Independent Journal, Or, The General Advertiser

The following curious circumstance is related by Dr. Forster.

"A vessel on its voyage from Jamaica to England had suffered so much from the storms by which it was overtaken, that it was at last on the point of sinking. The crew had recourse in all haste to the boat. The great hurry they were in, having occasioned them to take with them but a small quantity of provisions and liquor, they soon began to be afflicted with hunger as well as thirst, in a high degree, when the Captain advised them by no means to drink the sea water, as the effects of it would be extremely noxious; but rather to follow his example, and, thinly clad, to dip in the sea. He himself practiced this constantly, and not only he, but all those who followed his example, found, that when they came out of the water, both their hunger and thirst were perfectly appeased for a long time. Many of the crew laughed at him, and at those who followed his instructions, but at length they grew weak, exhausted, and died of hunger and thirst; nay, some of them, urged by despair, threw themselves into the sea; but the Captain and such as everal times a day dipped into the sea, preserved their lives for the space of nineteen days, and at the end of that period were taken up by a vessel which was sailing that way. It should seem that they absorbed, by the pores of their bodies, as much pure water as was sufficient for their nourishment, all the salt being at the same time left behind. In fact, the salt was deposited on the exterior surface of their bodies in the form of a thin pellicle- which they were obliged repeatedly to rub off."