NOETHERN PASSAGE TO INDIA. 5 



the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, by the North, 

 ever since it was first suggested about 330 or 350 

 years ago, is fully proved by the facts, — that the 

 speculation has never but once been abandoned by 

 the nations of Europe, for more than twenty-five 

 years together, — and that there have been only 

 three or four intervals of more than fifteen years, 

 in which no expedition was sent out in search of 

 one or other of the supposed passages, from the 

 year 1500, down to the present time. And it is not a 

 little surprising, that, after nearly a hundred different 

 voyages have been undertaken, with the view of dis- 

 covering the desired communication with the Indian 

 Seas, all of which have failed, Britain should again 

 revive and attempt the solution of this interesting 

 problem. 



It has been advanced as a maxim, that what we 

 wish to he true, we readily believe i — a maxim 

 which, however doubtful in general, has met with a 

 full illustration in the northern voyages of discovery. 

 A single trial is often sufficient for satisfying us as to 

 the truth of a disputed point ; but, in this instance, 

 though nearly an hundred trials have been made, 

 the problem is still considered as unresolved. 



Several facts may be brought forward, on which 

 arguments of no mean force may be founded, in 

 support of the opinion of the existence of a sea 

 communication by the north, between Europe and 



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