174 ANNOYANCES FROM STOVES. 



covered : this system was continued afterwards 

 at stated times, independently of the daily in- 

 spection at divisions. Hitherto the officers had 

 escaped every complaint, although two were now 

 temporarily indisposed from a return of attacks 

 to which they had been previously subject in 

 other climates ; yet as these would probably have 

 manifested themselves anywhere else, they did 

 not create the same uneasiness as the former. I 

 do not feel my self competent to pronounce in what 

 the malignant disease had its origin with us ; but 

 when it is considered that the difference of 

 temperature, between the outside and inside of 

 the ship, amounted frequently to one hundred 

 and ten degrees, that the air outside was pure 

 and extremely dry, whilst that inside was fetid and 

 excessively moist, there seems to be good ground 

 for presuming that this was, if not the source, 

 certainly a great aggravation of the evil. The 

 total failure of the warming apparatus had indeed 

 proved a serious misfortune. The stoves were 

 just sufficient to produce a warm current about 

 the central line of the deck, whilst the sides were 

 cool enough to convert this into vapour, which, 

 having accumulated within the cabins, streamed 

 down the sides and from over head, until they 

 were half afloat. If open stoves were brought 

 down to dry up the vapour, we were half suffo- 

 cated by the sulphuric odour of the coals ; and 



