by saying, the most universal, and consumption
is the most common. They represent no less than
a sixth part of the entire sickness throughout
the service, clinging to our sailors even in the
mild climate of the Mediterranean, and under the
bright skies of the tropics. Here, also, there is
a marked and instructive difference between
ships lying side by side on the same service. In
some ships it is no slight matter that there is
facility for getting warm food after a cold and
wet watch before turning in. "Generally speaking,"
says the report for 1856, "the comparative
frequency of inflammatory affections of the
lungs, in the home force, is to be ascribed to
the exposure of the men to cold and wet, which
it is difficult to avoid when there is a necessity
for employing them on dockyard duties and in
boats, and their being quartered in cold, damp,
and windy hulks during the winter months,
where they have few opportunities for drying
their clothes." As showing the difference in
different ships' crews employed in similar work,
it is stated that "in the Royal William, the
Hawke, Formidable, and Blenheim, there did not
occur a single case of inflammation of the lungs
and pleura, while in other ships they amounted,
in some instances, to eight, and even to fifteen
or sixteen."

During three years, three hundred and thirty-
nine of the deaths from chest diseases were
caused by consumption: one hundred and
eleven only arising from all other affections of the
throat and lungs. In the same period,
between five and six hundred seamen were
discharged consumptive, most of whom would
die within six months after discharge. That
was a number three times larger than the number
of discharges for all other forms of chest
disease.

Consumption among soldiers was, by the
report of the recent royal commission on the
sanitary state of the army "traced in a great
degree to the vitiated atmosphere generated by
over-crowding and defective ventilation, and
the absence of proper sewerage in barracks."
Special inquiry into the prevalence of lung
disease in certain districts of England, led Dr.
Greenhow to the conclusion that it proceeded
from working and sleeping in ill-ventilated rooms.
The following description of the berthing of the
men at night, and of its consequences, was given
in the First Statistical Report of the Navy in
1840.  "The usual space between the suspending
ing points (clues) of the hammocks is from
seventeen to eighteen inches, so that, when they
are extended by the beds, their bodies are in
contact. The effect is to bring the bodies of
the men into contact in greater or less number,
according to the size of the ships. When at
sea, with a watch on deck, the accumulation and
pressure are reduced by a half; but when in
secure harbours, five hundred men perhaps sleep
on one deck, their bodies touching each other
over the whole space laterally, and with very
little spare room lengthways. The direct results
of elevated temperature and deteriorated air,
may be conceived; but it is not easy to
conceive the amount of the first, nor the
depressing and debilitating power of both, as
measured by sensation, within the tropics. The
tendency of such a state of things must be to
subvert health, and lay the subject of it open to
attacks of serious disease."

Many important reforms have been effected,
some partial reforms in this direction also; but
it is to this part of the ship, and the arrangements
for the sleeping of the sailors, that
attention may be paid with the largest
resulting gain of life, health, and efficiency of
service. The necessity has become more pressing,
since the general use of steam power in the
service. Almost all recent instances of
extraordinary mortality have occurred in steam
vessels. So writes Dr. Gavin Milroy, to whose
letter the public is indebted for the fresh attention
now called to this subject.

The mortality by war in the navy, as in
the army, is inconsiderable even in hot war
times when compared with the loss by disease.
In the fleets during the Russian war, including
the marines and naval brigade serving with the
army before Sebastopol, one thousand five
hundred and seventy-four died of disease, but only
two hundred and twenty-seven died of wounds
received in action. In our fleet during the
China war of 'fifty-seven, thirty-eight men died
of wounds received in action, while three hundred
and twenty-seven fell by the unseen enemy,
disease. In the year 'fifty-eight, on the India
and China station, thirty-five men were killed
in action, while five hundred and fifty-one were
victims of disease.

The need in our ships seems to be of more
than ventilating tubes. Why is it insisted that
the lower deck in two-decked and frigate-built
ships, and the lower and middle in three-deckers,
shall be the only decks for sleeping the whole
crew? What is there, except blind adherence
to usage, that should prevent the men from
being distributed over all the decks, to their
immense gain in space and air, and therefore
in health, life, and efficiency?

GENTLE SPRING.

WE are apt to think that, to see wondrous
phenomena, we must travel into distant regions.
If for "wondrous" we read "unaccustomed,"
the proposition is perfectly correct. Of what we
are used to, we think but little; familiarity has
bred indifference. But to strangers arriving
from the uttermost parts of the earth our own
climate offers much that is striking. The native
of northern Ultima Thules—of the Faroe Islands,
the Shetlands, St. Kilda, Iceland—is especially
fascinated by our trees. To him they are not
inanimate, impassive things; they are living
hamadryads—attractive wood nymphs—captivating
him to such an extent that he can hardly tear
himself away from them. His immediate
impulse is to abduct them forcibly, and fix them in
his own treeless land. He longs for trees to
adorn his dwelling, with an ardour similar to