SYDENHAM. 97 remembrance, I ever saw." Ten days after this entry in his diary, he relates the following oc- currence. " June 17th. It struck me very deep this after- noon, going with a hackney-coach from Lord Treasurer's, down Holborne, the coachman I found to drive easily and easily, at last stood still, and come down hardly able to stand, and told me that he was suddenly struck very sick and almost blind, he could not see ; so I light and went into another coach, with a sad heart for the poor man and for myself also, lest he should have been struck with the plague." Of the distemper itself, it may be sufficient to mention, that it was very horrible in its symptoms, but in some more so than in others ; the swellings, which were generally in the neck or groin, when they grew hard, and would not break, became painful, with the most exquisite torment ; some, not being able to bear it, precipitated themselves from a window, or otherwise made away with them- selves ; others vented their pain by incessant roar- ings ; loud and lamentable cries were heard in the streets, sufficient to pierce the very heart. The precaution of shutting up houses was ge- nerally considered a very cruel and inhuman mea- sure, and the poor who were so confined made bitter lamentations ; the imprisonment, in fact, be- came so intolerable, that many attempted, both by violence and stratagem, to effect their escape : in these efforts several watchmen were killed, others wounded and left for dead, where the people, in infected houses, were opposed in their attempts to get away. Many houses having several ways out, H
