Note 2 — CHAP. I.
Reading edition
The following may serve as a specimen of these returns:
Sick now on Board. Died in the course of last Month. Sent to the Hospital in the course of last Month.
Fevers 4 Of Fever 1 Ill of Scurvy 35
Flux 5
Scurvy 26
Catarrh and Rheumatism 7
Total 42
During the course of last month we had one hundred and fourteen of the men, who contracted the scurvy in the late long cruise, recovered by the use of limes, which were procured at Montserrat. A pint of wine, with an equal quantity of water, made agreeable with sugar and tamarinds, is served to each patient daily. The regimen is exactly the same as mentioned last month.
Since we came into port, very few have been seized with scurvy, but several complain daily of fluxes and feverish complaints, none of which seem at present to be of any consequence.
Four patients have last month complained of an almost total blindness towards evening, accompanied with head-ach, vertigo, nausea, and a sense of weight about the precordia. The pupil is then extremely dilated, but contracts readily when a strong light is presented to it. Two of them had the scurvy in a high degree, one of them slightly, and the other seemed entirely free from it. I am not well acquainted with the nature or cure of this disease, which I believe is called Nyctalopia by some systematic writers.
I gave those who were affected with it an emetic, which brought up a great deal of bile, and relieved the symptoms both of the head and stomach. This encouraged me to a repetition of it, which seemed also to be attended with benefit. I likewise applied blisters behind the ears, and gave bark and elixir of vitriol, with the antiscorbutic course, to those that required it.
I can form no probable conjecture concerning the cause of this disease. I have observed a dilation of the pupil in scorbutic patients, and they complained of a cloud before their eyes, with imperfect vision, which disappeared as the scurvy went off.
WILLIAM TELFORD.
To Dr. Blane, Physician to the Fleet.