INTRODUCTION. 



atives, before the members of that house, the discourse which 

 forms the first part of this volume. In that speech I attempted a 

 rapid and comprehensive review of our maritime enterprise and 

 its results in the South Seas, Pacific and Indian Oceans ; a glance 

 at the vast field that still lies open before us ; at the great com- 

 mercial and scientific interests involved ; the means by which 

 those interests might be extended and secured by the expedition 

 now out, and by others which the good policy of the government 

 will yet cause to be fitted out. I am aware that more might have 

 been said upon the subject, and the whole better said ; and I doubt 

 not the reader will add new arguments to mine in favour of the 

 great national enterprise which in that discourse I endeavoured 

 to shadow forth. 



The learned societies of the country embarked, as was naturally 

 to be expected, zealously in the cause ; not only by casting the 

 weight of their associated influence in its favour, but by volun- 

 teering their individual time and attention to every part of its or- 

 ganization, where their labours or advice could contribute to ren- 

 der the preparations for scientific inquiry thorough and complete. 

 They saw in it the prospect of rich returns, which must necessarily 

 give a new impulse to the cause of science in this country, and, at 

 the same time, do much to rescue us from the imputation cast upon 

 our national character, that we were pensioners upon the bounty 

 of other nations in regard to maritime and scientific knowledge, 

 and had never put forth a particle of our strength or expended a 

 dollar of our money in contributing to the common stock. 



The letters from these distinguished individuals follow next in or- 

 der to the addresses before Congress, and will be found to have a di- 

 rect and luminous bearing upon the great objects of the expedition. 

 In some of them my friends have used language in reference to 

 my humble labours which it might be thought vain in me to pub- 

 lish ; but I have no right to garble their letters, and therefore give 

 them entire. I can, however, assure my readers that a ten years' 

 campaign in this great field of enterprise, with the vicissitudes of 

 hope and fear with which it has been checkered, has taken away 

 much of that susceptibility of feeling which is affected by praise 

 or blame. 



The next portion of the work, comprising nearly one hundred 

 and fifty pages, under the various heads of Memorials, Resolutions, 



