HISTORICAL summary 85 
the Company started a whale fishery at Marble island, and one 
of the boats engaged in the fishery accidently discovered a har- 
bour near the east end of the island; at its head guns, anchors, 
cables and many other articles were found. The wrecks of the 
ships lay in five fathoms of water, and the remains of the house 
were still in existence, with two skulls on the ground near by. 
Hearne learned from the Eskimos that the ships arrived late in 
the summer, that the larger one received much damage entering 
the harbour, that soon after arriving the house was built and 
that the white men numbered about fifty. When the natives 
again visited them, during the following summer, their number 
was greatly reduced, and the remainder were unhealthy. The 
carpenters were then at work on a boat. By the beginning of 
winter the number was reduced to twenty, and in the following 
summer only five remained alive, all of whom died within a 
few days after the arrival of the natives. That such a disaster 
could occur within two hundred and fifty miles of Churchill is ' 
astonishing at the present day, when so much more is known 
of the comparative ease with which long journeys may be made 
over the snow and ice in the springtime. 
After this disastrous termination of their first expedition by 
sea, the Company was not eager to undertake another, but they 
were practically forced to do so by Arthur Dobbs, a zealous and 
enthusiastic advocate of the northwest passage. On his insist- 
ence, two sloops were sent northward from Churchill, in 1737, 
to open trade with the natives, and to look for a northern pas- 
sage to the westward; the latter seems never to have been 
seriously undertaken, and did not at all satisfy Dobbs. 
in 1741, Captain Middleton, who had been long in the service 
of the Hudson's Bay Company, was selected by the Admiralty 
to conduct an expedition of discovery up the Welcome. He 
sailed with two small vessels, and wintered at Churchill. The 
following summer he proceeded northward, and discovered 
wager inlet and Repulse bay, the south headland of which he 
