nk in deep water, the other was forced on shore
and broken up. "It was in the fall of the year (August or September),"
they said, when the ships were destroyed, that all the white people
went away to the large river, taking a boat with them, and that in
the following winter their bones were found there.

McClintock now made his way to the opposite coast of King William's
Island. Here he found Eskimos with pieces of silver-plate bearing the
crest and initials of Sir John Franklin and some of his officers. They
said it was five days' journey to the wreck, of which little now
remained. There had been many books, said the Eskimos, but they had
been destroyed by the weather. One woman volunteered a statement.
"Many of the white men," she said, "dropped by the way as they went
to the Great River. Some were buried and some were not. Their bodies
were discovered during the winter following." Moving onwards,
McClintock reached the Great Fish River on the morning of 12th May.
A furious gale was raging and the air was heavy with snow, but they
encamped there to search for relics. With pickaxes and shovels they
searched in vain. No Eskimos were to be found, and at last in despair
the little party of explorers faced homewards. McClintock was slowly
walking near the beach, when he suddenly came upon a human skeleton,
lying face downwards, half buried in the snow. It wore a blue jacket
with slashed sleeves and braided edging and a greatcoat of
pilot-cloth.

The old woman was right. "They fell down and died as they walked along."
And now the reward of the explorers was at hand. On the north-west
coast of King William's Island was found a cairn and a blue ship's
paper, weatherworn and ragged, relating in simple language, written
by one of the ship's officers, the fate of the Franklin expedition.
The first entry was cheerful enough. In 1846 all was well. His Majesty's
ships, _Erebus_ and _Terror_, wintered in the ice--at Beechey Island,
after having ascended Wellington Channel and returned to the west side
of Cornwallis Island. Sir John Franklin was commanding the expedition.
The results of their first year's labour was encouraging. In 1846 they
had been within twelve miles of King William's Island, when winter
stopped them. But a later entry, written in April 1848, states that
the ships were deserted on 22nd April, having been beset in ice since
September 1846--that Sir John Franklin had died on 11th June 1847,
and that Captain Crozie