name of "Mr. Stanley" (surgeon of the Erebus); also chips, shavings, ends of plank, etc., apparently sawed by unskilful hands. On one the word "Terror" was carved. It was evident to Mr. Anderson that this was the spot where the boat was cut up by the Esquimaux ; but not a vestige of human remains could be discovered, or a scrap of paper. Point Ogle was next examined, and small articles of a similar character were also found there; but with no other result.

On the 8th of August, 1855, the party began to retrace their steps, having seen no Esquimaux, except the few at the rapids before mentioned, and having been unable to reach King William's Land.

This information was received in England early in 1856, and is confirmatory of Rae's supposition that the Great Fish was the river on which the party he heard of had retreated; but, so far as the particulars of their fate is concerned, it leaves the whole matter as much involved in mystery as ever.

CHAPTER XIX.

SECOND GRINNELL EXPEDITION. - DR. KANE'S PLAN.

THE ICE.

SEARCH FOR A HARBOR. FROZEN IN. TEMPERATURE.INCIDENTS. LOSS OF DOGS. DISASTROUS SLEDGING-PARTY. THE RESCUE. MEETING WITH ESQUIMAUX. — DISCOVERIES. — ATTEMPT TO REACH BELCHER'S SQUADRON. ANOTHER WINTER. PRIVATION AND PERIL. ABANDONMENT OF THE VESSEL. MAUX. -IN SAFETY. - REPORT TO NAVY POLAR SEA.-CHARACTER OF DR. KANE'S ADVENTURES. HIS PUBLISHED

NARRATIVE.

FAREWELL TO THE ESQUIDEPARTMENT. -THE OPEN

THE expedition under the command of Dr. Kane sailed from New York on the 30th of May, 1853. It consisted of eighteen chosen men, besides the commander, embarked in a small brig of one hundred and forty-four tons burden, named the Advance, which was furnished by Mr. Grinnell, other expenses being contributed by Mr. Peabody and several generous individuals and societies. Dr. Kane's predetermined course was to enter the strait discovered the previous year by Captain Inglefield, at the top of Baffin's Bay, and to push as far northward through it as practicable. He engaged the services of a native Esquimaux, of the name of Hans Christensen, at Fiskernaes, in Greenland, and then crossed Melville Bay in the wake of the vast icebergs with which the sea is there strewn. These huge frozen masses are often driven one way by a deep current, while the floes are drifted in another by winds and surface-streams, disruptions being thus necessarily caused in the vast ice-fields. The doctor's tactics were

to dodge about in the rear of these floating ice-mountains, holding upon them whenever adverse winds were troublesome, and pressing forward whenever an opportunity occurred.

Dr. Kane's plan was based upon the probable extension of the land-masses of Greenland to the far north a fact at that time not verified by travel, but sustained by the analogies of physical geography. Greenland, though looked upon as a congeries of islands connected by interior glaciers, was still regarded as a peninsula, whose formation recognized the same laws as other peninsulas having a southern trend.

Believing in the extension of this peninsula nearer to the pole than any other known land, and feeling that the search for Sir John Franklin would be best promoted by a course that might lead most directly to the supposed northerly open sea, Dr. Kane advanced, as inducements in favor of his scheme: Terra Firma as the basis of his operations; a due northern line which would lead soonest to the open sea; the benefit of northern land to check the southern drift of ice; the presumed existence of animal life; and the coöperation of Esquimaux, whose settlements were supposed to extend far up the coast.

The good ship Advance entered the harbor of Fiskernaes, on the 1st of July, "amid the clamor of its entire population assembled on the rocks to greet us." On the 16th of July she passed the promontory of Swartehuk, or Blackhead; and, on the 27th, Wilcox Point; icebergs showing themselves on all sides, and rendering the navigation of Melville Bay full of danger. On the 2d of August they were fairly in the ice, and beset by fogs. It was only at times that the floes opened sufficiently to allow the ship to make her way through them. At midnight of the 3d, however, they got clear of the bay

and of its difficulties, Dr. Kane taking credit to himself for having effected this by an outside passage.

The North Water, the highway to Smith's Sound, was now fairly before them. On the 5th they passed Sir John Ross's "Crimson Cliffs," and the patches of red snow could be seen clearly at the distance of ten miles from the coast; and on the 7th they doubled Cape Alexander - and the Arctic pillars of Hercules passed into Smith's Sound. Arriving at Littleton Island, they deposited there a boat with a supply of stores, not far from the vestiges of an old Esquimaux settlement.

On the 8th they again closed with the ice, and were forced into a land-locked cove. The dogs, of which they had more than fifty on board, began to be very troublesome; they would devour almost everything that came in their way, from an Esquimaux cranium to a whole feather-bed! The men tried to shoot some walruses, but the rifle-balls rebounded from their hides like pebbles; and it was only by accident that they found the carcass of a narwhal, with which to appease the poor dogs for a time.

All attempts to work the vessel seaward through the floes proving unsuccessful, it was resolved to try for a further northing by following the coast-line. But, although even warping was had recourse to, this also was followed by but very trifling success. On midnight of the 14th they reached the lee side of a rocky island, which, from the shelter it afforded, was designated "Godsend Ledge." It was, however, destined to be so but a short time. On the 20th it came on to blow a hurricane; the hawsers parted one after the other, and the ship was left at the mercy of the winds, waves, and ice, combined. It was a most trying time, and the party underwent many perils ere they found temporary shelter beyond a lofty

cape, and under an iceberg that anchored itself between them and the gale.

The point to which they were thus unceremoniously driven was ten miles nearer the pole than Godsend Ledge; and on the 22d, the storm having abated, the men were harnessed to the tow-lines, and they began to track along the ice-belt off the coast, warping also at

times, but with so little effect that, on the 29th, Dr. Kane rushed on ahead with a small boating-party for a personal inspection of the coast. After twenty-four

hours' toil, the boat had to be exchanged for a sledge, with which they also got on but slowly, passing Glacier Bay, Mary Minturn River, the largest known in North Greenland, being about three fourths of a mile wide at its mouth Capes Thackeray and Francis Hawkes, to Cape George Russell, from whence could be seen the great glacier of Humboldt, Cape Jackson on the one side, and Cape Barrow on the other, and between them a solid sea of ice.

The gallant captain returned satisfied that he had seen no place combining so many of the requisites of a good winter harbor as the bay in which he had left the Advance. So he gave the orders to warp in between two islands. They found seven fathom soundings, and