Ch. XI. FRANKLIN & RICHARDSON'S SECOND JOURNEY. 435 



Strait, arrived on the coast, on which Franklin 

 observes : — - 



" Could I have known, or by possibility imagined, that a 

 party from the Blossom had been at the distance of only 160 

 miles from me, no difficulties, dangers, or discouraging cir- 

 cumstances, should have prevailed on me to return ; but 

 taking into account the uncertainty of all voyages in a sea 

 obstructed by ice, I had no right to expect that the Blossom 

 had advanced beyond Kotzebue Inlet, or that any party 

 from her had doubled the Icy Cape." — p. 165. 



Captain Franklin states the distance traced 

 westerly, from the mouth of the Mackenzie River, 

 to have been 374 miles, along one of the most 

 dreary, miserable, and uninteresting portions of sea- 

 coast that can perhaps be found in any part of the 

 world ; and in all that space not a harbour exists 

 in which a ship could find shelter. 



The return voyage was equally harassing to the 

 one just completed. Near Herschel Island, how- 

 ever, they had a narrow escape from the effects of 

 a violent storm on the ocean : — 



" As the afternoon wore away, gloomy clouds gathered 

 in the north-west ; and at six a violent squall came from 

 that quarter, attended with snow and sleet. The gale in- 

 creased with rapidity : in less than ten minutes the sea was 

 white with foam, and such waves were raised as I had never 

 before been exposed to in a boat. The spray and sea broke 

 over us incessantly, and it was with difficulty that we could 

 keep free by baling. Our little vessels went through the 

 water with great velocity, under a close-reefed sail, hoisted 

 about three feet up the mainmast, and proved themselves to 



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