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has been built for ease to this great parish, and another in Petticoat Lane. There were no less than five other grounds made use of for the parish of Stepney at that time; one where now stands the parish church of St. Paul, Shadwell, and the other where now stands the parish church of St. John, at Wapping, both which had not the names of parishes at that time, but were belonging to Stepney Parish. I could name many more; but these coming within my particular knowledge, the circumstance, I thought, made it of use to record them. From the whole, it may be observed that they were obliged in this time of distress to take in new burying grounds in most of the outparishes for laying the prodigious numbers of people which died in so short a space of time; but why care was not taken to keep those places separate from ordinary uses, that so the bodies might rest undisturbed, that I cannot answer for, and must confess I think it was wrong. Who were to blame, I know not. I should have mentioned that the Quakers[324] had at that time also a burying ground set apart to their use, and which they still make use of; and they had also a particular dead cart to fetch their dead from their houses. And the famous Solomon Eagle, who, as I mentioned before,[325] had predicted the plague as a judgment, and run naked through the streets, telling the people that it was come upon them to punish them for their sins, had his own wife died[326] the very next day of the plague, and was carried, one of the first, in the Quakers' dead cart to their new burying ground. I might have thronged this account with many more remarkable things which occurred in the time of the infection, and particularly what passed between the lord mayor and the court, which was then at Oxford, and what directions were from time to time received from the government for their conduct on this critical occasion; but really the court concerned themselves so little, and that little they did was of so small import, that I do not see it of much moment to mention any part of it here, except that of appointing a monthly fast in the city, and the sending the royal charity to the relief of the poor, both which I have mentioned before. Great was the reproach thrown upon those physicians who left their patients during the sickness; and, now they came to town again, nobody cared to employ them. They were called deserters, and frequently bills were set up on their doors, and writ
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