ers
who likewise remained at their post to the end.

It will therefore be well understood that good Master Harmer and
his sons had no light time of it, and ran no small personal risk in
their endeavours to serve their fellow citizens in this crisis.
Although the pestilence had not as yet broken out in this part of
the town with the virulence that it had shown elsewhere, still
there were fresh cases rumoured day by day; and it often appeared
that when one case in a street was reported, there had been many
others there before of which no notice had been given, and that
perhaps half a dozen houses were infected, and must be forthwith
shut up. At first neglectful persons were brought before the
Magistrates; but soon these persons became too numerous, and the
Magistrates too busy to hear their excuses. An example was made of
one or another, to show that the laws must be kept; but Newgate
itself becoming infected by the disease, it was not thought fit to
send any malefactor there except for some heinous offence.

Dan joined the force of the constables, and day by day had exciting
tales to tell about determined persons who had escaped from
infected houses either by tricking or overpowering the watchman.
All sorts of clever shifts were made to enable families where
perhaps only one lay sick to escape from the house, leaving the
sick person sometimes quite alone, or sometimes in charge of a
nurse. Dan said it was heartrending to hear the cries and
lamentations of miserable creatures pleading to be let out,
convinced that it was certain death to them to remain shut up with
the sick. Yet, since they might likely be themselves already
infected, it was the greater peril and cruelty to let them forth;
and he had ghastly tales to tell of the visitation of certain
houses, where the watchmen reported that nothing had been asked for
for long, and where, when the house was entered by searchers or
constables, every person within was found either dead or dying.

The precautions duly observed by the Harmer family had hitherto
proved efficacious, and though the father and his sons going about
their daily duties came into contact with infected persons
frequently, yet, by the use of the disinfectants recommended by the
College of Physicians, and by a close and careful attention to
their directions, they went unscathed in the midst of much peril,
and brought no ill to those at home when they returned thither for
needful rest and refreshment