and one of them went up to the window and looked into the room,
where he saw a woman lying dead upon the floor in a dismal manner,
having no clothes on her but her shift. But though he called aloud,
and putting in his long staff, knocked hard on the floor, yet nobody
stirred or answered; neither could he hear any noise in the house.
He came down again upon this, and acquainted his fellow, who
went up also; and finding it just so, they resolved to acquaint either
the Lord Mayor or some other magistrate of it, but did not offer to go
in at the window. The magistrate, it seems, upon the information of
the two men, ordered the house to be broke open, a constable and
other persons being appointed to be present, that nothing might be
plundered; and accordingly it was so done, when nobody was found in
the house but that young woman, who having been infected and past
recovery, the rest had left her to die by herself, and were every one
gone, having found some way to delude the watchman, and to get
open the door, or get out at some back-door, or over the tops of the
houses, so that he knew nothing of it; and as to those cries and shrieks
which he heard, it was supposed they were the passionate cries of the
family at the bitter parting, which, to be sure, it was to them all, this
being the sister to the mistress of the family. The man of the house,
his wife, several children, and servants, being all gone and fled,
whether sick or sound, that I could never learn; nor, indeed, did I
make much inquiry after it.
Many such escapes were made out of infected houses, as
particularly when the watchman was sent of some errand; for it was
his business to go of any errand that the family sent him of; that is to
say, for necessaries, such as food and physic; to fetch physicians, if
they would come, or surgeons, or nurses, or to order the dead-cart, and
the like; but with this condition, too, that when he went he was to lock
up the outer door of the house and take the key away with him, To
evade this, and cheat the watchmen, people got two or three keys
made to their locks, or they found ways to unscrew the locks such as
were screwed on, and so take off the lock, being in the inside of the
house, and while they sent away the watchman to the market, to the
bakehouse, or for one trifle or another, open the door and go out as
often as they pleased. But this being found out, the officers
afterwards had orders to padlock up the doors on the outside, and
place bolts on them as they thought fit.
At another house, as I was informed, in the street next within
Aldgate, a whole family was shut up and locked in because the maid-
servant was taken sick. The master of the house had complained by
his friends to the next alderman and to the Lord Mayor, and had
consented to have the maid carried to the pest-house, but was refused;
so the door was marked with a red cross, a padlock on the outside, as
above, and a watchman set to keep the door, according to public order.
After the master of the house found there was no remedy, but that
he, his wife, and his children were to be locked up with this poor
distempered servant, he called to the watchman, and told him he must
go then and fetch a nurse for them to attend this poor girl, for that it
would be certain death to them all to oblige them to nurse her; and
told him plainly that if he would not do this, the maid must perish
either of the distemper or be starved for want of food, for he was
resolved none of his family should go near her; and she lay in the
garret four storey high, where she could not cry out, or call to anybody
for help.