It is a rule in the service, that though men are sick, their ordinary allowance of salt meat and other victuals is nevertheless served out, and is either used by the other seamen, who stand in no need of it, or is wasted. Now, if the pursers were instructed to provide themselves with certain species of necessaries, such as Madeira wine, sugar, rice, and dried fruits, to serve to the sick, in place of rum, and the common provisions of the ship, such a regulation would be productive of the very best effects, in recovering the health, and preserving the lives of those men who have the misfortune to be taken ill in a situation necessarily destitute of most of the comforts that can alleviate their sufferings. I cannot help here applauding a late regulation, by which melasses are substituted for part of the oatmeal; for the quantity of the latter heretofore legally allowed was so much greater than what was necessary, that one half of it has commonly been wasted. It is to be observed, in general, with regard to the West Indies, that ships on service are to be considered, in a great measure, in the light of ships constantly at sea; for, excepting the island of Barbadoes, there is no other port in which fresh meat and vegetables can be procured in any quantity, and therefore sour krout, melasses, and such other articles of antiscorbutic diet as can be supplied on board, are absolutely necessary. Fleets could hardly exist here, were it not that a warm climate is naturally more unfavourable to the scurvy than a cold one. Fifthly, Though the health of a ship’s company depends chiefly on diet, and that discipline and order which is the business of officers, yet much depends also on the medical art, particularly in the West Indies; and as surgeons frequently cannot do justice to the men without wronging themselves, in a country where the price of every thing is exorbitant, and medicines often unsound, Government would find its account in supplying gratuitously some of the most costly articles, particularly Peruvian bark in a fresh state, from time to time, from England.