232 SECRETS OF EARTH AND SEA 



but to a peculiar poison present in the salted and dried 

 meat served out as rations ; others again, without any 

 study of the disease, have expressed the opinion that it 

 is due to a bacterial micro-organism. 



A blow to the easy-going belief of the Admiralty that 

 they had mastered and made an end of scurvy was struck 

 when scurvy broke out (60 cases among 122 men) in the 

 expedition to the North Pole which sailed in May 1875 m 

 the Alert and the Discovery, under the command of Sir 

 George Nares. The expedition had to return prematurely 

 after seventeen months' absence, and a committee was 

 appointed to inquire into the cause of the outbreak. The 

 stores of food and of lime-juice were shown to have been 

 ample; and the action of the leader in equipping his 

 sledging parties was in accordance with the judgment 

 and experience of successful explorers who gave evidence. 

 The cause of the outbreak remained a mystery. The 

 firm belief in the anti-scorbutic powers of "lime-juice" was 

 shaken, and this unfavourable opinion of its value has 

 been confirmed by medical officers who, during the recent 

 war, have been confronted by outbreaks of scurvy. These 

 outbreaks occurred among troops who, in military circum- 

 stances which rendered an adequate supply of fresh meat 

 and vegetables impossible, were supplied with lime-juice 

 prepared from the West Indian " sour-lime." 



Under these circumstances, an experimental study of 

 scurvy has been carried out during the last four years 

 by a group of workers at the Lister Institute, together 

 with a historical inquiry as to the use of lime-juice. The 

 reports of these investigators have very great practical 

 value and far-reaching interest, as showing what disastrous 

 results may arise from inaccurate use of a word, and the 

 neglect to ascertain the exact nature of the material thing 

 upon which the issue between life and death may depend. 



Here let me say that the staff of the Lister Institute 



