weighed eight pounds
and a half; but their average weight in this state did not exceed two
pounds and a quarter. The distance of the fishing-place from the ships,
the dangerous state of the ice, and the soreness of the dogs' feet from
travelling on the rough, honey-combed ice, prevented our taking any
farther advantage of this very acceptable change of diet.

Nothing worthy of notice occurred till the 29th, when a patch of ice, a
mile broad, separated from the outer margin of our barrier and drifted
away. The canal formed by laying sand on the ice was now quite through
in most places, showing that the plan would, in this latitude at least,
always ensure a ship's escape at an earlier season than by the regular
course of nature, provided it could be carried the whole way down to the
open water.

I am now under the disagreeable necessity of entering on a subject which
I had at one time ventured to hope need scarcely occupy any part of this
narrative: I mean that of the scurvy, some slight but unequivocal
symptoms of which disease were this day reported to me, by Mr. Edwards,
to have appeared among four or five of the Fury's men, rendering it
necessary, for the first time during the voyage, to have recourse to
antiscorbutic treatment among the seamen and marines.

It will, perhaps, be considered a curious and singular fact in the
history of sea-scurvy, that during the whole of the preceding part of
this voyage, none among us but officers were in the slightest degree
affected by it, a circumstance directly contrary to former experience.
To whatever causes this might be attributed, it could not, however, but
be highly gratifying to be thus assured that the various means employed
to preserve the health of the seamen and marines had proved even beyond
expectation efficacious.

That a ship's company began to evince symptoms of scurvy after
twenty-seven months' entire dependance upon the resources contained
within their ship (an experiment hitherto unknown, perhaps, in the
annals of navigation, even for one fourth part of that period), could
scarcely, indeed, be a subject of wonder, though it was at this
particular time a matter of very sincere regret. From the health enjoyed
by our people during two successive winters, unassisted as we had been
by any supply of _fresh_ antiscorbutic plants or other vegetables, I
had began to indulge a hope that, with a continued attention to their
comforts, cleanliness, and exercise, the sam