scars of wounds that had been healed for many years, were forced open again by this virulent distemper.  There was a remarkable instance of this in the case of one of the invalid soldiers on board the Centurion, who had been wounded above fifty years before, at the battle of the Boyne; and though he was cured soon after, and had continued well for a great many years, yet, on being attacked by the scurvy, his wounds broke out afresh in the progress of the disease, and appeared as if they had never been healed.  What is even still more extraordinary, the callus of a broken bone, which had been completely formed for a long time, was dissolved in the course of this disease, and the fracture seemed as if it had never been consolidated.  The effects, indeed, of this disease, were in almost every instance wonderful, for many of our people, though confined to their hammocks, appeared to have no inconsiderable share of health, as they eat and drank heartily, were even cheerful, talking with much seeming vigour with a loud strong voice; and yet, on being in the least moved, though only from one part of the ship to another, and that too in their hammocks, they would instantly expire.  Others, who have confided in their seeming strength, and have resolved to get out of their hammocks, have died before they could well reach the decks; neither was it uncommon for such as were able to walk the deck, and even to perform some kind of duty, to drop down dead in an instant, on any attempt to act with their utmost effort; many of our people having perished in this manner in the course of our voyage.

We struggled under this terrible disease during the greatest part of the time of our beating round Cape Horn; and though it did not then rage with its utmost violence, yet we buried no less than forty-three men in the month of April, as formerly observed.  We were still, however, in hopes of seeing a period to this cruel malady, and to all the other evils which had so constantly pursued us, when we should have secured our passage round the Cape:  but we found, to our heavy misfortune, that the (so-called) Pacific Ocean was to us less hospitable even than the turbulent neighbourhood of Terra del Fuego and Cape Horn.  On the 8th of May, being arrived of the island of Socoro, on the western coast of Patagonia, [in lat. 44 deg. 50’ S. long. 73 deg. 45’ W.] the first rendezvous appointed for the squadron, and where we hoped to have met with some of our consorts, we cruized for them in that station several days.  We were here not only disappointed in our expectations of meeting our friends, which induced the gloomy apprehensions of their having all perished, but were also perpetually alarmed with the fear of being driven on this coast, which appeared too craggy and irregular to give us the least prospect, in such a case, that any of us could possibly escape immediate destruction.  The land, indeed, had a most tremendous aspect.  The most distant part, far within the country, being the