SIR EDWARD PARRY'S OPINIONS. 401 



Franklin ; and we know he did intend, if he could not 

 get westward, to go up Wellington Channel. We have 

 it from his own lips. My belief is still that, after the 

 first winter, he did go up that channel ; and that, having 

 steam power (which I had not in my time), it is possible 

 he may have gone up in a favorable season ; for you 

 cannot imagine anything more different than a favorable 

 and an unfavorable season in those regions. You can- 

 not imagine the changes that take place in the ice there. 

 I have been myself sometimes beset for two or three 

 days together by the ice, in such a way that from the 

 mast-head I could not see sufficient water to float that 

 bottle in ; and in twenty-four hours there was not a bit 

 of ice to be seen nobody could tell why I cannot 

 tell why ; and you might have sailed about as you may 

 in your own river, as far as ice is concerned. 



"Therefore, in a favorable season he may have gone 

 up that inlet, and may, by the power of steam and 

 favorable circumstances, have got so far to the north- 

 east that, in an ordinary season, he could not get back 

 again. And those who knew Franklin know this 

 that he would posh on, year after year, so long as his 

 provisions lasted. Nothing could stop him. He was 

 not the man to look back, if he believed the thing was 

 still possible. He may have got beyond the reach of 

 our searching parties ; for Sir Edward Belcher has not 

 been able to get far up, and we have not been able to 

 get the investigation completed. In speaking of Frank- 

 lin, every one will feel sorrow for his probable fate. 

 My dear friend Franklin was sixty years old when he 

 left this country ; and I shall never forget the zeal, the 

 almost youthful enthusiasm, with which that man entered 

 upon that expedition. Lord Haddington, who was then 

 first lord of the Admiralty, sent for me, and said, ' I 

 see, by looking at the navy-list, that Franklin is sixty 

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