The Tragedy of Mr. Hood and Michel the Iroquois. 455

across the stream proved fruitless. In this emergency Dr. Richardson volunteered to swim across, carrying with him round his middle, a line by which the raft could be hauled over. In this state he plunged into the stream, but just before he reached the opposite bank his arms grew benumbed with cold, and lost their moving power. Turning on his back, he had nearly reached the shore, when his legs became powerless and he sunk beneath the current. By hauling upon the line he was again brought to the surface, and gradually drawn ashore in a lifeless state. Though reduced to skin and bone, and scarcely able to speak, he contrived to give some slight directions respecting the mode of treating him, and he thus gradually regained his usual strength, having lost, however, all sensation in his left side. Bones made friable by burning, and the putrid marrow of the back-bone of a deer which was so acrid as to excoriate the lips, was their next variety of food, and being thus reduced to the last degree of starvation, several of the men were unable to proceed. Dr. Richardson, Mr. Hood, and John Hepburn, remained to take care of them, and Captain Franklin, with eight persons, left them on the 7th October for Fort Enterprise, a distance of 24 miles. Two of this party were unable to proceed; other two were seized with dizziness and great debility, and these returned to Dr. Richardson's encampment where fire and rocktripe were still to be obtained. One of them, Michel the Iroquois, alone arrived, but the other three were no more heard of. When the remnant reached Fort Enterprise, after supping upon tea and their shoes, they found the Fort desolate, without food, without provisions, and without the trace of a living animal. The bones and skins of several deer which they had formerly thrown away became now valuable food. Franklin tried to go to Fort Providence, but he fell between two rocks and was obliged to return to his companions, three of whom were unable to quit their beds, and continued to shed tears during the whole day.

After spending eighteen days in this wretched state, the party, seated round their evening fire, were startled by the sudden entrance of Dr. Richardson and Mr. Hepburn, each carrying his bundle. The absence of Hood, and Michel, and Perrault, and Fontano, excited their alarm. The two last had not been heard of, but Hood and Michel were dead.

The history of their death is a tragedy of the deepest interest, and we cannot withhold it from our readers. Michel the Iroquois had become an object of suspicion. He had evinced an obstinate and refractory spirit, and circumstances occurred which rendered it probable that he had murdered both Belanger and Perrault. His manner and conduct, to the rest of the party, had undergone a marked change. He refused to hunt and to

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cut or carry wood for the fires. "There are no animals," he replied, when implored by Mr. Hood to give his assistance, 66 you had better kill and eat me." Soon after Dr. Richardson had read the morning service on Sunday, he went out of the tent and heard the report of a gun. Hepburn, who had been cutting down a tree at a short distance, called upon him in a voice of great alarm to come directly. Upon entering the tent he found Hood lying lifeless at the fireside, a ball having apparently entered the forehead. He was at first horror-struck at the idea that his friend, under the pressure of cold and hunger, had fallen by his own hand; but upon discovering that the ball had entered the back part of the head, and that the muzzle of the gun had been applied so close as to set fire to the nightcap behind, he had no doubt that Michel had done the deed. Though he was not charged with it, he repeatedly protested that he was incapable of committing such an act, and was anxious to learn if he was suspected of it. The victim of this savage deed was a young officer of distinguished and varied talents. He had borne his unparalleled bodily sufferings with patience and fortitude, and had calmly contemplated the termination of his life, by the peaceful surrender of it on a bed of sickness. Bickersteth's Scripture Help was lying open beside the body, as if it had fallen from his hand, when the assassin's blow had closed his eyes while resting on the sacred page. His body was interred amid a clump of willows, and returning to the fire Dr. Richardson read the funeral service in addition to the evening prayer.

Dreading, as they had reason to do, the vengeance of the savage murderer, it became necessary to keep a strict watch over his proceedings. He muttered threats against Hepburn, and, as if he wished to find an apology for new acts of violence, he alleged that the white people had killed and eaten his uncle and two of his relatives. It had now become quite evident that his intention was to kill Dr. Richardson and Mr. Hepburn, and they came to the conclusion that their only safety was in his death. Hepburn offered to be the instrument of it: but Dr. Richardson, convinced of the necessity of this dreadful deed, determined to take the whole responsibility upon himself, and he immediately, upon the approach of the Iroquois, shot him through the head with a pistol.

On the ninth day after this tragical event, viz. on the 1st of November, Peltier and Samandré died of exhaustion from hunger and fatigue, and had not a supply of provisions arrived from Mr. Back, on the 7th November, the whole party must have perished in a few days. Franklin, Richardson, and Hepburn, eagerly devoured "the dried deer's meat, fat and tongues," and though aware of the danger of yielding to their appetite under their peculiar con

Saved by a Supply of Food from Capt. Back-Return Home. 457

dition, they could not restrain themselves, and suffered so dreadfully from indigestion that they had no rest the whole night.

Mr. Back had been sent by Captain Franklin, on the 4th October 1821, to Fort Enterprise to obtain provisions. His companions were St. Germain, Belanger, and Beauparlant. They pursued their route, sinking up to the thighs in deep snow, encamping amid willows, and dining on the 4th day upon "an old pair of leather trowsers and some swamp tea." Though two slept together they trembled with cold in their beds. On the 6th Belanger fell two times through the ice, and was pulled out by their worsted belts fastened together. On the 7th they were so weak that they were blown over by the wind and drift; and, unable to proceed, they encamped in a clump of pines, where they had nothing to allay the cravings of hunger but a gun cover and a pair of old shoes. The exhausted travellers at last reached Fort Enterprise, but what was their surprise when they found it utterly desolate, without the Indians to help them, without food to keep them alive, and without the means of succouring the starving friends whom they had left. "For the moment, however, hunger prevailed, and each began to gnaw the scraps of putrid and frozen meat that were lying about, without waiting to prepare them. A fire was then made, and the neck and bones of a deer found in the house were boiled and devoured." They continued to subsist on burned bones made palatable with a little salt, and scraps of old deer-skins and swamp tea. Beauparlant, with his head and limbs enormously swelled, died on the 17th October. Mr. Back was left alone with Belanger and St. Germain, and they continued to suffer from hunger, cold, and fatigue. On the 3d November, however, Akaitcho with his Indians arrived. Sledges laden with meat were despatched to Captain Franklin, and Mr. Back had the satisfaction of learning on the 9th that his supply of food had reached and saved his companions at Fort Enterprise. On the 10th they proceeded on their jour ney, and arrived at Fort Providence on the 21st of November.

Having joined Mr. Back at Moosedeer Island, the survivors of the party arrived in safety at Fort Chipewyan, where they paid off the Indians and Canadians that accompanied them. They reached Norway House on the 4th, and York Factory on the 14th July 1822, having been absent above three years, and journeyed by water and by land upwards of 5550 miles.

After encountering such dangers, and suffering such privations, greater by far than those which war demands from its victims, it will scarcely be believed that time could cast them into oblivion, and that the very men-not one, but all of them— should, before three years had elapsed, not only brave, but even court the same dangerous service. The soldier who returns

maimed and wounded from his campaigns, must again start at the call of duty, when his country is in danger: If he lives by war he must share its hazards: If he dies in battle it is but the death he coveted. It is different, however, with the intellectual hero, whose every hour is one of mental and bodily exhaustion, and who, under the bivouack of the midnight lamp, devours in thought the atoms of his brain, and works with a more fatal energy than the muscular hero who brandishes the cutlass or points the spear. But more fatal still, and more glorious too, are the achievements of those illustrious men who conjoin mental with bodily toil, and who, in the path of Arctic research and physical discovery, have abandoned the luxuries of home, the endearments of domestic life, and the society of rank, and wealth, and talent, which they enlightened and adorned. Among such men posterity will rank Franklin and Richardson, and Back, and the two Rosses; and while the men of the world will trace their history and mourn their loss, from whatever calamity that loss may arise, the Christian will admire their fervent piety, and patient resignation under suffering; while the bigot may learn, if he can learn, that there may be a Church amid the snow, and a service among the rocks, and that that spot is consecrated for His service wherever God shall place a human soul loving and fearing him, and recognising in the wilds around the greatness and glory of their Maker.

Towards the close of 1824 Captain Franklin became anxious to complete the exploration of the northern coast of America, and explained to the Government the plan of a second expedition for that purpose. In offering to execute the plan he was aware of the humane repugnance of the Government to expose their servants to the sufferings which he had endured, but he succeeded in shewing them "that in the proposed course similar dangers were not to be apprehended, while the objects to be attained were at once important to the naval character, scientific reputation, and commercial interests of Great Britain." Dr. Richardson and Lieutenant Back volunteered to accompany Captain Franklin, and, joined by Lieutenant Kendal, and by Mr. Drummond as botanist, they embarked at Liverpool for New York on the 16th February 1825, and arrived at Fort Chipewyan on the 15th July. After assembling on the Great Bear Lake River, which flows out of the western side of that lake into the Mackenzie River, they were instructed to descend the latter to the sea, and on their arrival at its mouth to divide themselves into two parties. The first of these parties, under Captain Franklin, was directed to proceed westerly, towards Icy Cape, on the entrance of Behring's Straits, where the Blossom, under Captain Beechey, was to meet them. The other party, under Dr. Richardson, was instructed to leave the mouth of Mackenzie

Capt. Franklin and Dr. Richardson's Second Journey in 1825. 459

River, and to proceed easterly along the coast, till they reached the mouth of Copper Mine River.

With six men, and Augustus, the Esquimaux interpreter, Captain Franklin embarked on the 8th of August in the Lion. On the banks of the Mackenzie River they found much woodcoal, which was on fire as they passed, as Mackenzie had observed in his voyage. There occurred also layers of unctuous mud, similar to that which is found on the banks of the Orinoco, and which the Indians eat as food in seasons of scarcity, and at other times chew as a luxury. Its taste was milky, and its flavour not disagreeable, and Captain Franklin found it useful for whitening the walls of their dwelling. Near the entrance of the Bear Lake River they saw a remarkable limestone mountain, with various insulated peaks, and from whose lower cliffs there oozed out a dark bituminous liquid, which discoloured the rock. After a friendly visit from a well-dressed, good-looking, and good-natured tribe of Indians, who conversed and danced with Augustus, the party reached Whale Island, and though the water was still fresh, as Mackenzie found it, they were satisfied, as he was, that they had reached the sea.

Upon arriving at Garry Island, an incident personal to Capt. Franklin occurred, which if it excited at that period of his career but little interest, cannot now be recorded with indifference. When he was about to leave England, Mrs. Franklin, to whom he had been married only two years before, was at the point of death. During the struggle, on his part, between duty and affection, she heroically urged him as he valued her peace of mind and his own glory, to depart on the appointed day. She felt that her days were numbered, and that to close her eyes was the only act of tenderness which he could perform. The gallant sailor yielded to the stern command, and his wife died the very day after he had left her. She had made and presented to him, as a parting gift, a silk union flag, under the express injunction that it should not be unfurled till the Expedition reached the sea; and it was upon Garry Island that this tender obligation was to be discharged. Upon hoisting the silk union flag over the tent, which the men had in his absence pitched upon the beach, he could scarcely suppress his emotion as it expanded to the breeze; but feeling that he had no right, by the indulgence of his own sorrows, to cloud the animated countenances of his companions, he joined with the best grace he could command in the general excitement, and endeavoured to return with corresponding cheerfulness their warm congratulations, on having thus planted the British flag on this remote island of the Polar Sea.

On the 18th August, Capt. Franklin embarked with the view of going over to the western shore, and of reaching, if possible,