Preface to Second Edition. vii 



The announcement that instructions had been 

 issued for the equipment of an Arctic Exploring 

 Expedition was received in the Navy with un- 

 bounded delight and enthusiasm. There was no 

 want of volunteers from all classes. Numbers were 

 willing and eager for Arctic service, and grievous 

 indeed was the disappointment of those whose 

 applications were perforce rejected. We have 

 only to look back, and not very far, to those who 

 have served amidst the ice floes of the Arctic re- 

 gions, for proofs that such a service is unrivalled, 

 in these piping times of peace, as a school for the 

 training of good and able officers. Our great Nel- 

 son himself received his initiation into that service 

 in which he was destined to immortalize himself, as 

 a midshipman in one of the ships composing a 

 North Polar Expedition. 



I have only to invite my readers to peruse the 

 Appendix at the end of this volume, the exhaustive 

 Memorandum compiled by the Arctic Committee of 

 the Royal Geographical Society, enumerating the 

 beneficial results that will accrue to science gene- 

 rally by the dispatch of an Arctic Exploring Expe- 

 dition, to show the important results to be derived 

 from such an enterprise. 



The lucrative whaling trade owes its foundation 

 to Arctic voyages of discovery ; and if a new field 

 should be discovered wherein the brave fellows who 

 were lately my shipmates would be able to pursue 



