Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 2.djvu/326

 of conversation, drew nearer to listen, and before long the Doctor had the whole crew round him. Seeing their eager curiosity, and knowing what an impression the recital would make in such circumstances, the Doctor recommenced his narrativenarrative. [sic]

"You know, I suppose, my good fellows," he said, "the early history of Franklin. He was a cabin-boy, like Cook and Nelson, and, after serving during his youth in several great expeditions, he determined, in 1845, to prosecute a search for the North-West Passage. He was in command of the Erebus and Terror, two ships that had been previously employed in an Arctic expedition undertaken by James Ross. The Erebus carried seventy sailors, including the officers, with Fitz-James as captain; Gore and Vesconte as lieutenants; Des Vœux, Sargent, and Couch as quartermasters; and Stanley as surgeon. The Terror numbered sixty-eight men. Her captain was Crozier; the lieutenants, Little, Hodgson, and Irving; quartermasters, Horesby and Thomas; and surgeon, Peddie. Not one of these ill-fated individuals ever returned to their native land, but you may read nearly all their names on the different bays, and capes, and straits, and points, and channels, and islands that are met with in this region. There were 138 men altogether. The last letters received from Franklin were dated July 12th, 1845, and written from Isle Disko. 'I hope,' he wrote, 'to weight anchor to-night for Lancaster Sound.' What has happened since his departure from Disko? The last time the ships were seen was in Melville Bay, by the captains of the Prince of Wales and the Enterprise, two whalers; and since then there has been no word of them. We are able to follow Franklin, however, in some of his subsequent movements. He went to the west, and up Barrow's Strait and Lancaster Sound, as far as Isle Beechey, where he spent the winter of 1845."

"But how was that ascertained?" asked Bell, the carpenter.

"By three graves discovered by the Austin expedition in 1850, in which three of Franklin's sailors were interred; and also by a document found by Lieutenant Hobson, of the Fox, which is dated 1848. From this we learn that, at the close of the winter, the Erebus and Terror went up Wellington Channel as far as the 77th parallel; but, instead of con-