ten o'clock
Saint Paul 's Churchyard , as is well known , was formerly the great mart for booksellers , who have not , even in later times , deserted the neighbourhood , but still congregate in Paternoster-row , Ave-Maria-lane , and the adjoining streets . At the period of this history they did not confine themselves to the precincts of the cathedral , but , as has been previously intimated , fixed their shops against the massive pillars of its nave . Besides booksellers , there were seamstresses , tobacco-merchants , vendors of fruit and provisions , and Jews -- all of whom had stalls within the cathedral , and who were now making preparations for the business of the day . Shortly afterwards , numbers who came for recreation and amusement made their appearance , and before ten o'clock , Paul 's Walk , as the nave was termed , was thronged , by apprentices , rufflers , porters , water-carriers , higglers , with baskets on their heads , or under their arms , fish-wives , quack-doctors , cutpurses , bonarobas , merchants , lawyers , and serving-men , who came to be hired , and who stationed themselves near an oaken block attached to one of the pillars , and which was denominated , from the use it was put to , the `` serving-man 's log . '' Some of the crowd were smoking , some laughing , others gathering round a ballad-singer , who was chanting one of Rochester 's own licentious ditties ; some were buying quack medicines and remedies for the plague , the virtues of which the vendor loudly extolled ; while others were paying court to the dames , many of whom were masked . Everything seemed to be going forward within this sacred place , except devotion . Here , a man , mounted on the carved marble of a monument , bellowed forth the news of the Dutch war , while another , not far from him , on a bench , announced in lugubrious accents the number of those who had died on the previous day of the pestilence .