Page:A Journal of the Plague Year (1722).djvu/277

 Edge of Shoreditch Church-yard, had a piece of Ground taken in to bury their Dead, cloſe to the ſaid Church-yard; and which for that very Reaſon was left open,and is ſince, I ſuppoſe, taken into the ſame Church-yard; and they had alſo two other burying Places in Spittlefields, one where ſince a Chapel or Tabernacle has been built for eaſe to this great Pariſh, and another in Petticoat-lane.

There were no leſs than Five other Grounds made uſe of for the Pariſh of Stepney at that time; one where now ſtands the Pariſh Church of St. Paul’s Shadwel, and the other, where now ſtands the Pariſh Church of St. John at Wapping, both which had not the Names of Pariſhes at that time, but were belonging to Stepney Pariſh.

I cou’d name many more, but theſe coming within my particular Knowledge, the Circumfſtance I thought made it of Uſe to record them; from the whole, it may be obſerv’d, that they were oblig’d in this Time of Diſtreſs, to take in new burying Grounds in moſt of the out Pariſhes, for laying the prodigious Numbers of People which died in ſo ſhort a Space of Time; but why Care was not taken to keep thoſe Places ſeparate from ordinary Uſes, that fo the Bodies might reſt undiſturb’d, that I cannot anſwer for, and muſt confeſs, I think it was wrong; who were to blame, I know not.

I ſhould have mention’d, that the Quakers had at that time alſo a burying Ground, ſet a-part to their Uſe, and which they ſtill make uſe of, and they had alſo a particular dead Cart to fetch their Dead from their Houſes; and the famous Solomon Eagle, who, as I mentioned before, had predicted the Plague as a Judgment, and run naked thro’ the Streets, telling the People, that it was come upon them, to puniſh them for their Sins, had his own Wife died the very next Day of the Plague,