ndon before the fire must remember that
there was then no such place as we now call Newgate Market, but that
in the middle of the street which is now called Blowbladder 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
meat.

It was in those shambles that two persons falling down dead, as they
were buying meat, gave rise to a rumour 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 so easily frighted
again.

There was still a question among the learned, and at first perplexed
the people a little: and that was in what manner to purge the house and
goods where the plague had been, and how to render them 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 and 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, burned 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 the goods, and did little or
nothing to them.

However, in general, prudent, cautious people did enter into some
measures for airing and sweetening their houses, and burned perfumes,
incense, benjamin, rozin, and sulphur in their rooms close shut up,
and then let the air carry it all out with a blast of gunpowder; others
caused large fires to be made all day and all night for several days and
nights; by the same token that two or three were pleased to set their
houses on fire, and so eff