But at last this voyage was nearing its end. They might have reached port some days earlier, had it not been that all the crew except three or four had—through lack of proper food and other bad treatment—been attacked by scurvy, a disease already then having been almost shut out even from sailing vessels on long trips. On December 16 they had the happiness of going ashore at Shanghai, where they soon found a welcome in the homes of missionaries and of other friends. Corbett was not well, and Mateer always believed that the health of both Julia and Corbett was permanently injured by the treatment received on that outward voyage. On the voyage the missionaries warned the captain that they would surely hold him to account for his conduct, when they reached Shanghai. They kept their word. After consultation with the missionaries on the local field, with a lawyer, and with the American consul, they determined to proceed with formal charges against him. Learning of this, he lost no time in coming to them, and, with fear and trembling, he begged that they would have mercy on him. A second interview was appointed, but Corbett was too unwell to see him, and Mateer had to meet him alone. In his Journal he says: I took the paper which had been read to the consul, and read it to him giving copious comments and illustrations, at the same time asking him to explain or correct if he could. I never in my life gave any man such a lecturing. I just kept myself busy for an hour and a half telling him how mean and contemptible a scoundrel he was. I then offered him as a settlement of the matter a paper which I proposed to publish, stating in it that he had apologized and that we had agreed to suspend prosecution. From this he pled off in the most pitiful manner, saying that he would be ruined by it. The third day he came again and made such an appeal for mercy that Mateer’s sympathy, and also his desire to avoid detention at Shanghai, led him to agree to accept a private apology, and to refer the matter to the interested parties at New York. Years afterward Mateer, on going aboard a coasting steamer bound for Shanghai, discovered that this man was the captain. He at once cancelled his passage, and went ashore until he could secure a place on another vessel.