History of the Plague in London Part 23

[247] The Act of Uniformity was pa.s.sed in 1661. It required all munic.i.p.al officers and all ministers to take the communion according to the ritual of the Church of England, and to sign a doc.u.ment declaring that arms must never be borne against the King. For refusing obedience to this tyrannical measure, some two thousand Presbyterian ministers were deprived of their livings.

[248] Madness, as in Hamlet, act iii. sc. 1.

[249] "Represented themselves," etc., i.e., presented themselves to my sight.

[250] "Dead part of the night," i.e., from midnight to dawn. Compare,

"In the dead waste and middle of the night."

_Hamlet_, act i. sc 2.

[251] "Have been critical," etc., i.e., have claimed to have knowledge enough to say.

[252] Being introduced.

[253] The plague.

[254] "First began" is a solecism common in the newspaper writing of to-day.

[255] Literally, laws of the _by_ (town). In modern usage, "by-law" is used to designate a rule less general and less easily amended than a const.i.tutional provision.

[256] "Sheriff" is equivalent to _shire-reeve_ (magistrate of the county or shire). London had, and still has, two sheriffs.

[257] Acted.

[258] The inspection, according to ordinance, of weights, measures, and prices.

[259] "Pretty many," i.e., a fair number of.

[260] The officers.

[261] Were.

[262] "Falls to the serious part," i.e., begins to discourse on serious matters.

[263] See note, p. 28. The Mohammedans are fatalists.

{Transcriber's note: The reference is to footnote 28.}

[264] A growth of osseous tissue uniting the extremities of fractured bones.

[265] Disclosed.

[266] The officers.

[267] Leading principle.

[268] Defoe means, "can burn only a few houses." In the next line he again misplaces "only."

[269] Put to confusion.

[270] Left out of consideration.

[271] The distemper.

[272] A means for discovering whether the person were infected or not.

[273] Defoe's ignorance of microscopes was not shared by Robert Hooke, whose Micrographia (published in 1664) records numerous discoveries made with that instrument.

[274] Roup is a kind of chicken's catarrh.

[275] Them, i.e., such experiments.

[276] From the Latin _quadraginta_ ("forty").

[277] From the Latin _s.e.xaginta_ ("sixty").

[278] Kinds, species.

[279] Old age.

[280] Abscesses.

[281] Himself.

[282] The essential oils of lavender, cloves, and camphor, added to acetic acid.

[283] In chemistry, balsams are vegetable juices consisting of resins mixed with gums or volatile oils.

[284] Supply "they declined coming to public worship."

[285] This condition of affairs.

[286] Collar.

[287] Economy.

[288] Supply "they were."

[289] Action (obsolete in this sense). See this word as used in 2 Henry IV., act iv. sc. 4.

[290] Which.

[291] Sailors' slang for "Archipelagoes."

[292] An important city in Asia Minor.

[293] A city in northern Syria, better known as Iskanderoon or Alexandretta. The town was named in honor of Alexander the Great, the Turkish form of Alexander being Iskander.