The houses were for the most part unoccupied--the streets overgrown with grass--while every object, animate and inanimate, bore some marks of the recent visitation.
Still, all looked hopeful, and the grocer could not doubt that the worst was past.

The different demeanour of the various individuals he met struck him.

Now he passed a young man whistling cheerily, who saluted him, and said, "I have lost my sweetheart by the plague, but I shall soon get another." The next was a grave man, who muttered, "I have lost all," and walked pensively on.

Then came others in different moods; but all concurred in thinking that the plague was at an end; and the grocer derived additional confirmation of the fact from meeting numerous carts and other vehicles bringing families back to their houses from the country.
After roaming about for several hours, and pondering on all he saw, he found himself before the great western entrance of Saint Paul's.

It chanced to be the morning on which the pallets and bedding were brought forth, and he watched the proceeding at a distance.