in their absence. They
cast away their lives to die among their goods.'

'Human nature,' said Puck. 'I've seen it time and again. How did your
sick do in the fields?'

'They died not near so thick as those that kept within doors, and even
then they died more out of distraction and melancholy than plague. But I
confess, good people, I could not in any sort master the sickness, or
come at a glimmer of its nature or governance. To be brief, I was flat
bewildered at the brute malignity of the disease, and so--did what I
should have done before--dismissed all conjectures and apprehensions
that had grown up within me, chose a good hour by my Almanac, clapped my
vinegar-cloth to my face, and entered some empty houses, resigned to
wait upon the stars for guidance.'

'At night? Were you not horribly frightened?' said Puck.

'I dared to hope that the God who hath made man so nobly curious to
search out His mysteries might not destroy a devout seeker. In due
time--there is a time, as I have said, for everything under the sun--I
spied a whitish rat, very puffed and scabby, which sat beneath the
dormer of an attic through which shined our Lady the Moon. Whilst I
looked on him--and her--she was moving towards old cold Saturn, her
ancient ally--the rat creeped languishingly into her light, and there,
before my eyes, died. Presently his mate or companion came out, laid him
down beside there, and in like fashion died too. Later--an hour or less
to midnight--a third rat did e'en the same; always choosing the
moonlight to die in. This threw me into an amaze, since, as we know, the
moonlight is favourable, not hurtful, to the creatures of the Moon; and
Saturn, being friends with her, as you would say, was hourly
strengthening her evil influence. Yet these three rats had been stricken
dead in very moonlight. I leaned out of the window to see which of
Heaven's host might be on our side, and there beheld I good trusty Mars,
very red and heated, bustling about his setting. I straddled the roof to
see better.

'Jack Marget came up street going to comfort our sick in Hitheram's
field. A tile slipped under my foot.

'Says he heavily enough, "Watchman, what of the night?"

"Heart up, Jack," says I. "Methinks there's one fighting for us that,
like a fool, I've forgot all this summer." My meaning was naturally the
planet Mars.

'"Pray to Him then," says he. "I forgot Him too this summer."

'He meant God, whom he always bitterly accused h