Ch. XI. FEANKLIN & RICHARDSON'S SECOND JOURNEY- 411 



main object of the present expedition was therefore 

 to explore these two portions of that coast, and was 

 so explained in the official instructions. 



In the preparations for this arduous undertaking, 

 Captain Franklin's experience had taught him, that 

 birch-bark canoes were not the vessels calculated for 

 rough and icy seas, and therefore three boats of a 

 particular size and construction were ordered by the 

 Admiralty to be made ; and when finished and tried 

 at Woolwich, as to their qualities of sailing, rowing, 

 and paddling, they were found to answer fully the 

 expectations that had been formed of them. A 

 third little boat, nine feet by four and a half, and 

 covered with Mackintosh's prepared canvas, was 

 made and called the Walnut Shell. The fatal 

 stoppage at the crossing of Copper Mine River had 

 suggested this ; and we are told that, on the trial, 

 several ladies fearlessly embarked in it, and were 

 paddled across the Thames in a fresh breeze. 



In the preparations nothing appears to have been 

 omitted. Scientific instruments of all kinds, fowl- 

 ing-pieces and ammunition, marquees and tents, 

 bedding, clothing, and water-proof dresses, flour, 

 arrow-root, maccaroni, portable soup, chocolate, 

 essence of coffee, sugar and tea, not omitting an 

 adequate supply of that essential article for all 

 North American travellers — pemmican. In short, 

 whatever of use or luxury could be suggested was 

 provided, to obviate, as Franklin said, any " appre- 



