Two great facts had now been ascertained. One was that none of Franklin’s men or ships survived. The other fact was, that although there was plenty of water north of the American continent, it was so obstructed by permanent ice that probably no vessel could ever make its way through from the Atlantic to the Pacific; none has done so yet, despite the determined effort of the steam yacht _Pandora_ in 1875, but ships from the east have reached points also reached by ships from the west. The everlasting ice sheet of the polar ocean, ever crowding down upon this northern coast and into the channels between the islands north of it, forms a barrier that will very rarely, if ever, pause or open long enough to let a vessel through, even south of King William and Victoria lands. The outflowing warm waters of the rivers or other influences may sometimes produce a narrow space comparatively free from ice in summer along the shore of the continent and greater islands; but everywhere off shore, and never at a great distance, begins a thick mass of perpetual ice, which, it is believed, extends across the pole like a cap, and reaches on the other side nearly to Petermannland. To this has been given the name of the Paleocrystic Sea, or sea of ancient ice, and nothing is known of it beyond the blue cliffs of its margin that confronts the explorer as he gazes abroad from the hills of the Parry Islands or Banks Land, or vainly seeks in some lone vessel north of Alaska or Siberia to penetrate its glassy front. So thoroughly were the islands of this archipelago explored, and so unpromising seems further study, that Arctic voyagers have long ceased to risk their ships there, and the story of Franklin’s fate was finally learned by land travelers. As early as 1854 Dr. Rae and a party of Hudson’s Bay Company’s men had traveled over land and ice to King William’s Land, proved it an island, and heard stories of the death by famine and cold of white men who could be no other than the Franklin crew, as was further shown by various relics which Dr. Rae obtained from the Eskimos. Dr. Rae claimed and received £10,000 of the reward offered by the British government. The next year another party, going down the Great Fish River, recovered many other articles from Eskimos at the mouth of the river and on Montreal Island. It was evident even then that every one had perished in an attempt, nearly successful, to reach the mainland at the mouth of this river. Lady Franklin, however, despatched an expedition in the _Fox_, under the command of the experienced M’Clintock, which at last brought back, not her husband, but the satisfaction of knowing fully his fate. All along the west and south coast remains of articles belonging to the ships were found, and skeletons—two of them in a broken boat; and finally in a stone cairn a written record that briefly told the tale of disaster. [Illustration: WORKING THROUGH AN ICE-FLOE, IN TOW OF A BERG.]