to nurse her; and told
him plainly that if he would not do this, the maid must perish either of
the distemper or be starved for want of food, for he was resolved none
of his family should go near her; and she lay in the garret four storey
high, where she could not cry out, or call to anybody for help.

The watchman consented to that, and went and fetched a nurse, as he
was appointed, and brought her to them the same evening. During this
interval the master of the house took his opportunity to break a large
hole through his shop into a bulk or stall, where formerly a cobbler had
sat, before or under his shop-window; but the tenant, as may be supposed
at such a dismal time as that, was dead or removed, and so he had the
key in his own keeping. Having made his way into this stall, which he
could not have done if the man had been at the door, the noise he was
obliged to make being such as would have alarmed the watchman; I say,
having made his way into this stall, he sat still till the watchman
returned with the nurse, and all the next day also. But the night
following, having contrived to send the watchman of another trifling
errand, which, as I take it, was to an apothecary's for a plaister for
the maid, which he was to stay for the making up, or some other such
errand that might secure his staying some time; in that time he conveyed
himself and all his family out of the house, and left the nurse and the
watchman to bury the poor wench--that is, throw her into the cart--and
take care of the house.

I could give a great many such stories as these, diverting enough,
which in the long course of that dismal year I met with--that is, heard
of--and which are very certain to be true, or very near the truth; that
is to say, true in the general: for no man could at such a time learn
all the particulars. There was likewise violence used with the watchmen,
as was reported, in abundance of places; and I believe that from the
beginning of the visitation to the end, there was not less than eighteen
or twenty of them killed, or so wounded as to be taken up for dead,
which was supposed to be done by the people in the infected houses which
were shut up, and where they attempted to come out and were opposed.

Nor, indeed, could less be expected, for here were so many prisons in
the town as there were houses shut up; and as the people shut up or
imprisoned so were guilty of no crime, only shut up because miserable,
it was really the more