Yet the strenuous efforts of the London Company would surely have brought something like prosperity to the colony had not an old enemy returned to cause the destruction of hundreds of the settlers. This was the sickness. For some years the mortality had been very low, because the old planters were acclimated, and few new immigrants were coming to Virginia. But with the stream of laborers and artisans that the Sandys régime now sent over, the scourge appeared again with redoubled fury. As early as January, 1620, Governor Yeardley wrote "of the great mortallitie which hath been in Virginia, about 300 of ye inhabitants having dyed this year".[164] The sickness was most deadly in the newly settled parts of the colony, "to the consumption of divers Hundreds, and almost the utter destruction of some particular Plantations".[165] The London Company, distressed at the loss of so many men, saw in their misfortunes the hand of God, and wrote urging "the more carefull observations of his holy laws to work a reconciliation".[166] They also sent directions for the construction, in different parts of the colony, of four guest houses, or hospitals, for the lodging and entertaining of fifty persons each, upon their first arrival.[167] But all efforts to check the scourge proved fruitless. In the year ending March, 1621 over a thousand persons died upon the immigrant vessels and in Virginia.[168] Despite the fact that hundreds of settlers came to the colony during this year, the population actually declined. In 1621 the percentage of mortality was not so large, but the actual number of deaths increased. During the months from March, 1621, to March, 1622, nearly twelve hundred persons perished. It was like condemning a man to death to send him to the colony. Seventy-five or eighty per cent. of the laborers that left England in search of new homes across the Atlantic died before the expiration of their first year. The exact number of deaths in 1622 is not known, but there is reason to believe that it approximated thirteen hundred.[169] Mr. George Sandys, brother of the Secretary of the London Company, wrote, "Such a pestilent fever rageth this winter amongst us: never knowne before in Virginia, by the infected people that came over in ye _Abigall_, who were poisoned with ... beer and all falling sick & many dying, every where dispersed the contagion, and the forerunning Summer hath been also deadly upon us."[170] Not until 1624 did the mortality decline. Then it was that the Governor wrote, "This summer, God be thanked, the Colony hath very well stood to health".[171] The dread sickness had spent itself for lack of new victims, for the immigration had declined and the old planters had become "seasoned".