[The ship's log of Ellerbeek: common sense and serendipity in the treatment of scurvy].

In accordance with the usual practice, chief surgeon Joan Ellerbeek recorded his observations during his voyage with the East Indiaman Mars to the Cape of Good Hope in 1776 in a logbook for the Dutch East India Company. During the voyage he was confronted with an increasing number of scurvy patients. Intuitive insight and serendipity led him to try using the seaweed ('Gramen Marinum') which had grown on the ship as an anti-scurvy agent, in the empirical and medical tradition of his time. The results were spectacular. Not only James Lind should therefore be credited with the solution of the problem of scurvy. Many before and after him, including Ellerbeek, also made a contribution.