FIRST VOYAGE OF CAPT. ROSS, 
73 
England, by the route of Cape Horn, you are to proceed with 
the other ships to repass Behring’s Straits, as above directed, if 
you should have determined upon that course; but if you should 
have determined to return by the south, you are to take care to 
interchange with Capt. Buchan, copies of your respective jour¬ 
nals and despatches, or if you do not meet Capt. Buchan or his 
ships, you are to deposit copies of your own papers on board the 
Alexander, in order to insure as far as possible, the arrival o* 
these important documents in England, by thus multiplying the 
modes of conveyance. 
If however, it should happen that from obstruction of ice, or 
any other circumstance, your progress to the westward should 
prove too slow to admit of your approach to Behring’s Straits, 
before the present season shall be too far advanced, to make it 
sale to attempt that passage, and at the same time your progress 
should be too considerable to the westward, to ensure your return 
the same season by the way of Davis’ Strait; you are in that case 
to edge down to the northern coast of America, and endeavour to 
find out some secure bay, in which the ships may be laid up for 
the winter; taking such measures for the health and comfort of 
the people committed to your charge, as the materials with 
which you are supplied, for housing in the ships, or hutting the 
men on shore may enable you to do; and if you shall find it ex¬ 
pedient to resort to this measure, and you should meet with any 
inhabitants, either Esquimaux or Indians, near the place where 
you winter, you are to endeavour by every means in your power, 
to cultivate a friendship with them, by making them a present 
of such articles as you may be supplied with, and which may be 
useful or agreeable to them; you will however take care not to 
suffer yourself to be surprised by them, but use every precaution 
and be constantly on your guard against any hostility. 
You will endeavour to prevail on them by such reward, and to 
be paid in such manner as you may think best to answer the 
purpose, to carry to any of the settlements of the Hudson’s Bay 
Company, or of the North West Company, an account of your 
situation and proceedings, with an urgent request that it may be 
forwarded to England with the utmost possible despatch. 
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