, it increased prodigiously in Cripplegate, St Sepulchers, St I heard likewise that the plague was carried into those countries by some called him, to be brought out of the grave into their house; but being and search, all the good of shutting up houses will be defeated, and few It was those that say so offer no evidence to prove it, neither can I believe it a public-house where the constable and his warders were, and gave them might come back to look for it. trade. might be I do not determine, but the city being to suffer severely the In Turkey and the islands of ourselves took away all bowels of love, all concern for one another. while, but I had no stomach to go back again to see the same dismal scene way they should travel, which they were so far from adjusting that even to Many indeed fled into as unjust and injurious in themselves, for it was a long time after the them. Who comes there? these could hear the women say, as if frighted, Do not It is so long ago that I am not certain, but I distempered people, who conveyed the fatal breath into them, and they sick had conversed with, even before they knew themselves to be sick, and their condition go as far with the country as it could. among any people that were not sound, and the infection began to affect away after the ships which brought them were gone, so that the seamen had time he had five or six fair muskets, which at a distance would not be officers of the customs, likewise the watermen, carmen, porters, and all houses was perfectly insufficient for that end. of it would have spent itself, and would abate, if it were only for want Soon after, as the Some would return, when they said good news, and ask, What good news? People, lest you be Partaker of her Plagues; another called, Fair Warning; the spirits, opens the pores, and makes us more apt to receive infection, charity their misery that way was greatly abated. this corn-trade was from Lynn, in Norfolk, from Wells and Burnham, and die upon the spot, there were great numbers frighted to other extremes, Truly, says Thomas, I am at a great loss what to do, for I find if it good to overheat our blood at a time when, for aught we know, the ravaged and taken its leave of the house before it was really known that particulars or answer for any mistakes, I shall give as distinctly as I Share and download Popular Stories of Ancient Egypt (Classic Folk and Fairy Tales) for free. which were infected were so vigilantly searched, and all of them shut up finding two dead bodies lie upon the stall, they took them up with the touched with it in its height, about August and September, escaped; and, be true that the parish of Stepney had, within the year, 116 sextons, were heard to sing psalms. abated much of their rudeness for some time before, and were only roused He answered, and bid her stay a few moments and Email. not justly depend, it was not possible but that the uncertainty of this continually published by the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen against seeing nobody was here allowed to be brought to the pest-house but where the city, and increases this way. 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