29 
for companionship. It was now 8 p.m., and we reached the tent at 10 p.m. 
Thermometer down to 21°. Night foggy, with hght airs. 
Tuesday, 7th. The wind this morning suddenly shifted round to the S.W., 
accompanied by a fall of snow, which, with a strong breeze blowing, confined 
us to the tent until about 5 p.m., when the weather cleared up, but the wind 
being against our going down channel, together with some heavy streams of bay 
ice in the offing, brought over from the opposite shore by the shift of wind, 
delayed our departure to-day. 
At the time of setting the first watch for the night, the moon appeared in a 
bright crescent form, shining forth through an opening in some light fleecy 
clouds, which were passing across the clear blue ethereal sky; the evening star was 
peeping over the ridge at the back of the tent, twinkling with unusual bright- 
ness, just above a faint red streak of light which skirted the horizon ; and here 
and there a star of the first magnitude was just becoming visible in the zenith 
and the western portion of the heavens. The thermometer had fallen to 24°. 
Wednesday, 8th. — This is the first fine day, that we have really had since we 
left the ship ; the sun, which for the last three weeks has been an entire stranger 
to us, now shone forth from a clear blue sky. When I registered the thermo- 
meter, however, at six o'clock this morning, it was as low as twenty degrees 
below the freezing point, having fallen no less than twelve degrees during the 
night — from 24° to 12°. The maximum during our voyage of three weeks was 
only 31°, minimum 12°, and the mean 21°, never having at any time risen above 
the freezing point. The mean of eight days, taken with the aneroid before it 
was damaged was 29° 54'. It was bitterly cold within the tent, my south- 
wester, mitts, and Esquimaux boots were hard frozen under my head, where 
they had formed a substitute for a pillow. 
After breakfast we built our last cairn on the spot of our last bivouac, and 
buried beneath it a tin cylinder containing the following record of our pro- 
ceedings : — 
Memo. — A boat expedition up Wellington Channel in search of Sir John 
Franklin. Left Her Majesty's ship " North Star " at Erebus and Terror Bay, 
Beechey Island, on Thursday morning the 19th of August, and after a close 
examination of Baring Bay by sledging round its shores on the snow, without 
finding any opening to the eastward, on returning down channel searched 
every bay, inlet, and headland along the coast without discovering any traces of 
the lost ships. Encamped here on Monday, September 6th, and the boat is now 
launching to return to the ship. The weather throughout the whole of this 
time has been most tempestuous — continued gales of wind, accompanied by thick 
weather and a short, broken sea with a heavy swell, very dangerous for boats. 
The thermometer, which has never been above the freezing point, fell last night 
twelve degrees, from 24° to 12° Fahr. The young ice formed in the bay, and 
the whole of the land is enveloped in a white mantle of snow. But few animals 
have been seen, vegetation being very scanty. Traces of the musk ox, how- 
ever, and its horns were found, and three hares seen in this bay. On Saturday 
last I shot a large bear on the south side of Griffin Bay. 
R. M'CoRMiCK, Officer Commanding Party. 
Wednesday Morning, Sept. 8th, 1851. 
Having struck the tent and stowed the boat, we launched her at 10.30 a.m. 
and made sail with a fresh and fa r breeze round Cape Bowden, outside of 
which there was still a short broken sea in the channel ; but we carried on 
through it without taking in a reef. Reached Cape Spencer at 4 p.m., after a 
fine passage of five hours and a half, under sail the whole way. Here we hauled 
the boat into a small creek between the shingle ridges, and lighting a fire on the 
bank of shingle, commenced cooking our dinner, when a boat under sail, and 
standing towards us, hove in sight, coming round the point of the shingle spit 
which divides Erebus and Terror Bay from Union Bay, and on which the graves 
are situated. On reaching us we found that it was the second gig, in charge 
of the second master, with provisions to be left en cach^ at Cape Osborn ; but 
she was far too late to have the slightest chance of accomplishing this object. 
In my own mind I doubted much her reaching even our last place of encanio- 
ment, which we left this morning. 
The news we obtained from her of the arrival of Lady Franklin's vessel, 
the " Isabel," from England din^ing our absence, having only sailed again this 
morning on her homeward voyage, was quite unexpected. 
D 3 
