Despite the fact that these enormous congregations of men were often exposed to very unfavourable weather conditions, and were much of the time scantily fed, the number of German field-troops that contracted and succumbed to infectious diseases was comparatively small. The total loss sustained by the German army in consequence of injuries and diseases amounted to 43,182 men and of these 14,648 died of disease. The following table indicates the percentage of deaths caused by the various diseases: _Disease._ _Per cent._ Typhoid Fever 60·0 Dysentery 16·2 Small-pox 1·9 Intermittent Fever 0·1 Other infectious diseases 0·3 Other diseases 21·5 Typhoid fever and dysentery were most prevalent, for the reason that the troops were often quartered in places where these diseases were already endemic. Regarding these matters we are accurately informed by the ‘Health Report relating to the German Armies in the War of 1870–1 against France’, an exhaustive account published by the Medical Division of the Prussian War Department.[238] A total of 74,205 men in the German field-army contracted typhoid and gastric fever, and 8,904 succumbed to them. The eastern Departments of France, especially the city and vicinity of Metz, were constantly afflicted with typhoid fever. This explains why both the German besiegers and the French defenders suffered so severely from that disease, the dissemination of which was helped by the contamination of the springs and water-courses, partly through excessive use, and partly in consequence of the burial of dead men and horses in close proximity to them. And while drinking-water was for that reason brought from a distance, the water used for other purposes was obtained in the immediate neighbourhood. It is obvious that typhoid fever must have raged extensively among the inhabitants of the villages surrounding Metz, the mortality in which during the siege was three times as high as normal. This is evident from a compilation of figures in the German Health Report,[239] indicating how the death-rate in these villages rapidly decreased after the withdrawal of the Germans; per 100 inhabitants, there died in: _Inhabitants._ _Nov._ _Dec._ _Jan._ _Feb._ _March._ Verneville 672 2·39 1·34 1·04 0·30 0·74 St. Privat 480 2·70 1·20 1·68 0·84 0·42 Gravelotte 708 2·14 0·71 0·55 0·71 — Ste. Marie aux 1·17 0·59 0·59 0·29 0·59 Chênes 340 Rezonville 587 1·87 0·87 0·68 0·68 0·85 Gorze 1,774 1·45 0·73 0·56 0·22 0·39