The ship captain's medical guide / compiled by Harry Leach ; revised and enlarged by William Spooner.
- Leach, Harry.
- Date:
- 1901
Licence: In copyright
Credit: The ship captain's medical guide / compiled by Harry Leach ; revised and enlarged by William Spooner. Source: Wellcome Collection.
27/216 page 5
![lood, especially in hot climates, will injure the diges- tion, derange the liver, induce gout and rheuniatisni, and produce a feverish condition of the blood pre- disposing to many diseases. Scurvy is caused by a deticiency of the salts contained in vegetables, and mostly occurs when a monotonous salt diet, with no vegetables, is given for any length of time. It is to remedy this condition that lime-juice is issued ; but with such a proper dietary scale as is now within the reach of all, lime-juice should not be required. The (juantity and descrii)tion of food usually named in the dietary scales, and signed for by the crew, seem to be adopted as a matter of course from generation to generation, and are by no means such as to give the most suitable food to seamen. The food scale is a matter of contract settled between the master and seamen for each ship for each voyage, and is not in any way prescribed by the Merchant Shipping Act. A skeleton scale is printed in the articles of agreement, which ])rovides for the inser- tion of other articles than salt beef and pork, biscuits, flour and {)eas, which form the usual monotonous diet, but too often the blank s})aces remain blank. The old-fashioned scale is not sutiiciently varied ; it contains too much salt meat, too much animal food generallv, and no vegetables. The Hoard of d’rade in 1888 issued a circular on the subject, written by .Mr. 'J'homas (b-ay, ‘ Dep. Paper,’ No. 75, in which the following scale is suggested :—](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b28992349_0027.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
