1846.] STORING OF WOOD. 81 



consumption, and as as it was very reasonable and clean, 

 we completed our available stowage with it. 



Those who are curious in the investigation of the 

 causes of fever and other attacks to which seamen are 

 liable, seem to have overlooked this, one of the most 

 obvious of mischiefs, on shipboard. In the year 1830, 

 my attention was directed to this subject ; in the fitting 

 and storing of H.M.S. 'JEtna', not a single article of 

 moist wood, or other matter which could ferment in the 

 holds, was permitted to be embarked. All casks were de- 

 prived of wooden hoops, and were carefully white-washed 

 and dried (under the direction of Mr., now Commander, 

 Town, at Clarence Victualling Yard), the flour was packed 

 in water casks, and the dry provision in tanks. Great 

 circumspection was exercised throughout the period which 

 she remained under my command; and although my 

 predecessors, Officers and crew, in the ' Hecla ' died, or 

 were invalided, still we continued healthy ; and but one 

 soul died in the course of three years and a half, chiefly 

 on the most unhealthy parts of Africa, situated between 

 Sierra Leone and the Gambia; and this man was a 

 supernumerary. Nearly the same good fortune attended 

 the ' Sulphur ', until the fever of China attacked those 

 exposed to the damp ground on Canton Heights. I am 

 therefore particular in alluding to this purchase of dry 

 wood, an acquisition which I never lost sight of, and 

 frequently, nay, invariably, looked after, to the interest of 

 my Purser, as well as of my crew. I feel satisfied that 

 to the fermentation resulting from the Mangrove bark, 

 which peels off on drying, and falls into the lower part of 

 the hold, where it meets with other moist substances, 



VOL. II. G 



