INTRODUCTION. 



vii 



sufficient for our whole consumption, had there been any occasion to 

 limit the expense of an article so conducive to health and comfort. 



In the account of the preceding voyage, it has been stated that a 

 serious annoyance arose, during the winter, from the accumulation of 

 moisture and ice produced by the condensation of the breath and other 

 vapours in the ships' companies' bed-places. It was determined, there- 

 fore, on the present occasion, to do away with these both for the 

 officers and men, substituting for the former cots, and hammocks for 

 the latter. This change proved extremely beneficial, by increasing the 

 ventilation, and promoting the more uniform circulation of warm air, 

 which had before been materially impeded by the number and close- 

 ness of the bulkheads. 



In the victualling of the ships several alterations were likewise made, 

 which the experience of the last voyage suggested. The principal 

 object being to stow as much as possible, a considerably larger supply 

 than before of the meat preserved in tin cases by Messrs. Gamble 

 and Co., was now furnished, amounting to two pounds per week a 

 man, together with a quart of vegetable or concentrated-meat soups, 

 for a period of three years. For the same reason, the spirits were 

 supplied at thirty-five per cent, above proof, to be reduced, when 

 issued, by means of a hydrometer, to the strength of that usually fur- 

 nished to the navy ; by which expedient the stowage was economized 

 in the proportion of an increase of forty gallons on every hundred. 

 For one-half of the proposed supply of biscuit, kiln-dried flour of the 

 best quality was substituted, to be baked into bread during the winters ; 

 three hundred- weight of flour occupying only the same space as one 

 hundred-weight of biscuit, A considerable portion of the fore-hold 

 was also partitioned off into two large binns or bread-rooms, for 



