Peter Ackroyd - Hawksmoor

Brick Lane, which is now a long well-paved Street, was a deep dirty Road, frequented by Carts fetching Bricks that way into White- chappel from Brick-kilns in the Fields (and had the Name on that account). Here I rambled as a Boy, and yet also was often walking abroad into that great and monstrous Pile of London: and as I felt the City under my Feet I had a habit of rowling Phrases around my Head, such as Prophesie Now, Devouring Fire, Violent Hands, which I would then inscribe in my Alphabeticall Pocket-Book along with any other odd Fancies of my own. Thus would I wander, but as like as not I would take my self to a little Plot of Ground close by Angell Alley and along the New Key. Here I used to sit against a peece of Ancient Stone and set my Mind thinking on past Ages and on Futurity. There was before me a stone Pedestal on which was fix'd an old rusty Horizontal Dial, with the Gnomon broke short off, and it was with an inexpressible Peacefulnesse that I gazed upon this Instrument of Time: I remember it as well as if it were Yesterday, and not already burned beneath the Weight of Years. (And now I consider: have I been living in a Dreame?) But of this I may speaker again in another Place, and I shall return in the mean time to my History for which I will, like a State Historian, give you the Causes as well as the Matter of Facts. I never had any faculty in telling of a Story, and one such as mine is will be contemned by others as a meer Winter Tale rather than that they should be brought to be afraid of another World and subjected to common Terrours which they despised before; for thus, to cut short a long Preamble, I have come to the most grievous story of the Plague.

I am perswaded that most Wretches let the World go wag: all is well, Jack has Joan, the Man has his Mare again, as they say, and they walk as it were above the Precipeece with no Conception of the vast Gulph and frightful Abyss of Darknesse beneath them; but it is quite another Case with me. The Mind in Infancy, like the Body in Embrio, receives impressions that cannot be removed and it was as a meer Boy that I was placed in the Extremity of the Human State: even now, a Crowd of Thoughts whirl thro' the Thorowfare of my Memory for it was in that fateful year of the Plague that the mildewed Curtain of the World was pulled aside, as if it were before a Painting, and I saw the true Face of the Great and Dreadfull God.

It was in my Eleventh year that my Mother attracted the noisome Distemper; first she had small knobs of flesh as broad as a little silver Peny, which were the Tokens of the Contagion, and secondly the Swellings upon her Body. The Chirugeon came to observe the Marks of the Sicknesse, and then stood slightly apart; Well what must I do, what will be the End of this? entreats my Father of him, and the Chirugeon pressed mightily to have her remov'd to the Pest-House adjoining the Moor-Fields, for as he said the Symptoms admitted of no Hope. But my Father would in no wise be perswaded: Tye her to the Bed then, says the Chirugeon and he gave my Father some bottles filled with Cordial Waters and with Elixir of Minerals; You are all in the same Ship, says he, and must Sink or Swim together. My Mother then called out to me Nick! Nick! but my Father would not let me go to her; soon she stank mightily and was delirious in her sick Dress. And indeed she became an Object of Loathing to me in her fallen state: there was no help for it but to Dye in her case, and I cared not how soon that might be. My Father wished me to flee into the Fields before the House was shut and marked, but my resolution was not for going: where should I go to, and how could I shift for my self in this fearful World? My Father was yet alive, and I might remain safe from the Contagion: considering these matters, even as the Thing stank on her Bed, I was of a sudden possess'd of an extream chearfulness of Spirits so that I might have sung a catch around my Mother's carcasse (you see what a Life mine was to be).

As I did not want my Liberty yet, but it might be for the future, I hid my self when the House was shut up by a Constable and Lord Have Mercy On Us set close over the Cross. A Watchman was plac'd by the Door and, tho' so many Houses in Black-Eagle-Street had been Visited that he would scarce have known who dwelled in them, I had no Desire to be seen, in case it became urgent to me to make my Escape.

Then my own Father began to sweat mightily, and a strange smell came off him in the way Flesh smells when put upon the Fire; he laid himself down upon the Floor of the Chamber where his Dame was but, tho' he called out to me, I would not go to him. From the Doorway I stared full in his Face and he stared back at me, and for an Instant our Thoughts revolved around each other: you are undone, says I, and with my Pulse beating high I left him.

I gather'd some Provisions of Beer, Bread and Cheese and, to avoid my Father's sight, I took my self to a little confin'd Closet above the Chamber where they both now lay in their Extremity: it was like to a Garret, with a window all cobwebbed over, and here I waited until they went to their Long Home. Now in the glass of Recollection I can see every thing: the shaddowes moving across the Window and across my Face; the clock telling the Hour until it fell silent like the World itself; the Noises of my Father beneath me; the little Murmurings in the House adjoining. I sweated a little but had no Tokens of the Sicknesse and, like a man in a Dungeon, I had visions of many spacious Waies, cool Fountains, shady Walks, refreshing Gardens and places of Recreation; but then my Thoughts would switch suddenly and I would be affrighted by Figures of Death who seemed to come in my own Shape and cast fearful Looks around them; then I awoke and all was quiet. No more moans now, thought I, they are dead and cold: then of a sudden my Fears ebbed away and I felt at Peace; like the Cat in the Fable, I smil'd and smil'd.

The House was now so silent that the Watch, calling and hearing no Noise withinne, summon'd the Dead-Cart and at the sound of his Voice I started up from my Reveries. There was a Hazard in being found with the Dead, and then (as it were) Imprison'd, and so I looked about me for a means of Escape. Although I was three storeys High, there were great Sheds before the Window (this was in back of the House, adjoining Monmouth Street) and as quick as Lightning I let my self down by means of them to the Ground: I had taken no Thought for Provisions, and had not even Straw to lie upon. Now I stood in the Dirt and Silence, and there were no Lights save those which had been placed by the Corses for the Dead-Carts. And there too as I turned up Black-Eagle-Street, I saw by the flickering Lanthorn my own Parents lying where the Watch had placed them, their Faces all shiny and begrimed: I was as like to have cried out in Fright until I recalled to myself that I was alive and these dead Things could in no manner harm me; and, making myself pritty invisible (for indeed there was little to be seen on so Dark a Night), I waited for the Cart to do its dismal Traffick.

The two Creatures were placed onto a bundle of Carcasses, all ragged and swollen like a Nest of Wormes, and the Bell-Man and two Linkes took the Cart down Black-Eagle-Street, past Corbets Court and through Brownes Lane: I follow'd close on their Heels, and could hear them making merry with their Lord Have Mercy On Us, No Man Will and their Wo To Thee My Honeys; they were Drunken to the highest degree, and were like to have Pitched the Corses into the Doorways so wayward was their track. But then they came out into the Spittle- Fields and, as I was running besides them now in my Wonder or Delirium (I know not what), of a sudden I saw a vast Pitte almost at my very Feet; I stopp'd short, star'd withinne it, and then as I totter'd upon the Brink had a sudden Desire to cast myself down. But at this moment the Cart came to the edge of the Pitte, it was turned round with much Merriment, and the Bodies were discharg'd into the Darknesse. I cou'd not Weep then but I can Build now, and in that place of Memory will I fashion a Labyrinth where the Dead can once more give Voice.