Nov. 24, 1856.] PIM ON ARCTIC SEARCH. 211 



Sir Roderick Murchison, f.b.g.s., was sure the members would return their 

 thanks to Lieutenant Pirn for his communication, inasmuch as they would re- 

 collect the efforts made by that officer in the search after our missing navigators. 

 No one could forget the bold enterprise which Lieutenant Pim formerly pro- 

 jected, the vigorous manner in which he set about it, with the full determina- 

 tion to reach, by a land journey over the wilds of Siberia, those distant regions 

 in which Franklin and his associates were supposed to be fast bound in ice. 

 Lieutenant Pim's antecedents were indeed an earnest that what he now pro- 

 posed was worthy of the serious consideration of the Society. He, the Chair- 

 man, had been alluded to as having been one of the individuals, who had 

 zealously advocated a final search for the relics of the ' Erebus ' and ' Terror.* 

 He, certainly, did take a very deep interest in the memorial which he himself 

 presented to the First Minister of the Crown upon this subject ; and lie must 

 say, that this document, signed as it was by many men eminent in science, as 

 well as by experienced Arctic explorers, met with the full and entire favour 

 of Lord Palmerston, who paid a very marked attention to it. Though he. Sir 

 Roderick, had no right to hold out any prospect upon authority, it might 

 still be hoped that Her Majesty's Government would think it due to the 

 honour of a great country like Britain, which had spent so many thousands of 

 pounds in the search after Franklin, not to abandon a last effort to detect the 

 relics of the ships, and probably to find the log-books, and such records of 

 those six years' wanderings in the far-off Arctic regions, as might well he pre- 

 served in the ice, and might be found by a survey in a circumscribed area. 

 The Society would recollect, that this proposed expedition differed entirely from 

 all former efforts to discover the direction even, in which the bold and gallant 

 Franklin had sailed. Through the discoveries of Dr. Eae, we now know that 

 within a very limited space indeed, the ships and their relics must lie. Again, 

 that the spot could be easily reached, had been set at rest by Captain CoUinson, 

 who in a sailing ship passed to within one hundred and fifty miles of the area 

 to which he adverted, along the north coast of America, and returned un- 

 scathed and without the loss of a man. If a screw vessel were propelled in 

 that same course, there could not be the remotest doubt that one portion of 

 the proposed scheme might be accomplished. Not being a naval man himself, 

 he did not pretend to enter into the relative merits of an expedition by the 

 east or the west. These were points which might be considered hereafter ; 

 but he did sincerely hope that a last effort might be made for the honour of 

 our country. Our neighbours, the French, as stated in the memorial alluded 

 to, in the case of the unfortunate catastrophe that befell La Perouse, had set 

 an example, which, for the credit of our country, we ought to imitate. The 

 moment our allies procured the first information respecting that ill-starred ex- 

 pedition, they sent out a considerable force to collect every remnant and record 

 connected with it. 1'hese they had justly hung up as trophies in Paris, and 

 such conduct was well worthy of imitation by other nations. In the event of 

 the Government declining to send out an expedition, he M^as authorized to 

 state that Lady Franklin, who had already expended so much in fitting out 

 expeditions in the search after the missing navigators, would, though there 

 might now be no chance of finding a living man of the party, spend her 

 last farthing in making this effort. He still hoped that the Government 

 would give to that noble-minded woman every possible support, and fur- 

 nish the expedition with provisions and instruments, and with a well-found 

 vessel. 



Dr. Rae, F.R.G.S., said he had done, as no doubt others had when employed for 

 the purpose, all he could to find traces of the missing expedition ; but Lieut. 

 Pim was perfectly right in saying that his discovery of relics in the region 

 named was unexpected. He thought Sir John Franklin had gone in another 

 direction ; because on a former expedition Sir John had lost half his party in 



