Samuel Hearne--"The Mungo Park of Canada"--Perouse complains--The North-West Passage--Indian guides--Two failures--Third journey successful--Smokes the calumet--Discovers Arctic Ocean--Cruelty to the Eskimos--Error in latitude--Remarkable Indian woman--Capture of Prince of Wales Fort--Criticism by Umfreville. Such an agitation as that so skilfully planned and shrewdly carried on by Arthur Dobbs, Esq., could not but affect the action of the Hudson's Bay Company. The most serious charge brought against the Company was that, while having a monopoly of the trade on Hudson Bay, it had taken no steps to penetrate the country and develop its resources. It is of course evident that the Company itself could have no reason for refusing to open up trade with the interior, for by this means it would be expanding its operations and increasing its profits. The real reason for its not doing so seems to have been the inertia, not to say fear, of Hudson's Bay Company agents on the Bay who failed to mingle with the bands of Indians in the interior. Now the man was found who was to be equal to the occasion. This was Samuel Hearne. Except occasional reference to him in the minutes of the Company and works of the period, we know little of Samuel Hearne. He was one of the class of men to which belonged Norton, Kelsey, and others--men who had grown up in the service of the Company on the Bay, and had become, in the course of years, accustomed to the climate, condition of life, and haunts of the Indians, thus being fitted for active work for the Company. Samuel Hearne became so celebrated in his inland expeditions, that the credit of the Hudson's Bay Company leaving the coast and venturing into the interior has always been attached to his name. So greatly, especially in the English mind, have his explorations bulked, that the author of a book of travels in Canada about the beginning of this century called him the "Mungo Park of Canada." In his "Journey," we have an account of his earlier voyages to the interior in search of the Coppermine River. This book has a somewhat notable history. In the four-volume work of La Perouse, the French navigator, it is stated that when he took Prince of Wales Fort on the Churchill River in 1782, Hearne, as governor of the fort, surrendered it to him, and that the manuscript of his "Journey" was seized by the French commander. It was returned to Hearne on condition that it should be published, but the publication did not take place until thirteen years afterwards. It is somewhat amusing to read in Perouse's preface (1791) the complaint that Hearne had not kept faith with him in regard to publishing the journal, and the hope is expressed that this public statement in reminding him of his promise would have the desired effect of the journal being published.