JAMES CLARK ROSS 251 
Another member of the expedition thought that the 
discipline on board the Erebus was lax compared with 
that on the Terror, and believed that Ross permitted too 
much familiarity between the officers and men. The two 
criticisms are not consistent, and stress need not be laid 
on either. Ross's old friend, Sir John Franklin con- 
sidered him to be an ambitious man who tried to do every- 
thing himself, and was not ready to encourage any initia- 
tive on the part of his subordinates. Franklin, in the same 
letter which contains this opinion, bears the strongest 
testimony to Ross's kindliness and generosity and to his 
high sense of honour. He had, perhaps, a tendency to 
underestimate the qualities of foreigners, but that is not 
unusual in the fighting services of all nations and is per- 
haps to some degree inseparable from the overmastering 
devotion which a naval officer ought to bear to his own 
flag. 
It is enough for us to know, and of this there cannot 
be a shadow of doubt, that there was no other man, not 
only in the British navy but in the British Empire, prob- 
ably in the whole world, who was so thoroughly fitted 
to take command of a great polar expedition. And the 
result proved the truth of the opinion of his contempo- 
raries. 
Having taken part in the magnetic survey of the British 
Isles with Sabine and Lloyd, Ross was familiar with the 
latest developments of the science of terrestrial magnetism 
and so was in a position to be the scientific as well as the 
executive chief of an expedition designed mainly for 
magnetic work. The expedition was purely naval, the 
scientific equipment was utterly inadequate and no scien- 
tific staff was carried, although the naval surgeons at- 
tached to the ships were selected on account of their 
