The Web of Authority • 219not the officials of church and state insisted that the citizens purge their sins
rather than the air? These dissenters, although a minority, were angry and
had to be taken seriously. Yet Albemarle brushed aside their protests and
stepped up the arrests of those doing privately what others did at public serv-
ices—imploring God to stay the hand of the Destroying Angel. Unfor-
tunately, there was no sign of repenting, only an increase in persecutions.
The public fires were nonetheless an administrative triumph that also
boosted public morale. Out in Earls Colne, Reverend Josselin believed that
high temperatures and lightning dispelled plague. If nature could purge the
air, he reasoned, why not help it along? The Covent Garden diarist Thomas
Rugge recalled the use in previous epidemics of coalfires to change the qual-
ity of the air, and he hoped for the best.^6
The sight of citizens setting those September blazes and steering gaping
passersby around them was something to behold. Fire tenders were stationed
by the Guildhall, at the western end of Saint Paul’s cathedral, at Bridewell
Gate, and at the Royal Exchange. Tenders built bonfires before the Three
Cranes tavern, where Poultry linked Cheapside, and at Cornhill near the
Stocks market. They set another below Thames Street by Queenhithe wharf.
Fires burned at the Custom House near the ramshackle waterfront ware-
houses that housed smugglers’ goods and homeless workers. Plague was rife
there; the royal council later demolished the buildings.
The Guildhall had made certain that a fire was lit in front of Sir John
Lawrence’s house in Saint Helen’s parish north of Cornhill and Leadenhall
Streets. It was a fitting site, a handsome four-story house with an ornate fa-
çade bearing the arms of the family and city. Citizens had become accus-
tomed to standing before the mayor’s door. He might not be at the Guildhall
every day, but Sir John still went through his daily ritual of greeting his fel-
low citizens. One certainly couldn’t fault him for doing it now from the bal-
cony above the front door; he was close enough to hear their petitions for
help against the plague, ready with compassionate words that the city would
help them in their time of need. It was reassuring to see a fire burning at his
doorstep.
The duke of Albemarle and his aides designated where the blazes would
be most effective in the Westminster area. In the huge outparishes where the
plague had swept away the highest percentage of the local populace, the fires
were more scattered. Messengers spread out with orders from the local jus-
tices, carrying printed instructions for each parish. Civic officials took special
aim at areas that were known to breed disease. The flames that Pepys and