the plague in all Stepney parish, and not one on the south side of
Whitechappel Road, no, not in any parish; and yet the weekly bill was
that very week risen up to 1006.
It was a fortnight after this before the two brothers met again, and
then the case was a little altered, and the’ plague was exceedingly
advanced and the number greatly increased; the bill was up at 2785,
and prodigiously increasing, though still both sides of the river, as
below, kept pretty well. But some began to die in Redriff, and about
five or six in Ratdiff Highway, when the sailmaker came to his
brother John express, and in some fright; for he was absolutely
warned out of his lodging, and had only a week to provide himself.
His brother John was in as bad a case, for he was quite out, and had
only begged leave of his master, the biscuit-maker, to lodge in an
outhouse belonging to his workhouse, where he only lay upon straw,
with some biscuit-sacks, or bread-sacks, as they called them, laid
upon it, and some of the same sacks to cover him.
Here they resolved (seeing all employment being at an end, and no
work or wages to be had), they would make the best of their way to
get out of the reach of the dreadful infection, and, being as good
husbands as they could, would endeavour to live upon what they had
as long as it would last, and then work for more if they could get work
anywhere, of any kind, let it be what it would.
While they were considering to put this resolution in practice in the
best manner they could, the third man, who was acquainted very well
with the sailmaker, came to know of the design, and got leave to be
one of the number; and thus they prepared to set out.
It happened that they had not an equal share of money; but as the
sailmaker, who had the best stock, was, besides his being lame, the
most unfit to expect to get anything by working in the country, so he
was content that what money they had should all go into one public stock,
on condition that whatever any one of them could gain more than another,
it should without any grudging be all added to the public stock.
They resolved to load themselves with as little baggage as possible
because they resolved at first to travel on foot, and to go a great way
that they might, if possible, be effectually safe; and a great many
consultations they had with themselves before they could agree about
what way they should travel, which they were so far from adjusting
that even to the morning they set out they were not resolved on it.
At last the seaman put in a hint that determined it. ‘First,’ says he,
‘the weather is very hot, and therefore I am for travelling north, that
we may not have the sun upon our faces and beating on our breasts,
which will heat and suffocate us; and I have been told’, says he, ‘that it
is not good to overheat our blood at a time when, for aught we know,
the infection may be in the very air. In the next place,’ says he, ‘I am
for going the way that may be contrary to the wind, as it may blow
when we set out, that we may not have the wind blow the air of the
city on our backs as we go.’ These two cautions were approved of, if it
could be brought so to hit that the wind might not be in the south
when they set out to go north.
John the baker, who bad been a soldier, then put in his opinion.
‘First,’ says he, ‘we none of us expect to get any lodging on the road,
and it will be a little too hard to lie just in the open air. Though it be
warm weather, yet it may be wet and damp, and we have a double
reason to take care of our healths at such a time as this; and therefore,’