obliged to abandon most of his vessels, one of which the Resolute, drifted over a thousand miles, and having been recovered by an American whaler, was refitted by the United States and presented to the Queen and people of Great Britain.
Notwithstanding all these efforts, the Franklin remains have not yet been discovered, though Dr. Rae, as we have seen, had practically ascertained their terrible fate. Lady Franklin, however, was not satisfied with this vague information. She was determined to fit out still another expedition, though already over £35,000 had been spent by private means, mostly from her own personal fortune; and in 1857 the steam yacht Fox was despatched under M'Clintock, who had already shown himself the most capable master of sledge work. He erected a monument to the Franklin expedition on Beechey Island in 1858, and then following Peel Sound, he made inquiries of the natives throughout the winter of 1858-59. This led him to search King William Land, where, on the 25th May, he came across a bleached human skeleton lying on its face, showing that the man had died as he walked. Meanwhile, Hobson, one of his companions, discovered a record of the Franklin expedition, stating briefly its history between 1845 and 1848; and with this definite information of the fate of the Franklin expedition M'Clintock returned to England in 1859, having succeeded in solving the problem of Franklin's fate, while exploring over 800 miles of coast-line in the neighbourhood of King William Land.
The result of the various Franklin expeditions had thus been to map out the intricate network of islands dotted over the north of North America.
