476 SIR RODERICK I. MURCHISON'S ADDRESS. [May 25, 1857. 



services, tinder tlie command of M'Clintock, but has actually snb- 

 scribed 500/. towards the expense of the expedition in wbich he 

 sails. * May God, therefore, crown their efforts with success ! and 

 may M'Clintock and his companions gather the laurels they so 

 well merit, in their noble endeavour to dissipate the mystery which 

 shrouds the fate of the Erebus and Terror and their crews ! 



If, however, this last effort which, in the absence of other aid save 

 that of her friends, Lady Franklin is now making, should fail in 

 rescuing from a dreary existence any one of our countrymen, and 

 should not even a plank of the Erebus and Terror be discovered 

 — still, for her devotion in carrying out this examination of the 

 unvisited tracts wherein, we have every reason to believe, the ships 

 were finally encompassed, every British seaman will bless the relict 

 of the great explorer, who has thus striven to honour the memory 

 of her husband and his brave companions. 



My earnest hope is, that this expedition of Lady Franklin may 

 afford clear proofs that her husband's party came down with a 

 boat to the mouth of the Back Eiver in the spring of 1850, as 

 reported on Esquimaux evidence by Dr. Eae, and thus demonstrate 

 that which I have contended for, in common with Sir Francis Beau- 

 fort, Captain Washington, and some Arctic authorities, that Franklin, 

 who in his previous explorations had trended the American coast 

 from the Back Eiver westward to Barrow Point, was really the 

 discoverer of the North- West passage ! 



In wishing then Godspeed to this private expedition, as I did to 

 all the previous efforts of Lady Franklin, far be it from me to under- 

 rate the zealous endeavours which successive Administrations have 

 made during a series of years, whether to extend geographical know- 

 ledge and determine a north-west passage, or more recently to rescue 

 Franklin and his crews — endeavours which will be recorded as among 

 the great glories of Britain, in having brought forth in striking 

 relief the characters of some of the ablest of our seamen, who, 

 formed in that school of severe trial, have proved to be leading 

 men in the late war. These British worthies have now been 



* I am happy to announce that, whilst these pages were passing through the 

 press, Petersen, the Esquimaux interpreter, well known to all the readers of the 

 Yoyages of Penny and Kane, having returned from Greenland to Copenhagen, has, 

 through the instrumentality of our distinguished foreign member Captain Irminger, 

 Koyal Danish Navy, and a telegraphic communication from myself, travelled 

 through London and reached Aberdeen in time to join Captain M'Clintock. The 

 Fox sailed from that port under Lady Franklin's eye on the 1st July, the whole 

 party on board in the highest spirits. — July 4, 1857. 



