to his Life, who was juſt expiring before: And another that ſmother’d a young Woman ſhe was looking to, when ſhe was in a fainting fit, and would have come to her ſelf: Some that kill’d them by giving them one Thing, ſome another, and ſome ſtarved them by giving them nothing at all: But theſe Stories had two Marks of Suſpicion that always attended them, which cauſed me always to ſlight them, and to look on them as meer Stories, that People continually frighted one another with. (1.) That wherever it was that we heard it, they always placed the Scene at the farther End of the Town, oppoſite, or moſt remote from where you were to hear it: If you heard it in White-Chapel, it had happened at St. Giles's, or at Weſtminſter, or Holborn, or that End of the Town; if you heard of it at that End of the Town, then it was done in White-Chapel, or the Minories, or about Cripplegate Pariſh: If you heard of it in the City, why, then it had happened in Southwark; and if you heard of it in Southwark, then it was done in the City, and the like.
In the next Place, of what Part ſoever you heard the Story, the Particulars were always the ſame, eſpecially that of laying a wet double Clout on a dying Man’s Face, and that of ſmothering a young Gentle-woman; ſo that it was apparent, at leaſt to my Judgment, that there was more of Tale than of Truth in thoſe Things.
However, I cannot ſay, but it had ſome Effect upon the People, and particularly that, as I ſaid before, they grew more cautious who they took into their Houſes, and who they truſted their Lives with; and had them always recommended, if they could; and where they could not find ſuch, for they were not very plenty, they applied τὸ the Pariſh Officers.
But here again, the Miſery of that Time lay upon the Poor, who being infected, had neither Food or Phyſick; neither Phyſician or Appothecary to aſſiſt
