SEARCH FOB FRANKLIN. 248 



might be gained to Victoria Strait, on the shores of which 

 the expected traces of the Erebus and Terror were to be 

 sought. 



For two days this ronte was pursued without inter- 

 ruption ; but on the evening of the second, the dis- 

 appointed crew beheld in their front a sheet of un- 

 broken ice, extending from shore to shore. Not daring 

 to lose a moment in what would most probably have been 

 a fruitless attempt to force a passage, the vessel's head 

 was again turned, and the last chance of an access by 

 the parallel estuary of Prince Regent's Inlet and Bellot'a 

 Strait, reported to form a passage to the open water on 

 the west, tried by their now doubly -anxious commander. 



The crisis of the voyage was fast approaching. "Does 

 Bellot Strait really exist ? If so, is it free from ice ? " 



They reached its mouth on the 20th, and found locked 

 ace streaming out of the opening. The next day they had 

 forced their way half through, but the lock to the west 

 was so consolidated, that though seventeen days were 

 spent in repeated efforts, and they were at last enabled 

 on the 6th September to steer right through the passage, 

 all further progress was at last abandoned as hopeless, 

 and the yacht, on the 28th, made secure for the second 

 winter in a little creek on the northern shore. 



" To-day we are unbending sails and laying up the 

 ngines ; uncertainty no longer exists, here we 

 compelled to remain ; and if we have not beep 

 successful in our voyaging as a month ago we h^ 



reason to expect, we may still hope that F< 



,rtune 



