There is probably no difference in the sus ceptibility of the sexes, but males are attacked in greater proportion than females, because they more frequently, and often recklessly, visit infected localities. The mortality is, as a rule, considerably greater among males. Ligon, in giving an account of the pestilence at Barba dos in 1647, of which he was an eye-witness, says: "The cause was unknown; one could not say if the ships of commerce had imported the scourge, or if it came from bad food, marshy water, the intemperance of the colonists, and, above all, the great quantity of eau-de-vie which they drank. . . . It was the most debauched who perished first, and not one woman died for ten men." No doubt Ligon was right in ascribing the difference in the mortality of the sexes largely to the difference in their habits, with reference to the use of eau-de-vie. Those who habitually use spirituous liquors are less likely to recover from an attack than the temperate, and a recent debauch is a recog nized predisposing cause.
The mortality among children is consider ably less than among adults. This applies es pecially to children from 5 to 15 years of age. The mortality among children under five is somewhat greater.
The idea which formerly prevailed in New Orleans and Havana that native-born citizens — •creoles"— have an inherited immunity from the disease is not well founded. Whatever im munity they may enjoy is no doubt, to a great extent at least, due to an attack of the disease frequently occurring during childhood and usu ally unrecognized.
Hinemann writes with reference to Vera Cruz: 'Until lately the physicians and people of Vera Cruz supported with fanaticism the dogma that natives were absolutely exempt from yellow fever. But the fearful epidemics of recent years (1875, 1877, 1878) have worked a change; for so many native children and adults suffered, that the truth could no longer be denied that these do not enjoy an absolute immunity.'
In Cuba the dogma that creoks are exempt from yellow fever did not withstand the search ing investigation made by the Havana Yellow Fever Commission of 1879.
Nevertheless the mortality from this disease among the creole population of cities where it has established itself as an endemic malady is comparatively small, and by far the largest quota of its victims is drawn from among the strangers who visit the infected places, or resi dents who have recently located in them. Con sult Camerer, C. B., 'Resume of Etiological Factors Concerned in Yellow Fever' (in United States Naval Medical Bulletin, Washing ton, January 1915) ; and 'Yellow Fever' (Docu ment No. 822 of the Sixty-first Congress, 3d Session, ib. 1911); Manson, Sir P., 'Tropical Diseases' (1907); Allbutt and IRtolleston, 'Sys tem of Medicine' ; Boyce, Sir R., 'Report on Yellow Fever in Honduras' (1906); 'Health and Administration in the West Indies' (1910) ; 'Bulletins of the United States Fever Insti tute' ; Aminales de 'Institut Pasteur (January 1906).
Geo. M. Sreesteutc., Sometime Surgeon-General, United States Army.
originally, in Great Britain, the common yellow bunting (Emberica eitrinelia), which is yellow above, varied by dark-brown patches, the under parts being pure yellow, and the wing-feathers dusky black, with brown or yellow edges. The flanks are of a brownish hue. The nest is placed on the ground, and is composed of grasses, moss, roots, etc., and lined with hair. When fat, in the autumn, the birds are much in request for their flesh. They are regarded with super stitious dislike in some districts, and their eggs are broken by boys whenever they are dis covered, a foolish saying being current that each egg contains a drop of 'devil's blood.' The birds are caught and fattened for the table in Italy In the United States the term is mis applied to the woodpecker or highhole See Fin nrsi.