It is well known, that the Surgeon on board his Majefty’ s
fliips keeps a lift of the perfons who are lick on board, fpe-
cifying their difeafes, and the times when they came under
his care, and when they were difeharged. It happened that
I was once at the pay-table on board a £hip, when feveral Tailors
objected to the payment of the Surgeon, alleging, that
although he had difeharged them from the lift, and reported
them to be cured, yet their cure was incomplete. From this
time* it has been my conftant practice when the Surgeon reported
a man to be cured, who had been upon the fick lift,
to call the man before me, and alk him whether the report
was true: i f he alleged that any fymptoms o f his complaint
remained, I continued him upon the lift; i f not, I required
him, as a confirmation o f the Surgeon’s report, to fign the
hook, which was always done in my prefence. A copy o f
the fick lift on board the Dolphin, during this voyage, figned
b y every man in my prefence, when he was difeharged well,
in confirmation o f the Surgeon’s report, written in my own
hand, and confirmed by my affidavit, I have depofited in the
Admiralty; by which it appears, that the laft man on board
the fhip, in her voyage outward, who was upon the fick lift
for the venereal difeafe, except one who was fent to England
in the Store fhip, was difeharged cured, and figned the book
on the 27th of December 1766, near fix months before our
arrival at Otaheite, which was on the 19th o f June 1767; and
that the firft man who was upon the lift for that difeafe, in
our return home, was entered on the 26th o f February 1768,
fix months after we left thé ifland, which was on the 26th o f
July 1767, fo that the fhip’s company was intirely free fourteen
months within one day, the very middle of which time
we fpent at Otaheite; and the man who was firft entered as a
venereal patient, on our return home, was known to have
contrafted the difeafe at the cape of Good Hope, where we
then lay.