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Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la mAthode. 1 2 3 4 5 6 (^^^-^^ fU*n*^' 1816. Cowper*4' Poems and Life. 129 Anx. VIIT.— 1. A Sketch of the British Fur Trade in North America; with Observations rc/iitive to the Koith-ff est Cum- panjf of Montreal. 8vo. By the Karl of Selkirk. London: 1810. C. / oijagc de la Mer Atlantifjne a /'Ocean Paciji(/ue par le Nord-otiest dans la Mer Glaciale ; par le Capitaine Laurent Ferrer Maldonado, Can 15R8. Nonve/lement fradnitd'an Ma- nuscrit Espagnol,et suivi d\in Discnurs qui en demontre CAuten- ticitv et la I cracite, par Charles Amoretti. Vlaisance: de finiprimeric del Majno. 1812. "VrO one will doubt that Lord Selkirk is an amiable, honourable, -^^ and intelligent man — but he has the misfortune to be a pro- tector. We are persuaded, however, that his are not the deep-laid schemes of a sordid narrow-minded calculator, but the suggestions of an ardent imagination and a benevolent heart — such as are apt sometimes to overlook difficulties which it is not easy to overleap. It will be remembered that his lordship, some jears ago, mad« an attempt, in part a successful one, to divert the tide of emigration from the Highlands of Scotland to the United States, and turn it to Prince Edward's Island, within the territories of Great Britain. His intentions were, no doubt, benevolent and humane ; but, an impulse was supposed to be given to them by the ruling passion of reviving, in North America, that species of feudal system which was finally extinguished in North Britain about * seventy years since.' His loi dship was thought to be ambitious of becoming the head of a clan — the chieftain and founder of numerous families. For such expansive views an island was too confined a sphere : but the neighbouring continent had all the requisites that could possibly be wished — an indefinite extent of territory, abounding in woods and plains, and extensive lakes, and navigable rivers ; with a soil capable of affording subsistence for millions, but nearly untenanted, save by the beasts of the forests, claimed as the exclusive property of some trading merchants under the grant of a Royal Charter, who Tvould neither cultivate any part of it themselves, nor sutler others VOL. XVI. NO. XXXI. I to T JO Lord Selkirk, and the fsorth-west Company. Oct. to do it; he set abuiit devising the means of rescuing some of the best parts of it from so unprofitable a condition. For this purpose, it is said, and v\u believe truly, his lordship purchased, at a price far beyond its value, about one-third part of the stock of the Hudson's Bay Company ; — the whole of v\hich is oitlyet' 100,000. A proprietor to such an extent coidd not well be refused a favour from the Governors of the Company ; and they granted him, what we ratiier think the Law Officers of the Crown have decided they had no power to grant, a wide extent of country held, or supposed to be held, under their Charter, of which he proceeded to take possession. * He was called away from Englaivl,' he says, * to a remote part of the British dominiuns tor the purpose, not only of defending his rights of j)roperty from threatened infringement, but also to give his personal support to a considerable body of individuals who, in a great degree, looked up to him for protection, and against whom a train of premedi- tated and violent aggression has been committed by their felktw sub- jects.' On his arrival in Canada he found the territory which he was about to settle, and indeed the whole of America from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from the Lakes of Canada to the extreme North, overrun by the servants of an Association of Merchants in London and Montreal calling itself the North-zcest Compant/f between which and the Hudson's Bay Company there had long sub- sisted a deadly feud. At Montreal, we presume, he writes his ' Sketch of the Fur Trade,' which is well calculated to bring down public indignation on the heads of those who conduct, or who are concerned in it. The pains that appear to be taken, and the phnis that are laid, to seduce the inoffensive savages into habits of vi( e, in order that the ' traders' may the more easily exercise a brutal tyranny over them ; and the ferocious and unfeeling conduct of the Canadian rivals in the fur trade towards each other, setting at de- fiance all religion, morality and law, are stated in such terms and on such evidence, that they are not only ' deserving the early at- tention of the public,' but will command it, and, we doubt not, call forth the immediate interference of the legislature. It would seem, however, that Lord Selkirk has not thought fit to await the decision of thelegislature or theexecutivegovernment. I'he details of the extraordinary and atrocious transactions which have urged his lordship to the strange steps he has taken are not yet fairly before the public. Private letters, however, from interetited indi- viduals say, that Mr. Semple, recently appointed Governor of the Hudson's Bay Company, while on a journey to inspect its forts and establishments in the ' Indian territories,' fell in with a parly of na- tive^ parrying proviiiions to some of \\ie trading establishments of the North- i 4 J Oct. Ifilfi. Lord Selkitk, and the North-west Company. 131 North-west Company; tliat Mr. Semple, throiigli a mistaken zeal for the interests of his employers, hesitated ti< iet tiitni pass; that u scuffle ensutd, in which the unfortunate governor and about twenty of liis people were put to death. Mr. Semple could scarcely have denied the right of a passage to the natives through their own territo- ries. The account given in the Montreal Herald of the I'ilh October, evidently from one of the few persons who survived the massacre, is probably the true one. From this it appears, thai a regular expedi- tion was fitted out by the North-west Company, to drive away, for the second time, the people belongiug to the Hudson's Bay Com- pany, w ho had re-possessed themselves of their establishment on tho Red-river. Mr. Semple, observing their approach from the fort, said * We must go and meet those people — let twenty men follow me.' They had only proceeded a few hundred yards, when several colonists came running towards them in great dismay, crying out, * The North-west Company — the "half breeds !" ' Having advanced about half a mile from Fort Douglas, a numerous body of cavalry appeared from behind a wood, and surrounded the Governor and his people, when one 13ouch6, a Canadian, rode up to Mr. Sempic, de- manding their * fort.* The Governor answered, * Go to your fort.* ' You,' retorted Bouch^, ' have destroyed our fort, you damned rascal.' ' Scoundrel,' said Semple, laying his hand upon Bouche's bridle, ' dare you call me sor' Bouche sprang from his horse, and a shot was immediately fired, by which Lieut. Holt fell. The next shot wounded the Governor, who called out to his men, ' Do what you can to take care of yourselves ;* but he was so much beloved that they affectionately gathered round him to learn what injury he had suffered ; when a volley of musketry was poured into the group, which killed several and wounded the greater part of them. ' The cavalry galloped towards the survivors, who took off their hats and called for mercy. But this address for mercy was made to the servants of the North-west Company, and at their hands was immedi- ately received by what must be presumed the accustomed measure of their compassion — a speedy termination of earthly calamities. The. knife, the axe, or the ball, in able and willing hands, soon placed in lasting repose, those whom pain or terror had rendered clamorous. One only was spared, through the exertions of a Canadian to whom he had been intimately known — two others were providentially saved by esca- ping to a canoe, and two more, by swimming, in the tumult, to th« other side of the river.' Thus fell Govenior Semple, a man of amiable and modest man- ners, and of a most humane and benevolent disposition, — his pri- vate secretary, the surgeon, two officers, and fifteen settlers. Their bodies are stated to have been barbarously mangled to gratify the lavage rancour of their nutrdfirers, commanded by a Mr. Cuthbert _ lH Grant, 11)3320 i ISi Lord Selkirk, and the North-zvest Company/. Oct. Grant, who to)d the survivor, if the remainder in the fort shewed the least resistance, * neither man, woman, nor child, yhould be saved.' The distress and hcrkor of those who had been left in the fort, and of others who had fled thither for safety, is thus described by the prisoner sent to sunmion it : * The wives, children, and relatives of the slain, were there collected, mourning for the dead, despairing for the living, and in agonies of horror, such as can be expressed in no language, nor even imagined, but by the minds of those on whom the Almighty may have permitted an equal visitation.' The writer further states, that death was not tiie worst they had to dread, as one M'Donakl had encouraged his people, by promi- sing then), in addition to tiie plunder they had to expect, ihe wives and daughters of the settlers, for the gratiticatiou of their brutal desires. When the account of this horrid transaction reached Montreal, Lord Selkirk, it seems, determined at once to secure the culprits or their employers, and for this purpose proceeded up the country, taking w ith him a considerable number of people, consisting chiefly of disbanded men from Meuron's regiment ; marched them, as his enemies say, directly against Fort William, (the principal post of the North-west Company on Lake Superior,) and, having summoned the garrison in a true military style, which is said to have surren- dered at discretion, sent the whole of the North-zvesters, including the Mac Gillivrays, the Mac Leods, Mac Kenzies, Frazers, and many other * Scottish northern chiefs Of high and warlike name,* as prisoners of war to Montreal, where they were released from their parole, or, in other words, admitted to bail. His lordship's friends, however, say that he took possession by the more peaceable process of a warrrnt issued by himself in his capacity of magistrate. Indeed we hardly can persuade ourselves that Lord Selkirk would venture to exercise, under any authority, such a stretch of power as is here imputed to him ; at least his avowed political principles lead us to think otherwise. 13ut we hasten to his pamphlet, which fully prepares us — not only for trans- actions like that just ntentioned, but — for almost any species of out- rage and aggression. When Canada was a province of France, the fur trade was car- ried on under a system of exclusive privileges. The governor granted licenses to individuals to trade with the Indians, within certain prescribed limits; the persons who obtained these privileges being generally officers of the army or others of respectable family- <;onnexion; and this system, Lord Selkirk observes, established and extended Oct. 1816. Lord Se/kifh, and the North-ziest Compant/. 133 shewed 3uld be ft in tiie escribed ollcctcd, onies of nagined, erniitteil liey had promi- e wives brutal ontreal, culprits •ountry, chiefly as his it of the imoned surren- cludinjj 2rs, aire! d from * ion bj in his rselves lority, ist his iut we trans- f out- s car- ernor 'ithiii leges nily- iand nded extended the political influence of the Frencti government in its transactions with the Indian nations of America. The privileged traders were generally men of education, and it was their interest, as well as duty, to promote the general objects expected from them ; knowing that, on failure, their exclusive rights would be withdrawn. Their conduct besides was closely watched by the missionaries, whose attention was particularly directed to the prevention of abuses arising from the sale of spirituous liquors among the savages. This system had the best eft'ect in improving the character and increasing the comforts of the natives; ' as a proof of which,' says Lord Sel- kirk, ' we need only compare the present state of the [lulians in Canada, with that m which they stood immediately after the con- quest of that province by Great Britain, at which period populous villages existed in many districts where, at present, we meet only two or tiiree wandering families, and these addicted to the most brutal excesses, and a prey to want and misery.' This system of tratlic, however, beitig inconsistent with the re- ceived principles of * freedom of trade' under the English govern- ment, was speedily abolished, and the trade thrown open ; the first adventurers made large profits ; and this encouraged others to em- bark in the same concern; a keen commercial competition arose, which, if confined to innoient barter, might have been advantageous to the Indians by supplying them with bettei- goods on more reasonable terms : but it was soon discovered that, of all the goods otfered for sale, a profuse supply of spirituous liquors was the short- est and most ready mode of obtaining a preference in the market. The propensity of the Indians to intoxication was fostered by un- bounded temptation ; and disorders of all kinds were the result : the rival traders, scattered over a country of immense extent, and removed to a distance from all civil authority, believed, and were confirmed in the belief, that the commission of almost every crime would pass with impunity. ' Every art,' says Lord Selkirk, ' which malice could devise, was exerted without restrahit, and the inter- course of the traders with each other partook more of the style of the savages by whom they were surrounded, than of the country from which they had sprung.' His lordship quotes Mr. Henry and Sir Alexander M'Kenzie to prove the reciprocal hostihty of the traders, — * each pursuing his own interests in such a manner as might most injure his neighbour,' — and the baneful effects of such conduct on the morals of the Indians. The agents principally employed in the distant parts of the country were French Canadians, known by the name of Coureurs des Iwis, a set of men who, by accompany- ing the natives on their hmiting and trading excursions, had become so attached to the Indian mode of life, that they had lost all relish for their former habits and native homes. The missionaries com- I 3 plaine4 134 Lord Se/hirk, and the North-west Compam/. Ocr. plained of thn licentious manners of these men, whom they repre- sented as a disgrace to the Christian religion ; while the liidiann, losing all respect fur them, laid them mider frequent contributions: the merchants who had embarked in the trade were disgusted with their ill success, and refused to continue their advances. Sir Alexander stales, that in the year 1780, as some of these traders were about tu depart from the Eagle Hills, where a large band of Indians were engaged in drinking near their houses, a Canadian, * to ease himself of the troublesome importunities of a native, gave him a dose of laudanum in a glass of grog, which effectually pre- vented him from giving further trouble to any one, by setting him asleep for ever.' The consequence of this was a frav, in which one of the traders and several of the men were killed, and the rest saved themselves by flight. About the same time two of the establish- ments on the Assineboin River were attacked, when several white men and a greater number of Indians were killed. In short, it appeared that the natives had come to the resolution of extirpating the traders, and that they were only saved from their indignation by the ravages of the smallpox, which, at this moment, spread amoii!;; the Indians like a pestilence, and almost depopulated the country. By this calamity the traders, though rescued from personal d;mi>c r, found the source of their profits cut off; no furs were brought to them ; and those natives who had escaped the contagion, fled their approach) and hunted only for their own subsistence. In this forlorn situation of the fUr trade, the merchants of Canada thought it best to form an association under the name of the No; //y- 7x:est Compani/, and throw their separate capitals into one com- mon stock ; but a few individuals, not satisfied with the arrange- ment, continued to carry on a separate trade. This retarded a general union, which, when effected, was ■ agnin dissolved ; in 1798 a great secession from the North-west Company took place, and a new one was formed, known by the name of the X. Y. Company. A coalition, however, was at length effected between these rival bodies in the -year 1805, at which time the North-west Company took its present form and character — a cha- racter so curious, that we shall briefly describe it from Lord Sel- kirk's pages. The whole concern is divided into a hundred shares ; seventy-five of which belong to the Old, and twenty-five to the New Company ; of the former, thirty are held by one house at Montreal; of the latter, eighteen or nineteen are appropriated to different houses in Montreal and London ; the remainmg shares are held by individuals, "who are termed zcintering partners, and who take upon themselves the charge of managing the affairs of the Company in the interior. These partners hold a general meeting every summer at the rendez- Inll \(>U? w hi' ^W\\ o\ altit mil'- thr post on nioi nail the i vous .J Ocr. y repre- Indians, tutioiis: ed with !s. Sir traders band oC nadiaii, ve, gave ly pre- ng him ich one St saved tablish- il white ihort, it ii'patinir tion hy amoMir ojintry. daiioor, light to ?d their Canada Mort/i- 5 com- rrange- rded a ed; ill took of the ffected le the a cha- dSel- ty-five pany; ►r the scs in iliials, selves erior. ridez- vous Jf>l(>. Lord Selkirk, and the Norl/i-tcc.st Compamj. 1J5 \oiis cf Fort William, at the Grand Portage, on Lake Superior; where all niatters are decided by a majority of votes, each share giving a vote, and absentees voting by proxy. Alter a certain period of service, a wintering partner is permitted to retire \\\\.\\ consider- alile ullouauces ; the vacancy is filled by the election of a clerk, >^ho must h:iv«' sii ved a certain number of years, under the diii-clion of the wintering partners, in the management of one or mure trading j[)osts in llnnnlerior; the choice, as may be supposed, generally falU on one who possesses the qtialilications most requisite for pro- moting the common interest; he must be well acquainted with the nature of the trade, tlie character and manners of the Indians, and the mode of anpiiring intluence among them. Ilie hope of obtain- ing the envied situation of a pnrt/tcr, excites among the senior clerks an activity and zeal for the general interests of the concern, hardly inferior to that of the partners themselves; who, on their part, watch closely the conduct of the clerks under their immediate com- mand, not only from regard to the common interest, in which they participate, but also from feelings of personal responsibility; as the praise or censure of his associates is dealt out to each partner acxrording to the success or failure of his nuuiiigement, and the profit or loss on his ledger. This system, Lord Selkirk observes, is admirably calculated to infuse activity into every department ; and to direct tl.at activity, in tlie most etf"ec?ual manner, and with complete unity of purpose, towards the common interest; but is by no means culcnialid to produce much respect for the riglils of others : on the contrary, he adds, * the very nature of the association and the extensive range which their operations embrace, cannot lail to produce an esprit de corps not very consistent with the feelings of propriety and justice;* and this observation is particularly applicable to the wintering partners. Secluded from all society, CNcept that of persons who have the same interests with himself, the necessity of maintaining a fair character in the estimation of the public, which, in the common intercourse of civilized society, operates as a check on the inordinate stiiMultis of self-interest, has no inHuunce with him ; he is solicitous only for the approbation of those who are not likely to judge his excesses wiUi extreme rigour. He knows too that in these remote regions, the restraints of law cannot operate ; and that it must be a case of very extraordinary importance which would induce a plain- i\& to travel thousands of miles to find the court from which he is to seek redress. It cannot, therefore, excite much surprize if, ui.der such circumstances, acts of injustice and oppression are com- mitted against weaker neighbours. His lordship concludes by ask- ing — * if acts of illegal violence are allowed to pass without any mark of reprobation ; and still more, if promotion is given to those 1 4 wlio 150 Loid Selkirk f and the "Sol th-ivcst Compamj. Oct- I 181 who have been unillv of lliein, ulietlier it can he tlouhttd that there exists a reiifular, eonctntrateil plan of systematic oppression, earned oil with the consent and appiobaticiii of tliose who have tiie chief active (hrcelion of tlie atl'airs of the Company ?' To prove that such a st/slc malic plan does exist, he proceeds to point out the emiduct of the Company, with regard, first, to their own servants in tiie interior — secondly, to the native Indians — and lastly, to private traders. ^ If the facts stated be true, they are most disgraceful to tiie par* ties concerned, and iiighly discreditable to the national character ; if false, we doubt not the gentlemen connected with the North- vest Company, in London and Montreal, many of whom are very respectable, will feel it incumbent on them to take immediate steps to wash away the foul stain cast upon them, by the felonious acts of pillage, robbery and murder, which liiey are seriously charged with having sanctioned and abetted. It appears from the Journal ri' Count Adriani, as quoted by the Due de Liaiiconrt, and fron: Mr. (now Sir Alexander) M'Kenzie, that the voi/ngeursy or servants employed in the interior by the North-west Compar.y, are men of the most uncontrolled dissipation and licentiousness, and that the Company encourage this conduct; that drunkenness and debauchery are so essential a part of the system, that if any of them evince a disposition to economy and sobriety, they are selected for the most laborious drudgery and subjected to such a train of ill usage as to drive them at length into the general system. Their wages are not paid in hard cash ; but the Company take care to supply them with rum, blankets, and trinkets for the Indian women, and no dirticulty is made in allowing them credit till they become deeply involved in debt. The servant is then in com- plete bondage, ' and no alternative left him but absolute stibinis^ sion to his employers, or a gaol. He must, therefore, yield to to every imposition which his superiors think fit to practise upon him' — a trifling imposition, it seems, of not more than three or four hundred per cent, on every article which he takes from them ! Besides this, money is reckoned according to the North-west ciir- renaj — every shilling of which is accounted tico of the ordinary money of the province; so that we cannot greatly wonder that with wages nominally double or treble the annual rate of wages ii\ the province, the ser\ants of the North-west Company should never realize any property. * So far, indeed,' says Lord Selkirk, ' from saving money, or bettering their condition in this service, there are many of them who leave their families in great distress, and never remit any part of their wages for the support of their Avives and children ;' and, he adds, * strangers travelling through Lower Canada must be struck with the frequent appearance of begga-]y \ Oct. i 18 iG. T.ord Selkirk, and the Sorth-nest Company. 1-57 of bejiparlv Imvt Is, hespcakinj^ a degree of poverty seldom to be met >villi in ollitr pa' s ot America ; — lliese hubitatiuns are usually occu- pied by tin' lauuiies of V oyageurs employed in the nortli-svcst.' ' The number of V'oyaijeurs in the service of ilie North-west (\)m- pany cjninot be less than 2,000. Tlieir noniinul wayes are from 30/. to (»0/., some as high as 80/., or even 100/. — ilie averHgt cannot be less thnn 40/., and is probably higher; so that the sum-total of wages must be HO (tr yO,()00/, The gujss return of their trade scldoiu e.xceeds 130,000/., and when the cost of trading goods, and all the f\penses of the concern are taken into consideration, it must be very evident that the Company could never afl'ord, out of this sum, to pay such an an)onnl of wages. To obviate this difficulty their servants receive goods, the real value of which cannot be accurately known without a reference to the books of the Company ; but in the opinion of persons of the best general infor- mation, the prime cost of the goods so employed cannot exceed 10,000/. sterling. From one article a judgment may be formed of the rest — spirits are sold to the st-rvants of the Company in the intnior, at the rate of eight dollars per cpiart, which cost the Company little more than one dollar per gallon at Montreal ; so that when a servant becomes addicted to drinking spirits (no very uncommon case) it is an easy matter to add 10/. or JO/, to his nominal wages.' — p. 39» 40. if i»u(^i be the treatment of then- own servants, that which is ex- perienced by the Indians, it may readily be imagined, is not likely to be of a more just or lenient description. Lord Selkirk says that the instances are numerous of Indians being plimdered of their pro- perty, and of personal violence being exercised towards them, for no ofltnce but that of having presumed to trade with others, who otfered them a better price for their furs ; that though this is gene- rally done under some pretence of debt, instances arc conunon of the most brutal and atrocious violence, when no such pretence could be alleged. One of these we shall give. ' In the year 179^ one of the gentlemen of the North-west Com- pany had been killed near Cumberland House, by a particular band of Indians. From the timid character of the Indians in that quarter, and the insults to which they have been in the habit of continually sub- mitting, it is more than probable that they must have been driven to this act of desperation by some extraordinary provocation. However that might be, it was thought of essential consequence to the North- west Company that the act should not pass unpunished. One of the Indians supposed to be guilty was overtaken by a party of the Com- pany's servants, commanded by Mr. M'Kay, the partner in charge of the department, who, taking upon hims:ilf the office of executioner, as well as of judge and jury, levelled his gun, and shot the offender dead upon the spot. Another Indian of the same band was t^ken alive ; a sort of mock trial was held, in which three partners of the North-west Company condemned him to death ; and he was immediately hanged on a tree in the neighbourhood of the trading-post.' — p. 47. It 338 Lord Selkirk, and the North-west Company. Oct. 18 It would be a disgusting task, says his lordship, to detail the nii- Mierous and continued acts of violence exercised in the most illegal and tyrannical manner against the wretched natives of these dis- tricts ; who have, in consequence of dieir connection with the traders, been growing more deficient in every estimable point of characlor, from the time that Canada fell under the government of Great I'.rJtain. The cause of tliis humiliating fact, Lord Selkirk adds, can no longer be a mystery, when it is known that the ma- nagement of these people has been left without controul in the hands of men, * who speculate upon the vices of their servants.' — Nor ntust the whole blame be thrown on the wintering partners. Their principals in London are accused of having lent themselves to counteract measures which might have tended to reform the habits, and ameliorate the condition of the native Indians. Tlie American government, it is said, by placing an effectual restraint on the sale of spirituous liquors, has succeeded in exciting a spirit of regularity and industry, formerly unknown, among the Indian tribes residing on the waters of the Ohio. When the same mea- sure was proposed to be adopted with regard to the Indians within the British boundaries, the Hudson's Bay Company are stated to have expressed their hearty concurrence in the proposition, as equally beneficial to the native inhabitants, and to the comfort and security of all \\\\o resided among them ; but the agents and partners of the North-west Company, in London, strongly opposed If ; and were supported by such intiuence as made it necessary, at that time, to drop the further prosecution (^f the measure. Lord Selkirk proceeds to shew how impossible it is to contend with the North-west Company, whose outrageous acts of violence and injustice long since drove all private competitors out of the trade ; and even rendered it necessary for the New Company to form a junction with them. On this occasion Sir A. Mackenzie observes, * after the severest struggle ever known in that part of the world, and suffering every oppression which a jealous and rival spirit could instigate ; after the murder of one of our partners, the laming of another, and the narrow escape of one of our clerks, who received a bullet through his powder-horn in the execution of his duty, they were compelled to allow us a share in the trade.' Once united, however, the two parties, Lord SeJkirk observes, were equally de- sirous of throwing a veil over the atrocities which took place during their quarrel. We deem it unnecessary to trouble our readers with a long recital of the unjust and atrocious conduct which Lord Selkirk ac- cuses the North-west Company of having held towards their rivals the Hudson's Bay Company. It is stamped with the same cha- jractei' as that of the other two Companies towards each other evi C«i Bi to wii bol ore ^^'^' i 1816. Lord Sclhirk, and the Nurf/i-zccsf Cnwpani/. ISO ac- before their junction. The instances related of theft, robhery, an«l murder, hitherto committed with impunity, render it suflleiently evident ' tliat the extensive countries occupied l)y the North-west Company are in a state which calls aloud for tiie attention of the iiritish legislature; and that the honour of the niition cannot fail to be tarnished, if the outrages now practised be allowed to go on without effectual check or interference.' i\s matters stand, there is scarcely a possibility of bringing an offender to justice for crimes committed within the ' Indian territories,' however atrocious. The only act of the British legislature which relates to them is that of 43 Geo. III. cap. 138, commonly called the ' Canada Jurisdiction Act;' the countries over which its operations extend are so vaguely defined, that the persons who drew it up nmst, as Lord Sellvirk thinks, have been ignorant of the existence of any British cohniy in North America, except Upper and Lower Canada. By this law all acts of violence and oppression nuist be tried in Montreal, a distance of three or four ihons ind miles from many parts of the ' Indian territories,' and thither the parties nuist repair by an inland navigation, far more tedious and diiiicult than a voyage to England. 7\t Montreal, a Canadian criminal is in the midst of liis friends and connections, with his employers on the spot, auNions to defend him. * But how is it,' asks Lord Selkirk, * with the Miiglisli trader, who is dragged down by this route to take his trial in a place wheie he is an utter stranger — in the nndst of his enemies — where his em- ployer may probably not have a correspondent to pay the smallest attention to his interest, and where he cannot bring down a single witness for his defence, except at an enormous expense and incon- venience r' One case only, it seems, has been brought to trial under this act, and we most heartily concur in Lord Selkirk's observation, that * the whole transaction which gave rise to that trial, and the singular proceedings connected with it, are of a description scarcely to be equalled in the judicial annals of any age or country.' It is too long to extract, but the case is briefly this : In the year 1809, a party of the \ordi-west Company, under the com- mand of one Eneas Mac Donnel, armed with swords and pistols, assaulted and plundered an imarmed party of the Hudson's Bay Company, vmounded several, and pursued them to their house, where Jolm Mowat, a servant of the Hudson's Bay Conipany, whom Mac Donnel had previously struck with his sword and was preparing to strike again, shot Mac Donnel on the spot. To prevent further bloodshed, Mowat stepped forward and volun- tarily surrendered himself; and it was settled that two of the Hudson's Bay servants should be taken down with him to Montreal, as witnesses in his behalf. The treatintnt of Mowat durinj; eigh- teen 140 Lord Selkirk, and the Norlh-Kcst Company. Oct. IS teen months confinement at Fort William, where l»e was loaded %vith heavy irons, in a miserable dimgton about eight feet square, without window or light of any kind, is of so disgraceful and bar- barous a character, as scarcely to be credited. His witnesses, who were subject to every sort of insult and indignity, were not allowed to see him when sick, till he grew djingcrousiy ill. They * found him in a most lamentable state, his arms cut with his fetters, and his body covered with boils ;' and when at length he was brought out of his dungeon, to be sent to Montreal, he fell down from weakness. The two witnesses who had volunteered a journey of fifteen hundred miles, were, on their arrival at Montreal, entrapped, and committed by a magistrate to the common gaol, * for aiding and abetting one John Mowat in the murder of Eneas Mac Donnel,' in order to prevent any one from appearing in his favour. In this gaol they remained six months, when they, toge- ther with Mowat, were indicted for murder. The Grand Jury found a true bill against Mowat, but none against them ; so that, fortunately for the accused, they became competent witnesses. The delay had, however, the advantage of procuring counsel for his de- fence, which it appears was highly necessary. From the extensive commercial establishment, and the limited population of Montreal, where the partners form a principal part of the society, and are connected, by marriage or consanguinity, with almost all the prin- cipal families, it may be supposed that it is not easy to find either a grand or a petty jury totally unconnected with the North-west Company, and that even the bench may not be wholly free from bias : but the proceedings of the trial are so extraordinary that Lord Selkirk shall speak for himself. — * In the case of Mowat it is well known that several partners of the Norlh-west Company were upon the grand jury which found the bill of indictment; and ouc of four judges, who sat upon the bench, two were nearly related to individuals of that association. In the course of the trial circumstances occurred which could not have taken place in a court of justice in England, without exciting indignation from one end of the kingdom to the other. The counsel for the prisoner was re- peatedly interrupted in his cioss-examinalion of the witnesses for the prosecution, by the judges prompting the witness, and helping him to preserve his consistency. One of these witnesses however did, on his cross-examination, acknowledge facts totally inconsistent with the evidence which he luui given upon his examination in chief; and upon this, one of the judges interrupted the counsel in an angry tone, and reproached him for having made the witness contradict himself. It was with great dilficulty that the advocate for the prisoner could obtain leave to address the jury on the point of law, and to explain the distinction between murder and justifiable homicide. His argument was repeatedly interrupted from the bench ; and, notwithstanding the clearest J cle vol dii his be \\A h( i. Oct. loaded square, and bar- itiiesses, vere not They s fetters, lie was 11 down journey ontreal, n jT-ioJ, Eneas g in his toge- «d Jury so that, The his de- :tensive ontreal, and are le prin- 1 either th-vvest e from It Lord of the bill of were of the J in a le end as re- br the lim to on his h the upon > and It was btain 1 the ment g the arest 1816. Lord Selkirk, and the North-zoest Company, 141 clearest evidence that Mac Donnel began the fray in the most unpro- voked and unprincipled manner, that he was engaged in an act of direct robbery, and that he was threatening the lives of Mowat and his lellow-servants at the time he was shot ; it was the opinion of the bench, that the man who killed him was guilty of vnirdcr, and such was their charge to the jury. After a consultation of fifteen or sixtteu hours, the jury brought in a verdict of manslaughter.' — p. 103. Mowat was sentenced to six months imprisonment, and to be branded on the hand with a hot iron ! Ills friends endeavoured to prevail on him to petition the president of tlie province to have the burning on the hand remitted : the petition was drawn up, and the jury joined in the object of it ; but every attempt to persuade Mowat to sign it was unavailing ; he renuiincd iuHcxiblc, declaring that he would ask no favour in a country where he had been so unjustly condemned ; and he was burnt in the hand in pursuance of his sentence. Lord Selkirk winds up the catalogue of the crimes of the North- west Company, by contrasting them with the honourable views, the fair dealing, and the moderation of the Hudson's Bay Company, Perhaps, however, the true point of contrast consists in the energy of the one and the apathy of the other — between the dangers, the fatigue and the sufferings from cold and hunger, endured by one set of people, and the torpid slate of existence w hich the otliers drag on, not very unlike that ot the cold-blooded animals by w horn they are sur- rounded. Shut up in summer and winter v^ithin their three forts, situated on the shores of Hudson's Bay, these people, for a long tituc, held no other intercourse witii the native Indians than re- ceiving from them, at the foot of their walls, their bear skins and beaver skins, their goose quills and castoreum, at one end of a rope, and lowering down at the other their value in blankets, baubles and brandy. Of the fatigue, drudgery and activity of iIk; servants of the North-west Company, a toltirable good notion may be formed from Sir A. Mackenzie's * General History of the I'm- Trade.' In treating of die indulgence, to which he thinks the North- west Company entitled, of conducting their trade to and from the interior by the Nelson river into Hudson's Bay, he says, — * The enhanced value of the articles, and the present difficulty of trausportinsr them, will be fully comprehended wht-n I relate, that the tract of transport occupies an extent of from three to four thousand nulcs, through upwards of sixty large lakes, and numerous rivers, and that the means of transport are slight bark canoes. It must also be observed that those waters are intercepted by more than two hundred rapids, along which the articles of merchandise are chiefly carried on men's backs, and over one hundred and thirty carrying-places, frf)m twenty-five paces to thirteen miles in length, whert' the canoes and cargoes proceed by the same toilsome and perilous operations.' Lord 142 Lord Se/kirkf and the l^orth-west Company. Oct. Lord Selkirk, however, has no intention of entering llie lists as a rival trader with the Norlh-west Company, his grand ohject being that of estahlishing a body of industrious farmers in the Ulte- rior of the Indian territories ; to create an increased population, an etifective police, and a regular administration of justice, than which, he says, nothing can be a greater object of dread to those who maintain a commercial monopoly by the habitual exercise of illegal violence ; * and who never will be fully satisfied unless the extensive regions in the north-west of America continue in the exclusive occupation of the savage Indians, the wild beasts of the forest and themselves/ We have strong doubts, we confess, of the policy as well as the efficacy of Lord Selkirk's plan of colonization. While we have such valuable possessions as the Cape of Good Hope and Ceylon, (per- haps, politically speaking, the most valuable of all others,) almost without a population, we cannot observe without the deepest regret the tide of emigration setting so strongly to the North-west- ward — but leaving the consideration of this point for the present — we can discover little to be gained on the side of ' morality.' Even the decent, quiet, sol)cr-minded Highlander, and the well- disposed Canadian, after a fi;w years service in the * fur trade,' part with the * innocence of their habits,' and ' return home much cor- rupted :' and docs Lord Selkirk suppose tl"»t the discharged soldiers from Meuron's regiment will preserve t/teir 'innocence:' that they will sit down quietly where he niay choose to fix them, labouring, * in the sweat of their brow s, merely to gain a subsistence :' Placed, as they must necessarily be till a population has been created, far beyond any market to receive their surplus produce, and scattered, as they would take especial care to be, at a wide distance from each other, is there not every reason to apprehend that thty would quit the plough and the spade to engage in the * fur trade ?' — this alone, according to Lord Selkirk's maxim, would at once convert their innocence into brutal ferocity, and render them fit associates for the subjects of the back settlements of a neighbouring stale. Like the inhabitants of Pitrsburgh, they would soon learn to hunt Indians * dining the shooting season,' and scalp them for their profit or their anuisement. But if England cannot profit from the colonization of these re- mote regions, it may not be amiss lo consider what advantage she is likely to derive iioiu their produce. The whole concern of the * fur trade,' which has occasioned the disgraceful proceedings here stated, never exceeds, by Lord Selkirk's account, 300,000/. — * a branch of commerce which gives occasion to the exportation of 40 or 50,000/. of British manufactures,' — and in which three ships are employed ! Even this miserable trade, according to Lord Selkirk, til ai v ill b Oct. ie lists as id object tlie iiitc- ation, ail t:e, than to those ercise of iiless the le in the ts of the ell as the ave such on, (pei- ) almost deepest th- west- present morality.' he well- de/ part uch cor- soldiers hat they bonring, Placed, I ted, far mattered, ce from f would ade ?'— at once hem iit bouring n learn em for ese re- age she I of the js here >/.—' a tion of c ships Lord Selkirk, X 181<3. Lord Selkirk f and the Norfh-itcst Compant/. 143 Selkirk, is verging rapidly towards its ruin. The system of the North-west Company, he says, is to obtain a great immediate re- turn of furs, without any regard to its permanent continuance, and with this view a war of extermination is waged against all the valuable fur-bearing animals ; the beaver, the most valuable of them, will, he tells us, in no long period of time, be nearly extirpated by the * gigantic system of poaching carried on by the North-west Company.' It may be so; though we confess our fears incline rather towards the extermination of the Indians, than of the 'fur- bearing aninials ;' the former are confessedly disappearing in a rapid progression, while the latter will, from that cncnmstance, as rapidly increase. The enumeration of one year's supply to the North-west Company, as given by Sir Alexander Macken/.ic, will atford some estimate of the number and kind of animals annually destroyed. They are as follows :— Skins of the beaver, 10(j,0()0; the bear, '2,100; the fox, o,500; the otter, 4,0OO ; the musquash, 17,000; the marten, :]2,000; the mink, IbOO; the lynx, 6,000; the wolverine, ()00; the fisher, 1,()50; the raccoon, 100; the wolf, J,800; the elk, 700; the deer 1,950. By doubling those numbers in order to take in the consumption of tho native Indians, those lost and destroyed on the passage, and those exported by the Hudson's Bay Company, we shall peijiapsi come pretty nearly to the actual number destroyed every year : nor is there any thing very surprizing in diis great slaughter, when we consider what quantities of game are consumed even in well peopled countries, without the smallest risk of extirpathig the breed. The ouly remarkable fea- ture here is the vast multitudes of various animals to be found within the cold and apparently barren regions of the Arctic circle. Mons. Jeremie, once governor of Fort Bourbon, (now York,) says, that when the rein-deer are driven out of the thickets by the clouds of mosquitoes which, on the return of summer darken the air, they fly to the shores of Hudson's Bay, in herds of ten thousand, scorn ing across these bleak and naked plains, untrodden perhaps by ten human beings in the course of as many years. We learn from tiiw same authority, fully corroborated by the testimony of travel- lers, that the flocks of geese and swans, of cranes, cormorants, biisturds, pelicans and ducks are so numerous as to obscure the jjky, and so noisy, in rising from the ground, as to deafen the bye- standers. M. Jeremie, and his garrison of eighty men, caught and consumed, in one winter, ninety thousand white partridgis, and tv\eiuy-iive thousand hares. The rein-deer are the most numerous of l!:e luiger animals, but elks, bears, buffaloes, the musk ox and the moose deer are all abundant. Nor are the waters less productive. The sea and the straits are amply stocked with the whale and the narwal, the grampus, the seal, and the sea-horae — tlie 1 11 144 Lord Selk'irhf and the North-rcest Company. Oct. the lakes and rivers with salmon, sturgeon, trout, pike, and carp ; so successfully are animals enabled to struggle against every incon- venience of soil or climate, and to * increase and multiply, and replenish the earth,' when undisturbed by the presence of man. -As far however as the beaver is concerned, Lord Selkirk's appre- hensions may not be unfounded. His haunts are known, and his habitation, constructed with such wonderful industry and skill, is easily discovered : most of the others have a retreat beyond die reach of man. In taking leave of Lord Selkirk, Me shall just observe, that his * Sketch of the Fur Trade' is in no respect equal, as to information, to the * History' of that trade, by Sir Alexander Mac- kenzie. Its character, indeed, is less that of a history, than of a Bill of Indictment against dje North-west Company — an angry attack on the provincial administration of justice — and a panegyric on the Hudson's Bay Company. I'he points at issue between the conflicting parties are matters not for us to intermeddle with ; we have no desire to prejudice or prejudge the case of either ; but we cannot join in the praise ascribed to the Hudson's Bay Company, whose only merits (if they have any) are, at any rate, of the nega- tive kind. Their total disregard of every object for which they obtained, and have now held, a Royal Charter for nearly one hun- dred and fifty ^> ears, entitles them to any thing but praise. The great leading feature on which their petition for an exclusive charter was grounded, the discovery of a North-west Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific, has not only been totally neglected, but, unless they have been grossly calumniated, thwarted by every means in their power. The examination of the work, whose title stands at the head of this article, will lead to a few observations on their con- duct in this respect. The Spaniards cannot disavow the name of Maldonado, as they have done that of Fuente. It has been registered with applause by dieir most authentic bibliographers; and consecrated, as it were, by assigning to it the best port in their possessions on the east side of South America : nor can they deny the existence of the journal of such a voyage, as the one in question; having sent so recently as 1789, the corvettes la Discuhierta ct tAirn- vidn, under the orders of Malaspiua, to examine the passages and inlets, which might be found to break the continuity of the line of coast of North-west America, between 53" and G0° of N. latitude; Mn order to discover the strait by which Laurent Ferrer Maldonado was supposed to have passed in l.>88, from the coast of Labrador to the Great Ocean,' That this was the main object of the expedition appears from a letter of a friend of Malaspina, employed on the voyage, which was seen by Amo- rotti, i t Oct. 1816. Lord Sel/iirl', and the Xorth-zirst Passage. 145 ! ^ ^: retti, and ulii( h states that the journal of !Maldonado was in the hands of the JJuc de I'lnfantado: the same circumstance is men- tioned by the writer of the Introduction to the voyage of Le Sutil and Mcxicaita, published at Madrid in 1802, who says that the Commander of this expedition was furnished with a copy of it, taken from tliat of the Due de I'lnfantado. — It is sufficiently clear, therefore, that tlie Spaniards of tlie present day are disposed to believe that some such voyage was made : they have, in fact, very strong testimony concerning it. In the Bi/i/iotheca llispana of Nicolao Antonio, under the article ' Laurent Ferrer Maldonado/ we are told that he was well skilled in nautical matters and in geo- graphy; that he published a book entitled* I ma gen del Mundo, 4t.' — and that he (Nicolao Antonio) had seen in the hands of Mas- scareiias, bishop of Segovia, the manuscript of a Vo}agc, * be- ing the Relation of the Discovery of the Strait of Anian, made by the author in the year 1388.'* Antonio de Leon Pinelof also bears testimony to his talents as a navigator, and tells us, that he presented to the Council of the Indies (of which Pinelo was a member) two plans, one relating to rendering the magnetic needle not subject to variation, the other, to finding the longitude at sea. Now Pinelo, Antonio, the Bishop of Segovia, and Maldo- nado, were contemporaries ; so that all doubt of the co-existence of such a person and such a manuscript is removed ; and it is to be presumed that the members of the * Consejo de las Indias' had the latter in their keeping, Mascaretias being a member and sena- tor of that board. The question is, wliether the manuscript, of which Amoretti has published the translation, in Italian, and after- wards in French, is the identical one mentioned by Antonio, and written by Maldonado ? The account which Amoretti gives of it is this : and we have always found so much good faith in the Italian publishers of voyages and travels, from Ramusio to the present time, that we are inclined to yield implicit credence to his story. He says, that in examining the manuscripts of the Ambrosian library of Milan, of which he is librarian, with a view to publish (agree- ably to the intention of its founder, the Cardinal Boromeo) such of them as should be found to contain new and instructive matter, his attention was arrested by a small volume written * ' Laiireiuius Ferrer Maldonado militiaj olini, &c. — ' Imngeti del Mundo sobre la Esf'erci, Cosmograjia, (hograjiu, y arte dc Navigar, cotnpluti iipud Johaiintm Gursiam, 1626.' ' Rtlacioii del DescubritnUnto del F.strecho dt Anian hcclio par el Alitor. Quam vidi AI.S. apiid D. Hieronvmiuii AJascurciuis regiuin ordinuia niilitanuni, deindc C'onciliiv l^rtugalliae Senatorem, Sogo^iinsom nunc Anti^tileni. Expeditiontuj auteiu hanc nauticatn se leclhs-^ anno 1588 aulor ait.' — Bib. llisp, lorn. ii. p. 2. t Epitome de la Dibliotcca Oriental y Occidental, Kuullca y Ucografica, Madrid. 1629. VOL. XVl. NO. XXXI. K in 146 Lord Selkirk, and the Nurth-nest Passage. Oct. ill the Spanish language, and entitled * A Relation of the Discovery of the Strait of Aniun by CajHuin Laurent I'errer Malilonado, towards the end of the Ifith century,' &,c. At (Ir-il lie considered it only as a tale to amuse the curious^ but on irnding itwuli atten- tion, he found it stamped so strongly with the character of authen- ticity and veracity, that he determined to translate it, and to add U> it some notes and a treatise to prove the truth ol the ' Kelaiion ;' and as M.de Humboldt and others had consigned it to the rank of geographical impostures, before they knew whi.t it con- tained, he conceived himself called upon to justify the manu- script and his own researches, by giving to the world the present volume, ile states fairly that he has not been able to trace, nor can he conjecture, how this manuscript had come into the posses- sion of the founder of the Milan library; but the writing, he ob- serves, is that of the end of the sixteenth, or beginning of the seveii- teenlh century; and from the paper having on it ' le filigraue du P^lerin,' a common mark on the paper of that period, he conjectures it was written at Milan; concluding from the frequent omissions and the faults in the orthography, tliat it must have been copied in haste. How far this document may be entitled to the character of * veracity or authenticity' a brief examination will enable us to judge. The memoir, or * Relation' as it is called, consists of thirty-tive paragraphs. The first eight are employed chiefly in enumerating the advan- tages that would result to Spain from the navigation to the Indies by the North-west passage ; as the shortness of the voyage — the monopoly of the spice trade — the facility of sending troops to the colonies — and the opening of a new door for the conversion of pagans. To secure these advantages, the necessity is pointed out of Spain being the Hist to get possession of the Strait of Anian ; and the king is reminded that, the year before, the English had sent some ships in search of it, — all of which might just as well have been written by a clerk in the India Board of Madrid as by Maldonado. The last observation, however, is so far important that it determines the date of the memorial to be that of the voyage, the expedition of Davis in 1587 being that of the preceding year alluded to. The ninth to the sixteenth inclusive contains general instructions for the navigation. They inform us, that by steering N.W. and running 450 leagues from Lisbon, the navigator will reach Fries- land, anciently called Thyle, an island somewhat less than Iceland, lying in (jO° N. latitude, and by continuing on that parallel I'iO leagues, he will open the S^trait of Labrador, 30 leagues in width ; the land, on the left, low ; on the right, mountainous ; the latter forming two straits, one running to theN.E., the other to the isI.W. — that to the north-west must be taken, and when the navi- gator f tl tl tli 7 T 111 th Oct. )iscovery )iisi(lt're(l ill atlen- I uullieii- o adil to elaiion ;' liic ruiik it con- 3 muim- ! prcstut ace, nor ! posst'S- , lie ob- le seveii- >;r:iue du ycciuies missions opied in racter of judge, lirty-tive advan- e Indies se — the to the *siou of d out of and the It some ve been donado. ermines jediiion o. ructions \V. and 1 Fries- ceJand, lei 120 width ; e latter to the e navi- gator IS 16. Lord Sclkir/:, aiid ihc Korth-nest riissa, he land ambalu uld not but we tion of e coast ito the 'essels ; appear ^-shells a para le har- bour^ 1 8 16. T^ord Selkirk, and the North-zccst Passage. 149 I bour, into which a vessel of jOO tons might enter. The surrounding country was delightful to behold, consisting of plains of great extent, capable of tillage; the air soft and agreeable; and the mildness of the winter apparent from the excellent fruits tuiuid dried on the trees, and remaining on them from the preetdinjj; \» ar. Birds, beasts and fishes abounded in tiiis fine climate under the 60th parallel, in which nature would seem to have forgotten no- thing but man ; for none appeared during their stay. We did not expect to find Cook called upon to support this de- scription of Maldonado ; yet so it is. Amoretti is so much prepos- sessed in favour of the * veracity and the authenticity' of the * Relation,' that he traces the most perfect accordance between the two navigators. No two descriptions however can be more at variance. Instead of any port, bay, or inlet, under the parallel of 60°, Cook found a straight coast ; and a low point, to which he gave the name of Shoal-ness, occupies the place of Maldonado's harbour: the country perfectly naked, producing neither tree nor shrub; but no less than twenty-seven canoes canie otf from the very spot, each having a man in it. According to Cook, Behring's Strait is about sixty leagues long, and fourteen wide, in the narrowest part ; the strait of Anian, in Maldonado, is fifteen leagues long, at the northern extremity not quite /««//"«;< English mile wide, and at the southern about a quarter of a league^ in the middle of which is a great rock or islet ; so that, he observes, the >vhole strait is capable of being defended with a cham, provided one could be made strong enough ; but at all events two sentinels on the northern part, and three on the southern, one on each con- tinent, and one on the islet, could give immediate notice by signals of the approach of ships either from the Northern or the Pacific Ocean. This description somewhat staggers Amoretti, though he is disposed to think that a point might be stretched on this oc- casion, by reading breadth for length, and thus bringing the fifteen leagues of Maldonado pretty nearly to the fourteen of Cook ; but the difiiculty of getting rid of the widUi would still remain. The Due d'Almadover, however, helps him out of his dilemma, by suggesting that some extraordinary convulsion of the two coasts may have enlarged the strait since Maldonado's time, to the size which Cook found it to be ; in short, any thing to give credit to the Voyage of Maldonado, and accommodate its geographical difficulties to the easy credulity of Amoretti. And though we now know that the Strait of Anian extends from the 66th to the 70th parallels of northern latitude, Maldonado, h'e says, called it 60, ' because all the preceding geographers of that century had laid down the Strait of Anian in 60° N. latitude, K 3 as 150 Lord Selhlrh, and the North-west Passage. Oct. as appears from llic tliarts of llortdins and Mcrcalor, published in 1570.' These eharls ini;;ht misU^ad the writer of a voyage made by the fireside, hut it rer|uiicd not a 'skilful' navigator to detect their errors oij the spot. IJul the ihirty-lliird paragraph, which exceeds in absurdity all the rest, establishes in the iniiid of Anioretti die auUientiCily of the * Relation,' and places its veracity heyond all doubt. It slates that being about to leave the hatbour tov\iiids the middle of June, a lar;;e vessel of 800 tons burdin wasohM-rvid to approach from the South Sia, steering directly for the Slriiit. Finding the strangers to be pacifically inclined, nuilnal cnilities weie exchanged, and !Mald(»iunl() received from them some presents of silks, porcj'laine, Jk-c. such as are i/iongljl from China. The people j'ppcarefl to be ^Muscovites, oi- liansealics, from the bay of St, Nicholas or St. [Michael: to understand each other ihty were under the necessity of conversing in Latin; the stiapgcrs seemed to be Christians, and if not Catholics, were at least Lutherans. They said they came from a great city more than 100 leagues off, which Mal- donado thinks (but he is not sure) they called Rohr, or something like it, which they told him had a V( ry extensive! harbour, upon a navigable river, and belonged to the King of Taitary: they added, that they bad left there another ship belonging to their countrymen. As they treated our discoverer with very little con- fidence, this was all that could be got out of tiiem : diey sailed to- gether, it would seem, through the Strait, when coming into the North Sea, the stranger bore away to the westward, tmd Maldo- nado pursued his route for Spain the same way he had come. Our English sailors would most certainly have at once set down this mysterious vessel for the * Flying Dutchman,' so frequently seen olf the Cape of Good Hope, but luckily for Maldonado his more enlightened crew were addicted to no such idle supersti- tions. * It would seem,' says Amoretti, ^ith great naivete, * that this vessel, turning to the left after passing the Slrait, coasted Siberia, and consequently that Deschnew was not the first who made this voyage.' After all that Cook and King have discovered and published ; after all the fruitless attempts of the Russians to circumnavigate the northern coast of Siberia, one can scarcely imagine that any man of common understanding, much less of some research, which M. Amoretti certainly is, could for a moment lend himself to such an idle talc, which, as the editor of the Voyage of Sut'd and Mexicana observes, * is full of false calcula- tions, of incredible circumstances, and gross fictions of every kind.* — But he who can really believe that the norUi-west passage has actually been made by several navigators ; that some straits have been shut up, others opened; and that islands have disappeared bj 'con- «■ ] Oct. >r, publislicd o)rage made >r to detect ihsuiditv all ticilv of the it states that of June, a < !i from the le stiaiij^ers •iinj^od, and porct laine, '« ;uc'd to be oliis or St. f necrssitj Christians, y said they hich Mal- something )oiir, upon tary : they g to their liitle con- ' sailed to- g into tlie id Maldo- ome. set down Vequently onado his supersti- 2te, ' that , coasted Hrst who iscovered jssians to I scarcely 1 less of moment r of the calcula- Jry kind.* sage has lits have eared bj 'con- 1^1(1. ]\'))<1 Si'Ihirh, and the Nortli-nesi Pussarrc. 151 i« ' conv nlsionx of nwf iirt' u ilhin the hist two centuries, is cap:ibh> of be- liLviii:' an) tiiiijij however ahsi ^1, Wecan safely assure iVI. Anioretti thai t!ie tKCoiiui cf * onr Cluny' having nrade this passage in 17 l-^; of lushivMig s •licitt'd tlic reward oflVrcd by our govenuncnl, witli- oiit oliiuiiiiiig it ; of the liudsoiTs Bay Company fuiding means to prevent his joinnal benig published, is destitute of all fotmdatitMi. 'i'\>v. compiler of the ' llistoire Uenerale des Voyages' is not the only I'Veiichman in whose hands an Knglish work is not safe from misreprosentalion or misapprehension. Cluny wrote a book called the * American 'Traveller,' m which he reprobates in strong language the conduct of the Hudson's Bay Company, and lays down a variety of plans and projects for the improvement of the American colo- nies ; but he is so far from pretending to have made the nordi-west passage, that he even doubts its existence; but in his chart prefixed, there ar»> two parallel dotted lines from Repulse liay to the Icy Sea, over which is wiiiten — * Here Is suppr)sed to be the North-west Passage ;' — wliich Vaugondy, the king's geographer, in a chart approved by the * Acatlemie Royale des Seiences,' has thus trans- lated — ' Cote parcourue par le Capilainc Cluny, auteur de VAmC'^ rictm Traveller.* We suspect this pretended voyage of Maldonad<^ to be the cbunsy and audacious forgery of some Ignorant German, from the circumstance of l.> leagues to the degree being used in some of the computations. It is, indeed, a fit companion for Dambcrger's Travels ; and we cannot but regret that Anioretti should have thought he was fulfilhng the intention of the pious founder of the Ambrosian library in selecting so palpable a iiction for publication, and still more that he should have undertaken to defend it. We do not, however, hesitate to express our firm belief that Maldonado did perform a voyage ; and thai Nicolao Antonio di(hec the journal of that voyage in the hands of the Bishop of Segovia : it was not, however, a voyage for the discovery of the * north-west passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific,' (no such discovery being once mentioned by the Spanish bibliographer,) but simply * for the dis- covery of the Strait of Anian.' That Spain should be extremely anxious for the security of her possessions in the Pacific and Indiaii oceans, when she saw the English with extraordinary perseverance sending out expeditions year after year, for the avowed purposeof dis- covering a nearer route to those i5»-..^ , and when their armed cruizers, unauUiorized it is true, but countenanced by the government, were destroying the Spanish commerce on the western coasts of America, was exceedingly natural. She must have seen these bold under- takings with alarm, and that would dictate to her the policy of as- certaining whether any and what kind of au outlet into the Pacific was likely to favour the enterprize of so active an enemy, and what K 4 " the n 152 Lord Seikirk, and the Norlh-zoest Passage. Oct. In t the means were to secure from surprize lier valuable po'^ses!' sions, extending from Peru to the Philippine islands: — in short, to ascertain the existence and the nature of this Strait of Aniau as marked in ail the early charts, and now become an object of the first importance. For sucli a purpose Mahlonado was a proper person to be employed ; and tlim he was so employed, but proceeded round Cape Horn, we have very little doubt. No Spa- niard, that we know of, ever entered, or attempted to enter, Hud- son's Bay in search of the N.A\\ passage, except Estovan Gomez in 1525; but * of this Steven Gomez,' says Purchas, * little is left us but a jest.' He reached only the coast of iS^ewfoundland in the 50th parallel of latitude, and carried off some of the natives. Being asked, on his return, what he had brought home, he answered Esdatosy which the inquirtr mistaking for clavos, or cloves, con- cluded that Gomez had discovered the north west passage to the Moluccas ; * and so posted to the Court,' says Purchas, * to carry the first news of this spicy discovery.' The object of Maldouado's voyage being that of reconnoitring rather than of making discoveries, it could not be expected that the Spaniards would publish it : they iiad, indeed, at that time, matters of far greater importance to attend to — the arms of England had just destroyed what the t lements had spared of their * invincible Armada.' — Under these circumstances the precautionr ary voyage of JVlaldonado was likely to remain among those un- published manuscripts which the Due d'Almadover supposes * to have been buried in the dust of the archives of Madrid,' and which Delisle says, ' have been so carefully concealed, that at this day the Spaniards thems^elvcs know nothing about them.' If by any means the spurious production in question was foisted into the records of the * Council for the Indies,' its members, by widi- holding it from publication, have given a further proof of that sound discretion which induced them ' to bury in the dust of their archives' forty-nine of the fifty memorials which Capitan Pedrcr Fernandez de Quiros presented to the king, eight of which, by his own statement, related to a settlement which it behoved his majesty to make on a land then undiscovered {Amtralia incognita), and since known to have no existence. But Maldonado probably discovered the strait he was sent in search of, and there are grounds for concluding that he describes it to lie about the 59ih or 6()th parallel of latitude, because the instructions of Ma- laspina directed him to look for it as far as 60° north. Now Mal- donado, in coasting America from the southward, could not have reached that latitude before he fell in with Cook's Inlet, which ex- tends from about 58-2° to 6li°, and is a strait of considerable magni- jude,the width between CapeDouglas and Cape Elizabeth being about ' • ^ ■ ' " or 18 i i "'*' i3(ft Oct. 1816. ^'Ord SelJcirkf and the North-west Passage. 15S Ic po-^ses- — in short, of AiiJau in object nado was !oyed, but No Spa- ter, ilud- in Gomez ttlo is left uid ill the ;s. Being answered ves, Con- nie to the ' to carry innoitring cted that l»at time, arms of of their icautionr hose un- oses * to rid,' and it at this ' If by ted into )y with- of that of their Pedro by his majesty ud since 1 search e about of Ma- Mal- it have ich ex- magni- gabout or 18 IS or 20 leagues : and as the Strait of Anian was laid down in the 60*^ of latitude in all the charts at the time of Maldonado, and as he found the land stretching on the one side to the souUi-east, and on the oilier to the soulh-west, it was most natural that this naviga- tor should conclude that Cook's Inlet w as the identical strait which he was sent to discover; and that it separated the two great conti- nents of Asia and America. We must not forget that Cook, who, w ith all the advantage of Behring's discoveries and chart, was employed twelve days in ascertaining that it was not a strait, observes, tliat if he * had not examined this very considerable inlet, it would have been assumed, by speculative fabricators of geography, as a fact, that it communicated w ith the sea to the north, or with Baflin's or Hudson's Bay to the east.' Destitute as we consider the * Relation' of Maldonado to be both of* veracity and authenticity,' we are by no means inclined to suppose that such a voyage as it describes is impracticable. We firmly believe, on the contrary, that a navigable passage from the Atlantic to *he Pacific round the northern coast of America does exist, and may be of no difficult execution. Why, then, it may be asked, have all the attempts made at different times, from both sides the continent of America, failed ? Because not one of them was ever made near that part of the coast of America, round which it is most likely the passage would lead into the Frozen or Northern ocean. To prove this we must take a glance at what has been done ; and if our readers should feel that pride and pleasure, which we do, in reviewing the daring enterprizes and the perilous and persevering efforts of our early navigators in the frozen regions of the Nordi, they will not deem a brief survey of them tedious or misplaced* — * Resolute, gallant, glorious attempts !' exclaims that ijuaint but delightful old writer of the * Pilgrimage,* — * How,* continues he, 'shall I admire your heroicke courage, ye marine worthies, beyond all names of wordiiness! that neyther dread so long eyther * We owe iiiHch of the rapid growth of our infant navy to those voyages ; and we may Ijprf take occasion to observe, tliattiie honourable appellation of Father of the British Navy lias not been justly conferred on Henry VIII. The real founder of a permunint navy, distinct from the Lmque-port Marine, was the Conqueror of Agincourt. Among the many curious documents brought to light by the present able and indus- trious keeper of the records in the Tower, is a letter of Henry V. dated 12th August, J417, directing the Lord Ciiancellor to issue letters-patent under the great seal, granting a sort of hall-pay or annuity to ' certainc maistres for owr owne grcte shippcs, carrackes, barges and balyngers.' That this monarch had regular King's ships, distinct from the mercantile marine, is further corroborated by that curious poem in Ilackluit's collectioHt called the ' English Policie, &c.' which complains of the neglect of the navy by Henry YI. and extols ' the policie of keeping the see in the time of the inarveillous werriour «nd victorious prince, King Henrie the lift and of his grete thippcs.' — We like the * policie' better than the poetry. ' And if I should conclude all by the King Ileniie the Fift, what was hit> purpo»ing Whan ).j4 J.ord Sdldrky and the NoHh-ZiCSl Passage. Oct. cyther presence or absence of tlie sunne ; nor those foggy mysts, tem- pestuous winds, cold Lltists, snowes and hayle in the ayre : nor the un- equall seas, which might amaze the hearer, and ainate the beholder, where the Tritons and Ncphmc^ selfe would {|uake with chillino; feare, to behold such monstrous icie ilands, renting themselves with terrourof iheir own owne massines, and disdayning otherwise both the seas sove- reigniie, and thesunne's hottest violence, mustering themselves in those watery plaines where they hold a continual civill warre, and rushing one upon another, make windes and waves give backe ; seeming to rent the eares of others, while they rent themselves with crashing and split- ting their congealed armours/ The flourishing commerce of the Portugueze and Spaniards in the Indian seas stimulated the merchants of England to a partici- pation in that great source of wealth, by the discovery of a pas- sage that would shorten the voyage to India and China to less than half the distance of that round the Cape of Good Hope or Cape Horn. Such a passage was, in fact, supposed to have been made by Caspar de Cortereal, a Portugueze of some rank, in the year 1500. He touched at Newfoundland, passed over to Terra f'crdc, after- wards called Terra de Cortereai, and gave to the southern part of it, Avhich was fit for cultivation, the name of Ten a de iMhrador. Then coasting to the northward and opening out a wide passage (now called Hudson's Strait) he concluded he had discovered the so much desired passage round America, \\liich he is said to have named the Strait of Anian ; not however, as we conceive, * in honour of two brothers who accompanied him,' but because he deemed it to be the eastern extremity of a strait, whose zcesteni end opening into the Pacihc, had already received that name. He hastened back to Portugal to communicate the agreeable intelligence, and was sent the following year to compieU; the discovery, but was never heard of more; and his brother Michael de Cortereal, who afterwards went in search of him, shared the same fate. The first Englishman who undertook the discovery of a Nortli- Wlien at HaDipioii, he made the Great Dmtnmis "Wliicli passp^l other yrete hiilj)j)es. of the Conimouij ; Till- Triuitk', the Giaci dc Dieii, tlie Hubi Oltusl, Ami other inoe, whi,;l) fis now be Ji;sl, ^Vh;it hope ve was the Kiiiu's y;rcte intent Ol'thoo shippesj and what iu iiiiiul he meant _; ^ It was not fclli.'-, but iliat he cast to bee Lord round-about environ ol' llie See. Better indeed is II(.'nr_v VIL eniith^d to be called tlie iViend and founder of the aavy lliaii lii^ successor, it was he wiio caused tlic ('rc»t Ilurrji to lie built at the expense of 1, '),()(>()/. an enormous sum in tiiosc days. It was he too wlio engai'ed tlip Cabots of Venice in the discovery of Newfoundland ; and it was accident only that pi-evented him from employ in;j; Columbus. Bui the spirit of discovery and foreign en- terprize died nway and revived only in full vigotn' after receiving the fostering hand ul" Elizabeth, whose long and Hourislung protection of it lias bees «x«eedi;d only by that ©f George III. west ;fe' Oct. lysts, tern- or the un- ■ beholder, lling feare, terrour of seas sove- es in those 111 rushing iiig to rent and split- uiiar js in partici- of a pas- less than or Cape made by ar 1.500. /f, afttr- jart of it, (ihrador. passage ered the I to have II lionour eemed it opening fled back was sent er heard ervvards North- 1816. Lord Selkirk, and the North-Zi'est Passage. 155 Pr of tht ilt at the [aged tlip only tliat reign oii^ J hand ul' y hy that west west passage to China, was Mr. (afterwards Sir Martin) Frobisher, He left I'ngland in the middle of July, 1576, with two small vessels and a pinnace, the largest only 25 tons ; and proceeding to the entrance of a supposed strait in latitude 63° 10' N. he returned to Harwich on the Jd October, bringing back from an island on the coast of Greenland ' one of the salvages' and some bright stones. The wife of one of the adventurers threw one of these stones accidentally into the fire, and having quenched it with vinegar, * it glisiered with a bright marquisset of gold.' The following year Probisher anchored on the west coast of Greenland, where the ' stones be altogether sparkled, and glister in the sun like gold.' One of his people found the horn of a sea unicorn, into which some spideis being put immediately died ; and ' these spi- ders,' we are told, ' as many affirm, are signs of great store of gold.' They also caught two women, one of whom Mas so ugly that the sailors suspected her to be the devil, and would not be convinced of the contrary, until they had stripped off her skin boots to see whether she had a cloven foot. Queen Elizabeth, it seems, was so much satisfied with the report of this voyage, that Frobisher was sent out for the third time the following year, to take possession of Meta 2«cogw?7« (Greenland) with 15 ships and 120 settlers; but the ice opposing their passage through the Strait, and the season being far advanced, they contented themselves with taking on boar*^' a large quantity of the * glistering stones,' and re- turned to England. These stones we suppose turned out to be pieces of that beautiful iridescent spar known by the name of La- brador spar. The unfavourable result of Frobisher's third expedition seems for a while to have cast a damp on the spirit of enterprize in this quarter; which however was revived in 1585, when some noblemen and gentlemen fornied an association for effecting the discovery of the North-west passage, and John Davis, of Sand- ridge in Devonshire, was engaged to conduct the expedition. He left England with two ships, passed the south point of Greenland on the 20th July, to which, from its horrid appearance, he gave the name of the * Land of Desolation/ then steered N. VV. and making the land on the fitli August, in latitude 66*^ 40' N., he gave to a high mountain ' glittering like gold,' the name of ' Mount Ra- legh' Having doubled the South cape of this island, which he named ' Cape of God's Mercy,' he proceeded up a strait (Cumberland Strait of modern charts) 20 leagues wide, to the distance of 00 leagues, when adverse winds and tides obliged him to return. In 1586, Davis was again sent with four ships, but made no discoveries of importance, and reached not beyond his former latitude. On his third voyage in 1587, lie was more suc- cessful, r liG Lord Selkirk, and the Xorlh-nest Passage. Oct. lip "'•1 Mi!fi cessful, having proceeded along the Most coast of Greenland to the latitude of 72° 12' N. He then steered a uesterl)- course to- vards the continent of America, but being opposed by fields and mountains of ice, which alarmed his peojjle, he coasted to the southward along the same land he had discovered on his first voyage ; saw Limdey's Inlet between 62° and iiS°, and returned to Dartmouth by the loth September. In his short letter to Mr. Saunderson, the great promoter of the undertaking, he says, * I have been in 73°, finding the sea all open, the passage most pro- bable, the execution easy.' The failure of Davis, however, put an end to any further attempt in that century; and in 1591 Sir James Lancaster was sent with five ships by the usual but circuitous route of the Cape of Good Hope. This officer, or some person for liini, having added to one of his letters a postscript, in which he says * the passage to the Indies is in the N. VV. of America in 62^ 30' N.' the report of it once more revived the question; and, in 1602, Captain Waymouth left England with two fly-boats in search of the North-west pas- sage. He succeeded in passing all the straits, and in reaching the latitude of 63° 55' N. on the coast of America ; (about Marble Island;) but here his crew muthiicd, which obliged him to return to England. Knight and Hull, in l606 and l607) lost their lives in a scuffle with the natives before they had made any discovery of importance. Notwithstanding alt these failures, a society of merchants still persevered in the attempt to discover a northern route to India and China ; they engaged, for this purpose, Captain Henry Hud- son, a man of approved skill in seamanship, of great experience, and daring intrepidity. He left England in 1 607, but instead of entering any of the straits, he stood directly for the East coast of Greenland, which he made in 73~, and named the point Hold with Hope. The weather continued mild, and even warm, till he reach- ed the latitude of 78° ; the sea open, with much drift-wood. In 80° 25' N. he sent his boat on shore with the mate and boatswain, who quenched their thirst, the weather being hot, at two excellent streams of fresh water. He still advanced to the northward as high as 82° N. when falling in with mountains and fields of ice, he returned home, and arrived at Gravesend on the loth September. The following year he made a second voyage, to attempt a passage between Spitzbergen and Nova Zembla, few particulars of which were made public, and these are not to our present purpose. The third, and, to him, the last and fatal voyage, was undertaken in 16 10. Having passed the strait which now bears his name, and doubled the westernmost capes of Labrador, which he named Wol- atenholme and Digges, he stood to the southward down the great bay a o cr. IS 1(5. Lord Selkirk and the North-zeest Passage. 157 *reeiiland to ^ course to- •y fields and istod to the on his iirst returned to Iter to Mr. le says, 'I niot>t pro- 'Pr attempt ' sent with B of Good tied to one ^ge to the eport of it Vaymouth west pas- Jching the It Marble to return their lives coverv of lants still to India ry Hud- Jerience, IS lead of coast of o/d with e reach- od. Irt ^tswain, xcellent vard as ice, he ember, massage which The ken in f and pWoI- great bay ■« bay which bears his own name, and entered a harbour which they called Michaelmas, where it was Hudson's intention to pass the winter; but an accident prevented him, and he stood down to the lowest bite of the bay. Here the chief employ of his crew was to procure provisions, with which they appear to have been scan- tily supplied in the ship ; but they killed about a hundred dozen of partridges as white as milk; and in the spruig, when those left them, * came birds of divers sorts, as swannes, goose, duckc, and teale.* While thus employed, a mutiny was stirred up among the ship's company by one Greene, a person whom Hudson had taken on board out of charity and treated as his own child. On leav- ing this spot, the mutineers forced Hudson, his son, and seven others into the boat, amidst fields of ice, with a scanty supply of provisions — she was never beard of more, and all that were in her must have miserably perished. The mutineers stood away foi* Digges's Island at the mouth of Hudson's Strait, where they found tents full of men, women, and children, * bigge-boned, broad-faced, flat-nosed, and small-footed, like the Tartars.' Here Greene and another of the principal mutineers were shot by tlie natives, and three others died a few days after of their wounds : * everywhere,' observes Purchas, * can Divine justice find execu- tioners.' The remainder of the crew, after taking on board about 400 sea-fowl which they caught on leaving the land, made the best of their way homewards, being reduced to the greatest distress, living chiefly on sea- weeds fryed with candle-ends, and the skins and feathers of the fowl they had eaten. The account of this un- fortunate voyage is written by one of the crew named Habakuk Pricket, who, of course, endeavours to lay the whole blame on Greene and the others who had been killed by the Eskimeaux; but* North-west Foxe,' in his remarks on the transaction, slily ob- serves, * Well, Pricket, I am in great doubt of thy fidelity to Master Hudson.' This Habakuk Pricket, however, was engaged to accompatjv Sir Thomas Button two years after 0^>12) on the same voyage of discovery, with two ships whose names were tli«! same as those under the celebrated Cook in his last vovasrc — tlie Resolulion and the Discovery. He passed through Hudson's Strait, saw the south point of the large island named on some of our charts Southampton Island, and gave it the name of Carey s SrcYui^s Nesi, and steering from thence S.VV. made the main land of America in C)0° 40', to which he gave the name of Hope's Check. Button wintered in Port Nelson, so called from his pilot, in latitude 31° 10' N. which is now the principal station of the Hudson's Bay Company. He lost many nun by cold and hunger, * and yet,' says Foxe, * he was sup- plied with great store of white partridges and oilier fowie, of which J havti 158 Lord Selkirk, and the North-west Passage. Oct. m 'm 'm- have heard it credibly reported, that this Company killed eighteen hundred doien in the winter season.' L>uttoi) reached no higher than the latitude of ()j° on the cast coast of Southampton Island. In lGl4, Captain Gibbons was sent out in the Discovery; but his ship was beset by ice on the N.E. coast of Labrador, in about 57° N. where ho remained nearly live mouths in a sort of bay, to which his ship's company, in derision, gave the name of Gibbons his Hole; escaping at last from his place of confinement, he made the best of his w ay home. Robert Bylot, who had been with Hudson, Button, and Gib- hons, now appointed master of the same ship, the Discovery, of 55 tons burden, set sail from England in April, 1015, passed through Hudson's Strait, as far as Cape Comfort, on the east coast of South- ampton Island in latitude 05° N. but having proceeded northerly about half a degree, and finding, as he says, the water shallow, and the land trending to the N.E. (which, however, is doubtful,) he returned to England without making any discovery. The following year, Bylot, with Baffin (who had acted as his pilot in the former voyage) proceeded again in the same ship, the Discovery, being her fifth voyage on the same object. They now stood along the west coa!?t of Greenland ; and saw some islands in 72* 1 5', to which, finding women only on them, they gave the name of Women's Islands; they are situated close to the ^ari' derson's Hope of Davis, the extreme point which that navigator reached. Coasting from hence, in an open sea, they passed * a fayre cape,' in latitude 76° .j5', which diey named Cape Dudley Digges; then standing N. westerly they passed li hale Sound, in 77° 30'; then Sir Thomas Smith's Sound, which was choked up, not with ice, but with whales; and extended beyond 78° N. this being the farthest point they reached to the northward. They then stood five day^! to the southward of west, through an open sea, and saw Alderman J ones s Sound, in latitude 7G° 30'; and in two days, standing more southerly, they opened Sir James Lancaster's Sound; from whence they continued their course two days south- easterly, the sea still open, till they came to latitude 71° l6', when meeting with much ice, they struck off from the coast due east, and passing through Baffin's Strait, into the Strait of Davis, made the best of their way home : first touching, however, at Cockin Sound on the coast of Greenland, to collect scurvy grass, sor- rel and orpine, for their sick, who, Baffin says, were cured in eight days by the scurvy grass (cochlearia) boiled in beer. This might be considered as the most important of all the voyages, if the brief account of it could be depended on ; but there is nothing left on record, except a meagre sort of journal by Baffin, unaccom- panied by any chart; Bylot, as would appear from Habakuk Pricket's % Oct. led eighteen d no higher :on Island, overy; but ►J", in about of bay, to »f Gibbons It, he made i8l6. "Lord Selkirk, and the Noith-ucst Passage. }59 55 , and Gib very, of f^d through : of South- I northerly illow, and btful,) he ted as his i «>hip, ilie ;t. They aw some they gave ihe i!{an- uavigator assed ' a Dudley mind, in ked up, N. this They ^pen sea, in two toaster's s south- ', when ue east, niade Cockin , sor- ired in This , if the ng left ccom- bakuk cket's jS Pricket's narrative of Hudson's V^oyage, being unable ciiher to read or write. The floating masses of ice drifting from the north- ward, and the heavy swell Uom the same quarter, >\hen oft" Whale Sound, would sieni to indicate that Greenland is no part of America, but a large island, or rather an archipelago of islands. BaHui's ]?av, as we now see it on some modern charts, is wholly suppo- sititious. The unabated zeal and the extraordinary perseverance which actuated the promoters of these early voyages of discoverv were kept alive by the prevailing opinion that the north-west passage had actually been made by the Spaniards and Portugue/e,* and particularly by a Greek pilot of the name of Juan de Fuca ;i* but from the termination of Baffin's last voyage, if we except an obscure attempt of Hawkridge, who had accompanied SirTliomas Button in l()l!i, the ardour for the discovery of this passage seems to have abated. It was, iiowever, revived in ]G3(), by one Lucas Toxe, a shrewd, sensible man, who, having availed himself of the information gained by preceding adventurers, was so certain of making the passage, that he obtained a letter from Charles I. ad- dressed to his brother the l£mperor of Japan. This enterprize was, in fact, under the immediate patronage of the king, who con- tributed one of his own ships, fitted out in the most complete man- ner, and victualled for 18 months. Sir Thomas Roe and Sir John VV olstenholme were named by the king to superintend the equip- ment of the voyage. Some merchants of Bristol having fitted out * Sir Humfrcy CiilDerf says, that one Snlvnterra, a gentleman of Vittoria, in Spain* caiuo into Irilaiui in \bC)V>, imd in liis (Sir Gilbert's) licjiring, told Sir Henry Si(ine_y, \\u'.\\ l.urd Deputy, tliat one rrdamt:!, a Iriar of Mexico, liad told liiin eight years be- .'orc, lliat he came iroiii Mar del Stir into (jermany tinouuli this norlli-wesl passage, and shewed Salvaterra a sea-card made by Iii» own experience and travel in tliat voyaac. 'J'his friar, Sir (iilbert adds, t(jld the Ki'iu; of Portugal that ho meant to publish the s;iine, but tiie king most earnei'Iy desired liim not to make the same known, for that * if Kiiuland liad knowledge and experience tiiereof, it would greatly hinder botli him and the King of Spain.' Tliis l^rdanetu went with Magellan and afterwards with Legaspi's expedition, in \bM, to the Pliiiippinc Islands ; and the chart, long used by tiie Manilla ships, was ori_'inally constructed by l^rtlaneta. t His real luime was Apostolos \ alerianus. The story told to Mr. Michael I/)k, Consul for tiie Turkey merchants at Aleppo, was a plain and no doubt a true one — that he was plundered in a Manilla ship, otf Cape California, by one Candish, (Cavendish, who states liis liaving found a (>'fTcfc pilot in one of the ships he plundered,) an ringlishuiau — tiiat he was afterwards sent by the Viceroy of Mexico, to discover the Strait of Anian, but owing to a mutiny in the squadron, he returned — that in 1599 he was again sent on this discovery ; that lie entered a strait between 47° and 48" of lati- tude, and Siiiled ebove twenty days in u broad sea ; and tliat, opposed by savages clothed in skins, he returned to Acapulco. The late Bishop of Salisbury, rather inilis- cretely, has pronounced this story of De Fuca, ' the fabric of imposture ;' for the ink was scarcely dry wh'-.h transmitted to posterity this hasty opinion, w hen the strait, and the sea, and the savages were recognized by Mearcsand oth'-rs, in the very spot pointed out by the old Creek pilot, to whom modern geographers have rendered lardy justice, by assi^niug to tba strait he discovered, the uaiue of Juan dc Fuca, a ship « 160 J>or(l Selkirk, and the North-zvest Passage. Oct. l^-^ o a ship for tlie same purpose, un.ler the command of Captain James, requested that slie might accompany Toxe. Early in May, 10*31, His Majesty's ship Charles, of SO tons left England; but owing to foggy weather, and ice, it was the loih July bttore she reached the islands of Salisbury and Notlnighain. From hence Foxe slood over to the Continent of America, and made the land in 64° 10', which he named Sir Thomas Roes iVelcome; and directing his course to the southward discovered Brook Cobham, since called Marble Island; after this he anchored in Nelson's River; and con- cluding that no passage existed between that point and 64° 10' N., he next stood to the noi thward, between Southampton and Cum- berland Islands, and on the west coast of the latter gave names to King Charles's promontory. Cape Maria, Trinity Islands, Lord Weston's Portland and Fu.re's Farthest, being, as the name imports, the extretne point to which he proceeded, in latitude 66° 47' N. Adverse winds, long nights, a waning moon, and the sickness of his crew, obliged him * either to seek for harbour, or to freeze to death in the sea,' and he therefore returned to England. ' Captain James wintered in the cul-de-sac of Hudson's Sea, named after him James's Bay ; came home the following year, and published a dismal account of his sufferings from cold, hunger, disease, &c. though the latitude in which he passed the winter was only 52° S'. Without adding the slightest information to the geo- jrraphy of Hudson's Sea, he decides boldly that there is no such thing as a north-west passage. About the same time one M. de Groseiller, of Canada, was dispatched from Quebec for the purpose of discovery. lianding near Nelson's River, he fell in with a wretched hut in which were six people nearly famished. They were part of the crew of a ship which had been sent from Boston, and which, while they were on shore, had been driven to sea by the ice, and was never heard of niore. Groseiller went to Paris, but meeting with no encourage- ment from the French government, came to Eiigland with a letter from our ambassador to Prince Rupert, who received him favour- ably; and, behjg joined by other noblemen and merchants, fitted out a ship in 1668, which Captain Gillam was appointed to command. He proceeded up Davis's Strait to 7i° N., returned to Rupert's River in the bottom of Hudson's Bay, and there wintered. h\ the mean time Charles H. bv his Roval Charter, constituted Prince Rupert and certain lords, knights, and merchants, a body corporate, known by the name of * the Governor and Company of the Adventurers of England trading into Hudson's Bay.' From the moment this body of * Adventurers' was instituted, the spirit of adventure died away ; and every succeeding effort was palsied by the baneful influence of monopoly, of which the disco- very Oct. 1 James, , JG31, It owing reached xe slood fi4° JO', ting his :e called nd con- 10' N., d Cum- ames to s, Lord mpoits, ' 47' N. cness of eeze to I's Sea, nr, and hunger, ter was le geo- 10 such ia, was landing h were ' a ship ere on ;ard of lurage- letter "avour- fitted ted to ned to itered. iituted bodv any of tuted, t was disco- very 1810". Lord Selkirk, and the North-west Passage. 161 very of a north-west passage was deemed the forerunner of destruc- tion, l^ven llie publication of De Fonte's* Voyage failed to rouse the attention of specidators. At length, however, in 17^0, one Knight, who had long l>een in the Company's service as master of a ship, and subsequently governor of one of their forts, reminded his old masters that they were obliged, by their charter, to make discoveries and extend their trade, and that if the} refused to indid^;e him with an expedition for these purpo:»es, he would apply to the crown. Being nearly 80 years of age, the Company thought it more advisable to gratify his * troublosoine zeal,' as Kobson calls it, than to let the business be taken up by some abler hand — his instructions were to find the Strait of Anian, in ordt^r to di^icover gold, whales, and other valuable commodities!, to the northward, &c. Knight was so cuntident of success, that he caused strong chests to be made, hooped with iron, to hold the gold and copper which he was determined to find, and which seem to have engrossed his mind more than the disc(»very of the northwest passage. The two ships sent under him and Barlow were never heard of more ; but some of their remains wi.'re discovered six or seven years afterwards in a bay on Marble Island, where their crews appear to have perished in the most miserable manner. In 17'2'2 one Scroggs was sent to the northward ostensibly to look for these unfortunate sufferers, about which, however, Hobsoii says, there was not one word in his instructions. This Scruggs appears to have been totally nntit for any expedition on account of his ignorance and timidity, but exceedingly well qualilied to answer the purpose of the Hudson's Bay Company, who seemed to enjoy their monopoly in perfect tranquillity, without giving themselves the smallest con- cern about making discoveries either by land or by water. At length a gentleman of the name of Dobbs, having well consi- dered what preceding navigators had stated with regard to the high tides from the northward in the tVelcome, prevailed on the Com- pany, after much importunity, to send a vessel to the northv^ ard, in 1737, but she returned %vith()ut doing any thing, never having reached so high as the latitude (i3°. Dobbs, perceiving the reluc- tant and negligent conduct of the Company, applied next to the • Tlie Voyaiie of De Fonlc, Fnente, or Fonta, iippeared for llie first time in a periodi- cal publication called the Monthly MisrtUuni,, or Mnnoiis for t>te Curioui, for April, 170d. It is supposed to liave been perloniiod in 1640. Capluin Biiraey, who has publiiihcd it at lenglli in his • History of Voya^C'i, 5cc.' seems to think with Mr. Uul-- ryinple, that it is an idle piece of invention by one P?tiver, a contributor to the above- mentioned Miscellany ; though it uiiglit liave been founded on ihe ciriir,n>tance of Burgomaster Witsen having mentioned a voyage made by the celebrated Da i'onin iu 1649, to Terra del Fuego, ai Uie cost of the Kii'g of Spain ; and of the Do-'toii ship that was lost in Hud%>n's Baj', six cf whose crew we:o found on shore by vJrcaciller — it is something of the kind of our modern romances con;pcsedof fact and ti'.tiou, pleasant to read, but injurious to the truth of history. VOL. XVI. NO. XXXI. L government. 162 Lord Selkirk, and the North-west Passage. Oct. W^. I government, and by his perseverance aiul sani^iiine representations obtained tlie Furnace bomb and tlie pink Discovery, to be appro- pri;:ted for this service, under the orders of Captain Middlelon, a commander in the British navy, who had served as master in the employ of tlie Hudson's Bay Conipany for many voyages. Mid- dleton left England in 1741, wintered in Churchill River, ami in the summer of 174- proceeded up tlic Welcome to Wager liiver, and looked into (he says sailed round) what he was pleased to call Repulse Bin/. From hence he returned to the southward. On his arrival in England, Dobbs accused him ot wilfully misrepre- senting his discoveries, to curry favour with his old employers, and of having taken a bribe of .3000/. from them not to make any disco- veries. He denies the bribe, hut admits that he might have said to some of the governors that he would discover the passage and none of those with him should be the wiser for it. His officers too swore to his having misrepresented facts. The Lords of the Admiralty called upon him to answer the charges preferred against him by Mr. Dobbs, which he did, at full leiigth ; but without satisfying them. To evince, on the contrary, how strongly impressed they still were with the probability of a north-west passage, their Lord- ships procured an act the following year (ISGeo.U.), for grant- ing a reward of twenty thousand pounds to the person or per- sons who should discover a north-west passage through Hudson's Strait to the western and southern ocean of America; a discovery which the preamble states to be of * great benetit and advantage to the trade of this kingdom.' The ofterof this reward immediately brought forward new adven- tiirers, who raised by subscription a sum sufFicient to equip two ships, the Dobbs connnanded by Captain Moor, and the California by Captain Smith, which left the Thames in May, 174(i. On the nth August they reached the coast of America about Marbl« [sland, and having made some observations on the height, direc- tion and velocity of the tides, they stood to the southward and wintered in Port Nelson, where they were treated with great jea- lousy, and closely watched by the servants of the Hudson's Bay Company. "^1 hey remained here, we know not why, till the 1st July, when they again proceeded to the northward, and examined Wager's Strait; here the two comnianders differed respecting the examination of Repulse Bay, and the ships returned to England, without havi)ig accomplished any odier discovery beyond that of ascertaining V\ ager Water to be u deep bay or inlet. Two accounts of this voyage w ere published ; one, containing many curious and sensible observations, by Mr. Ellis, the other, a laboured and con- ceited performance in two volumes, by * the Clerk of the Cali- f*#rnia.' After o tl n( tl ISIrt. Lord Selkirk, and the North-west Passant. J 65 After After this the spirit of discovery in the north seenjs totally to have Slink ; and the Hudson's Bay Company were left in that slato of a])athy which seems most congenial to tlieir habil.s and interests. They sent, it is true, Mr. Hearne thirteen hundred miles in search of copper, and after the lapse of a hundred years lluy discovered tiiat Chestertield's Inlet at the distance of u hundred leagues from one of their estahlishmcnts, was not the north-west passage ; but they never once thought of sending nny one a little farther to the north, where probably in half the distance travelled by Ilearne^ the sea coast would have interrupted the traveller's progress. The government, however, was vigorously prosecuting new dis coveries ; and, after so many failures to the northward, it was resolved to employ the celebrated Cook to determine the exact situation of the two continents of Asia and America, or, in other words, to exaniine the Strait of Atiian. On this occasion a new act was passed (1(3 Geo. III.) granting a reward of twenty thou- sand pounds to any person or persons who should discover any northern passage for vessels by sea, between the Atlantic and I^acific Oceans, in any direction or parallel to the northward of the fiftv-second degree of northern latitude. In the same vear Cook sailed from the Thames with the Resolution and Discovery. On the yili August, 1778, he determined the western extremity of America, to which he gave the name of Cape Prince of Wales, to beinf),3°4(>' N. long. 1()1° 45; and, when in lat. 66^ 5', the width of the Strait which divides the two continents of Asia and America, to be about fourteen leagues. Standing to the northward he named a point of land on the American coast Point Mti/f^rave, the lat. of which was ()7'^4.5'. He continued up the Strait till he was in lat. 70° 3;j', in an open sea, but soon after, in 70° 41', found himself * close to the edge of the ice which was as compact as a wall,' and ten or twelve feet high. In returning to the southward he saw, on the American side, a low point in lat. 70° 29', to which he gave the name of Icy Cape. As the ice was still near the ships in lat. 69° .^2' while there was none in proceeding to the northward, lie concluded that the whole was a moveable mass, though he could not detect any current. To a point of high land in lat. 6{)° 5', he gave the name of Cape hislmrne. it being now near the end of August, Captain Cook repaired to Oonalashka, and from thence to the Sandwich islands, with the intention of renewing the examination of the Strait the following year; but by his unfor- tunate death, that task devolved on Captain Clarke, who entered the Strait toward the end of June, 1779, on the Asiatic side. On the ()ih July he had reached the lat. 67° N. and, after encoun- ering much ice, that of 70° 33'. On the IQth, in (i9° 34', he got night of the laud on the American side to the S. E. but could not l2 come 164 Lord Selkirk, and the North-nest Passage. Oct. 1 come near it — and this, with Cape Prince of Wales, viewed from the middle of the Strait, were the only two points he saw on the coast of America: after some further attempts on the Asiatic side, he returned to Kamschatka, though the month of July had not yet expired. Witiiout attaching blame to Captain Clarke, whose constitution was so debilitated that he died before they reached Kamschatka, or to Captains Gore or King, we think that, had Cook lived, he would not so soon have abandoned this great object. It is admitted in the narrative of the voyage, that the * impenetrable barrier of ice* occasionally breaks up and is moved about hi every direction ; that ' as far as their experience went,' the sea to the north of Hehring's Strait is clearer of ice in August than in July; and that ' perhaps in September it may still be more free ;* it is also admitted that there is less probability of success on tlie Asiatic, than on the Americar side of the Strait ; and yet it is known that Deschneff succeeded in passing) the Strait from tho north side of the Asiatic continent: under such admissions, it was certainly unfortunate that the attempt should so soon have beeq abandoned. About the same time Lieutenant Pickersgill was sent in the armed brig Lion to examine the western piirts of Baltin's bay — but the choice was unfortunate ; he never once entered Baffin's bay ; and Lieutenant Young, who superseded him and proceeded under similar instructions the following year, reached only the 72d degree of latitude, cruizing along the eastern instead of western side of Baffin's bay, and consequently aH)ong the ice which almost always clings to the shore. * His talents,* as Dr. Douglas observes, * were more adapted to contribute to the glory of a victory, as commander of a line of battle ship, than to add to geographical discoveries, by encountering mountains of ice, and exploring un- known coasts.' The Hudson's Bay Company were again left free, for many years, from the apprehensions of a discovery of the north-west passage. Fortunately, however, for the world, it rarely happens that a generation passes away without producing men zealous for their country's weal, and the honour of science. Mr. Dali-ym- ple, late hydrographer to the Admiralty, after carefully examining the question of the north-west passage, was decidedly of opinion that the problem was still to be solved; and conceiving with Dr. Douglas that * the governor and committee of the Hudson'» Bay Company had made amends for the narrow prejudices of their predecessors, and that no further obstruction would be thrown in the way of those who might be sent on discovery,' he prevailed on them to employ Mr. Duncan, a master in the navy, and now master attendant of his Majesty's dock-yard at Chatham, who had exhi- bited \9l6. T.ord Selkirk, and the North-west Pi assuge. lOj bited considerable talent on :i voyage to Nootka Sound, on this service. Mr. Dalryuiple liad long been of opinion that not only Greenland, but ail the land said to have been seen by Jiatiin on the northern and eastern sides of the great bay beaj ing his name, was composed of clusters of islands, and that a passage tlirough the \f)rtitm Jhtvis,' round the northern extremity of Cumberland island, led directly into the North Sea, from the 70'^ to the 7 V^ of latitude. It is thus mark«'d on an ancient globe, the first, we believe, ever made in this country, and now in the library of the Inner Temple, which contains all the discoveries of our early navigators ; it is, in fact, die only remaining record of this kind, as charts were then rude and not in fashion. Davis himself refers to it; and Hackluit, m his edition of I J89, has celebrated this early specimen of geographical science.* On inquiring after this globe, we were told, that it had recently been new-coaled, and that Mr. Arrowsmith's sketches had succeeded to the discoveries of Frobisiier and Davis! We are slow to believe that the venerable Benchers of the Temple can have given their sanction to so bar- barous and sacrilegious an act, as tl it of defacing this curious and valuable relic of antiquity.-}' I — • — — — — ♦ Hiickliiit apologizes lo tlie gentle reader ' lor inserting into the worke, one of the host gencriiil niappcs of the work! onciy, untill the coniini; out of u very large and most exact ternstriall globe, collected and reformed, according to the newest, secretest, and latest discoveries, both Spanisii, Portuguil and Enylisli, composed by M. Emmeiie Alolliiieux, of Lambeth, a rare gentleman in his profession, being tliereiu for divert yeeres greatly supported by tlie purse aad liberalitic of tiie worsiiipful niarclnnt, Mr. Willianj Sanderson.' This is the gl;;be which the Benclicrs of the Temple are said to have white-washed. t Mr. Dalrymple caused a copy to be taken of lliose jjiuts of this globe relative to the present question. On this sketch, we see with pleasure, the Drogio and liic Fries- land of the two noble Venetians, the Zeni ; we observe the latter where it always was and still is, nt the southern extremity of Greenland, a little above the 60t!i parallel of latitude ; still holding its head above water, in spite of the volcanoes and the earlliqnakcs treated by the Due d'Almadover and Delisle, the Abbe Zurla and Sig. Amoretti,to over- whelm it in the ocean. We see no reason to disbelieve (as some affect to do) the fact stated by Nicolao Zenoof the friars of the monastery of St. Thomns warming their rooms, cooking their victuals, and watering their garden from a spring of hot water ; vuch springs are known to exist : and what shoiUd prevent these friars in that dreadful cold region from availing themselves of an article so obviously useful and effeclual.' Is there any thing more extraordinary in the friars of Greenland boiling their victuals in the water of a hot spring liian the party in the suite of Lord Macartney's eml>assy boil- ing the fish in the hot sprines on the margin of the volcanic crater, in wlu'ch they were caught, on the island of Amsterdam' The I/iind monk whom Dethmar Plefkins saw in the monastery of Helgafiel, in Iceland, and who was himself thrust, when young, into the convent of St. Thomas, in the very early part of the sixteentii ccniury, long before Rurousio published the letters of the two Zeni, corroborates all that Zeno slated, adding that the walls of the monastery were built of pumice-stone. There is one simple fact mentioned by Nicolao Zeno which no man in the fourteenth century could know or imagine who had not lived among the Eskimaux — their bouts, he says, were framed of the bones of fishes and covered with their skins; and they wrre shaped like a uiavtr'a thuUlt—a description so just and a resemblance so perfect, that from timt time to this, it hai been adopted by every succeeding voyager. L 3 Never 1()6 Lord Selkirk, and the North-west Passage. Oct. 4'" s in Never was man more sanguine of success in any undertaking than Mr. Duncan. In 1790 he went out in the Company's ship Sea-horse, to laketlie command of a sloop in Hudson's Bay, called the Churchill. He found, on his arrival, a crew who affected to beterritied at the idea of going on discovery; the Company's servants told hinj die vessel was totally uiitit lor such a purpose, and that she could not be made sea-worthy in that countjy; though Mr. Dun- can says he has since learned that she had been constantly employed for tzcenty years afterwards. Seeing nothing to be done there he immediately returned to England, resolving to have no further concern with the Hudson's Hay Company— but the governors expressed so much regret and disappointment, and Mr. Dal rymple was so urgent for following up the discovery, that he consented to take the command of a strong well-built ship of eighty-four tons, called the Beaver, fitted to his mind, and stored for eighteen months. He left the Thames on the 2d May, 1791, but did not reach the height of Charles's Island in Q'o^ lat. till the 2d August, nor Churchill River till the 5th September, when all hope of accomplishing any thing thai year was at an end. It is remarkable that our early advent'.irers, at a time when the art of navigation was hi its infancy, the science but little understood, the instruments few and imperfect, in barks of twenty-live or thirty tons burthen, ill-constructed, ill-found and apparently ill-suited to brave the mountains of ice through which they had to force tlieir way, and the dark and dismal stornis which beset them — that these juen should have succeeded in running through the straits to high lati- tudes and home again in less time than Mr. Duncan required to reach one of the Hudson's Bay Company's establishments, the route to which was then as well known as that to the Shetland islands. Mr. Duncan remained in Churchill River till the loth July in the following year, got into Chesterfield Inlet and returned to Churchill about the end of August ; his crew having mutinied, encouraged, as he states, by his first officer, who was a servant of the Company. — Here grief and vexation so preyed on his mind as to render a voyage which promised every thing, completely abortive: — thus ter- minated the last and the least efficient of all the expeditions (ex- cepting that of Gibbons) for the discovery of the North-west Passage! All these failures, however, are by r o means conclusive against its existence. We must bear in inind that not one of die adven- turers proceeded, on the eastern side of America, beyond the Arctic circle; and that on the western side, or Strait of Behring, three points of land only to the northward of Cape Prince of Wales have been seen at a distance, Jlie northernmost (Icy Cape) in lat. 70^ 21)'; the next, (Cape Lisburne,) in Q(f o, and the third (Cape Mulgrave} IS 16. Lord Selkirk, and the North-zcest Passage. 167 Alulgrave) in 67° 4.3'. Could we only be certain then that Hearne and Mackenzie actually arrived at the shore of the northern ocean,* as * Hearne talks of the tide beiiii;; out, ' but that it flowed, by the marks on the edjje •f the ice, twelve or fourteen feel," and that ' it only reached a little way within tlis river's mouth ;" tli;it ' the water at the moutii of the river was pcrjectlu fresh wlieu the tide was out, but it was the sea or some brancli of it, by the quantity of wiiale- bone and seal skins which the KMjuimaux had at tlieir tents, and ?lso by the nuuiher of seals which appean d on the ice.' If the tide was out on the morning of tiic 17th it was III on the middle of that day, and he never quitted the margin of the river till the morning of the IHth : why then judge of its rise by ' the marks on the ice ?' The tide rises /(iitrteeu feet in the Tiiames as high as Woolwich, and is salt at low water at Gravesend ; iiow fourteen feet of seu water could leave that of the river ' perfectly fresli' close within Jhc bar, is difficult to comprehend. As to his latitude of thi» spot, that is still less to be depended on ; he tells us that ' in those high latitudes and at this season of the year the sun is always at a good height above the horizon, so that he had not only day-light, but sun-shine the whole night,' Now there is not a word of this ' sun-slsine all night,' in his M.S. .Tournai, as quoted by Doctor Douglas ; and indeed, he says in his printed book, that a thick fog and drizzlhig rain came on, and ' finding that neither the river nor the sea w ere likely to be of any u»o, I did not think it worth while to wait for fair weather to determine the latitude ex- actly by an ohservaticn.' What did he go for? he was selected for the journey because he could take an observation for the laatude, and yet in the whole of the journey of thirteen hundred miles and back agaui, he takes but one single observation ! But the latitude of the river's mouth, he says, may be depended on— w'lat that latitude was, however, is never once mentioned ; but by the chart it is about 73" 30'. — The result of his single observation at Congecathawl.achaga was 68° 16' and the courses and distances from that place to (he nior;'; of the river give a dill'erence of about 3", 80 that the latitude we are to ' depend upon,' instead of 73'' 30' as on the chart, is, hy his reckoning, Tl** 46'. Docior Douglas states it from his Journal at 72°. — Dal- rymple, however, and Arrowsmith, and all the chart-makers, have agreed to cut hira down to about 69°, and if so, the sun was not always a good height above the horizon, for its declination being on the 18tU July about 20", he must have been, on that mid- night, in the horizon. Mackenzie's account is not more satisfactory. On his arrival among the Quarrellerit in latitude 68°, he was informed that the distance from thence to the sea, on the east side of the river, was not far, and on the west that it was still shorter ; that the land on both sides projected to a point in the direction of the river, to which point he was proceeding, — at six miles beyond the Quarrellers, tlie river branched into a mul- titude of channels, separated by low islands, and banks of nmd and sand. He took the mid-channel, which was to carry him to BenahuUa Toe, or whi*e man's lake, into ivhich he entered in latitude 69° 1' N. This lakt was quite open to the westward, and out of the channel of the river had only four feet, and in some places, one foot of depth ; he reached, however, an island to the westward. From the whole tenor of his statement, we certainly concluded that this was the sea, but are presently informed that his people could not refrain from expressions of real concern that they were obliged to return without reaching the sea. In the course of the night, they were disturbed hy the rising of the water ; they also saw whales, but they were white ; the guide, how- ever, assured hiu\ they were the same that constituted the principal food of the Esqui- maux ; ' the tide cppeared to rise rixteen or eighteen inches ;' he saw no natives, but found many of their huts, their domestic utensils, frames of (ledges and of canoes made of whale-bone, which left no doubt on his mind that they were the deserted abodes of the Esquimaux. The latitude of Whale-island was 69° 14' N. — and with this slight and imperfo\\l' between it and Cape Lisburne ; Icy Cape is very low land, the Russians, whose regular establishments on ihe American continent ex- tend as far north as (J7° north lat. say that it is an island ; and so strong is the impression at Petersburgh of a practicable passage from the Pacific to the Atlantic, round the northern coast of America, that Count Romanzotf, at his own expense, has fittrd out a stout vessel called the Rurick, commanded by ihu,. Kotzebue, son of the celebrated writer of that name, to make hu attempt. She passed Plymouth last summer, where she was sup- plied with a life-boat, and during the summer of the present year, she is to endeavour to penetrate into the northern sea between ley Cape and Cape Lisburne, or, on meeting with any impediment, to proceed round the former: it will be a singular event if the last, and we may almost say least of the maritime powers of Europe, should be the first to make this important discovery — so often attempted before i,\\e had a single ship on the ocean. Thus «hen the coast of America may be presumed to preserve a line from Behring's Strait to Mackenzie's River, and from thence to Copper-mine River, a distance of 800 miles, fluctuating between the parallels of (J9" and 70^, and we see not the slightest reason to question its continuance, in or near that line, for the remauiing 400 miles to Baffin's Sea, or to the strait which connects it with Hudson's Sea : this is the only point to be discovered. — No human being has yet approached the coast of America, on the eastern side, from 6(H° to 72°. Davies, Baffin, and Foxe came nearest to it; but the attempts of the rest were chieHy confined to the southward. Mid- dleton was in the way of making discoveries, if, instead of losino* his time in Wager River, he had continued to coast to the northward. The solution of this important problem is the business of three months out and home. The space to be examined, at the very if he did so, he is uncandid in not mentioning the result — if he did not, he is woefullj deficient in that sagacity wliich has always been accounted a prominent feature in the character of a North-Briton. Under alt the circumstances mentioned by these two travellers, we may perhaps conclude that both were near the seu-shore» but neither gf them reached it. Utmost Oct. 1816. Lord Selkirk, and the. i\oi(h'U'est Paxsagc. 169 utmost, is from the ()7lli to the 71st parallels, or [four degrees of latitude. Two small schooners of 80 or 100 tons, imder the command of a skilful Naval Officer, with a couple of Greenl'ind fishermen to act as pilots through the ice, would be sufficient for the purpose. They should proceed at once up the very middle of Davis's Strait, kee;^>ing to the westward so as not to raise their latitude higher than 72°, and having cleared Cumberlagd Island, edge away to the southward. Hitherto most of our adventurers have worked their way through Hudson's Strait, which is generally choked up with ice ; then standing to the northward ihey have had to contend with ice drifting to the southward, with contrary winds and currents ; these inconveniences would be obviated bv standing Hrst to the latitudes of 7 1'^ or 7'i° and from thence southerly and westerly till they either reached Hudson's Bay, which would decide the question in the nega- tive, or till they saw the north coast of America, which would go far to complete the disco veiy. Disappointment is generally ferflle in apologies for failures; we need not therefore be surprized if we lind some assert that no such passage exists, and others pronounce iis i.mtilily if it should be discovered, from the uncertainty of its being free iVoni ice any one year, and perhaps practicable only ofice in three or four years. Such an apology for our present ignorance of every thing that re- gards the geography, the hydrography, and meteorology of the tiorth-eastern shores of America, might be pleaded by mercantile speculators, but can have little weight with those who have the interests of science at heart, or the national honour and fame, which are intimately connected with those interests. When the govern- ment offered a reward of =£"20,000 for the discovery of the North- west Passage, and o£'5000 to him who should approach within one degree of the North Pole, it was not with a view to any immediate commercial advantages that this liberal encouragement was held out, but with the same expanded object that sent Cook in search of a ' Southern Conthient.' If, however, the con- tinent of America shall be found to tei minate, as is most likely, about the 70th degree of latitude, or even below it, we have little doubt of a free and practicable passage round it for seven or eight months in every year ; and we are much mistaken if the North-west Company would not derive immediate and incalculable advantages from a passage of three months to their establishment in Columbia River, instead of the circuitous voyage of six or seven months round Cape Horn ; to say nothing of the benefit which might be derived from taking in their cargoes of furs and peltry for the China market at the mouths of Mackenzie and Copper-mine rivers, to which the northern Indians would be too happy to bring them, if protected 170 Lord Selkirkj and the ^orth-west Passage. Oct. by European establishments, at these or other places, from their enemies the Esquimaux. The polar regions of the globe within the arctic circle offer a tvide rieid for the researches of a philosophic mind ; jet, in point of science, very little is known beyond what is contained in the account of Captain Phipps's voyage to the neighbourhood of Spitz- bergen. The natural history, though the best, is still but imperfectly known; the .sea and land swarm with animals in these abodes of ice and snow, and multitudes of both yet remain to be discovered and described. It is an important object to obtain more ac- curate observations on those huge mountains of ice which float on the sea ; it is no longer a question that the fiefd or Jfaked ice is frozen sea-water, though itself perfectly fresh ; and it is almost as cer- tain, though doubted by some, that the huge masses which the Dutch call icebergs, are formed on the steep and precipitous shores, from whence th =e * thunderbolts of snow' are occasionally hurled into the deep, bt r' .ith them fragments of earth and stones. 'I came,' says Foxe, * b^ e piece of ice higher than the rest, whereupon a stone was of the contents of five or six tonne weight, with divers other smaller stones and mud thereon.' It is a common but we believe an erroneous opinion, that the temperature of our climate has regularly been diminishing, and that it is owing to the ice having permanently fixed itself to the shores of Greenland, which, in consequence, from being once a flourishing colony of Denmark, is now become uninhabitable and unapproachable. We doubt both the fact and the inference. It is not the climate that has altered, but we who feel it more severe as we advance in years; the registers of the absolute degree of temperature, as measured by the th,ermometer, do not warrant any such conclusion ; and more attempts than one to land on the coast of Greenland must be made, before we can give credit to its being bound up in eternal ice — which is known to shift about with every gale of wind — to be drifted by currents — and to crumble and consume below the surface of the water. We suspect indeed, that the summer heat, which in the latitude 80^** Phipps found to be on the average of the month of July at 42° of Fahrenheit, during the whole twenty- four hours, and once, when exposed to the sun, as high as 8G^°, dissolves fully as much of the ice and snow on the surface of the sea as the preceding winter may have formed.* It appears too, that * In tlie Transactions of the Werneritm Society are published several Meteorologi- cal Journals of IMr. Scoresby, a whale-fi.'-lier of IIulJ, which, compared with that of Phipps, would seem to sanction the idea of a decreasing temperature, the average height of the thcrnionieter, in the months of July in 181 1 and 1812, being only about 33°, and Tcry often below the freeaing point, though in a lower latitude by three degrees than that in which Captain Phipps observed it ; but the fisliing vessels penetrate the fields of ice, the open spaces of which are frequented by whales; and there can be no donht this diminished temperature is owing to their being in the midst of an atmosphere thilled by the surrounding ice. there I8l6. Lord Selkirk, and the North-west Passage. 171 there are times in the depth of winter when the temperature is ex- ceedingly mild: and the intense frosts are undunhtedly moderated by the calorie given out from the Aurora borealis, which in these regions aft'ords not only an admirable compensation for the short absence of the moon, but iaiparts a considerable degree of warmth to the lower regions of the atmosphere, tilling the whole circle oi the horizon, and approaching so near the surface of the globe as to be distinctly heard in varying their colours and positions. * I have frequently,' says Hearne, * heard them making a rustling and crackling noise, like the waving of a large flag in a fresh gale of wind/ The electric aura, it is well known, will raise the mercury in the tube of the thermometer, but no experiments have been made to ascertain the degree of heat given out by these henbanes ox petty dancers, as Foxe calls them, which must be very considerable; as Button says, * the stream in the element is like the flame that cometh forth from the mouth of a hot oven/ Al- most every voyager into Hudson's and IJaftin's seas complains of the occasional hot weather, and the great annoyance of mosquitoes on the shores. Duncan, when surrouiided with ice, had the ther- mometer in August at 56° in the shade, and 82° in the sun. Yet the cold in winter is more intense than they have yet been able to measure either by a mercurial or spirit thermometer. It is a well established fact, that on the eastern sides of great continents, the temperature is greatly below that in the same degree of latitude on the western sides : thus, while the whole of Hudson's Bay, the coast of Labrador and Newfoundland, down to 46° may be said to be, in winter, one mass of ice, not a particle of ice was ever seen in the sea on the western side of America, to the southward of 64° or 6.3°. The delicate humming-bird is not uncommon at Nootka, and was seen by Mackenzie at Peace River, in latitude 54* i24'. The cold of Halifax, in latitude 44" 40', is much more intense than that of London in 5 1 2°. Pekin, in less than latitude 40*, has ge- nerally a constant frost for three months every year ; and ice, the thick- ness of a dollar, is not uncommon at Canton, under the tropics. On the coast of Jesso, in latitude 45° ^24', Captain Krusenstern found the ground covered with snow in the middle of May, and vege- tation moie backward than at iVrchangei, in latitude 64|°, in the middle of April. Some of our old navigators ascribed the great variation and irregularity of the magnetic needle in Hudson and Battin's Seas, to the eff'ects of cold ;* and others to the attraction of particular * Foxe observL'(i tliut llie nt;etlle lu'ar Nottingham IslHiid had lost its powers, which, among other things, he ascribed to the cold air interposed between thi' needle ,and the pouit of its attraction Ellis conceived the cold to be the catisc of the irre- gular action of the needle, and he says, that the. compasses OD being bronght into • warm jilace rccoveied iheir action and proper direction. isJandf. 174 Lord Selkirk, and the North-west Passage. Oct. island;^. In the northern regions, near Spitzhergen, Phipps ob- served nothing remarkable in the variation of the needle, but Baffin found it at 5 points, or 56^^, * a thing almost incredible, and almost matchless in all the world besides.' Duncan supposed the needle to be attracted by Charles's Island, as the variation amounted to 65° 51', nearly 6 points; and on the same parallel, when the island was out of sight, only 45°2'2'; and he states, that when near Merry and Jones's Islands, in a violent storm of thunder, lightning and heavy rain, the night being very