All things being ready, the Greely Expedition left St. John’s, Newfoundland, for Lady Franklin Bay, on Thursday, July 7, 1881, in the steamer Proteus, Captain Pike. She was a barkentine, measuring two hundred and fifty feet in length, and having a burden of six hundred tons. Built in Scotland for the whaling and sealing service, she had already made several successful voyages within the Arctic Circle and on the Labrador coast. The departure of the ship elicited no demonstration from the people on the dock, excepting a few cheers from some warm-hearted fishermen. Whether the good people of Newfoundland were disgusted because they could not sell any more supplies at extravagant prices, or were displeased with the Yankee explorers for presuming to compete with Englishmen in the icy North, are questions not to be easily solved. During his stay in St. John’s, Lieutenant Lockwood wrote a letter to his mother, in which he gave the following account of the city: “St. John’s is a queer and forlorn old place; everything is antiquated, slow, and behind the times in every respect. The few hotels are more like third-class boarding-houses; a livery-stable is not to be found in this city of thirty thousand. This condition of affairs is said to be due to the religion of the place, which is Roman Catholic. It is charged that ignorance and poverty are what this church most thrives on, and it is certainly a thriving church here. The other day the shops were all closed, and the place assumed the appearance of Sunday—it was a holy day for their patron saints, Peter and Paul. Only two classes here—the poor and the rich—and everything accords with the former class. Crooked streets and mean, forlorn, dirty houses everywhere. The only respectable public buildings are the Catholic churches and the convents.”