88 ADDRESS. 



since their conception alone bespeaks a liberal and enlightened 

 policy ; or, in the words of the intrepid Parry, such enterprises, 

 so disinterested and useful in their objects, do honour to the coun- 

 try that undertakes them even when they fail ; they cannot but 

 excite the admiration and respect of every intelligent mind, and 

 the page of future history will undoubtedly record them, as in 

 every way worthy of a powerful and virtuous nation." The hard- 

 ships and adventure attending them, have all the interest of war 

 without its guilt ; and the people of this country have ever read, 

 with the greatest eagerness, every work that has been published 

 in reference to them. Will they read with less interest the efforts 

 of their own sons ? 



On examination of the maps, it will be perceived that there exist 

 but two outlets to the Northern Polar Seas, one by Bhering's 

 Straits, and the other through the Spitzbergen Seas ; and that the 

 combined width of these at seventy degrees, equals hardly a 

 ninth of the earth's circumference. Now, the British navigators, 

 in seeking a north-west passage, were bound by their instructions 

 to search for it among the bays and indentations of a frozen coast, 

 and to force their way amid numerous islands, each forming a 

 point of retardation and adhesion to the earliest ice that is formed 

 during the prolonged winter of the Pole. It is impossible that any 

 "expedition thus conducted, and fettered in its operations, should 

 prove successful ; and succeeding times will wonder at the perti- 

 nacity of the British Admiralty, in adhering to instructions, in our 

 humble opinion, so injudiciously given. 



Let us consider the immutable principles of nature, ever the 

 same in similar circumstances. Observe a large lake or river, 

 partially frozen. The ice is compact, and firmly attached to the 

 shore, long before it is formed in the centre. In Baffin's Bay, the 

 Esquimaux go out some twenty miles from the shore, and kill 

 seals on the edge of the ice ; and it is more than probable that a 

 vessel might sail unobstructed in the middle of that bay, at any 



