Years Registers
examined		 With excess of
burials over baptisms		 Baptisms
in these		 Burials
in these
1669 118 33 685 878
1670 119 53 781 1403
1671 121 36 668 1051
1672 121 28 555 741
1673 124 16 365 487

by Short, show an excessive mortality in those years, which would have been in part caused by bowel complaints, as in the general “choleric lasks” of the 16th century.

In the summers of 1671 and 1672 the article of “griping in the guts” continues high in the London bills. It rises again decidedly in the summer of 1675, reaching a maximum of 129 deaths in the week ending 24 August, the deaths from all causes being 460. In the summer of 1676 it almost equals the high mortality of 1669 and 1670, reaching a maximum of 238 deaths in the week ending 22 August, the deaths from all causes being 607. In 1678 and 1679 there were epidemic agues, complicated with choleraic flux and gripes, which undoubtedly affected many adults[1394]. The deaths from “griping in the guts” continue high in the summers of 1680 and 1681. But by that time the article “convulsions” had steadily increased in the bills; and in the next great season of bowel complaint, the excessively hot and dry summer of 1684, the high mortality of the season is divided more equally between “griping in the guts” and “convulsions,” a sufficient indication of the age-incidence of the former:

London Weekly Mortalities.

1684

Week
ending		 Griping in
the guts		 Convulsions All
deaths
July1 56 98 454
8 71 92 404
15 65 79 364
22 74 89 420
29 116 84 503
Aug.5 154 180 720
12 — — —
19 186 100 609
26 — — —
Sept.2 171 95 585
9 144 82 564
16 103 58 471
23 91 59 464

The summers and autumns of 1688 and 1689 were again characteristic seasons of infantile diarrhoea. The deaths rose in August and September almost as in 1669 and 1670; but now the article of convulsions has actually more of the mortality of the season assigned to it than the original article of “griping in the guts.”

London Weekly Mortalities.

Summer and Autumn of 1688