The Sun.
London, England, 1854-11-13 00:00:00

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SIR JOHN FRANKLIN AND HIS
COMPANIONS.

TO THE ZDITOB, OF TRB EXAMINEE.

Sir,—The letter signed "S. Lichfield, Oct. 31," and
he letter of Dr. Rae, quoted by you in answer, deserve

•cam me a few comments.

Dr. Rae deservedly takes rank with the Arctic heroes,
and he is a traveller after my own fashion—simple and
inexpensive, bold and enduring in his personnel and
materiel. I should be sorry, very sorry, therefore, to
say anthing to give him pain.
Had. Dr. Rae " limited his belief," as you, sir, "to
the proof.: of identity and death," much pain and anxiety
would have been spared to us. The intrepid traveller
has formed an opinion s, lely upon his pantomimic con-
versation with an Esquimaux—solely upon " the few
words which pass between two men who speak no com-
mon language ;" and is still striving to maintain that
opinion, solely and irrespective of all others, of his own
knowledge of the country he is dealing with. I believe
he cannot, I hope he cannot, establish that opinion.
The conclusion, as I understand it, at which Dr. Rae
has arrived, is that the white men at the Great Fish
River have died the death of starvation and cannibalism.
His premises are these. The Esquimaux had no abund-
ance of wood, and they would have had abundance of
wood if they had plundered Franklin's ships. The
Great Fish River is deficient of game in the spring, and
it was in the spring they were said to have died.
Dr. Rae has stated in the Times, he has not read the
"Blue Books ;" and a relative of Sir John Franklin
states for him in the Times, that he knew not of the
10,0001. prize offered by the Government in 1850 for
the trims of the Franklin Expedition. I can scarcely
presume, therefore, to think he has ever read the humble
narrative of a journey by me to the Polar Sea by the
Great Fish River, or a History of the Esquimaux by me
in the Journal of the Ethnological Society of London.
Further, that he is not acquainted with my "cache"
at Montreal Island, notwithstanding constant reference
has been made to that cache, not only in the daily press,
but within the walls of the Geographical Society ; and
notwithstanding Mr. T. Simpson visited it to correct his
longitude and raise a memorial of his visit.
These are Mr. Simpson's words :—" On the 16th we
directed our course, with flags flying, to the Montreal
Island. Directed by M'Say our people soon found a
deposit among the rocks, containing two bags'a pemi-
can, several pounds of chocolate, two canisters of gun-
powder, a box of percussion saps, and a japanned tin
vasculum, inclosing three large fish-hooks. The pemi-
can, or taureau, as the voyageurs call it, was literally
alive ; and it was wittily remarked, ' L'isle de Montreal
sera bientot, peuphSe de jeunes taureaux.' The minor
articles Mr. Dense and I took possession of as memo-
rials of having breakfasted on the identical spot where
the tent of our less successful precursor (Sir G. Back)
stood that very day five years before. Finding it ha.
possible to reconcile Back's longitude, I have ad-
hered to my own observations the longitude
of the island will thus be 96. 24. 15, instead
of 95. 18. 15 ; and the extent of our discoveries
Ds i
Simpson,
cpcosavonenrai Dies
tuhorne
JtDahner.:NßloBar4et3htliCpa ot. a3hs7et
olo..8)f America, by Thomas
be diminished by twenty-five miles."—(Narrative of
wrong in all his pre-
mises. First, the Esquimaux have no use for wood, for
they de not use wood for fuel, the sea-oil is their fuel ;
for they do not use wood for boat-building, the walrus-
skin is their boat ; and, as the little wood they use,
together with walrus ivory, in the manufacture of im-
plements of the chase, is so adapted as to return to the
owner, we may almost say they do not use wood even
for the manufacture of implements of the chase. More-
over Dr. Rae seems to forget that the Esquimaux de-
scribe the forty white men as dragging a boat, and of
course its complement of oars and masts ; and as forty
men could not get into one boat, at least such a boat
as Franklin would select to pass up rapids and cascades,
there were most likely two boats, aye, and even three
boats, enough wood for several generations of the Esqui-
maux of that locality. There is also the Victory steam-
ship left by Sir J. Ross close by.
Second, Dr. Rae states :--"'That portion of country
near to, and on which a portion of Sir J. Franklin's party
was seen, is in the spring notoriously the most barren of
animal life of any of the Arctic shores, and the few deer
that may be seen are generally very shy, from having
been hunted during the winter by Indians on the bor-
ders of the Woodlands."
Dr. Rae must excuse my saying this is mere assump-
tion, and altogether gratuitous on his part. He is not
justified in saying any such thing. Dr. Rae, it has to
be borne in mind, has never put his foot on a single
inch of the ground under consideration. He knows only
of the Great Fish River by hearsay. The only three

,ravellers who have visited the Polar coast-line between

the Coppermine River and the Great Fish River are Sir
G-. Back, Mr. T. Simpson, and myself. The three narra-
tives of these travellers are published, and all show the
country to be teeming with animal life, even up to the
great human family.
The Esquimaux are very numerous in the vicinity of
the Great Fish River, and as we know n9thiug of their
moral and intellectual character they may turn out in
the end to be as treacherous as the Esquimaux of the
Mackenzie River. There is not a doubt in my mind
that the small seal the 40 white men traded from the
Esquimaux was for the known beauty of its young
skin, and that thirty-five of the forty white men were
subsequently murdered by treachery ; that if the fire
white men on Montreal Island, one of them was Sir
John Franklin himself, and that he had separated with
his four companions from the other thirty-five for the
purpose of depositing in the King cache a memorial of
his visit, which had been his practice year after year, as
Captain M'Clure visited the Parry Sandstone. The
Esquimaux, taking advantage of the separation, fell
upon the thirty-five white men at Point Sir Charles
Ogle, who were most assuredly withou, fire-arms, and
massacred them—five only escaping—and then sur-
rounding OD
M treal Island, starved out Franklin and his
four companions.—l have, &c.,
17, Smile-row, Nov. Bth, 1854.

RICHARD KING.

True WELSI IRON AND COAL TBADES.—Those, the
staple trades of South Wales, still coatinue in full acti-
vity ; the demand is unabated, and the natural result is
that there is ne tendency to decline in prices. The iron
market has been firm throughout the autumn, and the
usually least active quarter has closed without the least
sign of any diminution in the demand. Pig iron is par-
ticularly firm, the consumers being unable to obtain the
least alteration in the rates of this description. The rates
for coal are advancing, and there is no doubt that before
long the price of this essential article will be materially
advanced. An advance of 25 per cent. has been for
some time established upon customary prices, and now
this will be increased before Christmas. The demand
still is larger, if possible, than ever, and enough, it is
said, cannot be raised at the pit's month to meet the
consumption.
DIPUTT-LIEUTRIsTATS FOR CORK.—The Earl of Ban-
don, Lord-Lieutenant of the county and city, has no-
minated John Nicholas Murphy, the mayor ; William
Fagan, M.P., Francis B. Beamisb, M.P., Andrew J.
Wood, and Thomas Tobin, Esqrs., deputy-lieutenants
for the city of Cork.