er, and as they proceeded sadly on their way, starvation stared
them in the face. One day we hear of the pangs of hunger being stilled
by "pieces of singed hide mixed with lichen"; another time the horns
and bones of a dead deer were fried with some old shoes and the "putrid
carcase of a deer that had died the previous spring was demolished
by the starving men."

At last things grew so bad that Franklin and the most vigorous of his
party pushed on to Fort Enterprise to get and send back food if possible
to Richardson and Hood, who were now almost too weak and ill to get
along at all. Bitter disappointment awaited them.

"At length," says Franklin, "we reached Fort Enterprise, and to our
infinite disappointment and grief found it a perfectly desolate
habitation. There were no provisions--no Indians. It would be
impossible for me to describe our sensations after entering this
miserable abode and discovering how we had been neglected; the whole
party shed tears, not so much for our own fate as for that of our friends
in the rear, whose lives depended entirely on our sending immediate
relief from this place." A few old bones and skins of reindeer were
collected for supper and the worn-out explorers sat round a fire made
by pulling up the flooring of the rooms. It is hardly a matter of
surprise to find the following entry in Franklin's journal: "When I
arose the following morning my body and limbs were so swollen that
I was unable to walk more than a few yards."

Before November arrived another tragedy happened. Hood was murdered
by one of the party almost mad with hunger and misery. One after another
now dropped down and died, and death seemed to be claiming Franklin,
Richardson, Back, and Hepburn when three Indians made their appearance
with some dried deer and a few tongues. It was not a moment too soon.
The Indians soon got game and fish for the starving men, until they
were sufficiently restored to leave Fort Enterprise and make their
way to Moose Deer Island, where, with the Hudson Bay officers, they
spent the winter recovering their health and strength and spirits.

When they returned to England in the summer of 1822 they had
accomplished five thousand five hundred and fifty miles. They had also
endured hardships unsurpassed in the history of exploration. When
Parry returned to England the following summer and heard of Franklin's
sufferings he cried like a child. He must have realised better than
any one else what