18Q Memoir on the Expediency of [March, 



often impossible to distinguish what was true from what was 

 false. The mind had no resting place. Not to go further back 

 than Dampier, the most intelligent, correct, and instructive 

 voyager, considering his rank and station, that any country has 

 produced, it is wellTaiown that his accounts, until confirmed, as 

 they have been, to the minutest point by subsequent accredited 

 authorities, were regarded as little better than the tales of a 

 Buccanneer. The same may be said of Lionel, Wafer, Woods, 

 Rogers, and others of the like stamp. Even Anson's voyage, 

 though performed by order of the government, has not been 

 given to the world with all the marks of authenticity about it 

 that could be wished. Bruce, the Abyssinian, was set down as 

 a mendacious fabulist, till lately that justice has been done to his 

 veracity. Hearne's account of the Copper Mine River was not 

 implicitly believed until the disastrous but wonderful Journey 

 of Capt. Franklin to the Shores of the Polar Sea demonstrated 

 its general truth. Even the Narrative of Mackenzie, though 

 bordering nearly on truth, remains to this day unauthenticated, 

 except by the reports of the fur traders ; nor will scepticism on 

 some points be wholly set at rest, till the same intrepid and inde- 

 fatigable officer dispose of it as he did of the other. Much 

 uncertainty prevailed respecting the extent and direction, and 

 even the existence of Baffin's Bay as a bay, and of Lancaster 

 Sound, &c. and it is but within the last seven years that we have 

 witnessed the final adjustment of all those important questions, 

 and this, be it remembered, has been effected only after repeated 

 public expeditions, under the sanction of government, and upon 

 the solemn and conclusive guarantee of national good faith. 

 Compared with the private individual accounts of which mention 

 has been made, how different is the state of our knowledge 

 derived from those invaluable public sources. All the results 

 have, to the utmost attainable degree, the attributes of moral 

 and physical truth. 



A lofty point of elevation has thus been gained by the country 

 in regard to its present character, but more especially in the 

 relation which that character bears to posterity. Of this we 

 may be satisfied, if indeed we require any assurance, by reflect- 

 ing how much the want is felt of some standard by which to 

 judge of the actual truth and condition of many things belonging 

 to antiquity, as these are handed down to us by individuals, 

 whether poets or historians. How difficult to get at realities ! 

 Often not till after laborious collating of obscure hints and 

 phrases, and then only by the help of grammatical subtleties, 

 strained analogies, and constructive interpretations. If, for 

 example, instead of the scanty and imperfect notices of certain 

 tribes of people afforded by Greek and Roman writers (however 

 worthy of credence, they possessed few means of informing 

 themselves correctly), we could have the history of an expedi- 



