A Journal of the Plague Year

by Daniel Defoe

  An antient Gentlewoman having practised, with great Success, in the late Plague in this City, Anno 1636, gives her advice only to the Female Sex. To be spoke with, &c.

  An experienc’d Physician, who has long studied the Doctrine of Antidotes against all Sorts of Poison and Infection, has after 40 Years Practise, arrived to such Skill, as may, with God’s Blessing, direct Persons how to prevent their being touch’d by any Contagious Distemper whatsoever. He directs the Poor gratis.

  I take notice of these by way of Specimen: I could give you two or three Dozen of the like, and yet have abundance left behind. ’Tis sufficient from these to apprise any one, of the Humour of those Times; and how a Set of Thieves and Pick-pockets, not only robb’d and cheated the poor People of their Money, but poisoned their Bodies with odious and fatal preparations; some with Mercury,* and some with other things as bad, perfectly remote from the Thing pretended to; and rather hurtful than servicable to the Body in case an Infection followed.

  I cannot omit a Subtilty of one of those Quack-operators, with which he gull’d the poor People to croud about him, but did nothing for them without Money. He had it seems, added to his Bills, which he gave about the Streets, this Advertisement in Capital Letters, (viz.) He gives Advice to the Poor for nothing.

  Abundance of poor People came to him accordingly, to whom he made a great many fine Speeches; examin’d them of the State of their Health, and of the Constitution of their Bodies, and told them many good things for them to do, which were of no great Moment: But the Issue and Conclusion of all was, that he had a preparation, which if they took such a Quantity of, every Morning, he would pawn his Life, they should never have the Plague, no, tho’ they lived in the House with People that were infected: This made the People all resolve to have it; But then the Price of that was so much, I think ’twas half a Crown: But, Sir, says one poor Woman, I am a poor Alms-Woman, and am kept by the Parish, and your Bills say, you give the Poor your help for nothing. Ay, good Woman, says the Docter, so I do, as I publish’d there. I give my Advice to the Poor for nothing; but not my Physick. Alas, Sir! says she, that is a Snare laid for the Poor then; for you give them your Advice for nothing, that is to say, you advise them gratis, to buy your Physick for their Money; so does every Shop-keeper with his Wares. Here the Woman began to give him ill Words, and stood at his Door all that Day, telling her Tale to all the People that came, till the Doctor finding she turn’d away his Customers, was oblig’d to call her up Stairs again, and give her his Box of Physick for nothing, which, perhaps too was good for nothing when she had it.

  But to return to the people, whose Confusions fitted them to be impos’d upon by all Sorts of Pretenders, and by every Mountebank. There is no doubt, but these quacking Sort of Fellows rais’d great gains out of the miserable People; for we daily found, the Crouds that ran after them were infinitely greater, and their Doors were more thronged than those of Dr. Brooks, Dr. Upton, Dr. Hodges, Dr. Berwick,* or any, tho’ the most famous Men of the Time: And I was told, that some of them got five Pound a Day by their Physick.

  But there was still another Madness beyond all this, which may serve to give an Idea of the distracted humour of the poor People at that Time; and this was their following a worse Sort of Deceivers than any of these; for these petty Thieves only deluded them to pick their Pockets, and get their Money; in which their Wickedness, whatever it was, lay chiefly on the Side of the Deceiver’s deceiving, not upon the Deceived: But in this Part I am going to mention, it lay chiefly in the People deceiv’d, or equally in both; and this was in wearing Charms, Philters, Exorcisms, Amulets,* and I know not what Preparations, to fortify the Body with them against the Plague; as if the Plague was not the Hand of God, but a kind of a Possession of an evil Spirit; and that it was to be kept off with Crossings, Signs of the Zodiac, Papers tied up with so many Knots; and certain Words, or Figures written on them, as particularly the Word Abracadabra,* form’d in Triangle, or Pyramid, thus.

  I might spend a great deal of Time in my Exclamations against the Follies, and indeed Wickedness of those things, in a Time of such Danger, in a matter of such Consequences as this, of a National Infection, But my Memorandums of these things relate rather to take notice only of the Fact, and mention that it was so: How the poor People found the Insufficiency of those things, and how many of them were afterwards carried away in the Dead-Carts,* and thrown into the common Graves of every Parish, with these hellish Charms and Trumpery hanging about their Necks, remains to be spoken of as we go along.

  All this was the Effect of the Hurry the People were in, after the first Notion of the Plague being at hand was among them: And which may be said to be from about Michaelmas 1664, but more particularly after the two Men died in St. Giles’s, in the Beginning of December. And again, after another Alarm in February; for when the Plague evidently spread it self, they soon began to see the Folly of trusting to those unperforming Creatures, who had Gull’d them of their Money, and then their Fears work’d another way, namely, to Amazement and Stupidity, not knowing what Course to take, or what to do, either to help or relieve themselves; but they ran about from one Neighbours House to another; and even in the Streets, from one Door to another with repeated Cries, of, Lord have Mercy upon us, what shall we do?

  Indeed, the poor People were to be pity’d in one particular Thing, in which they had little or no Relief, and which I Desire to mention with a serious Awe and Reflection; which perhaps, every one that reads this, may not relish: Namely, that whereas Death now began not, as we may say, to hover over every ones Head only, but to look into their Houses, and Chambers, and stare in their Faces: Tho’ there might be some stupidity, and dullness of the Mind, and there was so, a great deal; yet, there was a great deal of just Alarm, sounded into the very inmost Soul, if I may so say of others: Many Consciences were awakened; many hard Hearts melted into Tears; many a penitent Confession was made of Crimes long concealed: [it] would wound the Souls of any Christian, to have heard the dying Groans of many a despairing Creature, and none durst come near to comfort them: Many a Robbery, many a Murder, was then confest aloud, and no Body surviving to Record the Accounts of it. People might be heard even into the Streets as we pass’d along, calling upon God for Mercy, thro’ Jesus Christ, and saying, I have been a Thief, I have been an Adulterer, I have been a Murderer, and the like; and none durst stop to make the least Inquiry into such Things, or to administer Comfort to the poor Creatures, that in the Anguish both of Soul and Body thus cry’d out. Some of the Ministers did Visit the Sick at first, and for a little while, but it was not to be done; it would have been present Death, to have gone into some Houses: The very buryers of the Dead, who were the hardnedest Creatures in Town, were sometimes beaten back, and so terrify’d, that they durst not go into Houses, where the whole Families were swept away together, and where the Circumstances were more particularly horrible as some were; but this was indeed, at the first Heat of the Distemper.

  Time enur’d them to it all; and they ventured every where afterwards, without Hesitation, as I Occasion to mention at large hereafter.

  I am supposing now, the Plague to be begun, as I have said, and that the Magistrates began to take the Condition of the People, into their serious Consideration; what they did as to the Regulation of the Inhabitants, and of infected Families, I shall speak to by it self; but as to the Affair of Health, it is proper to mention it here, that having seen the foolish Humour of the People, in running after Quacks, and Mountebanks, Wizards, and Fortune-tellers, which they did as above, even to Madness. The Lord Mayor, a very sober and religious Gentleman appointed Physicians and Surgeons for Relief of the poor;* I mean, the diseased poor; and in particular, order’d the College of Physicians to publish Directions for cheap Remedies,* for the Poor, in all the Cirumstances of the Distemper. This indeed was one of the most charitable and judicious Things that could be done at that Time; for this drove the People from haunting the Doors of every Disperser of Bills; and from taking down blindly, and without Con
sideration, Poison for Physick, and Death instead of Life.

  This Direction of the Physicians was done by a Consultation of the whole College, and as it was particularly calculated for the use of the Poor; and for cheap Medicines it was made publick, so that every Body might see it; and Copies were given gratis to all that desired it: But as it is publick, and to be seen on all Occasions, I need not give the Reader of this, the Trouble of it.

  I shall not be supposed to lessen the Authority or Capacity of the Physicians, when, I say, that the Violence of the Distemper, when it came to its Extremity, was like the Fire the next Year; The Fire which consumed what the Plague could not touch, defy’d all the Application of Remedies; the Fire Engines were broken, the Buckets thrown away; and the Power of Man was baffled, and brought to an End; so the Plague defied all Medicine; the very Physicians were seized with it, with their Preservatives in their Mouths; and Men went about prescribing to others and telling them what to do, till the Tokens were upon them, and they dropt down dead, destroyed by that very Enemy, they directed others to oppose. This was the Case of several Physicians, even some of them the most eminent; and of several of the most skilful Surgeons;* Abundance of Quacks too died, who had the Folly to trust to their own Medicines, which they must needs be conscious to themselves, were good for nothing; and who rather ought, like other Sorts of Thieves, to have run away, sensible of their Guilt, from the Justice that they could not but expect should punish them, as they knew they had deserved.

  Not that it is any Derogation from the Labour, or Application of the Physicians, to say, they fell in the common Calamity; nor is it so intended by me; it rather is to their Praise, that they ventured their Lives so far as even to lose them in the Service of Mankind; They endeavoured to do good, and to save the Lives of others; But we were not to expect, that the Physicians could stop God’s Judgments, or prevent a Distemper eminently armed from Heaven, from executing the Errand it was sent about.

  Doubtless, the Physicians assisted many by their Skill, and by their Prudence and Applications, to the saving of their Lives, and restoring their Health: But it is no lessening their Character, or their Skill, to say, they could not cure those that had the Tokens upon them, or those who were mortally infected before the Physicians were sent for, as was frequently the Case.

  It remains to mention now what publick Measures were taken by the Magistrates for the general Safety, and to prevent the spreading of the Distemper, when it first broke out: I shall have frequent Occasion to speak of the Prudence of the Magistrates, their Charity, their Vigilance for the Poor, and for preserving good Order; furnishing Provisions, and the like, when the Plague was encreased, as it afterwards was. But I am now upon the Order and Regulations they published for the Government of infected Families.

  I mention’d above shutting of Houses up; and it is needful to say something particularly to that; for this Part of the History of the Plague is very melancholy; but the most grievous Story must be told.

  About June the Lord Mayor of London, and the Court of Aldermen, as I have said, began more particularly to concern themselves for the Regulation of the City.

  The Justices of Peace for Middlesex, by Direction of the Secretary of State, had begun to shut up Houses in the Parishes of St. Giles’s in the Fields, St. Martins, St. Clement Danes, &c. and it was with good Success; for in several Streets, where the Plague broke out, upon strict guarding the Houses that were infected, and taking Care to bury those that died, immediatly after they were known to be dead, the Plague ceased in those Streets. It was also observ’d, that the Plague decreas’d sooner in those Parishes, after they had been visited to the full, than it did in the Parishes of Bishopsgate, Shoreditch, Aldgate, White-Chappel, Stepney, and others, the early Care taken in that Manner, being a great means to the putting a Cheque to it.

  This shutting up of Houses was a method first taken, as I understand, in the Plague, which happened in 1603, at the Coming of King James the First to the Crown, and the Power of shutting People up in their own Houses, was granted by Act of Parliament, entitled, An Act for the charitable Relief and Ordering of Persons infected with the Plague.* On which Act of Parliament, the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of the City of London, founded the Order they made at this Time, and which took Place the 1st of July 1665, when the Numbers infected within the City, were but few, the last Bill for the 97 Parishes being but four; and some Houses having been shut up in the City, and some sick People being removed to the Pest-House beyond Bunhill-Fields,* in the Way to Islington; I say, by these Means, when there died near one thousand a Week in the Whole, the Number in the City was but 28, and the City was preserv’d more healthy in Proportion, than any other Places all the Time of the Infection.

  These Orders of my Lord Mayor’s were publish’d, as I have said, the latter End of June, and took Place from the first of July, and were as follows, (viz.)

  * * *

  ORDERS Conceived and Published by the Lord MAYOR and Aldermen of the City of London, concerning the Infection of the Plague. 1665*

  ‘WHEREAS in the Reign of our late Sovereign King James, of happy Memory, an Act was made for the charitable Relief and ordering of Persons infected with the Plague; whereby Authority was given to Justices of the Peace, Mayors, Bayliffs and other head Officers, to appoint within their several Limits, Examiners, Searchers, Watchmen, Keepers, and Buriers for the Persons and Places infected, and to minister unto them Oaths for the Performance of their Offices. And the same Statute did also authorize the giving of other Directions, as unto them for the present Necessity should seem good in their Discretions. It is now upon special Consideration, thought very expedient for preventing and avoiding of Infection of Sickness (if it shall so please Almighty God) that these Officers following be appointed, and these Orders hereafter duly observed.

  Examiners * to be appointed in every Parish

  ‘FIRST, It is thought requisite, and so ordered, that in every Parish there be one, two, or more Persons of good Sort and Credit, chosen and appointed by the Alderman, his Deputy, and common-Council of every Ward, by the Name of Examiners, to continue in that Office the Space of two Months at least: And if any fit Person so appointed, shall refuse to undertake the same, the said parties so refusing, to be committed to Prison until they shall conform themselves accordingly.

  The Examiners Office*

  ‘THAT these Examiners be sworn by the Aldermen, to enquire and learn from time to time what Houses in every Parish be Visited, and what Persons be Sick, and of what Diseases, as near as they can inform themselves; and upon doubt in that Case, to command Restraint of Access, until it appear what the Disease shall prove: And if they find any Person sick of the Infection, to give order to the Constable that the House be shut up; and if the Constable shall be found Remiss or Negligent, to give present Notice thereof to the Alderman of the Ward.

  Watchmen

  ‘THAT to every infected House there be appointed two Watchmen, one for every Day, and the other for the Night: And that these Watchmen have a special care that no Person go in or out of such infected Houses, whereof they have the Charge, upon pain of severe Punishment. And the said Watchman to do such further Offices as the sick House shall need and require: and if the Watchmen be sent upon any Business, to lock up the House, and take the Key with him: And the Watchman by Day to attend until ten of the Clock at Night: And the Watchman by Night untill six in the Morning.

  Searchers*

  ‘THAT there be a special care to appoint Women-Searchers in every Parish, such as are of honest Reputation, and of the best Sort as can be got in this kind: And these to be sworn to make due Search, and true Report to the utmost of their Knowledge, whether the Persons whose Bodies they are appointed to Search, do die of the Infection, or of what other Diseases, as near as they can. And that the Physicians who shall be appointed for Cure and Prevention of the Infection, do call before them the said Searchers, who are, or shall be appointed for the several Parishes under their respective Cares; to the end they may consider,
whether they are fitly qualified for that Employment; and charge them from time to time as they shall see Cause, if they appear defective in their Duties.

  ‘That no Searcher during this time of Visitation, be permitted to use any publick Work or Employment, or keep any Shop or Stall, or be employed as a Laundress, or in any other common Employment whatsoever.

  Chirurgeons

  ‘FOR better assistance of the Searchers, for as much as there hath been heretofore great abuse in misreporting the Disease, to the further spreading of the Infection: It is therefore ordered, that there be chosen and appointed able and discreet Chirurgeons, besides those that do already belong to the Pest-House: Amongst whom the City and Liberties to be quartered as the places lie most apt and convenient; and every of these to have one Quarter for his Limit: and the said Chirurgeons in every of their Limits to join with the Searchers for the View of the Body, to the end there may be a true Report made of the Disease.

  ‘And further, that the said Chirurgeons shall visit and search such like Persons as shall either send for them, or be named and directed unto them, by the Examiners of every Parish, and inform themselves of the Disease of the said Parties.

  ‘And forasmuch as the said Chirurgeons are to be sequestred from all other Cures, and kept only to this Disease of the Infection; It is order’d, That every of the said Chirurgeons shall have Twelvepence a Body searched by them, to be paid out of the Goods of the Party searched, if he be able, or otherwise by the Parish.

  Nurse-keepers