“Yes. A moment ago, we were in the year 1665, and the Chepe, and Wood Street, showed you the terrible state of things that existed then all over the city. Nearly all the richer people had left London by the time we had that glimpse of only one of the streets in which the disease raged. The Court had moved from Whitehall; most of the clergy had run away. So had many of the doctors. The people died by thousands, and still in those narrow dirty streets the plague spread. Trade was at a standstill, and multitudes were starving, and only kept alive by money sent for their relief to the Lord Mayor and the Archbishop and two or three noblemen who bravely refused to desert the city.” “Did Mr. Pepys go away?” Betty asked with interest. “No. His work kept him in London nearly all the time, and of course he tells us much about this awful year. Let us look at his ‘Diary.’” She opened the book which had been responsible for the magic scenes Betty had already beheld, and began to turn the leaves. “Here,” she said, “on June 7th, 1665, long before the terrible disease had reached its height, Mr. Pepys wrote, ‘_The hottest day that ever I felt in my life. This day, much against my will, I did in Drury Lane see two or three houses marked with a red cross upon the doors, and Lord have mercy upon us writ there._’ But though Pepys owns that he is often afraid, he keeps quite calm, and does not forget to mention when he puts on new clothes. (He is very vain, you know, and fond of dress.) “On September 3rd, when the plague was at its height, this is what appears in his ‘Diary’: ‘_Up; and put on my coloured silk suit very fine_.’ He goes on to say how he dares not put on his new ‘periwigg’ (that is the sort of long curling wig we saw him wearing just now) because he thinks it might hold the infection. Still Mr. Pepys was no coward during this terrible time, and seems to have done what he could to help the poor. Well, we will not linger over the misery of London during that awful year of 1665. A hundred thousand Londoners died of it, and even before it was quite over, another terrible misfortune fell upon the poor city, of which you shall just have a second’s glimpse. Hold this book. Shut your eyes, and think yourself on Bankside in Southwark, near St. Saviour’s Church.” Betty had no sooner done this, than even before she opened her eyes she was conscious of a fierce glare. Then just for a flashing second she saw on the opposite side of the river, London burning. From the Tower on the right hand, across the river, to St. Paul’s far down on the left, the city was a sheet of flame, and the night sky overhead was deep crimson with the reflected glare! Before she had time to feel frightened she was in the quiet parlour where Godmother still sat, turning over the leaves of the “Diary.” “How wonderful, but _awful_ it looked, Godmother! I couldn’t have borne to see it a second longer. What does it say about it in Mr. Pepys’s book?”