upon the sick person, and the sickness not appearing infectious, or if
uncertain, yet on his being content to be carried to the pest-house,
were released.

It is true that the locking up the doors of people's houses, and setting
a watchman there night and day to prevent their stirring out or any
coming to them, when perhaps the sound people in the family might have
escaped if they had been removed from the sick, looked very hard and
cruel; and many people perished in these miserable confinements which,
'tis reasonable to believe, would not have been distempered if they had
had liberty, though the plague was in the house; at which the people
were very clamorous and uneasy at first, and several violences were
committed and injuries offered to the men who were set to watch the
houses so shut up; also several people broke out by force in many
places, as I shall observe by-and-by. But it was a public good that
justified the private mischief, and there was no obtaining the least
mitigation by any application to magistrates or government at that time,
at least not that I heard of. This put the people upon all manner of
stratagem in order, if possible, to get out; and it would fill a little
volume to set down the arts used by the people of such houses to shut
the eyes of the watchmen who were employed, to deceive them, and to
escape or break out from them, in which frequent scuffles and some
mischief happened; of which by itself.

As I went along Houndsditch one morning about eight o'clock there was
a great noise. It is true, indeed, there was not much crowd, because
people were not very free to gather together, or to stay long together
when they were there; nor did I stay long there. But the outcry was loud
enough to prompt my curiosity, and I called to one that looked out of a
window, and asked what was the matter.

A watchman, it seems, had been employed to keep his post at the door of
a house which was infected, or said to be infected, and was shut up. He
had been there all night for two nights together, as he told his story,
and the day-watchman had been there one day, and was now come to relieve
him. All this while no noise had been heard in the house, no light had
been seen; they called for nothing, sent him of no errands, which used
to be the chief business of the watchmen; neither had they given him any
disturbance, as he said, from the Monday afternoon, when he heard great
crying and screaming in the house, which,