bout him an antidote or cordial on purpose to take when he thought
himself in any danger, and he had such a rule to know or have warning of
the danger by as indeed I never met with before or since. How far it may
be depended on I know not. He had a wound in his leg, and whenever he
came among any people that were not sound, and the infection began to
affect him, he said he could know it by that signal, viz., that his
wound in his leg would smart, and look pale and white; so as soon as
ever he felt it smart it was time for him to withdraw, or to take care
of himself, taking his drink, which he always carried about him for that
purpose. Now it seems he found his wound would smart many times when
he was in company with such who thought themselves to be sound, and
who appeared so to one another; but he would presently rise up and say
publicly, 'Friends, here is somebody in the room that has the plague',
and so would immediately break up the company. This was indeed a
faithful monitor to all people that the plague is not to be avoided by
those that converse promiscuously in a town infected, and people have
it when they know it not, and that they likewise give it to others when
they know not that they have it themselves; and in this case shutting
up the well or removing the sick will not do it, unless they can go back
and shut up all those that the sick had conversed with, even before they
knew themselves to be sick, and none knows how far to carry that back,
or where to stop; for none knows when or where or how they may have
received the infection, or from whom.

This I take to be the reason which makes so many people talk of the air
being corrupted and infected, and that they need not be cautious of whom
they converse with, for that the contagion was in the air. I have seen
them in strange agitations and surprises on this account. 'I have
never come near any infected body', says the disturbed person; 'I have
conversed with none but sound, healthy people, and yet I have gotten the
distemper!' 'I am sure I am struck from Heaven', says another, and he
falls to the serious part. Again, the first goes on exclaiming, 'I have
come near no infection or any infected person; I am sure it is the air.
We draw in death when we breathe, and therefore 'tis the hand of God;
there is no withstanding it.' And this at last made many people, being
hardened to the danger, grow less concerned at it; and less cautious
towards the latter end of the