About the last quarter of the 18th century medical writers were inclined to drop the names of nervous and putrid as distinctive of certain fevers. Pringle, in his edition of 1775, says he had been careful to avoid the terms nervous, bilious, putrid and malignant, which conveyed either no clear idea or a false one. Armstrong, another army physician, writing in 1773, says: “Nervous, putrid, bilious, petechial or miliary, they are all of the malignant family; and in this great town [London] these are almost the only fevers that have for many years prevailed, and do so still, to the great destruction of mankind. For inflammatory fevers ... have for many years been remarkably rare[228].” Dr John Moore becomes sarcastic over the variety of names given to continued fever, some such generic name as Cullen’s “typhus,” then newly introduced, being what he desired[229]. Haygarth, writing of the Chester fevers in 1772, said that the miliary fever had been “supposed” endemic there for more than thirty years past, but he thought it probable that the eruption had generally, or always, been fabricated “by close, warm rooms, too many bed-cloaths, hot medicines and diet.” He had seen only one case in the epidemic that year, and he believed its rarity at that time was due to the treatment by fresh air and by “such regimen and medicines as are cooling and check putrefaction[230].” We shall see later that Percival, for Manchester, contents himself with saying that miliary fevers, which were formerly very frequent in that town and neighbourhood, now [1772] rarely occur[231]. In Scotland as late as 1782 the type was still nervous or low, and hardly ever inflammatory[232]. _Mortalities in London from fever and all causes._ Fever All Year deaths deaths 1741 7528 32169 1742 5108 27483 1743 3837 25700 1744 2670 20606 1745 2690 21296 1746 4167 28157 1747 4779 25494 1748 3981 23069 1749 4458 25516 1750 4294 23727 1751 3219 21028 1752 2070 20485 1753 2292 19276 1754 2964 22696 1755 3042 21917 1756 3579 20872 1757 2564 21313 1758 2471 17576 1759 2314 19604 1760 2136 19830 1761 2475 21063 1762 3742 26326 1763 3414 26148 1764 3942 23202 1765 3921 23230 1766 3738 23911 1767 3765 22612 1768 3596 23639 1769 3430 21847 1770 3214 22434 It is singular to observe that in the five successive years in this period with lowest fever-deaths and deaths from all causes, the years 1757-61 England was at war on the Continent. A similar low fever-mortality corresponded with the wars under Marlborough and Wellington.