Page:A Journal of the Plague Year (1722).djvu/139

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the PLAGUE.
131

People in Redriff, and in Wapping, and Ratcliff on both Sides the River, and almoſt all Southwark-Side, a mighty Fancy, that they ſhould not be viſited, or at leaſt, that it would not be ſo violent among them: Some People fancied, the ſmell of the Pitch and Tar, and ſuch other things, as Oil and Roſin, and Brimſtone, which is ſo much uſed by all Trades relating to Shipping, would preſerve them. Others argued it, becauſe it was in its extreameſt Violence in Weſtminſter, and the Pariſhes of St. Giles’s and St. Andrew’s, &c. and began to abate again, before it came among them, which was true indeed, in Part: For Example.

From the 8th to the 15th of Auguſt. Total this
Week
St. Giles's in the Fields 242 Stepney 197 4030
St. Mag. Bermondſey 24
Cripplegate 886 Rotherhith 3
From the 15th to the 22d of Auguſt. Total this
Week.
St. Giles's in the Fields 175 Stepney 273 5319
St. Mag. Bermondſey 36
Cripplegate 847 Rotherhith 2

N. B. That it was obſerv’d the Numbers mention’d in Stepney Parith, at that time, were generally all on that Side where Stepney Pariſh joined to Shoreditch, which we now call Spittle-fields, where the Pariſh of Stepney, comes up to the very Wall of Shoreditch Church-Yard, and the Plague at this Time was abated at St. Giles’s in the Fields, and raged moſt violently in Cripplegate; Bifhopſgate and Shoreditch Pariſhes, but there was not 10 People a-Week that died of it in all that Part of Stepney Pariſh, which takes in Lime-Houſe, Ratcliff-high-way, and which are now the Pariſhes of Shadwell and Wapping, even to St. Katherines by the Tower, till after the whole Month of Auguſt was expired; but they paid for it afterwards, as I ſhall obſerve by and by.

This, I ſay, made the People of Redriff and Wapping, Ratcliff and Lime-Houſe ſo ſecure, and flatter them-