mentioned, the plague came east and spread over all the city. It was
indeed a merciful disposition of God, that as the plague began at one
end of the town first (as has been observed at large) so it proceeded
progressively to other parts, and did not come on this way, or
eastward, till it had spent its fury in the West part of the town; and so,
as it came on one way, it abated another. For example, it began at St
Giles’s and the Westminster end of the town, and it was in its height in
all that part by about the middle of July, viz., in St Giles-in-the-Fields,
St Andrew’s, Holborn, St Clement Danes, St Martin-in-the-Fields, and
in Westminster. The latter end of July it decreased in those parishes;
and coming east, it increased prodigiously in Cripplegate, St
Sepulcher’s, St James’s, Clarkenwell, and St Bride’s and Aldersgate.
While it was in all these parishes, the city and all the parishes of the
Southwark side of the water and all Stepney, Whitechappel, Aldgate,
Wapping, and Ratcliff, were very little touched; so that people went
about their business unconcerned, carried on their trades, kept open
their shops, and conversed freely with one another in all the city, the
east and north-east suburbs, and in Southwark, almost as if the plague
had not been among us.
Even when the north and north-west suburbs were fully infected,
viz., Cripplegate, Clarkenwell, Bishopsgate, and Shoreditch, yet still
all the rest were tolerably well. For example from 25th July to 1st
August the bill stood thus of all diseases: –
St Giles, Cripplegate 554
St Sepulchers 250
Clarkenwell 103
Bishopsgate 116
Shoreditch 110
Stepney parish 127
Aldgate 92
Whitechappel 104
All the ninety-seven parishes within the walls 228
All the parishes in Southwark 205
—–
Total 1889
So that, in short, there died more that week in the two parishes of
Cripplegate and St Sepulcher by forty-eight than in all the city, all the
east suburbs, and all the Southwark parishes put together. This caused
the reputation of the city’s health to continue all over England – and
especially in the counties and markets adjacent, from whence our
supply of provisions chiefly came even much longer than that health
itself continued; for when the people came into the streets from the
country by Shoreditch and Bishopsgate, or by Old Street and
Smithfield, they would see the out-streets empty and the houses and
shops shut, and the few people that were stirring there walk in the
middle of the streets. But when they came within the city, there
things looked better, and the markets and shops were open, and the
people walking about the streets as usual, though not quite so many;
and this continued till the latter end of August and the beginning of
September.
But then the case altered quite; the distemper abated in the west and
north-west parishes, and the weight of the infection lay on the city and
the eastern suburbs, and the Southwark side, and this in a frightful
manner.
Then, indeed, the city began to look dismal, shops to be shut, and the
streets desolate. In the High Street, indeed, necessity made people stir
abroad on many occasions; and there would be in the middle of the
day a pretty many people, but in the mornings and evenings scarce any
to be seen, even there, no, not in Cornhill and Cheapside.
These observations of mine were abundantly confirmed by the
weekly bills of mortality for those weeks, an abstract of which, as they
respect the parishes which. I have mentioned and as they make the
calculations I speak of very evident, take as
follows.
The weekly bill, which makes out this decrease of the burials in the
west and north side of the city, stands thus – –
From the 12th of September to the 19th –
St Giles, Cripplegate 456
St Giles-in-the-Fields 140
Clarkenwell 77
St Sepulcher 214
St Leonard, Shoreditch 183
Stepney parish 716
Aldgate 623
Whitechappel 532
In the ninety-seven parishes within the walls 1493
In the eight parishes on Southwark side 1636
—–
Total 6060
Here is a strange change of things indeed, and a sad change it was;