8 LADY FRANKLIN'S VISIT. Chap. I. 



Throughout the whole period required for our equipment I 

 constantly experienced the heartiest co-operation and earnest 

 goodwill from all with whom my varied duties brought me 

 in contact. Deep sympathy with Lady Franklin in her dis- 

 tress, her self-devotion and sacrifice of fortune, and an earnest 

 desire to extend succour to any chance survivors of the 

 missing expedition who might still exist, or at least, to 

 ascertain their fate, and rescue from oblivion their heroic 

 deeds, seemed the natural promptings of every honest 

 English heart. 



It is needless to add that this experience of public opinion 

 confirmed my own impression that the glorious mission in- 

 trusted to me was in reality a great national duty. I could 

 not but feel that, if the gigantic and admirably equipped 

 national expeditions sent out upon precisely the same duty, 

 and reflecting so much credit upon the Board of Admiralty, 

 were ranked amongst the noblest efforts in the cause of 

 humanity any nation ever engaged in, and that, if high 

 honour was awarded to all composing these splendid expe- 

 ditions, surely the effort became still more remarkable and 

 worthy of approbation when its means were limited to one 

 little vessel, containing but twenty-five souls, equipped and 

 provisioned (although efficiently, yet) in a manner more 

 according with the limited resources of a private individual 

 than with those of the public purse. The less the means, the 

 more arduous I felt was the achievement. The greater 

 the risk — for the ' Fox ' was to be launched alone into those 

 dangerous seas from which every other vessel had long since 

 been withdrawn — the more glorious would be the success, the 

 more honourable even the defeat, if again defeat awaited us. 



Upon the last day of June Lady Franklin, accompanied 

 by her niece Miss Sophia Cracroft, and my esteemed friend 

 and brother officer Rochfort Maguire, 1 came on board at 



1 The late Commodore Maguire. This brave, generous, and humane 



