sible, a cable was cut up into thirty-feet lengths, and these, with plates of iron four feet square, which had been supplied to us as fenders, together with some walrus' hides, were hung round the vessels, especially about the bows. The masts, at the same time, were secured with additional ropes, and the hatches were battened and nailed down. By the time these precautions had been taken, our approach to the breakers only left us the alternative of either permitting the ships to be drifted broadside against the ice, and so to take their chance, or of endeavoring to force fairly into it by putting before the wind. At length, the hopeless state of a vessel placed broadside against so formidable a body became apparent to all, and we resolved to attempt the latter expedient."

Eagerly, but in vain, was the general line of the pack scanned, to find one place more open than the other. All parts appeared to be equally impenetrable, and to present one unbroken line of furious breakers, in which immense pieces of ice were heaving and subsiding with the waves, and dashing together with a violence which nothing apparently but a solid body could withstand, occasioning such a noise that it was with the greatest difficulty the officers could make their orders heard by the crew.

The fearful aspect of this appalling scene is thus sketched by Captain Beechey :

"No language, I am convinced, can convey an adequate idea of the terrific grandeur of the effect now produced by the collision of the ice and the tempestuous ocean. The sea, violently agitated and rolling its mountainous waves against an opposing body, is at all times a sublime and awful sight; but when, in addition, it encounters immense masses, which it has set in motion with a violence equal to its own, its effect is prodigiously increased. At one moment it bursts upon these icy fragments and buries them many feet beneath its wave, and the next, as the buoyancy of the depressed body struggles for reascendancy, the water rushes in foaming cataracts over its edges; while every indi

vidual mass, rocking and laboring in its bed, grinds against and contends with its opponent, until one is either split with the shock or upheaved upon the surface of the other. Nor is this collision confined to any particular spot; it is going on as far as the sight can reach; and when from this convulsive scene below, the eye is turned to the extraordinary appearance of the blink in the sky above, where the unnatural clearness of a calm and silvery atmosphere presents itself, bounded by a dark, hard line of stormy clouds, such as at this moment lowered over our masts, as if to mark the confines within which the efforts of man would be of no avail. The reader may imagine the sensation of awe which must accompany that of grandeur in the mind of the beholder."

"If ever," continues the narrator, "the fortitude of seamen was fairly tried, it was assuredly not less so on this occasion; and I will not conceal the pride I felt in witnessing the bold and decisive tone in which the orders were issued by the commander (the present Captain Sir John Franklin) of our little vessel, and the promptitude and steadiness with which they were executed by the crew."

As the laboring vessel flew before the gale, she soon neared the scene of danger.

"Each person instinctively secured his own hold, and with his eyes fixed upon the masts, awaited in breathless anxiety the moment of concussion.

"It soon arrived, the brig, (Trent) cutting her way through the light ice, came in violent contact with the main body. In an instant we all lost our footing; the masts bent with the impetus, and the cracking timbers from below bespoke a pressure which was calculated to awaken our serious apprehensions. The vessel staggered under the shock, and for a moment seemed to recoil; but the next wave, curling up under her counter, drove her about her own length within the margin of the ice, where she gave one roll, and was immediately thrown broadside to the wind by the succeeding wave, which beat furiously against her stern, and

brought her lee-side in contact with the main body, leaving her weather-side exposed at the same time to a piece of ice about twice her own dimensions. This unfortunate occurrence prevented the vessel penetrating sufficiently far into the ice to escape the effect of the gale, and placed her in a situation where she was assailed on all sides by battering-rams, if I may use the expression, every one of which contested the small space which she occupied, and dealt such unrelenting blows, that there appeared to be scarcely any possibility of saving her from foundering. Literally tossed from piece to piece, we had nothing left but patiently to abide the issue; for we could scarcely keep our feet, much less render any assistance to the vessel. The motion, indeed, was so great, that the ship's bell, which, in the heaviest gale of wind, had never struck of itself, now tolled so continually, that it was ordered to be muffled, for the purpose of escaping the unpleasant as sociation it was calculated to produce.

"In anticipation of the worst, we determined to at tempt placing the launch upon the ice under the lee, and hurried into her such provisions and stores as could at the moment be got at. Serious doubts were reasonably entertained of the boat being able to live among the confused mass by which we were encompassed; yet as this appeared to be our only refuge, we clung to it with all the eagerness of a last resource."

From the injury the vessel repeatedly received, it became very evident that if subjected to this concussion for any time, she could not hold together long; the only chance of escape, therefore, appeared to depend upon getting before the wind, and penetrating further into the ice.

To effect this with any probability of success, it became necessary to set more head-sail, though at the risk of the masts, already tottering with the pressure of that which was spread. By the expertness of the seamen, more sail was spread, and under this additional pressure of canvass, the ship came into the desired position, and with the aid of an enormous mass under

the stern, she split a small field of ice, fourteen feet in thickness, which had hitherto impeded her progress, and effected a passage for herself between the pieces.

In this improved position, by carefully placing the protecting fenders between the ice and the ship's sides, the strokes were much diminished, and she managed to weather out the gale, but lost sight of her consort in the clouds of spray which were tossed about, and the huge intervening masses of ice among which they were embayed. On the gale moderating, the ships were fortunately got once more into an open sea, although both disabled, and one at least, the Dorothea, which had sustained the heavy shocks, in a foundering condition. For the main object of the expedition they were now useless, and, both being in a leaky_state, they bore up for Fair Haven, in Spitzbergen. In approaching the anchorage in South Gat, the Trent bounded over a sunken rock, and struck hard, but this, after their recent danger, was thought comparatively light of.

On examining the hulls of the vessels, it was found they had sustained frightful injuries. The intermediate lining of felt between the timbers and planks seems to have aided greatly in enabling the vessels to sustain the repeated powerful shocks they had encountered. Upon consulting with his officers, Captain Buchan came to the opinion that the most prudent course, was to patch up the vessels for their return voyage. Lieutenant Franklin preferred an urgent request that he might be allowed to proceed in his own vessel upon the interesting service still unexecuted; but this could not be complied with, in consequence of the hazard to the crew of proceeding home singly in a vessel so shattered and unsafe as the Dorothea. After refitting, they put to sea at the end of August, and reached England by the middle of October.

FRANKLIN'S FIRST LAND EXPEDITION, 1819-21.

IN 1819, on the recommendation of the Lords of the Admiralty, Capt. Franklin was appointed to command

an overland expedition from Hudson's Bay to the northern shores of America, for the purpose of determining the latitudes and longitudes, and exploring the coast of the continent eastward from the Coppermine River. Dr. John Richardson, R. N., and two Admiralty Midshipmen, Mr. George Back, (who had been out on the polar expedition, in the previous year, in H. M. S. Trent,) and Mr. Robert Hood, were placed under his orders. "Previous to his departure from London, Capt. Franklin obtained all the information and advice possible from Sir Alex. Mackenzie, one of the only two persons who had yet explored those shores. On the 23d of May, the party embarked at Gravesend, in the Prince of Wales, belonging to the Hudson's Bay Company, which immediately got under weigh in company with her consorts, the Eddystone and Wear. Mr. Back, who was left on shore by accident in Yarmouth, succeeded in catching the ship at Stromness. On the 4th of August, in lat. 59° 58' N., and long. 59° 53′ W., they first fell in with large icebergs. On the following day, the height of one was ascertained to be 149 feet. After a stormy and perilous voyage they reached the anchorage at York Flats on the 30th of August.

On the 9th of September, Capt. Franklin and his party left York Factory in a boat by the way of the rivers and lakes for Cumberland House, another of the Company's posts, which they reached on the 22d of October.

On the 19th of January, Franklin set out in company with Mr. Back and a seaman named Hepburn, with provisions for fifteen days, stowed in two sledges, on their journey to Fort Chipewyan. Dr. Richardson, Mr. Hood and Mr. Conolly accompanied them a short distance. After touching at different posts of the Company, they reached their destination safely on the 26th of March, after a winter's journey of 857 miles. The greatest difficulty experienced by the travelers was the labor of walking in snow shoes, a weight of between two and three pounds being constantly attached to galled feet and swelled ankles.

On the 13th of July, they were joined by Dr. Richard