The watchman brought out three little shrouded forms.  They were laid upon the top of the awful pile, and the cart with its heavy load rumbled away, the bell no longer ringing, because there was no room for more upon that journey.

The boys stood with hands closely locked together, for although they had heard of these things before, they had never seen the sight.  Their bedroom at home looked out upon the river, and the dead cart only went about at night.  They trembled at the thought which came to them, that had they been numbered amongst the dead during this terrible visitation they too had been carried in that fashion to their last resting place.

“Come, Ben, let us be going,” said Joseph, recovering himself first; “we need not linger in the city if we like it not.  There may be strange things to see in all truth; but if we have no stomach for them, why let us make our way northward with all speed.  We can leave all this behind us by daybreak an we will.”

Taking hands, and feeling their courage return as they walked on, the brothers passed along the silent streets.  Sometimes a window would be opened from above, and a doleful voice would cry aloud in grief or anguish of mind, or some command would be shouted to the watchman beneath, or there would be a piercing cry for the dead cart as it rumbled by.  The boys at last grew used to the sound of the bell and the wheels.  Go where they would they could not avoid hearing one or another as the men went about their dismal errand.  It seemed less terrible after a time than it had done at first, and the bold spirit within them came back.

They wended their way northward, avoiding the narrower thoroughfares and keeping to the broader streets.  Even these were often very narrow and ill smelling, so that the brothers had recourse to their vinegar bottle or swallowed a spoonful of Venice treacle before venturing down.  Once they were forced to turn aside out of their way to avoid a heap of corpses that had been brought out from a narrow alley to wait for the cart.  They had heard of such things before, but to see them was tenfold more terrible.  Yet the spirit of adventure took possession of them as they passed along, and they were less afraid even of the most terrible things than they had been of lesser ones at starting.

In passing near to the little church of St. Margaret’s, Lothbury, they were attracted by the sound of a voice crying out as if in excitement or fear.  Being filled with curiosity in spite of their fears, they turned in the direction of the sound, and came upon a man clutching hard at the railings of the little churchyard, which like all others in that part was now filled to overflowing, and closed for burials, the dead being taken to the great pits dug in various places.  Night though it was, there was a small crowd of persons gathered round the railings, all peering in with eager faces, whilst the voice of the man at the corner kept calling out: