In "The Discovery of the Northwest Passage" and in "Pim's Timely Sledge Journey" there have been sketched various heroic phases connected with the last voyage of Sir John Franklin and the expeditions of the Franklin search. In the search there were employed thirty-three ships and nearly two thousand officers and men, whose utmost endeavors during a period of eight years, and at an expense of many millions of dollars, had failed to obtain any definite information as to the fate of the missing explorers. One clew had come from private sources, as shown in the tale of "Dr. Rae and the Franklin Mystery." This present narrative sets forth the work accomplished through the devotion of the widow of Sir John Franklin, in a so-called hopeless enterprise. Sacrificing her ease and her private fortune to a sense of duty, not alone to her husband but also to those who served under him, her labors eventually wrested from the desolate isles of the northern seas the definite secret of the fate of the expedition as a whole. * * * * * After his abandonment in 1853 of four expeditionary ships of the Franklin search, Sir Edward Belcher returned to England, ending what he termed "The Last of Arctic Voyages," in which opinion the British Government concurred. Lady Jane Franklin did not accept this decision as final. On April 12, 1856, in a letter to the admiralty, she strongly urged the need for a further search, saying: "It is due to a set of men who have solved the problem of centuries by the sacrifice of their lives." To this letter no reply was made, and efforts for another expedition made by her friends in Parliament were equally futile. It is needless to say that even such unwonted and discourteous neglect did not silence this noble-hearted woman, whose heroic devotion had been conspicuously displayed in her earlier efforts. It will be remembered that she had previously awakened the interest and engaged the active support of two great nations--Russia and the United States--in the search for the Franklin squadron. Americans will recall with pride that, moved by Lady Franklin's appeal, President Zachary Taylor, in a message of January 4, 1850, urged co-operation on Congress, which took action that resulted in the expedition commanded by Lieutenant E. J. De Haven, United States Navy. In her letter to President Taylor, Lady Franklin alluded gracefully to "that continent of which the American republic forms so vast and conspicuous a portion," and says: "To the American whalers I look with more hope, being well aware of their numbers and strength, their thorough equipment, and the bold spirit of enterprise which animates their crews. But I venture to look even beyond these. I am not without hope that you will deem it not unworthy of a great and kindred nation to take up the cause of humanity, which I plead, in a national spirit."