HISTORICAL SUMMARY 107 
the Alert for northern explorations. One party, under Com- 
mander Markham, was to push northward over the frozen 
ocean; the other, under Lieutenant Aldrich, to explore the 
north coast of grinnell land. Markham, after great toil and 
hardships, hauling heavy sledges and boats over exceedingly 
rough ice, and with five of his eighteen men helpless from the 
effects of scurvy, succeeded in reaching a point on the ice in 
latitude 83 20' 26", the farthest north to that date. The 
health of the men became worse on the return journey, and if 
Lieutenant Parr had not, by a forced march of twenty-four 
hours, reached the ship for assistance, all would probably have 
been lost; as it was, one died and eleven others had to be 
dragged to the ship. 
Lieutenant Aldrich surveyed two hundred and twenty miles 
of new coast, reaching, on the 18th of May, Point Albert, in 
82 16', and 85 33' w. His party, also attacked by scurvy, 
would not have reached the ship without assistance. 
Exploring parties were, at the same time, in the field from 
the Discovery. Lieutenant Archer explored Franklin sound 
and reached the head of Archer fiord. Lieutenant Beaumont 
left the ship with two sleds, and, after first visiting the Alert, 
crossed robeson channel to repulse harbour, on the coast of 
Greenland. He succeeded in reaching with one man, the 
eastern side of Sherard Osborne fiord, in 82 20' n. and 50 
45' w., on the 20th of May. The return was made under dis- 
tressing circumstances; only Beaumont and one man were free 
from scurvy when Repulse harbour was reached. The ice in 
Robeson channel was too rotten to cross with his .crew of in- 
valids, and but for the timely arrival of a relief party all would 
have perished. Two men died, and only with great difficulty 
did the remainder reach the ship. Owing to the scurvy, Captain 
nares wisely determined to return home. The disease had 
attacked almost every man on the ships outside the officers, but 
it is a mystery why it should have played such ravages on an 
