and took them from them. One of them, who, I confess, did not look
like a thief – ‘Indeed,’ says she, ‘we are wrong, but we were told they
were goods that had no owner. Be pleased to take them again; and
look yonder, there are more such customers as we.’ She cried and
looked pitifully, so I took the hats from her and opened the gate, and
bade them be gone, for I pitied the women indeed; but when I looked
towards the warehouse, as she directed, there were six or seven more,
all women, fitting themselves with hats as unconcerned and quiet as if
they had been at a hatter’s shop buying for their money.
I was surprised, not at the sight of so many thieves only, but at the
circumstances I was in; being now to thrust myself in among so many
people, who for some weeks had been so shy of myself that if I met
anybody in the street I would cross the way from them.
They were equally surprised, though on another account. They all
told me they were neighbours, that they had heard anyone might take
them, that they were nobody’s goods, and the like. I talked big to
them at first, went back to the gate and took out the key, so that they
were all my prisoners, threatened to lock them all into the warehouse,
and go and fetch my Lord Mayor’s officers for them.
They begged heartily, protested they found the gate open, and the
warehouse door open; and that it had no doubt been broken open by
some who expected to find goods of greater value: which indeed was
reasonable to believe, because the lock was broke, and a padlock that
hung to the door on the outside also loose, and not abundance of the
hats carried away.
At length I considered that this was not a time to be cruel and
rigorous; and besides that, it would necessarily oblige me to go much
about, to have several people come to me, and I go to several whose
circumstances of health I knew nothing of; and that even at this time
the plague was so high as that there died 4000 a week; so that in
showing my resentment, or even in seeking justice for my brother’s
goods, I might lose my own life; so I contented myself with taking the
names and places where some of them lived, who were really inhabitants
in the neighbourhood, and threatening that my brother should call them
to an account for it when he returned to his habitation.
Then I talked a little upon another foot with them, and asked them
how they could do such things as these in a time of such general
calamity, and, as it were, in the face of God’s most dreadful
judgements, when the plague was at their very doors, and, it may be,
in their very houses, and they did not know but that the dead-cart
might stop at their doors in a few hours to carry them to their graves.
I could not perceive that my discourse made much impression upon
them all that while, till it happened that there came two men of the
neighbourhood, hearing of the disturbance, and knowing my brother,
for they had been both dependents upon his family, and they came to
my assistance. These being, as I said, neighbours, presently knew
three of the women and told me who they were and where they lived;
and it seems they had given me a true account of themselves before.
This brings these two men to a further remembrance. The name of
one was John Hayward, who was at that time undersexton of the
parish of St Stephen, Coleman Street. By undersexton was
understood at that time gravedigger and bearer of the dead. This man
carried, or assisted to carry, all the dead to their graves which were
buried in that large parish, and who were carried in form; and after
that form of burying was stopped, went with the dead-cart and the bell
to fetch the dead bodies from the houses where they lay, and fetched
many of them out of the chambers and houses; for the parish was, and