The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1856-01-09 00:00:00

PHILADELPHIA

InoN.--The inactivity usual to this season of the year
pervades the market. Inquiries for future delivery impart
some degree of firmness, and in :general the :prospects
are esteemed ;favourable for ironmasters. A sale
of 4000 tons pig was consummated for future delivery; 100
tons Car-wheel sold at 37 dols 50c; for foundry purposes
the sales have been of small amounts—making a total of
nearly 4900 tons Pig for the week; No. 1 at 27 dols; No.
2at 25 dols; No. 3at 23 dols. Bars and most descrip-
tions of iron are quiet, but firm, at past quotations.

RETURN OF THE HUDSON BAY COM-
PANY'S ARCTIC EXPEDITION IN SEARCH
OF SIR JOHN FRANKLIN.
CONFIRMATION OF DR. RAE'S REPORTS.

DISCOVERY_ OF_ THE REMAINS OF SIR JOHN

FRANKLIN AND PARTY. -
From the (St; Paul) Ninteesotian, Dec. 12, 1855.
Mr. J. D. Stewart, lady, and suite, arrived at the
American House on Monday evening, and left in the
stage yesterday afternoon for below.

1 Will be remembered that Dr. Rae has been employed
by the Hudson's Bay Company for the last four or five
years in an effort to discover any traces of the remains of
the fate of Sir John Franklin and his party; that he has
made two expeditions into the Arctic regions for that
purpose, and that he was so successful in the last expe-
dition as to discover evidences of the fact that a party of
white men, with ships and boats, had perished in that
far-off hyperborean region several years ago. which Dr.
Rae concluded to have been the id-fated expedition he
was in search of. Beyond the finding of some spoons
and other trifles among the Esquimaux bearing the name
of "Franklin," and the tidings which he gathered from
the inhabitants, his expedition amounted to nothing. In
pursuance of his object, the Doctor has passed through
this place twice—once on his way to England, and again
when he returned to go on his second tour.

It will also be recollected that soon after the conclusion
of his last topr, the Hudson's Bay Company sent out
another party to elicit still more facts on this point, and
that in pursuance of this design a messenger was sent
from their headquarters in Montreal (which messenger
passed through this place about fourteen months since),
to Governor Simpson at the Selkirk Settlement to make
the necessary arrangements for that purpose. Mr. J. U.
Stewart, whose arrival in this city we noticed above. was
the person selected for this duty. Mr. S. was well calcu-
lated for this hazardous undertaking, having lived in the
Arctic regions for the last ten or twelve years, at one of
the most extreme of the Company's posts, and able to
endure any amount of fatigue consequent upon exposure
and absence of food.
Mr. Stewart started with four voyageurs and arrived at
Slave Lake during the early part of the season, and pro-
ceeding up one of the streams that flow into that body of
water from a north-east direction till he came to latitude
6S° he was completely successful in his efforts. He here
learned more fully and partiaiilarly of the fate of .the
lamented explorer than any account yet published gives.
The fact that a party (some 40 in number) of whites, who
came into that region in ship:, but which were destroyed.
and that they endeavoured to proceed on their way in the
ships' boats, and that the boats were also afterwards de-
stroyed on the rapids of a strait which they were endea-
vouring t,.) navigate, Mr. Stewart will undertake to
demonstrate to any person's satisfaction. It was Mr.
S.'s opinion that the party was making an effort to reach
one of the posts of Hudson's Bay Company at the time of
the destruction of their boats. Their remains were found
in the sand along the coast for several miles in length, and
the drifting sands of each successive season were burying
them still deeper. It had been five years since they had
perished, and it was impossible to distinguisk as to the
persons of one of the crew.

This is described as a most dreary region—not a sign of
vegetation being anywhere visible ; and that the party of
Sir John Franklin met their death by starvation, is not to
be questioned. The Esquimaux, from whom much infor •
matron was gained, when questioned on this point, signifi-
cantly placed their hands upon their stomachs, endeavour-
ing thereby to indicate their horrible fate. This point is
on the coast opposite Montreal Island. Mr. S. brought
with him many relics taken from the Esquimaux which
they had obtained of the ill-fated exploring party ; among
other things, a piece of one of the boats belonging to that
expedition.

Mr. S. was' accompanied to the place by several
voyageurs (half-breed Chippewas), part of whom went
with him on his tour below, and the others are stopping
at the Imerican. We understand it to be the intention of
Mr. S. to proceed directly to England. He has performed
this whole journey in a comparatively short space of
time—being only thirteen months since he first fitted out
for it He represents the cold weather as being intense
in that region, in some instances it having reached a
point 650 below zero.

( From the Montreal Herald of Dec. 24.)
We have been favoured by E. M. Hopkins. Esq. (in the
absence of Sir George Simpson), with the following out-
line cf the proceedings of the Arctic Expedition, which,
by instructions from her Majesty's government, was
employed by the Hudson's Bay Company to follow up the
clue discovered by
.Dr. Rae while engaged on another
exploring expedition, also fitted out by the Hudson's Bay
Company, of the fate of Sir John Franklin's party.
It will be in the recollection of our readers that it is
scarcely a year ago that we published to the world infor-
mation which had been received of the lamentable fate of
the gallant Franklin and his brave comrades. The intel-
ligence which was conveyed to Dr. Rae in the winter of
1853-54 by the Esquimaux, and in the accuracy of which
that distinguished Arctic traveller placed perfect reliance,
was received by the public in England with great hesita-
tion, arising. probably, front au unwillingness to believe
the mournful facts.

That intelligence was in substance that in the winter of
1850, the Esquimaux saw a party of whites travelling
from the nortnward toward the Arctic coast, dragging a
boat over the ice, intending to use it as soon as they
reached open water ; that the party, about forty in all,
made the land near the mouth of a large river (the Great
Fish River of Back) and there perished of starvation,
to which were added a number of frightful details of
their sufferiugs, which we will not again inflict on our
readers. In proof of the truth of these reports the
Esquimaux exhibited and sold to Dr. Rae a great
variety of relics, principally silver forks and spoons,
marked with the crest and initials of various officers
of the ships Erebus and Terror (Franklin's), and
among other articles a small order, or star, with Sir
John Franklin's name engraved on it. lhese were
the tangible proof; conveyed to England by Dr. Rto in
confirmation uf the tale he colleettA !MU the Esquimaux
but his proeeediugs and conclusions have been frequently
called iu question, and therefore it will bd the tuo. e gra-
tifying to trim now that they are fully corroborated, even
to minute details of locality, &c., in which he might pos-
sibly have been mistaken.
As soon as Dr. Rae had laid his report before her
Majesty's Government, it was decided that an attempt
should be made to follow up the trace he had obtained,
commencing at the point indicated by the Esquimaux, as
the scene of the last sufferings of the party of whites seen
by them in 1850.
The or,:anization and management of this new expedition
were wisely entrusted to the Hudson's Bay Company. On
the 27th October, 1854, the instructions of her Majesty's
Government and the Company were forwarded from London
to Sir George Simpson at Lachine, where he received them
in the middle of November. His great experience and well
known ability in affairs of that nature enabled him to
decide with promptitude on the mode of carrying out the
expedition, the men to be employed as leaders and in
subordinate capacities, the amount of supplies, craft, and
all other requisties for the undertaking; and on the 20th
of November, last year, his instructions were dispatched by
special message to the Hudson's Bay . Teritories; all
parts of which were put under requisitioa to furnish
materiel, the whole to be collected at the rendezvous,
Fort Resolution, in Great Slave Lake, by the Ist of
June following ; and so complete were the plans, and
80 carefully had all contingencies been provided against,
that in no point was there a failure in carrying out his
arrangements.

The officers selected to lead the party were Mr. Anderson,
a chief factor of the company, and Mr. J. G. Stewart, a
chief trader—both well qualified by experience, courage,
physical strength, &c. for the arduous duty, The party
consisted of these two officers and lourteen men, and left
Fort Resolution, a port of the Hudson's Bay Company on
the Great Slave Lake, on the 22nd of June last in two bark
canoes, in which they performed the perilous voyage down