Read the passage from The American Plague. Toward the end of October, Washington heard from Postmaster General Pickering that the fever seemed to be on the wane. A cold spell had swept in and with it a cleansing rain. Burials were falling in number, from a high of 120 on October 11 to half that number on October 21. This good news was followed almost immediately by a contradictory report from Comptroller Wolcott. After several good days in the city, he explained, warm weather reappeared and deaths increased, jumping to 82 on October 22. Wolcott advised the president to delay his return trip several more days. From the central ideas of these two paragraphs, the reader can conclude that Washington had reliable information from many sources. Washington lacked reliable information despite his sources. Wolcott was not a good source of information for Washington. Pickering was not a good source of information for Washington.