180 FOUR YEARS IN THE T\mTE NORTH [Aug. 



filed aft and, in the presence of their officers, drank 

 their stipulated amount of lime-juice; practically every 

 man was afflicted with scurvy within less than a year. 

 It is of interest to note that fresh meat was issued only 

 twice in three weeks. According to Nares, even Nellie, 

 Markham's dog, and both the cats plainly showed scor- 

 butic symptoms. 



A very early account of scurvy by Pigafetta, the his- 

 torian of Magellan, is of interest: 



Our greatest misfortune was that we were attacked by a sort of 

 malady which caused the gums to swell so that they rise above the 

 teeth in the upper and lower jaws ahke, and those who are attacked 

 by it can take no nourishment. Nineteen of our men died of it, 

 among whom were the Patagonian giant and a Brazilian whom we 

 had taken on board. Besides the dead we had twenty-five or twenty- 

 six sailors who had pains in their legs and other parts of their body, 

 but they recovered. 



All on board of Bering's ship had the scurvy. She 

 drifted about without sail or helmsmen, finally entering 

 a cove of Bering Island, where nearly all died either on 

 board ship or after landing. 



Huddled on deck, one half that hardy crew 



Lie shrunk and withered in the biting sky. 



With filmy stare and Kps of Hvid hue, 



And sapless Hmbs that stififen as they lie; 



While the dire pest scurge of the frozen zone 



Rots through the vein and gnaws the knotted bone. 



Although our relief-ship might possibly reach Etah 

 within the next ten days, the men, now thoroughly 

 alarmed, decided to aid me in every possible way in 

 the execution of plans formulated months before against 

 a non-arrival by September 1st. On the 20th Jot, 



