RAE FINDS THE FIRST TRACE OF FRANKLIN 171 

 on the 22nd of May, he rounded Cape Baring, just 

 above the seventieth parallel. Crossing to its con- 

 tinuation, Victoria Land, on a second journey, he 

 travelled eastward, and, going up Victoria Strait, 

 rounded Pelly Point, also just above the seventieth 

 parallel, on the 12th of July, thus practically complet- 

 ing the survey of the southern half of what Collinson 

 was to prove is one large island. 



Off Pelly Point, it afterwards appeared, the Erebus 

 and Terror were beset in the ice in September, 1846, 

 and fifty miles to the south-east they had been 

 abandoned in April, 1848 ; but the only relic found by 

 Rae on this occasion was the doubtful one picked up 

 in Parker Bay of the butt-end of a flag-staff on 

 which was nailed a piece of white line by two copper 

 tacks, all three bearing the Government mark. This 

 was the first to be found of anything that could be 

 thought to be a trace of the missing ships, a sort 

 of promise of what he was to meet with four years 

 later ; and it is worth noting that, had he not failed in 

 getting across the strait to King William Land, Rae 

 would in 1850 have probably discovered Franklin's 

 fate. 



His farthest in these parts was passed in May, 1853, 

 by Captain Richard Collinson, in his sledge journey to 

 Gateshead Island from H.M.S. Enterprise, then winter- 

 ing in Cambridge Bay. The Enterprise and Investigator 

 had been placed under Collinson's command and sent 

 by way of Cape Horn to search for Franklin from 

 the west, the instructions being that the ships should 

 not part company ; but regardless of this, Commander 

 Robert Le Mesurier M'Clure, of the Investigator, 



