37 
A few Suggestions on the Preservation of Health in Polar Climes. 
Having had under consideration the best means of escaping scurvy, and pre- 
serving health in the Arctic regions, I deem it my duty to submit the following 
brief remarks for the use of future voyagers. In so doing, I shall confine myself 
wholly to the results of my own experience during a period of some years passed 
in the higher latitudes, feeling confident that attention to the precepts here incul- 
cated will secure for those who may follow me as successful an exemption from 
scurvy and sickness as have crowned my own efforts, by a rigid adherence to 
them. 
In the first place, I would unhesitatingly recommend the entire exclusion of 
all kinds of salted meats from the diet ; convinced as I am, from long experience 
and close attention to the effects of such food, that it proves, through its indi- 
gestibility and deficient nutrient properties, injurious to the system, and dete- 
riorating the condition of the circulating fluids and secretions generally — inducing 
a debilitated habit of body, favourable to the production of scurvy, under 
circumstances of privation and exposure, and other exciting influences, calculated 
to call it into action. In fact, it is my belief that the origin of every case of 
scurvy may be fairly traced to the use of salted meats. 
In the present age of inventions and improvements there can be no lack of 
substitutes, and excellent ones too, for the hard salt beef and pork, and the whole 
category of dried tongues, hams, &c., which constituted the sea stock of bygone 
years, when every ship in a long voyage, as in Anson's time, lost great numbers 
of the crew. 
Now, we have preserved meats, poultry, soups, pemmican, and fresh bacon of 
all kinds. The latter article, which was supplied for the first time to the expe- 
dition now out, especially that preserved in tins for the use of travelhng parties, 
proved the most valuable addition of all to the scale of Arctic victualling ; its 
freshness and mildness rendering it easy of digestion, and its fatty quality ren- 
dering it highly nutritious by affording a large supply of carbonaceous material 
to make up for the constant waste occasioned by the increased exhalation of 
carbon which accompanies the activity of the respiration in very low tempera- 
tures of the atmosphere. 
The various kinds of vegetables when carefully selected and preserved are 
quite equal to the fresh ones ; more especially the preserved potato, carrot, 
parsnip, turnip, and peas ; and I cannot speak too highly of those bottled fruits, 
as the damson, greengage, currant and raspberry, gooseberry, and that perhaps 
best of all antiscorbutic fruit, the cranberry, which is quite equal to the lime- 
juice in its valuable properties : all these fruits are quite as good as when first 
gathered. 
Dried fruits — apples, figs, prunes, raisins, and almonds, &c. — are all objec- 
tionable. 
The best diluents are tea, coffee, and chocolate, more especially the patent 
chocolate which the travelling parties were supplied with in the last expedition. 
Of spirits and wines, the less taken the better ; good sound malt liquors are 
preferable in all respects, combining, as they do, a nutritive with a stimulating 
property. 
On the subject of clothing I have only to observe that I found the Govern- 
ment pilot-cloth suit, with a " sou'- wester," the most generally useful in summer 
or winter ; but for boating or sledging, in severe weather, I know of nothing 
equal to the Esquimaux seal-skin dress and fur boots.* A common blanket bag 
I have always found far more comfortable than a felt one for sleeping in, when 
away travelling, with a buffalo robe beneath it. 
Of medical treatment, little is required. The bracing effects of a low, dry 
temperature, and the absence of all moisture in the atmosphere for a large portion 
of the year, so that not a cloud can form in the clear blue sky, render catarrhal 
and other affections resulting from atmospheric transitions of rare occurrence. 
During the dark and monotonous season of winter, active exercise in the open 
air, on the floe or on the land, is the very best presei'vative of health, aided by 
proper attention to diet ; the mind being at the same time engaged in rational 
occupations, reading, writing, sketching, or whatever may be the bent of indivi- 
dual taste. 
* TIioso supplied to the expedition by Mr. liichard Jeffs, of No- 1, Ilaiuvay Street, Oxford 
Street, I believe, gave imieli satisfaction. 
£3 
