Page:A Journal of the Plague Year (1722).djvu/228

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Memoirs of

and ſweaty, and they were generally apt to ſweat too.

Now it was impoſſible to know theſe People, nor did they ſometimes, as I have ſaid, know themſelves to be infected: Theſe were the People that ſo often dropt down and fainted in the Streets; for oftentimes they would go about the Streets to the laſt, till on a ſudden they would ſweat, grow faint, ſit down at a Door and die: It is true, finding themſelves thus, they would ſtruggle hard to get Home to their own Doors, or at other Times would be juſt able to go in to their Houſes and die inſtantly; other Times they would go about till they had the very Tokens come out upon them, and yet not know it, and would die in an Hour or two after they came Home, but be well as long as they were Abroad: Theſe were the dangerous People, theſe were the People of whom the well People ought to have been afraid; but then on the other ſide it was impoſſible to know them.

And this is the Reaſon why it is impoſſible in a Viſitation to prevent the ſpreading of the Plague by the utmoſt human Vigilance, (viz.) that it is impoſſible to know the infected People from the ſound; or that the infected People ſhould perfectly know themſelves: I knew a Man who converſed freely in London all the Seaſon of the Plague in 1665, and kept about him an Antidote or Cordial, on purpoſe to take when he thought himſelf in any Danger, and he had ſuch a Rule to know, or have warning of the Danger by, as indeed I never met with before or ſince, how far it may be depended on I know not: He had a Wound in his Leg, and whenever he came among any People that were not ſound, and the Infection began to affect him, he ſaid he could know it by that Signal, (viz.) That his Wound in his Leg would ſmart, and look pale and white; ſo as ſoon as ever he felt it ſmart, it