_Second stage:_ This is a stage of intermission of the symptoms which may last for three days or more, the patient seems as if going to recover, and only suffers from general malaise. A case is recorded where the intermission lasted nine weeks. In cases proceeding to a fatal termination the intermission is followed by the third stage. _Third stage:_ Jaundice is the most notable symptom and rapidly increases; the liver becomes much enlarged and the abdomen distended; epigastric pain is severe and there is vomiting of grumous black material consisting of altered blood; purging may be present and the motions contain blood. There is a marked tendency for hæmorrhages to occur from the mucous membranes and subcutaneously, producing purpuric spots. The urine is diminished, high coloured, contains bile pigments, albumen, blood, and casts. There are great prostration, a quick weak pulse, sleeplessness, coldness of the surface, gradually increasing weakness, apathy, convulsions, and coma, followed by death about the fifth or sixth day. The liver may diminish in size before death. It is rare for recovery to take place after enlargement of the liver and jaundice have supervened. It is by no means always easy to diagnose acute yellow atrophy of the liver or malignant jaundice from phosphorus poisoning. In phosphorus poisoning, the early symptoms, those of acute gastritis, are more severe, are developed more rapidly, and run their course more quickly than in acute atrophy, and there is a marked interval between these and the appearance of the jaundice; in acute yellow atrophy this interval is wanting, and from the beginning, on the contrary, there are gradual malaise, slight gastric catarrh, and jaundice. The jaundice and suffering, together with the increased action of the heart in phosphorus poisoning, are wanting in malignant jaundice, but the cerebral symptoms are more marked in the latter than in the former. Acute yellow atrophy most frequently occurs in women, especially during pregnancy. In acute atrophy leucin and tyrosin are present in the urine; in phosphorus poisoning they may occur, but generally in the urine voided just before death. Chronic poisoning, accompanied with all the symptoms just mentioned, may result from the action of the vapour on those engaged in the manufacture of phosphorus or of lucifer matches. In persons thus employed, necrosis of the jaws and caries of the teeth are not of infrequent occurrence. The lower jaw is more commonly affected. Mr. Lyons states that this form of necrosis cannot attack persons who have perfectly sound teeth, but only those whose teeth are carious (_St. Bartholomew‘s Hospital Report_, vol. xii.).