﻿March, 1848. DEPARTURE FROM ENGLAND. 49 



other instruments usually employed to determine 

 the latitude and longitude, or the variations and 

 dip of the magnetic needle, and had just brought to 

 a successful conclusion, under circumstances of very 

 unusual privation, an expedition of discovery fitted 

 out by the Hudson's Bay Company, for the purpose 

 of exploring the limits of Regent's Inlet. Lord 

 Auckland highly approved of my suggestion, and 

 Mr. Rae was appointed with the assent of the 

 Governor and Committee of the Hudson's Bay Com- 

 pany. 



Mr. Rae and I left Liverpool on the 25th of 

 March, 1848, in the North American mail steam- 

 packet " Hibernia," and landed at New York on the 

 morning of the 10th of April. In addition to our 

 personal baggage, we took with us a few very port- 

 able astronomical instruments required for deter- 

 mining our positions; and four pocket chronometers, 

 one of them being the property of Mr. Frodsham, 

 which had been used on the several expeditions of 

 Sir W. E. Parry and Sir John Ross, and which he 

 wished to lend gratuitously for service in the pre- 

 sent enterprise. We had also a few meteorological 

 instruments, and some others for determining ques- 

 tions in magnetism, that shall be more particularly 

 described hereafter, when their employment comes 

 to be mentioned. An ample supply of paper for 



VOL. I. E 



