Once there, she was told that she could wait to see a doctor, but the sight of the crowded UHS waiting room prompted her to return to her Thayer Hall room instead.

"I found out that they're putting people on I.V.s so they don't pass out," she said.

Some students did not immediately link their malady to the food they ate.

"I thought it was the flu at first," said Jennifer Y. Lin '98. "My head really hurts."

"I lay in bed for a while," Lin added. "Everyone was throwing up, really violently."

Lin said she chose to remain in bed rather than go to UHS because she had heard the clinic was overburdened.

"Everyone I know is sick," said Conley Rollins '98, who became ill shortly after dinner. Rollins, who reported nausea and stomach aches, entered UHS at around midnight.

Many believed their symptoms were due to yesterday's Chem 10 lab, which involved some groups working with live E. Coli bacteria. But Baird Professor of Science Dudley R. Herschbach said there was little chance that the bacteria caused the epidemic.

"Unless people actually eat stuff, there's no way they should get sick from them," Herschbach said.

Rollins argued that even the nausea has its positive side.

"It's good timing, you know," she said. "The Ec 10 exam is tomorrow."

Dean of Freshmen Elizabeth Studley Nathans said, however, that the mystery illness wouldn't affect classes today. "I would not imagine the University schedule will be disrupted," she said.

Reached at home--herself sick with the flu last night--Nathans said ill students with exams today should discuss the problems with their instructors.

Sandip Madhavareddy '98 said he was feeling ill last night, but did not plan to go to UHS. His roommate had gone before 8 p.m. and had not returned three hours later.

Madhavareddy's roommate is yet another anomaly in this mysterious illness. He ate only breakfast yesterday.

"He left [Chem 10 lab] early, felt sick, and started throwing up all over the place," Madhavareddy said. "And he basically didn't have anything [to eat] today."

Madhavareddy said the Chem lab might have been responsible for his roommate's attack. But he also noted that he knew many others who were not in the class and that the number of sick was growing into the night.

"The news just keeps coming in," he said