Although scurvy has been known to exist for centuries, well developed cases are not often seen among adults to-day, because experience has taught the importance of including some fresh food in the dietary, and present transportation facilities make this a fairly simple matter for most people. The disease was doubtless limited almost entirely to soldiers and pioneers until after the discovery of America. This event marked the beginning of long sailing voyages, with diets of dried and otherwise preserved foods, and scurvy began to take a heavy toll of life among the mariners. It became known as “the calamity of sailors” because of its frequency on shipboard. A notable instance in the history of the disease was the voyage of Jacques Cartier, in 1536, when he lost twenty-six of his party from scurvy, and only saved the remainder by the use of an infusion of pine needles. The efficacy of fresh fruits and vegetables in the prevention and cure of scurvy was discovered by common experience; when it became customary to administer lime- or lemon-juice to all sailors, scurvy practically disappeared from the service. Although we seldom see actual cases of the disease among adults to-day, it is believed that there are large numbers of border-line cases among people who subsist largely on meats, canned and dried vegetables and canned fruits, the meat-bread-and-potato type of diet, for several months at a time, as during the winter season. “Every individual requires a certain amount of anti-scorbutic substance in his dietary, or to put this statement in a broader way, every nation has need for a per capita quota of foodstuffs containing this necessary food factor, if scurvy is to be avoided.”[11]