Ford. Blessed be God that some do escape, though it is but few;
what may be our portion still we know not, but hitherto we are
preserved.
Richard. What part of the town do you come from? Was the plague
come to the places where you lived?
Ford. Ay, ay, in a most frightful and terrible manner, or else we had
not fled away as we do; but we believe there will be very few left
alive behind us.
Richard. What part do you come from?
Ford. We are most of us of Cripplegate parish, only two or three of
Clerkenwell parish, but on the hither side.
Richard. How then was it that you came away no sooner?
Ford. We have been away some time, and kept together as well as
we could at the hither end of Islington, where we got leave to lie in an
old uninhabited house, and had some bedding and conveniences of
our own that we brought with us; but the plague is come up into
Islington too, and a house next door to our poor dwelling was infected
and shut up; and we are come away in a fright.
Richard. And what way are you going?
Ford. As our lot shall cast us; we know not whither, but God will
guide those that look up to Him.
They parleyed no further at that time, but came all up to the barn,
and with some difficulty got into it. There was nothing but hay in the
barn, but it was almost full of that, and they accommodated
themselves as well as they could, and went to rest; but our travellers
observed that before they went to sleep an ancient man who it seems
was father of one of the women, went to prayer with all the company,
recommending themselves to the blessing and direction of
Providence, before they went to sleep.
It was soon day at that time of the year, and as Richard the joiner
had kept guard the first part of the night, so John the soldier relieved
him, and he had the post in the morning, and they began to be
acquainted with one another. It seems when they left Islington they
intended to have gone north, away to Highgate, but were stopped at
Holloway, and there they would not let them pass; so they crossed
over the fields and hills to the eastward, and came out at the Boarded
River, and so avoiding the towns, they left Hornsey on the left hand
and Newington on the right hand, and came into the great road about
Stamford Hill on that side, as the three travellers had done on the
other side. And now they had thoughts of going over the river in the
marshes, and make forwards to Epping Forest, where they hoped they
should get leave to rest. It seems they were not poor, at least not so
poor as to be in want; at least they had enough to subsist them
moderately for two or three months, when, as they said, they were in
hopes the cold weather would check the infection, or at least the
violence of it would have spent itself, and would abate, if it were only
for want of people left alive to he infected.
This was much the fate of our three travellers, only that they seemed
to be the better furnished for travelling, and had it in their view to go
farther off; for as to the first, they did not propose to go farther than
one day’s journey, that so they might have intelligence every two or
three days how things were at London.
But here our travellers found themselves under an unexpected
inconvenience: namely that of their horse, for by means of the horse to
carry their baggage they were obliged to keep in the road, whereas the
people of this other band went over the fields or roads, path or no
path, way or no way, as they pleased; neither had they any occasion to
pass through any town, or come near any town, other than to buy such
things as they wanted for their necessary subsistence, and in that
indeed they were put to much difficulty; of which in its place.