"The atmospheric influences, the mephitism of the soil, and the inhabited
locality, are the three principal conditions of the causes of general
mortality," says Pringle.
He should have added food; for diet, of all external causes, affects the
condition of the human race more than any other. Those who have observed
the mortality curve follow the harvests in Ireland and Germany, and
noticed how strangely the number of the dead corresponded to the
scantiness of food, and those who have experimented with the feeding of
domesticated animals, will agree with me on this point.
Let us review these three great principles of destruction, as laid down by
the distinguished European authority, and apply them in the explanations
of the mortality at Andersonville.