conscience of breaking in upon the orphan’s money to show charity to
the distressed citizens than the managers in the following years did to
beautify the city and re-edify the buildings; though, in the first case,
the losers would have thought their fortunes better bestowed, and the
public faith of the city have been less subjected to scandal and reproach.
It must be acknowledged that the absent citizens, who, though they
were fled for safety into the country, were yet greatly interested in the
welfare of those whom they left behind, forgot not to contribute
liberally to the relief of the poor, and large sums were also collected
among trading towns in the remotest parts of England; and, as I have
heard also, the nobility and the gentry in all parts of England took the
deplorable condition of the city into their consideration, and sent up
large sums of money in charity to the Lord Mayor and magistrates for
the relief of the poor. The king also, as I was told, ordered a thousand
pounds a week to be distributed in four parts: one quarter to the city
and liberty of Westminster; one quarter or part among the inhabitants
of the Southwark side of the water; one quarter to the liberty and parts
within of the city, exclusive of the city within the walls; and one-
fourth part to the suburbs in the county of Middlesex, and the east and
north parts of the city. But this latter I only speak of as a report.
Certain it is, the greatest part of the poor or families who formerly
lived by their labour, or by retail trade, lived now on charity; and had
there not been prodigious sums of money given by charitable, well-
minded Christians for the support of such, the city could never have
subsisted. There were, no question, accounts kept of their charity, and
of the just distribution of it by the magistrates. But as such multitudes
of those very officers died through whose hands it was distributed,
and also that, as I have been told, most of the accounts of those things
were lost in the great fire which happened in the very next year, and
which burnt even the chamberlain’s office and many of their papers,
so I could never come at the particular account, which I used great
endeavours to have seen.
It may, however, be a direction in case of the approach of a like
visitation, which God keep the city from; – I say, it may be of use to
observe that by the care of the Lord Mayor and aldermen at that time
in distributing weekly great sums of money for relief of the poor, a
multitude of people who would otherwise have perished, were
relieved, and their lives preserved. And here let me enter into a brief
state of the case of the poor at that time, and what way apprehended
from them, from whence may be judged hereafter what may be
expected if the like distress should come upon the city.
At the beginning of the plague, when there was now no more hope
but that the whole city would be visited; when, as I have said, all that
had friends or estates in the country retired with their families;
and when, indeed, one would have thought the very city itself was
running out of the gates, and that there would be nobody left behind;
you may be sure from that hour all trade, except such as related to
immediate subsistence, was, as it were, at a full stop.
This is so lively a case, and contains in it so much of the real
condition of the people, that I think I cannot be too particular in it,
and therefore I descend to the several arrangements or classes of
people who fell into immediate distress upon this occasion. For example:
1. All master-workmen in manufactures, especially such as belonged
to ornament and the less necessary parts of the people’s dress, clothes,
and furniture for houses, such as riband-weavers and other weavers,
gold and silver lace makers, and gold and silver wire drawers,
sempstresses, milliners, shoemakers, hatmakers, and glovemakers;
also upholsterers, joiners, cabinet-makers, looking-glass makers, and