n Limeys by David I Harvie (Sutton, £14.99)
SCURVY was an utterly disgusting disease. It started with putrid breath, receding gums and teeth falling out. Soon the limbs turned black - and from then on, the victim's rapid decline led to almost certain death.
It was the curse of the British sailor.
And for three centuries, this shipboard plague claimed thousands of victims, exacting an even greater toll than warfare. Yet the cure was staring the Royal Navy in the face.
Captain Cook - he of Antipodean fame - is widely credited with introducing fresh fruit into the diet of his men, thus keeping scurvy at bay. But, as this author explains, it was a Scottish naval surgeon, Dr James Lind, who conducted the first practical medical research to find a cure.
And what an uphill struggle this was, as he tried to persuade the upper echelons of the Admiralty to enforce the dispersal of fruit among the men.
And therein lies the strength of this book - for the author painstakingly sifts through contemporary accounts and pieces together the story of how commonsense overcame prevarication and other obstacles placed in his way.
And what a brick wall of bumbledom and mumbo-jumbo was to face the indefatigable Lind.
With bureacracy and callous disregard on the one hand, and mediaeval quackery on the other, it was a miracle that this dreaded illness was eventually eradicated.
David Harvie is a writer who specialises in social history.
His latest work is an epic account of reason's triumph over the forces of superstition and Government-sanctioned obduracy.
It's a cracking good,
all-round read.
John Phillpott
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