The class of vessels best adapted for discovery in the Polar seas, seems to be that of one hundred to two hundred tons’ burden. They are stronger, more easily managed, in less danger of being stoved or crushed by ice, and not so expensive as those of larger dimensions. An increase of size is a diminution of comparative strength; and hence it is evident, that a vessel intended for discovery should be just large enough for conveying the requisite stores and provisions, and for affording comfortable accommodation to the navigators, but no larger. Perhaps a vessel about one hundred and fifty tons’ burden would be fully sufficient to answer every purpose. The navigation of the Polar seas, which is peculiar, requires in a particular manner an extensive knowledge of the nature, properties, and usual motions of the ice, and it can only be performed to the best advantage by those who have had long experience in working a ship in icy situations. It might be a material assistance to those employed in completing the examination of Baffin’s Bay, as well as productive of some interesting information in meteorological phenomena, were a vessel or two to remain in the northern part of this bay through the winter. There is very little doubt that the vessel would, by this method, be released by the ice as early as May or June, and thus be afforded about double the time of research that could be obtained by wintering out of the bay. There would not, I imagine, be any very great danger in making this experiment, provided a sufficient quantity of fresh provisions, for the prevention of the scurvy among the crew, were taken out, and certain precautions adopted for the preservation of the ships. The ingenious apparatus invented by Mr. Thomas Morton designed to supersede, in repairing vessels, the necessity of dry docks, might be eminently advantageous. In seas perpetually encumbered with ice, and probably crowded with islands, if not divided by necks of land, the chance of great discoveries and of extensive navigations towards the north-west, even under the best arrangements and under the boldest seamen, is but small. The most certain method of ascertaining the existence of a communication between the Atlantic and Pacific, along the northern face of America, would doubtless be by journeys on land. Men there are who, being long used to travel upon snow in the service of the Hudson’s Bay company, would readily undertake the journey by the interior lakes of North America to the Frozen Ocean, or, in case of a continuity of land being found, to the very Pole itself, of whose success we should certainly have a reasonable ground of hope. The practicability of this mode of making discoveries has been fully proved by the expeditions of Mackenzie and Hearne; and a possibility of performing very long journeys on snow can be attested, from personal experience, by those who have wintered a few times in Hudson’s Bay.