1853.] THOUGHTS ABOUT ' INVESTIGATOR.' 35 



In this matter I had to deal with subjects involved in 

 doubt and intensely perplexing. Had it been possible for 

 me to communicate in time last season, I should instantly 

 have determined on the abandonment of the ' Investiga- 

 tor;' indeed, privately, I had reason to understand that 

 it must be. Doubtless my " Geographical" opponents in 

 England scouted the idea; but Her Majesty's Govern- 

 ment had entrusted to my keeping the public interests, 

 and I felt too well assured of the decision which they 

 contemplated. I had for years looked this matter seri- 

 ously in the face ; I had put very searching questions, in 

 1850, into the possibility of ice moving between Melville 

 Island and Banks Lands, and, with perhaps too strong a 

 conviction that it never would break up, unless by some 

 extraordinary effort of nature, or possibly under an in- 

 comprehensible season, came to the conclusion that extri- 

 cation, without any hesitation, would have been my course, 

 that officers and crew would now be safely in England, 

 and I should have received the thanks of their Lordships 

 and the public. That no twenty men would be found 

 mad enough to volunteer, I felt confident ; indeed I should 

 strongly suspect the saneness of those who might, unless 

 indeed for bombast, knowing it could never be carried 

 out. But one object, in my mind, could warrant any 

 such devotion, not to any proof of north-west passage, 

 but to one infinitely more akin to the high, honourable, 

 and philanthropic feeling of our profession, the relief to, 

 and extrication of, their missing Commander-in- Chief, 

 Captain Collinson. But in none of the records can any 

 such feeling be traced ; it is mere matter of endurance, 

 in order to solve the geographical question. The alter- 



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