d Militia, under the command of Lord Algernon Percy; in
some few of the city wards, the burgesses turned out, and without
making a very fierce show, looked brave enough. Some hundreds of stout
gentlemen threw themselves, armed to the teeth, into the halls of the
different companies, double-locked and bolted all the gates, and
dared the rioters (among themselves) to come on at their peril. These
arrangements being all made simultaneously, or nearly so, were completed
by the time it got dark; and then the streets were comparatively clear,
and were guarded at all the great corners and chief avenues by
the troops: while parties of the officers rode up and down in all
directions, ordering chance stragglers home, and admonishing the
residents to keep within their houses, and, if any firing ensued, not
to approach the windows. More chains were drawn across such of the
thoroughfares as were of a nature to favour the approach of a great
crowd, and at each of these points a considerable force was stationed.
All these precautions having been taken, and it being now quite dark,
those in command awaited the result in some anxiety: and not without a
hope that such vigilant demonstrations might of themselves dishearten
the populace, and prevent any new outrages.

But in this reckoning they were cruelly mistaken, for in half an hour,
or less, as though the setting in of night had been their preconcerted
signal, the rioters having previously, in small parties, prevented the
lighting of the street lamps, rose like a great sea; and that in so many
places at once, and with such inconceivable fury, that those who had the
direction of the troops knew not, at first, where to turn or what to do.
One after another, new fires blazed up in every quarter of the town,
as though it were the intention of the insurgents to wrap the city in a
circle of flames, which, contracting by degrees, should burn the whole
to ashes; the crowd swarmed and roared in every street; and none but
rioters and soldiers being out of doors, it seemed to the latter as if
all London were arrayed against them, and they stood alone against the
town.

In two hours, six-and-thirty fires were raging--six-and-thirty great
conflagrations: among them the Borough Clink in Tooley Street, the
King's Bench, the Fleet, and the New Bridewell. In almost every street,
there was a battle; and in every quarter the muskets of the troops were
heard above the shouts and tumult of the mob. The f