Some think that the pestilence was conveyed into Austria from Bukowina, where it had broken out in May 1866. When the war broke out, it is maintained, the disease was conveyed by troops to the western crown-lands of Austria.[230] ‘The truth’, says Niedner, ‘probably lies half way between; the epidemic in Bohemia was disseminated chiefly by the Prussian troops, but in the other Austrian countries by Austrian troops.’ Daimer,[231] one of the best authorities on the history of pestilences in Austria, says: ‘In the year 1866 an epidemic of cholera came to an end in Bukowina, where it was looked upon as the continuation of one that had been prevailing in Turkey and Roumania; it spread throughout the countries in which fighting was going on at that time, and was borne by troops to remote regions.’ According to Presl,[232] the number of deaths due to cholera in the several crown-lands in the year 1866 was: _No. inhabitants _Deaths due to (Dec. 31, 1869)._ cholera._ Lower Austria 1,983,149 15,114 Upper Austria 733,241 153 Salzburg 152,141 1 Styria 1,139,205 260 Carinthia 336,768 40 Carniola 465,463 930 Küstenland 585,467 1,067 Tirol and Vorarlberg 880,985 25 Bohemia 5,151,332 42,730 Moravia 2,016,186 55,527 Silesia 518,443 2,919 Galicia 5,491,675 34,857 Bukowina 522,481 11,656 Dalmatia 445,201 13 —————————— ——————— All Austria 20,421,737 165,292 In Prussia, too, cholera spread, in consequence of the war, more widely than ever before; the total number of deaths caused by it in the year 1866 was no less than 114,776, and in the following year it was 6,086.[233] Of the Prussian troops 4,529 (16·2 per cent) succumbed to cholera, and the total loss due to disease was 5,219; only 4,008 men were killed on the field or died from wounds. In the Grand Duchy of Hesse a few rather small epidemics occurred, and a larger one in Mayence.