Даниэль Дефо - History of the Plague in London

What variety of stratagems were used to escape, and get out of houses thus shut up, by which the watchmen were deceived or overpowered, and that [236] How. the people got away, I have taken notice of already, and shall say no more to that; but I say the magistrates did moderate and ease families upon many occasions in this case, and particularly in that of taking away or suffering to be removed the sick persons out of such houses, when they were willing to be removed, either to a pesthouse or other places, and sometimes giving the well persons in the family so shut up leave to remove, upon information given that they were well, and that they would confine themselves in such houses where they went, so long as should be required of them. The concern, also, of the magistrates for the supplying such poor families as were infected,—I say, supplying them with necessaries, as well physic as food,—was very great: and in which they did not content themselves with giving the necessary orders to the officers appointed; but the aldermen, in person and on horseback, frequently rode to such houses, and caused the people to be asked at their windows whether they were duly attended or not, also whether they wanted anything that was necessary, and if the officers had constantly carried their messages, and fetched them such things as they wanted, or not. And if they answered in the affirmative, all was well; but if they complained that they were ill supplied, and that the officer 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 favor 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 a 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 authorized 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 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 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. [237] It was not known in Defoe's time that minute disease germs may be carried along by a current of air. 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 infected, nor whom they were infected by.

A house in Whitechapel was shut up for the sake of one infected maid, who had only spots, not the tokens, come out upon her, and recovered; yet these people obtained no liberty to stir, neither for air or exercise, forty days. Want of breath, fear, anger, vexation, and all the other griefs attending such an injurious treatment, cast the mistress of the family into a fever; and visitors came into the house and said it was the plague, though the physicians declared it was not. However, the family were obliged to begin their quarantine anew, on the report of the visitor or examiner, though their former quarantine wanted but a few days of being finished. This oppressed them so with anger and grief, and, as before, straitened them also so much as to room, and for want of breathing and free air, that most of the family fell sick, one of one distemper, one of another, chiefly scorbutic [238] Affected with scurvy. ailments, only one a violent cholic; until, after several prolongings of their confinement, some or other of those that came in with the visitors to inspect the persons that were ill, in hopes of releasing them, brought the distemper with them, and infected the whole house; and all or most of them died, not of the plague as really upon them before, but of the plague that those people brought them, who should have been careful to have protected them from it. And this was a thing which frequently happened, and was indeed one of the worst consequences of shutting houses up.

I had about this time a little hardship put upon me, which I was at first greatly afflicted at, and very much disturbed about, though, as it proved, it did not expose me to any disaster; and this was, being appointed, by the alderman of Portsoken Ward, one of the examiners of the houses in the precinct where I lived. We had a large parish, and had no less than eighteen examiners, as the order called us: the people called us visitors. I endeavored with all my might to be excused from such an employment, and used many arguments with the alderman's deputy to be excused; particularly, I alleged that I was against shutting up houses at all, and that it would be very hard to oblige me to be an instrument in that which was against my judgment, and which I did verily believe would not answer the end it was intended for. But all the abatement I could get was only, that whereas the officer was appointed by my lord mayor to continue two months, I should be obliged to hold it but three weeks, on condition, nevertheless, that I could then get some other sufficient housekeeper to serve the rest of the time for me; which was, in short, but a very small favor, it being very difficult to get any man to accept of such an employment that was fit to be intrusted with it.

It is true that shutting up of houses had one effect which I am sensible was of moment; namely, it confined the distempered people, who would otherwise have been both very troublesome and very dangerous in their running about streets with the distemper upon them, which, when they were delirious, they would have done in a most frightful manner, as, indeed, they began to do at first very much until they were restrained; nay, so very open they were, that the poor would go about and beg at people's doors, and say they had the plague upon them, and beg rags for their sores, or both, or anything that delirious nature happened to think of.

A poor unhappy gentlewoman, a substantial citizen's wife, was, if the story be true, murdered by one of these creatures in Aldersgate Street, or that way. He was going along the street, raving mad, to be sure, and singing. The people only said he was drunk; but he himself said he had the plague upon him, which, it seems, was true; and, meeting this gentlewoman, he would kiss her. She was terribly frightened, as he was a rude fellow, and she run from him; but, the street being very thin of people, there was nobody near enough to help her. When she saw he would overtake her, she turned and gave him a thrust so forcibly, he being but weak, as pushed him down backward; but very unhappily, she being so near, he caught hold of her and pulled her down also, and, getting up first, mastered her and kissed her, and, which was worst of all, when he had done, told her he had the plague, and why should not she have it as well as he. She was frightened enough before; but when she heard him say he had the plague, she screamed out, and fell down into a swoon, or in a fit, which, though she recovered a little, yet killed her in a very few days; and I never heard whether she had the plague or no.