collected at "various times" as it wandered from
"various sources"? But, if the leader of that
party were the leader of this very party too;
if Franklin himself had undergone those
dreadful trials, and had been restored to
health and strength, and had been—not for
days and months alone, but years—the Chief
of this very expedition, infusing into it, as
such a man necessarily must, the force of his
character and discipline, patience and fortitude;
would there not be a still greater and
stronger moral improbability to set against
the wild tales of a herd of savages?

Now, this was Franklin's case. He had
passed through the ordeal we have described.
He was the Chief of that expedition, and he
was the Chief of this. In this, he
commanded a body of picked English seamen of
the first class; in that, he and his three
officers had but one English seaman to rely on;
the rest of the men being Canadian voyagers
and Indians. His Narrative of a Journey to
the Shores of the Polar Sea in 1819-22, is one
of the most explicit and enthralling in the
whole literature of Voyage and Travel. The
facts are acted and suffered before the reader's
eyes, in the descriptions of FRANKLIN,
RICHARDSON, and BACK: three of the greatest
names in the history of heroic endurance.

See how they gradually sink into the depths
of misery.

"I was reduced," says Franklin, long
before the worst came, "almost to skin and
bone, and, like the rest of the party,
suffered from degrees of cold that would have
been disregarded whilst in health and
vigour." " I set out with the intention of
going to Saint Germain, to hasten his
operations (making a canoe), but though he was
only three quarters of a mile distant, I spent
three hours in a vain attempt to reach him,
my strength being unequal to the labour of
wading through the deep snow; and I
returned quite exhausted, and much shaken by
the numerous falls I had got. My associates
were all in the same debilitated state. The
voyagers were somewhat stronger than
ourselves, but more indisposed to exertion, on
account of their despondency. The sensation
of hunger was no longer felt by any of us,
yet we were scarcely able to converse upon
any other subject than the pleasures of
eating.'' " We had a small quantity of this
weed (tripe de roche, and always the cause of
miserable illness to some of them) in the
evening, and the rest of our supper was made
up of scraps of roasted leather. The distance
walked to-day was six miles." ''Previous
to setting out, the whole party ate the
remains of their old shoes, and whatever scraps
of leather they had, to strengthen their
stomachs for  the fatigue of the day's journey."
"Not being able to find any tripe de roche,
we drank an infusion of the Labrador
tea-plant, and ate a few morsels of burnt leather
for supper.'' " We were unable to raise the
tent, and found its weight too great to carry
it on; we therefore cut it up, and took a part
of the canvass for a cover.'' Thus growing
weaker and weaker every day, they reached,
at last, Fort Enterprise, a lonely and desolate
hut, where Richardson—then Dr. Richardson,
now Sir John—and Hepburn, the English
seaman, from whom they had been parted,
rejoined them. " We were all shocked at
beholding the emaciated countenances of the
Doctor and Hepburn, as they strongly
evidenced their extremely debilitated state. The
alteration in our appearance was equally
distressing to them, for, since the swellings had
subsided, we were little more than skin and
bone. The Doctor particularly remarked the
sepulchral tone of our voices, which he requested
us to make more cheerful, if possible, quite
unconscious that his own partook of the same
key." "In the afternoon Peltier was so
much exhausted, that he sat up with
difficulty, and looked piteously; at length he
slided from his stool upon the bed, as we
supposed to sleep, and in this composed state he
remained upwards of two hours without
our apprehending any danger. We were
then alarmed by hearing a rattling in his
throat, and on the Doctor's examining him
he was found to be speechless. He died in
the course of the night. Semandré sat up the
greater part of the day, and even assisted in
pounding some bones; but, on witnessing the
melancholy state of Peltier, he became very
low, and began to complain of cold, and stiffness
of the joints. Being unable to keep up
a sufficient fire to warm him, we laid him
down, and covered him with several blankets.
He did not, however, appear to get better,
and I deeply lament to add, he also died
before daylight. We removed the bodies of the
deceased into the opposite part of the house,
but our united strength was inadequate to the
task of interring them, or even carrying them
down to the river." "The severe shock
occasioned by the sudden dissolution of our two
companions, rendered us very melancholy.
Adam (one of the interpreters) became low and
despondent; a change which we lamented the
more, as we perceived he had been gaining
strength and spirits for the two preceding days.
I was particularly distressed by the thought
that the labour of collecting wood must now
devolve upon Dr. Richardson and Hepburn, and
that my debility would disable me from affording
them any material assistance; indeed both
of them most kindly urged me not to make the
attempt. I found it necessary, in their absence,
to remain constantly near Adam and to
converse with him, in order to prevent his reflecting
on our condition, and to keep up his spirits
as far as possible. I also lay by his side at
night." "The Doctor and Hepburn were
getting much weaker, and the limbs of the
latter were now greatly swelled. They came
into the house frequently in the course of the
day to rest themselves, and when once seated
were unable to rise without the help of one
another, or of a stick. Adam was for the