Clapperton's perishing of fever on the
banks of the great lake, in the heart of the same continent, which
was afterwards to be rediscovered and described by other explorers;
Franklin's perishing in the snow--it might be after he had solved
the long-sought problem of the North-west Passage--are among the most
melancholy events in the history of enterprise and genius.

The case of Flinders the navigator, who suffered a six years'
imprisonment in the Isle of France, was one of peculiar hardship. In
1801, he set sail from England in the INVESTIGATOR, on a voyage of
discovery and survey, provided with a French pass, requiring all French
governors [21notwithstanding that England and France were at war] to give
him protection and succour in the sacred name of science. In the course
of his voyage he surveyed great part of Australia, Van Diemen's Land,
and the neighbouring islands. The INVESTIGATOR, being found leaky and
rotten, was condemned, and the navigator embarked as passenger in the
PORPOISE for England, to lay the results of his three years' labours
before the Admiralty. On the voyage home the PORPOISE was wrecked on a
reef in the South Seas, and Flinders, with part of the crew, in an open
boat, made for Port Jackson, which they safely reached, though distant
from the scene of the wreck not less than 750 miles. There he procured a
small schooner, the CUMBERLAND, no larger than a Gravesend sailing-boat,
and returned for the remainder of the crew, who had been left on the
reef. Having rescued them, he set sail for England, making for the Isle
of France, which the CUMBERLAND reached in a sinking condition, being
a wretched little craft badly found. To his surprise, he was made a
prisoner with all his crew, and thrown into prison, where he was treated
with brutal harshness, his French pass proving no protection to him.
What aggravated the horrors of Flinders' confinement was, that he knew
that Baudin, the French navigator, whom he had encountered while making
his survey of the Australian coasts, would reach Europe first, and claim
the merit of all the discoveries he had made. It turned out as he had
expected; and while Flinders was still imprisoned in the Isle of France,
the French Atlas of the new discoveries was published, all the points
named by Flinders and his precursors being named afresh. Flinders was at
length liberated, after six years' imprisonment, his health completely
broken; but he continued correcting his maps