PERSONAL NARRATIYE. 
CHAPTER I. 
INTRODUCTORY. 
The region which is known on our maps as the 
Arctic Ocean is inclosed between the northern shores 
of Asia, Europe, and America. It has an area of 
about four and a half millions of square miles : its 
tributary waters exceed those of the Western Atlan- 
tic from Hudson's Bay to the Caribbean; and it girds 
the Pole with an ice-locked coast of nearly three thou- 
sand marine leagues : it is a mysterious sea, that has 
baffled for centuries the research of navigators. One 
of the more recent attempts to penetrate its recesses 
will form the subject of this volume. 
About the year 1816, the notion of a northwestern 
passage, which had fallen for a time into the same 
category with the El Dorado and the Cathay of a 
less practical era, began to find favor with the Brit- 
ish government. The spirit of private enterprise 
took the same direction. Year after year expedition 
followed expedition, under commanders of tried gal- 
lantry and intelligence. But they all came back 
without traversing the forbidden channel ; bearing 
contributions, indeed, to our knowledge of its charac- 
ter and aspects, but accumulating proofs also of the 
hazards of exploring even its barrier. 
