have had no concern since that about them. Yet by those
frequent clamors we were all kept with some kind of apprehensions
constantly upon us; and if any died suddenly, or if the spotted fevers
at any time increased, we were presently alarmed; much more if the
number of the plague increased, for to the end of the year there were
always between two and three hundred[342] of the plague. On any of these
occasions, I say, we were alarmed anew.

Those who remember the city of London before the fire must remember that
there was then no such place as that we now call Newgate Market; but in
the middle of the street, which is now called Blow Bladder Street, and
which had its name from the butchers, who used to kill and dress their
sheep there (and who, it seems, had a custom to blow up their meat with
pipes, to make it look thicker and fatter than it was, and were punished
there for it by the lord mayor),--I say, from the end of the street
towards Newgate there stood two long rows of shambles for the
selling[343] meat.

It was in those shambles that two persons falling down dead as they were
buying meat, gave rise to a rumor that the meat was all infected; which
though it might affright the people, and spoiled the market for two or
three days, yet it appeared plainly afterwards that there was nothing of
truth in the suggestion: but nobody can account for the possession of
fear when it takes hold of the mind. However, it pleased God, by the
continuing of the winter weather, so to restore the health of the city,
that by February following we reckoned the distemper quite ceased, and
then we were not easily frighted again.

There was still a question among the learned, and[344] at first
perplexed the people a little; and that was, in what manner to purge the
houses and goods where the plague had been, and how to render them[345]
habitable again which had been left empty during the time of the plague.
Abundance of perfumes and preparations were prescribed by physicians,
some of one kind, some of another, in which the people who listened to
them put themselves to a great, and indeed in my opinion to an
unnecessary, expense; and the poorer people, who only set open their
windows night and day, burnt brimstone, pitch, and gunpowder, and such
things, in their rooms, did as well as the best; nay, the eager people
who, as I said above, came home in haste and at all hazards, found
little or no inconvenience in their houses, nor in their go