der J. B. Cator, there fell an equal amount of
labour; and that to all, ships as well as screws, there was an equal
proportion of hardship, danger, and privation. I should indeed be
forgetful as well as ungrateful, did I here fail to acknowledge the
more than kindness and assistance I have ever experienced from my
friend Mr. Barrow, a name past and present inseparably connected with
our Arctic discoveries; so likewise I have to offer my thanks,
heartfelt as they are sincere, to those who, like Admiral Sir Francis
Beaufort and Captain Hamilton of the Admiralty, bade me speed, when
sincerity and zeal was all I had to boast, and who dared to overlook
the crime of youth, and granted to "seven-and-twenty" the deference
which "five-and-fifty" alone can claim.

RICHMOND, _Feb. 15, 1852_.

STRAY LEAVES
FROM
AN ARCTIC JOURNAL.

The evils attendant on a hurried outfit and departure, as is the usual
man-of-war custom, were in no wise mitigated in the case of the Royal
Naval Expedition, fitted out at Woolwich, in 1850, to search for Sir
John Franklin's Squadron; and a general feeling of joy at our departure
prevailed amongst us, when, one fine morning, we broke ground from
Greenhithe.

The "Resolute" and "Assistance" had a couple of steamers to attend upon
them; whilst we, the "Pioneer" and "Intrepid," screwed and sailed, as
requisite to keep company. By dark of the 4th of May, 1850, we all
reached an anchorage near Yarmouth; and the first stage of our outward
journey was over.

No better proof of the good feeling which animated our crews can be
adduced than the unusual fact of not a man being missing amongst those
who had originally entered,--not a desertion had taken place,--not a
soul had attempted to quit the vessels, after six months' advance had
been paid.

Here and there amongst the seamen a half-sleepy indifference to their
work was observable. This I imputed to the reaction after highly
sentimental "farewells" in which, like other excesses, Jack delights;
the women having, as usual, done all they could, by crying alongside,
to make the men believe they were running greater risks than had ever
been before undergone by Arctic navigators.

The old seamen's ditty of--

"We sailed by Fairl[=e]e, by Beach[=e]y, and Dung[)e]ness,
Until the North Foreland light we did see"--

gives a very good idea of our progress from beacon to lighthouse, and
lighthouse to headland, until the lofty coast of Yorkshir