85$ LASt VOYAGE OF CAPT. ROSS. 
in our progress through this work, examined the conduct of 
Capt. Ross, abstractedly, as the Commander of the Victory, and, 
as an individual, Who had taken upon himself the arduous task 
of the discovery of the North West Passage; we have never 
trespassed beyond those two relations, nor ventured upon a dis¬ 
quisition of any part of his previous conduct, which had not an 
immediate reference to the subject under our immediate discus¬ 
sion. That he was able, in the mere character of a mariner, to 
take upon himself the command of the expedition, we should 
stultify ourselves, were we to deny it; but that there were cer¬ 
tain traits in his character, which wholly unfitted him for so 
important and responsible an office, is a fact, which was proved 
in every stage of the expedition, and which, even if the appear¬ 
ances had been favorable, would have gone a great way to frus¬ 
trate the object, which it was his endeavour to attain. The 
circumstance, however, which we are now going to relate, has 
no reference to his professional character, it concerns him as a 
man; and for the Sake of the character of the species, to which 
he belongs, for the sake of his own character, as holding a high 
rank in his majesty’s navy, and in respect for the station, which 
he holds in society, we sincerely hope, that he will be able to 
refute the charge, which his crew have brought against him, 
and, we are certain, that he ought to be grateful to us for the 
opportunity, which we now afford him, of washing off a dark 
and damning spot from his character, which, at present, clings 
to it, like blood on the hands of the murderer. 
The circumstances, under which George Taylor had his foot 
so frost-bitten, as to render amputation necessary, has been 
already related, and the burden, which he became, in conse¬ 
quence, upon the labor of the, crew, after the Victory had been 
abandoned. On the journey from Fury Beach to Batty Bay, 
poor Taylor was in one of the boats, what the lumber of Capt. 
Ross was in the second, and Capt. Ross himself in the third, 
,—a dead weight upon the efficient part of the crew. When 
it was found necessary to abandon the boats, and to make the 
best of their way back to Fury Beach on foot, the case of Taylor 
became one of serious consideration. The distance from Batty 
