CETACEANS. 193 



healthy condition of their crews : scurvy, so long the 

 bane of distant voyagers, is now of exceedingly rare 

 occurrence amongst them ; and it is common for these 

 ships to return to their port, after a voyage of three 

 years, with an entire and healthy crew an object which, 

 little more than half a century ago, could only be ef- 

 fected by the talent and anxious exertion of Captain 

 Cook, aided by every appliance it was in the power of 

 the British government to afford. 



It is a prevalent, but very erroneous idea, enter- 

 tained by persons unacquainted with the economy of 

 South-Seamen, that these vessels are constantly in a 

 state of dirt and disorder. That there might formerly 

 have existed just grounds for such an opinion is not 

 improbable : the systematic observance of rules, tend- 

 ing to maintain health and comfort amongst seamen, 

 has been of comparatively recent adoption in any de- 

 partment of our naval service. To our great navigator, 

 Cook, we are chiefly indebted for having led the way to 

 the attainment of so desirable an object. 



The better construction of ships a greater attention 

 to the quality and mode of preserving provisions* 

 the daily and unremitted routine of measures tending 

 to the cleanliness of ship and crew as well as the en- 

 couragement of a proper pride amongst seamen, in re- 

 gard to decent apparel, and a disposition to enforce 

 amongst themselves that social order over which their 

 officers can have but little control afford prominent 



* From the remarkably early period at which the crews of some ships 

 are attacked by scurry, and the protracted absence from port which 

 others will endure without exhibiting any trace of this malady, there is 

 good reason to suspect, that scorbutic disease arises less from a long 

 continued diet of salt provisions than from the bad quality of the latter, 

 or from a general defect in the selection, or mode of preserving, both 

 food and water. 



VOL. II. 



