salt of sodium to be used to
alkalize the blood as an experiment, if necessity arose. Darkness, cold,
and hard work are in Atkinson's opinion important causes of scurvy.

Nansen was an advocate of variety of diet as being anti-scorbutic, and
Scott recalled a story told him by Nansen which he had never understood.
It appeared that some men had eaten tins of tainted food. Some of it was
slightly tainted, some of it was really bad. They rejected the really bad
ones, and ate those only which were slightly tainted. "And of course,"
said Nansen, "they should have eaten the worst."

I have since asked Nansen about this story. He tells me that he must have
been referring to the crew of the Windward, the ship of the
Jackson-Harmsworth Expedition to Franz Josef Land in 1894-97. The crew of
this ship, which was travelling to and from civilization, got scurvy,
though the land party kept healthy. Of this Jackson writes: "In the case
of the crew of the Windward I fear that there was considerable
carelessness in the use of tinned meats that were not free from taint,
although tins quite gone were rejected.... We [on shore] largely used
fresh bear's meat, and the crew of the Windward were also allowed as much
as they could be induced to eat. They, however, preferred tinned meat
several days a week to a diet of bear's meat alone; and some of the crew
had such a prejudice against bear's meat as to refuse to eat it at
all."[143]

Of course tainted food should not have been eaten at all, but if it had
to be eaten, then, according to Nansen, the ptomaines which cause scurvy
in the earlier stages of decomposition are destroyed by the ferment which
forms in the later stages. They should therefore have taken the worst
tins, if any at all.

Wilson was strongly of opinion that fresh meat alone would stop scurvy:
on the Discovery seal meat cured it. As to scurvy on Scott's Discovery
Southern Journey, he made light of it: however, during the Winter Journey
I remember Wilson stating that Shackleton several times fell in a faint
as he got outside the tent, and he seems to have been seriously ill:
Wilson knew that he himself had scurvy some time before the others knew
it, because the discoloration of his gums did not show in front for some
time. He did not think their dogs on that journey had scurvy, but
ptomaine poisoning from fish which had travelled through the tropics. He
was of opinion that on returning from sledge journeys on the Discovery