Contents -- Preface -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction: Epidemic Constitutions -- 1. "A Rude Place and an Unpolisht Man" : William Penn and the Nature of Pennsylvania -- 2. "An Infancy of Government" : Population, Authority, and the Problem of Proprietorship -- 3. "A Suitable Charity or an Effectual Security" : Community, Contagion, and the Care of Strangers -- 4. "A Body Corporate and Politick" : Association, Interest, and Improvement in a Provincial City -- 5. "Improvement in Every Part of the Healing Art" : Transatlantic Cultures of Medical Improvement -- 6. "A Fine Field for Professional Improvement" : Sites and Sources of Medical Authority in the Revolutionary War -- 7. "In a Yielding State" : Nervous Nationalism in the New Republic -- 8. "Those Friendly Reciprocities" : Panic and Participation in the Age of Yellow Fever -- 9. "A Matter of Police" : Fever and Betrayal in the Federal Union -- Conclusion: Looking West from Philadelphia -- Notes -- Index.