The food that was supplied to these north country "southspainers" was neither plentiful nor good. It was not infrequently bought in the cheapest and nastiest markets--in fact, it is not an exaggeration to say that large quantities of it were not fit for human beings to eat. The owners were, as a rule, of humble birth. Many of them inherited frugal habits from their parsimonious parents, and many of them became miserable misers independent of any hereditary tendency. If their generous impulses ever did swell big enough to give the captains a few delicacies, they were overcome with fear lest extravagance should enter into their lives, and therefore they hastened to caution them with imploring emphasis to take special care not to allow too much to be used, as luxuries of that kind were very costly! The captains were put to sore straits at times to carry out the wishes of their owners in doling out the food; and it often happened in the process of economising they became imbued with the same greedy ways as their employers. It would not be fair to charge all north-east coast owners of that period with the shame of stinting their crews of proper food; those who did so had no idea that they could be accused of being criminally mean. Their lean souls and contracted little minds could only grasp the idea of making money, and hoarding it after it was made. Hundreds of fine fellows had their blood poisoned so that their teeth would drop out, and their bones become saturated with virulent scurvy owing to the unwholesome food the law provided they should eat. The hereditary effects of this were in some cases appalling, and yet while this was going on never a voice in the country was raised effectually against it; and if the conditions under which the sailor lives to-day are vastly improved on what they were in the sailing-ship days, he has neither the country nor the Parliament of England to thank for it, but the new class of shipowner who sprang into existence simultaneously with the introduction of steam.