But these extravagant reports were very prejudicial to our trade,as well as unjust and injurious in themselves,for it was a long time after the plague was quite over before our trade could recover itself in those parts of the world;and the Flemings and Dutch (but especially the last)made very great advantages of it,having all the market to themselves,and even buying our manufactures in several parts of England where the plague was not,and carrying them to Holland and Flanders,and from thence transporting them to Spain and to Italy as if they had been of their own making.
But they were detected sometimes and punished:that is to say,their goods confiscated and ships also;for if it was true that our manufactures as well as our people were infected,and that it was dangerous to touch or to open and receive the smell of them,then those people ran the hazard by that clandestine trade not only of carrying the contagion into their own country,but also of infecting the nations to whom they traded with those goods;which,considering how many lives might be lost in consequence of such an action,must be a trade that no men of conscience could suffer themselves to be concerned in.
I do not take upon me to say that any harm was done,I mean of that kind,by those people.But I doubt I need not make any such proviso in the case of our own country;for either by our people of London,or by the commerce which made their conversing with all sorts of people in every country and of every considerable town necessary,I say,by this means the plague was first or last spread all over the kingdom,as well in London as in all the cities and great towns,especially in the trading manufacturing towns and seaports;so that,first or last,all the considerable places in England were visited more or less,and the kingdom of Ireland in some places,but not so universally.How it fared with the people in Scotland I had no opportunity to inquire.
It is to be observed that while the plague continued so violent in London,the outports,as they are called,enjoyed a very great trade,especially to the adjacent countries and to our own plantations.For example,the towns of Colchester,Yarmouth,and Hun,on that side of England,exported to Holland and Hamburg the manufactures of the adjacent countries for several months after the trade with London was,as it were,entirely shut up;likewise the cities of Bristol and Exeter,with the port of Plymouth,had the like advantage to Spain,to the Canaries,to Guinea,and to the West Indies,and particularly to Ireland;but as the plague spread itself every way after it had been in London to such a degree as it was in August and September,so all or most of those cities and towns were infected first or last;and then trade was,as it were,under a general embargo or at a full stop -as Ishall observe further when I speak of our home trade.
One thing,however,must be observed:that as to ships coming in from abroad (as many,you may be sure,did)some who were out in all parts of the world a considerable while before,and some who when they went out knew nothing of an infection,or at least of one so terrible -these came up the river boldly,and delivered their cargoes as they were obliged to do,except just in the two months of August and September,when the weight of the infection lying,as I may say,all below Bridge,nobody durst appear in business for a while.But as this continued but for a few weeks,the homeward-bound ships,especially such whose cargoes were not liable to spoil,came to an anchor for a time short of the Pool,*or fresh-water part of the river,even as low as the river Medway,where several of them ran in;and others lay at the Nore,and in the Hope below Gravesend.So that by the latter end of October there was a very great fleet of homeward-bound ships to come up,such as the like had not been known for many years.
*That part of the river where the ships lie up when they come home is called the Pool,and takes in all the river on both sides of the water,from the Tower to Cuckold's Point and Limehouse.[Footnote in the original.]
Two particular trades were carried on by water-carriage all the while of the infection,and that with little or no interruption,very much to the advantage and comfort of the poor distressed people of the city:and those were the coasting trade for corn and the Newcastle trade for coals.
The first of these was particularly carried on by small vessels from the port of Hull and other places on the Humber,by which great quantities of corn were brought in from Yorkshire and Lincolnshire.
The other part of this corn-trade was from Lynn,in Norfolk,from Wells and Burnham,and from Yarmouth,all in the same county;and the third branch was from the river Medway,and from Milton,Feversham,Margate,and Sandwich,and all the other little places and ports round the coast of Kent and Essex.
There was also a very good trade from the coast of Suffolk with corn,butter,and cheese;these vessels kept a constant course of trade,and without interruption came up to that market known still by the name of Bear Key,where they supplied the city plentifully with corn when land-carriage began to fail,and when the people began to be sick of coming from many places in the country.
This also was much of it owing to the prudence and conduct of the Lord Mayor,who took such care to keep the masters and seamen from danger when they came up,causing their corn to be bought off at any time they wanted a market (which,however,was very seldom),and causing the corn-factors immediately to unlade and deliver the vessels loaden with corn,that they had very little occasion to come out of their ships or vessels,the money being always carried on board to them and put into a pail of vinegar before it was carried.
