344 



THE POLAR WORLD. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 



ARCTIC VOYAGES OF DISCOVERY, FROM BAFFIN TO M'CLINTOCK, 



Buchan and Franklin.— Ross and Parry (1818). — Discovery of Melville Island. — Winter Harbor (1819- 

 1820). — Franklin's first land Journey. — Dreadful Sufferings. — Parry's second Voyage (1821-1823). 

 — Iligliuk. — Lyon (1824). — Parry's third Voyage (1824). — Franklin's second land Journey to the 

 Shores of the Polar Sea. — Beechey. — Pany's sledge Journey towards the Pole. — Sir John Ross's 

 second Journey. — Five Years in the Arctic Ocean. — Back's Discovery of Great Fish River. — Dease 

 and Simpson (1837-1839). — Franklin and Crozier's last Voyage (1845). — Searching Expeditions. — 

 Richardson and Rae. — Sir James Ross. — Austin. — Penny. — De Haven. — Franklin's first Winter- 

 quarters discovered by Ommaney. — Kennedy and Bellot. — Inglefield. — Sir E. Belcher. — Kellett. — 

 M'Clure's Discovery of the North-west Passage. — Collinson. — Bellot's Death. — Dr. Rae learns the 

 Death of the Crews of the " Erebus" and " Terror." — Sir Leopold M'Clintock. 



THE failure of Captain Phipps (afterwards Lord Mulgrave) in the Spitzber- 

 gen seas (1773), and that of the illustrious Cook (1776), in his attempt to 

 circumnavigate the northern shores of America or Asia by way of the Straits of 

 Bering, entirely damped, for the next forty years, the spirit of Arctic discov- 

 ery ; but hope revived when it became known that Captain Scoresby, on a whal- 

 ing expedition in the Greenland seas (1806), had attained 81° 30' lat., and 

 thus approached the pole to within 540 miles. "No previous navigator had 

 ever reached so far to the north ; an open sea lay temptingly before him, and 

 the absence of the ice-blink proved that for miles beyond the visible horizon no 

 ice-field or snow-covered land opposed his onward course; but as the object of 

 Scoresby's voyage was strictly commercial, and he himself answerable to the 

 owners of his vessel, he felt obliged to sacrifice his inclinations to his duty, and 

 to steer again to the south. 



During the Continental war, indeed, England had but Httle leisure to prose- 

 cute discoveries in the Arctic Ocean ; but not long after the conclusion of peace, 

 four stout vessels (1818) were sent out on that mission by Government. Two 

 of these, the " Dorothea," Captain Buchan, and the " Trent," Commander Lieu- 

 tenant John Franklin, were destined to proceed northward by way of Spitzber- 

 gen, and to endeavor to cross the Polar Sea. After unnumbered difficulties, the 

 expedition was battling with the ice to the north-west of that wintry archipela- 

 go, when, on July 30, a sudden gale compelled the commander, as the only 

 chance of safety, to " take the ice " — that is, to thrust the ships into an opening 

 among the moving masses that could be perceived. In this very hazardous op- 

 eration, the "Dorothea" — having received so much injury that she was in dan- 

 ger of sinking — was therefore turned homeward as soon as the storm subsided, 

 and the " Trent " of necessity accompanied her. 



The other two ships, which sailed in the same year, the " Isabella," command- 

 ed by Captain John Ross, and the "Alexander," by Lieutenant William Ed- 

 ward Parry, had been ordered to proceed up the middle of Davis's Strait to a 



