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Windsor to consult with us. Every day added to his difficulties; the
arrival of fresh vessels with emigrants, the total cessation of commerce,
the starving multitude that thronged around the palace of the Protectorate,
were circumstances not to be tampered with. The blow was struck; the
aristocracy obtained all they wished, and they subscribed to a
twelvemonths' bill, which levied twenty per cent on all the rent-rolls of
the country. Calm was now restored to the metropolis, and to the populous
cities, before driven to desperation; and we returned to the consideration
of distant calamities, wondering if the future would bring any alleviation
to their excess. It was August; so there could be small hope of relief
during the heats. On the contrary, the disease gained virulence, while
starvation did its accustomed work. Thousands died unlamented; for beside
the yet warm corpse the mourner was stretched, made mute by death.
On the eighteenth of this month news arrived in London that the plague was
in France and Italy. These tidings were at first whispered about town; but
no one dared express aloud the soul-quailing intelligence. When any one met
a friend in the street, he only cried as he hurried on, "You know!"--
while the other, with an ejaculation of fear and horror, would answer,--
"What will become of us?" At length it was mentioned in the newspapers. The
paragraph was inserted in an obscure part: "We regret to state that there
can be no longer a doubt of the plague having been introduced at Leghorn,
Genoa, and Marseilles." No word of comment followed; each reader made his
own fearful one. We were as a man who hears that his house is burning, and
yet hurries through the streets, borne along by a lurking hope of a
mistake, till he turns the corner, and sees his sheltering roof enveloped
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