r did not do his duty, or did not treat them civilly,
they (the officers) were generally removed, and others placed in their
stead.

It is true such complaint might be unjust, and if the officer had such
arguments to use as would convince the magistrate that he was right, and
that the people had injured him, he was continued and they reproved.
But this part could not well bear a particular inquiry, for the parties
could very ill be well heard and answered in the street from the
windows, as was the case then. The magistrates, therefore, generally
chose to favour the people and remove the man, as what seemed to be the
least wrong and of the least ill consequence; seeing if the watchman
was injured, yet they could easily make him amends by giving him another
post of the like nature; but if the family was injured, there was
no satisfaction could be made to them, the damage perhaps being
irreparable, as it concerned their lives.

A great variety of these cases frequently happened between the watchmen
and the poor people shut up, besides those I formerly mentioned about
escaping. Sometimes the watchmen were absent, sometimes drunk, sometimes
asleep when the people wanted them, and such never failed to be punished
severely, as indeed they deserved.

But after all that was or could be done in these cases, the shutting up
of houses, so as to confine those that were well with those that were
sick, had very great inconveniences in it, and some that were very
tragical, and which merited to have been considered if there had been
room for it. But it was authorised by a law, it had the public good in
view as the end chiefly aimed at, and all the private injuries that were
done by the putting it in execution must be put to the account of the
public benefit.

It is doubtful to this day whether, in the whole, it contributed
anything to the stop of the infection; and indeed I cannot say it did,
for nothing could run with greater fury and rage than the infection did
when it was in its chief violence, though the houses infected were shut
up as exactly and as effectually as it was possible. Certain it is that
if all the infected persons were effectually shut in, no sound person
could have been infected by them, because they could not have come near
them. But the case was this (and I shall only touch it here): namely,
that the infection was propagated insensibly, and by such persons as
were not visibly infected, who neither knew whom they