Cholera struck: the term is especially apposite. It could be anticipated, for its pandemics approached slowly. For most of the nineteenth century it could not reliably be prevented, avoided, or cured. For most of the twentieth, it could be (and was often) avoided; it could be (but was not always) prevented or cured. But what it did, it can do again. Cholera did not merely kill, and rapidly, but it distorted lives and bodies. It took hold, drawing out the body’s heat, twisting muscles into spasms and cramps, producing insatiable thirst but taking away voice. It liquefi ed a body as fl uids streamed uncontrollably and insensibly from both ends. It quickly wrung the water from the body, leaving a shriveled form and thickened blood. All this in a few hours.