1687. John Baptist Lulli, the celebrated musician, died, aged 54. He was
born at Florence, in 1634, and from being page to madame Montpensier,
niece to Louis XIV. became superintendent of music to that monarch.
_The Plague in London._
In March, 1665, London abounded in wealth and grandeur, in comparison
with its state in former ages. Goldsmiths’ shops shone with plate all
along the south-side of the street called Cheapside, then named
Goldsmiths’-row. The Strand then united London and Westminster by a
range of palaces, inhabited by the nobility, with gardens in the rear
reaching to the Thames, from whence through water-gates they descended
by stairs to take water. Each of these mansions was named after its
owner or occupier; as Essex, Arundel, Norfolk, Salisbury, Worcester,
Exeter, Hungerford, Howard, York, and Northumberland. They were built
at equal distances from each other, in the grandest style of antique
architecture. Such was London in March 1665, when it was visited by the
plague, which raged with such unabating fatality, that three, four, and
five thousand of the inhabitants died weekly. Deaths increased so fast
that the usual mode of interment could no longer be observed; large pits
were dug at Hollywell-mount, and in other suburbs of the city, to which
the dead were carried in carts, collected by the ring of a bell, and the
doleful cry of “Bring out your dead.” The bodies were brought out of the
houses, and placed in the carts with no other covering than rugs or
sheets tied round them, and were thrown into the pits in promiscuous
heaps. Trade was at a stand, the shops were shut up, every day had the
appearance of a sabbath; grass grew on the Royal Exchange, and most of
the public streets; and Whitechapel might be mistaken for green fields.