8 
SUPPLEMENT. 
find it to be his inclination to survey. There is further very 
little doubt, that the breeding-places of the whales were known 
to the majority of the captains of whaling ships, long before 
Capt. Ross made his debut in the Arctic seas, or before he took 
upon himself the character of principal buffoon in his serio-tra- 
gico-farcico-comico pantomime of the Discoverer of the Magnetic 
Pole. 
If, however, we direct our attention to the different subjects 
of scientific research, as forming the chief objects of the expedi¬ 
tion, we shall find, that in whatever progress was made towards 
their attainment, the talents and exertions of Capt. Ross were 
very seldom called into action ; at the same time that his answers 
to the questions put to him by the members of the Commons’ 
committee, are so dexterously and scottishly worded, as to lead 
them to believe that his brow only is entitled to wear the laurel. 
Thus, according to the 59th question, he is asked, “ Do you con¬ 
ceive yourself to have attained any other scientific object?” “Yes, 
I have brought with me a table of meteorological statements, 
first stating the direction of the wind, its force, the state of the 
weather, and the height of the thermometer every hour for three 
years, at nearly the same spot, which is considered a very great 
desideratum, as you will be able to compare it with the temper¬ 
ature of other parts of the globe.” 
The manner in which he evades the gist of this question, is at 
once obvious ; he is asked, “Do you conceive yourself to have- 
attained,” &c. ? To which he does not reply that he had or had 
not attained any particular object; but he merely states, that he 
brought home with him a meteorological journal, on the same 
principle that he also brought home with him some bear skins ; 
but if the acquisition of these skins had depended upon his 
shooting the animals, whose carcasses they covered, it scarcely 
amounts to a question whether he would have had any skins to 
exhibit at all. 
Capt. Ross is subsequently asked, “ Who had the charge of the 
meteorological journal ?” and he answers, “ Mr. Thom, to whom it 
was principally entrusted ; and by that officer the men were 
taught regularly to look at the thermometer every hour, to note 
