had
disappeared, their owners having taken them up the river, and moored
them against its banks at different spots, where they lived in them
under tilts. Many hundreds of persons remained upon the river in this
way during the whole continuance of the visitation.

August had now arrived, but the distemper knew no cessation. On the
contrary, it manifestly increased in violence and malignity. The deaths
rose a thousand in each week, and in the last week in this fatal month
amounted to upwards of sixty thousand!

But, terrible as this was, the pestilence had not yet reached its
height. Hopes were entertained that when the weather became cooler, its
fury would abate; but these anticipations were fearfully disappointed.
The bills of mortality rose the first week in September to seven
thousand, and though they slightly decreased during the second
week--awakening a momentary hope--on the third they advanced to twelve
thousand! In less than ten days, upwards of two thousand persons
perished in the parish of Aldgate alone; while Whitechapel suffered
equally severely. Out of the hundred parishes in and about the city, one
only, that of Saint John the Evangelist in Watling-street, remained
uninfected, and this merely because there was scarcely a soul left
within it, the greater part of the inhabitants having quitted their
houses, and fled into the country.

The deepest despair now seized upon all the survivors. Scarcely a family
but had lost half of its number--many, more than half--while those who
were left felt assured that their turn would speedily arrive. Even the
reckless were appalled, and abandoned their evil courses. Not only were
the dead lying in the passages and alleys, but even in the main
thoroughfares, and none would remove them. The awful prediction of
Solomon Eagle that "grass would grow in the streets, and that the living
should not be able to bury the dead," had come to pass. London had
become one vast lazar-house, and seemed in a fair way of becoming a
mighty sepulchre.

During all this time, Saint Paul's continued to be used as a pest-house,
but it was not so crowded as heretofore, because, as not one in fifty of
the infected recovered when placed under medical care, it was not
thought worth while to remove them from their own abodes. The number of
attendants, too, had diminished. Some had died, but the greater part had
abandoned their offices from a fear of sharing the fate of their
patients. In consequenc