3. Notwithstanding the signs of the favourable and unfavourable issue of the fever are in general uniform, when the cure of the disease is committed to nature, or to tonic medicines, yet they are far from being so when the treatment of the fever is taken out of the hands of nature, and attempted by the use of depleting remedies. We often see patients recover with nearly all the unfavourable symptoms that have been mentioned, and we sometimes see them die, with all those that are favourable. The words of Morellus, therefore, which he has applied to the plague, are equally true when applied to the yellow fever. "In the plague, our senses deceive us. Reason deceives us. The aphorisms of Hippocrates deceive us[7]." An important lesson may be learned from these facts, and that is, never to give a patient over. On the contrary, it is our duty in this, as well as in all other acute diseases, to dispute every inch of ground with death. By means of this practice, which is warranted by science, as well as dictated by humanity, the grave has often been deprived for a while of its prey, and a prelude thereby exhibited of that approaching and delightful time foretold by ancient prophets, when the power of medicine over diseases shall be such, as to render old age the only outlet of human life. [7] De Feb. Pestilent. cap. v. "Acutorum morborum incertæ admodum, ac fallaces sunt prædictiones." HIPPOCRATES. AN ACCOUNT OF THE _BILIOUS YELLOW FEVER_, AS IT APPEARED IN PHILADELPHIA, IN THE YEAR 1798. The yellow fever of the year 1797 was succeeded by scarlatina, catarrhs, and bilious pleurisies, in the months of November and December of the same year. The weather favoured the generation of the latter diseases. It became suddenly cold about the middle of November. On the 5th of December, the navigation of the Delaware was obstructed. There was a thaw on the 13th and 14th of this month, but not sufficient to open the river. In the month of January, 1798, the fevers discovered an uncommon determination to the brain. Four cases of the hydrocephalic state of fever occurred under my care during this month, all of which yielded to depleting remedies. The subjects of this state of fever were Mr. Robert Lewis, and the daughters of Messrs. John Brooks, Andrew Ellicott, and David Maffat.