OF A NORTH-WEST PASSAGE. 



489 



out in my Instructions, could possibly have been pursued with any reasonable 

 hope of success. 



Circumstances, however, beyond the reach of any previous speculation, 

 have combined to oppose an insurmountable barrier to our entrance into the 

 Polar Sea by the route lately pursued, and consequently preventing us from 

 reaching the northern shore of the continent of America, along which it 

 would have been our object to proceed. The state of the ice for two suc- 

 cessive summers in the Strait of the Fury and Hecla seems to indicate, 

 that the obstruction we there met with is dependent rather on locality than 

 on season ; for the phenomenon of two consecutive winters of extraordinary 

 severity is one of extremely rare occurrence. It is more than probable, that 

 the obstacles which finally arrested our progress in the Strait are to be 

 mainly attributed to the current we found setting to the eastward through it ; 

 and which coincides with that observed by Captain Franklin and by the 

 Russians to the westward. This stream, in finding its way out through the 

 Strait, would undoubtedly have the effect of keeping the ice close home upon 

 its western mouth, so as to prevent the egress of a ship in that direction ; 

 and I cannot help thinking that, on this account, the navigation of that Strait 

 will seldom if ever be practicable. 



Being thus unavoidably shut out from the northern shores of the continent, 

 it remains to inquire by what other opening there may be the best chance of 

 approaching it the nearest ; for the principle of coasting it, whenever it can 

 be reached, must still in my opinion be carefully kept in view. There is 

 no known opening which seems to present itself so favourably for this pur- 

 pose as Prince Regent's Inlet. This leads me to observe that, had we even 

 succeeded in fairly entering the Polar Sea by the Strait of the Fury and 

 Hecla, the geographical information obtained from the Esquimaux, and on 

 which I conceive the greatest reliance may be placed, would probably have 

 induced me so far to depart from the strict tenor of my instructions, as 

 to attempt a passage across the mouth of the great bay lying on the south- 

 western side of Melville Peninsula, instead of coasting its winding and pro- 

 bably much-indented shores. Indeed I consider that the spirit of my In- 

 structions was fulfilled, as far as they regarded my close examination of the 

 coast of America, from the moment that I had discovered the Strait which 

 terminated that coast to the northward ; and that had I been fortunate enough 

 to succeed in entering the Polar Sea, that my business then was to get to the 

 westward in the shortest way I was able. It being therefore no longer necessary 



3 R 



