ivately out in the night. I must confess I
thought it at that time the most innocent corruption or bribery that any
man could be guilty of, and therefore could not but pity the poor men,
and think it was hard when three of those watchmen were publicly whipped
through the streets for suffering people to go out of houses shut up.

But notwithstanding that severity, money prevailed with the poor men,
and many families found means to make sallies out, and escape that way
after they had been shut up; but these were generally such as had some
places to retire to; and though there was no easy passing the roads any
whither after the 1st of August, yet there were many ways of retreat,
and particularly, as I hinted, some got tents and set them up in the
fields, carrying beds or straw to lie on, and provisions to eat, and
so lived in them as hermits in a cell, for nobody would venture to come
near them; and several stories were told of such, some comical, some
tragical, some who lived like wandering pilgrims in the deserts, and
escaped by making themselves exiles in such a manner as is scarce to be
credited, and who yet enjoyed more liberty than was to be expected in
such cases.

I have by me a story of two brothers and their kinsman, who being single
men, but that had stayed in the city too long to get away, and indeed
not knowing where to go to have any retreat, nor having wherewith to
travel far, took a course for their own preservation, which though in
itself at first desperate, yet was so natural that it may be wondered
that no more did so at that time. They were but of mean condition, and
yet not so very poor as that they could not furnish themselves with some
little conveniences such as might serve to keep life and soul together;
and finding the distemper increasing in a terrible manner, they resolved
to shift as well as they could, and to be gone.

One of them had been a soldier in the late wars, and before that in the
Low Countries, and having been bred to no particular employment but his
arms, and besides being wounded, and not able to work very hard, had for
some time been employed at a baker's of sea-biscuit in Wapping.

The brother of this man was a seaman too, but somehow or other had been
hurt of one leg, that he could not go to sea, but had worked for his
living at a sailmaker's in Wapping, or thereabouts; and being a good
husband, had laid up some money, and was the richest of the three.

The third man was a j