From 22 March 1986: They used to say that war is the ruin of serious soldiering. Too much disorder, too many accidents. So it could be said of the bubonic plague: it spoilt dying completely. There was so much to fear. Not merely a sudden, unexplained and incurable form of disease, since brevity of life and mysterious illness were commonplace; besides, there was no lack of plague-theories and official nostrums.