By an extract of a letter from Jamaica we learn the following singular fact;–The Captain and crew of the brig Exuma, which arrived there some days before from Newfoundland, having in the course of their passage fallen in with a French schooner, Captain Alward asked the Captain of the schooner to accommodate him with some nails, which he politely did; at the same time begging his acceptance of some barracoutes caught that morning. Captain Aylward and his crew having dined off them the same day, they were immediately seized with violent sickness convulsive fits, and other dangerous symptoms. The Captain, judging that the fish they had eaten were of a poisonous nature, conceived that salt water might be of service, he instantly made the expedient on himself, which relieved him greatly ; he applied the same remedy to his crew and it was attended with good effects. When this unfortunate accident happened, it was luckily a dead calm ; had the weather been tempestous, it is more than probable the ship and crew would have been lost, as during their sickness, there was not a man able to stand by the helm.
Citation: Glasgow Advertiser (Glasgow, United Kingdom), 19 November 1790, available at the Scissors and Paste Database, http://www.scissorsandpaste.net/397.