(*Note. 'Scurvy.' The nature of the disease and the proper method of
treatment were not fully understood in Anson's day. It is caused by
improper diet and particularly by the want of fresh vegetables. Lemon and
lime juice are the best protectives against it and they were made an
essential element in nautical diet in 1795. The disease which used to
cause dreadful mortality on long voyages has since that time gradually
disappeared and is now very rarely met with.)
THE PACIFIC.
Soon after our passing Straits le Maire the scurvy began to make its
appearance amongst us; and our long continuance at sea, the fatigue we
underwent, and the various disappointments we met with, had occasion its
spreading to such a degree, that at the latter end of April there were
but few on board who were not in some degree afflicted with it; and in
that month no less than forty-three died of it on board the Centurion.
But though we thought that the distemper had then risen to an
extraordinary height, and were willing to hope that as we advanced to the
northward its malignant would abate, yet we found, on the contrary, that
in the month of May we lost nearly double that number. And as we did not
get to land till the middle of June, the mortality went on increasing,
and the disease extended itself so prodigiously that after the loss of
above two hundred men we could not at last muster more than six foremast
men in a watch capable of duty.
This disease, so frequently attending all long voyages, and so
particularly destructive to us, is usually attended with a strange
dejection of the spirits, and with shiverings, tremblings, and a
disposition to be seized with the most dreadful terrors on the slightest
accident.
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