The Whole Sky Was Obscured By A
Veil Of Yellowish Grey, That Shut Out The Face Of The Sun.
The
streets were utterly silent, being indeed almost entirely deserted;
and not without cause, for the scorching blast, whilst it fevers
the blood, closes up the pores of the skin, and is terribly
distressing, therefore, to every animal that encounters it.
I
returned to my rooms dreadfully ill. My head ached with a burning
pain, and my pulse bounded quick and fitfully, but perhaps (as in
the instance of the poor Levantine, whose death I was mentioning),
the fear and excitement which I felt in trying my own wrist may
have made my blood flutter the faster.
It is a thoroughly well believed theory, that during the
continuance of the plague you can't be ill of any other febrile
malady - an unpleasant privilege that! for ill I was, and ill of
fever, and I anxiously wished that the ailment might turn out to be
anything rather than plague. I had some right to surmise that my
illness may have been merely the effect of the hot wind; and this
notion was encouraged by the elasticity of my spirits, and by a
strong forefeeling that much of my destined life in this world was
yet to come, and yet to be fulfilled. That was my instinctive
belief, but when I carefully weighed the probabilities on the one
side and on the other, I could not help seeing that the strength of
argument was all against me.
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