Throughout the long sultry summer we were mercifully preserved from the contagion; then, as autumn came, and still the plague did not appear amongst us, people began to think that with the approach of the cold weather all danger was past. But this was not the case. Winter drew on, and with it the cold was intense, a sharp frost lasting for over six weeks. Towards the end of December the _Essex_, man-of-war, came into port, and hardly had she moored alongside the jetty when the report spread about that she was infected with the dread disease. Immediately there was a panic amongst the workmen, and, throwing down their tools, they betook themselves off, vowing that neither the king nor the king’s enemies would make them resume work till the _Essex_ had gone. Finding threats and entreaties useless, the commissioner ordered the _Essex_ to moor in the centre of the harbour. This was done, but rumour had it that at midnight the bodies of eight men, victims of the plague, were taken ashore and buried secretly in the Pest House fields. Two days afterwards it was known that three more of her crew had died, and were buried on the foreshore at Gosport; while, to disinfect the ship, great quantities of brimstone were burnt, but to no purpose. Then, strange to relate, the plague broke out in Gosport town, whither some three hundred men pass over every day to work in the dockyard, so it was not surprising to learn that at length the dreaded scourge had appeared in our own town. With fierce violence it spread. Many houses were shut up, their doors marked by a cross with the words "God have mercy upon us" written underneath. At first passers-by would cross in fear and trembling to the other side of the street whenever this mournful sign met their eyes, but as the number of cases increased people became hardened to the danger. Many put the cause of the disease, rightly enough, to the filthy habits of the poorer people, and hearing that salt water was a preventive, scores of the inhabitants repaired daily to the seashore, plunging into the bitterly cold waves in the hope of staving off the malady. Day and night large fires were lighted in the streets, while, to add to the misery, the silent watches of the night were broken by the hoarse shout of the watchmen, who, ringing their bells, cried out in solemn tones: "Bring out your dead." All the time the war with the Dutch was waged unceasingly, till it was reported that the French, apprehensive of our supremacy at sea, joined forces with the States of Holland and declared war against us. Early in April, to my great joy, Sir Thomas Middleton informed me that I was to join the _Prince Royal_, a ship of 100 guns, then lying at Chatham with the rest of the fleet under the command of the Duke of Albemarle and Prince Rupert.