he first time, and possibly that accounts for it. When the poor
little mites were alive she constantly left them, and when taken
back she either trod on them or lay on them, till not one was left
alive. It is extremely annoying.

As the daylight comes, people are busier than ever. It does one good
to see so much work going on.

_Friday, August_ 18.--Atkinson lectured on 'Scurvy' last night. He
spoke clearly and slowly, but the disease is anything but precise. He
gave a little summary of its history afloat and the remedies long in
use in the Navy.

He described the symptoms with some detail. Mental depression,
debility, syncope, petechiae, livid patches, spongy gums, lesions,
swellings, and so on to things that are worse. He passed to some of the
theories held and remedies tried in accordance with them. Ralph came
nearest the truth in discovering decrease of chlorine and alkalinity
of urine. Sir Almroth Wright has hit the truth, he thinks, in finding
increased acidity of blood--acid intoxication--by methods only possible
in recent years.

This acid condition is due to two salts, sodium hydrogen carbonate
and sodium hydrogen phosphate; these cause the symptoms observed
and infiltration of fat in organs, leading to feebleness of heart
action. The method of securing and testing serum of patient was
described (titration, a colorimetric method of measuring the percentage
of substances in solution), and the test by litmus paper of normal
or super-normal solution. In this test the ordinary healthy man shows
normal 30 to 50: the scurvy patient normal 90.

Lactate of sodium increases alkalinity of blood, but only within
narrow limits, and is the only chemical remedy suggested.

So far for diagnosis, but it does not bring us much closer to the
cause, preventives, or remedies. Practically we are much as we were
before, but the lecturer proceeded to deal with the practical side.

In brief, he holds the first cause to be tainted food, but secondary
or contributory causes may be even more potent in developing the
disease. Damp, cold, over-exertion, bad air, bad light, in fact
any condition exceptional to normal healthy existence. Remedies
are merely to change these conditions for the better. Dietetically,
fresh vegetables are the best curatives--the lecturer was doubtful of
fresh meat, but admitted its possibility in polar climate; lime juice
only useful if regularly taken. He discussed lightly the relative
values of vegetabl