HOW WE DWELT IN A HOUSE THAT WAS NOT OUR OWN.
And now Althea began her search after Andrew, with none to help her but
poor me and honest Will. Our chief care being not to be seen going out
or coming in, she chose to steal forth of the back door early in the
mornings; sometimes I with her, sometimes Will, but one of us always
staying in the house to watch it, and to open at nightfall to the
others. Althea went to such shops as she could find open and bought
things, sometimes mere trifles, sometimes food and other necessaries,
but always spending much time over it, and both listening to the talk of
other folk, and drawing the shop-people into talk herself; when she
contrived to work round to the prisons, and the poor souls in them, and
how they fared in these bad times. Once or twice she took a boat and
went up the river, and then was wondrous affable to the watermen,
setting them talking also on the same matters; and thus she did with
every one whom she could draw to speak with her, not disdaining even
beggars, nor fearing the watchmen who guarded houses supposed to be
infected, and therefore shut up. I confess that these last were people I
would gladly have shunned, there being something so awful to me in the
locked doors (marked with a great red cross, and 'Lord, have mercy on
us' writ large upon them) by which the poor fellows sat. But Althea
seemed to have said a long good-bye to fear. And with questioning and
listening, and piecing things together by little and little, she assured
herself that Andrew must be in Newgate, if he lay in any London prison.
She had tried to find out by artful inquiries if any man had shown
himself in London, announcing a coming judgment, and warning people to
avoid it, as Andrew had proposed to do; on which people informed her of
several such persons, but their descriptions answered not to our poor
friend.
One man had cried up and down the streets, 'Yet forty days, and London
shall be destroyed,' after the fashion of the prophet Jonah; and another
had run about by day and by night, naked to the waist, and crying, 'Oh!
the great and dreadful God!' and no other words; which struck a great
terror into all who saw and heard him; and yet a third, who was said to
be a Quaker, acted more strangely; but he was known by name to those who
told about him. Also in all these tales there was something frantic and
unreasonable, not like Andrew, nor like the way he had designed to act.
I think I myself saw one of these strange creatures. It was my turn to
be housekeeper, Althea wanting Will's help to carry her purchases home
that day. Such a solitary day was very dismal and heart-sinking to me;
and had it not been for my plan of writing this history, I know not how
I could have borne it. When it grew dusk I ventured to look out at a
front window to see if my friends were coming; but what I saw was the
light of torches coming up the street, which was the sign of a funeral,
it being ordered that people should only bury at night; and presently
came by a coffin borne of four, and a great many people following; for
it was wonderful how people crowded to funerals at this time, as if
desperate of their lives. They stopt suddenly, to my terror, right in
front of my window; but it was because of another crowd meeting them,
and in its midst a tall man, moving very swiftly, and going straight
before him. He was stript to the waist; and I thought at first that the
hair of his head was all in a flame of fire, but it was a chafing-dish
of burning brimstone that he had set upon his head, and which glared
through the darkness. As he met the coffin he made a stand, and looked
upon it.
[Illustration: 'I think I myself saw one of these strange creatures.']
'Yet one more,' he said, in a deep hoarse voice,--'one more has fallen
in his sins! but ye do not repent. Woe, woe, woe to this unfaithful
city!' and he went on again directly, but continued to cry 'Woe, woe!'
as long as I could hear him; the people running after and around him
could scarce keep up with his swift pace. Those who were bearing and
following the coffin had seemed struck with horror; but now they got
into order again; and I heard one near the window bidding them
sneeringly never to heed a mad Quaker, while another said aloud, 'I
marvel such an evil-boding fool is left at large, when far quieter folks
of his sort lie rotting in prison;' words which made me fain to hear
more; but the men all moved off, and I had scarce seen their torches go
twinkling away into darkness, when I heard the signal at the back door,
and hurried joyfully to let in my friends, who had been delayed by
meeting the funeral; but they had missed the other strange spectacle.
As I remember, this was the second Saturday we spent in town; and here I
may say that almost every Lord's Day which found us in our dismal abode,
we two made our way to some church at a good distance, and there joined
in worship.
I never saw churches more crowded, worshippers more devout, ministers
more fervent. We understood by what we heard that not a few clergymen
were dead of the Plague, and others fled for terror; because of which
certain of the silenced ministers were called on to fill those vacant
pulpits; and they did so while the Plague lasted, with great zeal and
boldness, no man saying them nay. But neither the courage of these men,
nor the fervency with which they preached and visited among the sick and
dying, could so far recommend them to Will that he would set foot in
what he called the steeple-houses; so on the Lord's Day we had to
dispense with his attendance, and this troubled me; but on the other
hand there was comfort in seeing how my poor sister rejoiced in the
ministerings of these faithful men. A great change showed itself in
her; she was full of a new tenderness to me, and was most mild and
patient with poor Will and his odd ways; and as for him, I believe he
would have died for her, or done anything that she desired, except
lodging in Mr. Dacre's house, or worshipping in a church.
Now when Althea had assured herself she must look for Andrew in Newgate
and in no other prison, she set herself to get admission there. 'No lock
so hard,' she said to me, 'but will go with a golden key.'
So she put money enough in her purse. She took Will with her, clad in a
suit fit for a plain country gentleman, for she wished it to be thought
he was one who had power to protect her; and, having found out the
keeper of Newgate, she bought from him at a great price leave to visit
his gloomy wicked kingdom, and to relieve poor creatures lying in it for
conscience sake.
Now, had she relieved all who professed that they were such as she
sought, she might have spent the wealth of both Indies; for it was
shocking how many utter reprobates pressed up to her and to Will,
claiming that they were imprisoned for matters of religion; but their
brazen countenances, that bore the deep impress of their wickedness,
witnessed against them. With great trouble she found out at last a few
of the sort she wanted, and then began to ask for Andrew by name; but no
one seemed to know aught of him; the keeper too professed ignorance of
any such person. But her belief was strong that he lay within those
walls, and she went again and again on the same errand.
Now I could never get her leave to go with her to Newgate. She said at
first that Will, being a man, was more useful to her than I could be;
but afterwards she owned that the prison was so vile and hideous a place
she could not endure I should see it.
'There is no need,' she said, 'for more than one of us to behold such
monstrous evil. 'Tis a society of fiends, Lucy, a training-school for
all vice, and the keeper is worthy of it. I think it is not less than
acted blasphemy to throw good men into it; as well send them alive into
hell. The Lord look upon it, and require it.'
'Are there any of the Friends shut up there?' I asked.
'There have been hundreds, I am told,' she said; 'even now there are too
many, but they die daily of fever and misery;' and she stopped short,
presently saying, 'If I find him not, I will not repent of my search. I
have fed some starving saints already.' So she continued her visits and
her inquiries.
But I began to find it an almost unbearable penance to stay within doors
alone in her absence; I prayed and struggled for composure, but could
not attain it, and at last I said I must go out sometimes to breathe the
air. She warned me of perils awaiting me if I walked abroad by myself,
but I got some poor coarse black clothes that I put on, and a hood to
hide my face; and I sometimes added to these a cloth tied about my neck,
such as I had seen on poor creatures who had sores. It was an artifice,
but I hope not a sinful one; for in this disguise, and contriving to
behave like a sick languishing person, I was more terrible to disorderly
people than they to me, and they kept at a good distance from me. Thus I
took many a walk about the streets; but my chief comfort was only to see
a variety of dismal objects. The street where we dwelt was quite
grass-grown and empty; I do not think there were above two inhabited
houses in it, nor would you see above half a dozen people go through it,
in all the length of the summer's day. Of the passengers that I met
elsewhere, I think two out of every three were poor sickly objects with
sores and plasters upon them; and sometimes it was my luck to meet
coffins of those dead of the sickness; for now there could be no strict
observing of the rule to bury them by night, the number of such funerals
increasing at a frightful rate.