Page:A Journal of the Plague Year (1722).djvu/274

 The People being thus return’d, as it were in general, it was very ſtrange to find, that in their inquiring after their Friends, ſome whole Families were ſo entirely ſwept away, that there was no Remembrance of them left; neither was any Body to be found to poſſeſs or ſhew any Title to that little they had left; for in ſuch Caſes, what was to be found was generally embezzled, and purloyn’d ſome gone one way, ſome another.

It was ſaid ſuch abandon’d Effects, came to the King as the univerſal Heir, upon which we were told, and I ſuppoſe it was in part true, that the King granted all ſuch as Deodands to the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen of London, to be applied to the uſe of the Poor, of whom there were very many: For it is to be obſerv’d, that tho the Occaſions of Relief, and the Objects of Diſtreſs were very many more in the Time of the Violence of the Plague, than now after all was over; yet the Diſtreſs of the Poor was more now, a great deal than it was then, becauſe all the Sluces of general Charity were now ſhut; People ſuppos’d the main Occaſion to be over, and ſo ſtop’d their Hands; whereas particular Objects were ſtill very moving, and the Diſtreſs of thoſe that were Poor, was very great indeed.

Tho’ the Health of the City was now very much reſtor’d, yet Foreign Trade did not begin to ſtir, neither would Foreigners admit our Ships into their Ports for a great while; as for the Dutch, the Miſunderftandings between our Court and them had broken out into a War the Year before; ſo that our Trade that way was wholly interrupted; but Spain and Portugal, Italy and Barbary, as alſo Hamburgh, and all the Ports in the Baltick, theſe were all ſhy of us a great while, and would not reſtore Trade with us for many Months.

The Diſtemper {weeping away ſuch Multitudes, as I have obſerv’d, many, if not all the out Pariſhes