60 
EXPEDITION OF JAMES. 
Rowe’s Welcome, and where he expressed his firm opinion that 
the passage would ultimately be found. 
In almost all the expeditions, which had been fitted out 
for the prosecution of the northern discoveries, the merchants of 
Bristol appear not only to have been the chief projectors of them, 
but also to have cheerfully borne the whole expence, although 
the object might in reality be called a national one, and not in 
any degree confined to individual profit. In no instance was this 
laudable and patriotic spirit more strikingly evinced on the part 
of the Bristol merchants, than when the appointment of Fox to 
the command of the expedition took place, for they appeared so 
resolved not to be excelled by the London merchants in maritime 
activity, or in their endeavours to discover an easier and a shorter 
route to India, that they fitted out an expedition to the same 
quarter, and the commander Captain James, was furnished with 
the same instructions as Fox, and also with the same credentials 
from the King. Captain James had distinguished himself as an 
able seaman in several voyages which he had made across the 
Atlantic, but he was wholly ignorant of the art of navigating a 
vessel amongst ice, and in fact, previously to his appointment to 
the command by the Bristol merchants, it may be said that he had 
never seen a mass of floating ice in his life. In Hudson’s Bay 
he met with such tempestuous weather, that he says, “ the sea 
so continually over-reached us, that w r e were like Jonas in the 
whale’s belly. 1 ’ Either from timidity, or insuperable obstacles, 
he was unable to cross Hudson’s Strait; but there is one circum¬ 
stance which redounds to his character, and in some degree 
absolves him from the charge of cowardice ; which is, that unlike 
many of his predecessors, he determined to winter in those inhos¬ 
pitable regions, although he was by no means prepared, either by 
an adequate supply of provisions, or necessary clothing for his men, 
to endure the rigour of an arctic winter. He fixed upon an island 
now known as Charlton Island, in latitude 5*2° as his winter resi¬ 
dence, and a hut was built for the reception of the sick, which 
being covered with the main sail, and as James expresses him¬ 
self, “ thatched with snow,’" was all the habitation which they 
