INTRODUCTION. 
XV 
directing Captain Franklin’s attention to bottles containing written 
information, which will be buried at each station. 
“ In this manner it is proposed, circumstances permitting, to navi- 
gate from Kotzebue’s Sound northward, and then eastward as far as 
the state of the ice will allow, following up every opening, and never 
quitting the main shore. The distance to which the ship can proceed 
to the eastward will be limited by the lateness of the season, and the 
necessity of avoiding the hazard of being beset in the ice and obliged 
to winter. 
“ Fog-signals and night-lights will of course be established between 
the launch and the ship ; and should the launch part company with the 
ship, it will proceed to the last formed signal station, and there await 
the junction of the ship ; but if she does not arrive there in five days, 
the launch is to prosecute the voyage along shore, in search of Captain 
Franklin, but not to go so far as to put the certainty of returning to 
Chamisso Island by the 30th of September at any risk, by which date 
the ship will also have arrived there ; and Captain Franklin will proceed 
to the same place should he not have met either the ship or launch 
before. 
“ During the time the Blossom remains in Kotzebue Sound, a 
party will be directed to proceed inland on a north course, if practicable, 
in order that should the coast of the Polar Sea be within reasonable 
distance, signals may be erected upon the heights for Captain F ranklin, 
whose party may by this means be spared a long journey round the 
N. W. promontory of America. At this and every other station where 
information is deposited of Captain Beechey, it is advisable that a 
request in the Russian language be also placed, that this information 
be not taken away, or the signals disturbed. 
“ Since the transmission of the above. Captain Franklin has received 
his instructions from Earl Bathurst, the contents of which have been 
made known to Captain Beechey, and the only addition which we think 
necessary to make is, that in the event of Captain Franklin arriving 
at an early period at Icy Cape, or at the N. W. extremity of America, 
or in the longitude of Icy Cape (16P 42' W.), and returning the same 
