North- West was formerly mentioned, Sebastian Cabot and the brothers Cortereal were the first who attempted to double the n. coast of America; Cabot had reached as far n. its lat. 67° 80', in the strait between Greenland and America, but the courage of his crew failing, he was compelled. to return. Notwithstanding his urgent representations, he was linable to prevail upon the English monarch to send out another expedition, and it was not till after several unsuccessful attempts had been made to find a n.e. passage that investigations of the n. coast of America were resumed. As these investigatiohs were carried on till within the last few years solely by the English, their prosecution till a definite result was arrived at came to be looked upon as a point of national honor, and repeated expedithlits were sent out long after it had been clearly shown that a n.w. passage, when found, would be useless in a mercantile point of view. In all, more than 200 voyages were made in search of a n.w. passage, so that only the most important of them can be even mentioned. The first expedition, after that of Cabot, was sent out in 1576, under Martin Frobisher, who made a second and third voy age in the two following years. but without any important discovery. In 1585-88 northern enterprise received an impetus from th.;t successful expeditious of capt. John Davis. ThiS navigator sailed up the strait which bears his name, as far at lat. 72° n., and reported open sea still further n. ; he then surveyed the e. and w. sides of the strait, but without further results. Henry Hudson (q.v.), who had previously attempted the n.e. passage, followed in 1610, and discovered the Hudson strait and bay, believing the latter to be none other than an inlet of the Pacific ocean, an opinion which was proved the investigations of Button in 1612; the latter, however, disseminated on his return the equally erroneous opinion that the bay was closed in on all sides, with the exception of the two eastern entrances. Button's account was not universally cred ited, and accordingly, in 1615, capt. Bylot, who had been one of Hudson's company, was sent out, accompanied by Baffin, the most skillful navigator and scientific observer of the time; but their first expedition, which was to Hudson's bay, was devoid of results. In their next voyage (1016), they sailed up Davis's strait, reaching lat. 78° n., and satis fying themselves by a very superficial investigation that their was no northern outlet, the bay (as it was then believed to be) was named in honor of its explorer Baffin's bay. Ott their return southwards, they coasted along the w. side, and discovered an opening to the w. which they named Lancaster sound, but believing it to lie only an inlet, did not explore further. On his return, Bailin gave it as his decided opinion that no outlet to the w. existed from Baffin's bay, and the attention of explorers was again directed to discover an outlet from Hudson's bay. In 1619 the solitary attempt by foreignpowers to aid in the search was undertaken by Jens Munk, a Dane, but he made no discoveries, and the attempt was not renewed. The expedition of Fox and James, in 1631, led to the partial exploration of the channel since known as the Fox channel, which forms the northern outlet to Hudson's bay, and from this time the spirit of discovery slumbered till 1741. Between this date and 1746, several expeditions were sent out to discover an outlet from the n.w. corner of Hudson's bay, but their united researches satisfae proved that no such outlet existed. Owing to these disappointments, the search' tor a n.w. passage was discontinued for more than half a century, notwithstanding the fact of the British parliament having promised a reward of £20,000 to the fortunate discoverer. In 1818 the admiralty took up the search. and sent out capt. John Ross and lieut. Parry, who sailed up Davis's strait, and ascended Lancaster sound for 30 m.; here capt. Ross gave up the search, considering it to be hopeless. But this opinion was by no means coin cided in by Parry, who was accordingly sent out in the following year, and succeeded in far outstripping all Ids predecessors in the career of northern discovery. He entered Lancaster sound on July 30, and a few days afterward discovered a large inlet, 30 m, broad, which luynarnyd Prince; Regent inlet. „After this inlet for some dis
tance, he,returned; and continued his course westward, as the lee alloy ed him, passing through a strait which he named after sir John Barrow, the promoter of the expedition. Continuing his westward course, he reached long. 110° w., in Melville sound, where he was stopped by the ice; and after wintering here, and giving names to the numerous islands, seas, and straits he had discovered, returned to Britain, with the glory of hav ing advanced 30° of longitude further w. than any previous explorer. On his arrival lie was welcomed with the utmost enthusiasm, and his discoveries imparted renewed energy to the half-dormant maritime enterprise of the British. There was now no doubt in what direction the n.w. passage was to be sought, but Parry's second expedition (1821-23) was for the purpose of determining whether the Fox channel was connected with the Arctic sea of his previous voyage: it was, however, unsuccessful. A little before this time the coast-line of North America from Behring's strait to point Turnagain, in long. 109° w., had been fully traced, so that it only remained to find some navigable passage from Regent inlet to this point, and the long-wished-for result would he attained. For this purpose eapt. John Ross was sent out with an expedition in 1829. and after a labori ous and difficult voyage up Prince Regent a point only 200 m. from point Turnagain. It was during this voyage that lie discovered the magnetic pole. Dense and Simpson, in 1838, extended the survey of the American coast from point Turnagain to within 90 m. of the magnetic pole, but the hopes of a channel between these points were dashed by the discovery made by Dr. John Rae, in 1847, thin Boothia (the land which bounds Regent inlet on the w.) is a peninsula of the American continent. We now come to the unfortunate expedition of sir John Franklin, which, it was fondly hoped, would settle the question of a u.w. passage. It sailed from England, May 19, 1845. and was last seen in Baffin's bay. Franklin is believed to have sailed through Lancaster sound, and ascended Wellington channel to lat. 77° n., and thence returned southwards, crossing Barrow strait, and sailing down the channel (now called Franklin channel) which separates North Somerset and Boothia Felix from Prince of Wales island to the w., where, in lat. n., long 98° 30' w„ his ships were beset with ice, Sept. 12, 1816, and Franklin died June 11, 184'7. The survivors abandoned the vessels 20 in. s.w. of this point, and perished in the attempt to reach the American mainland. Many expeditions were sent out to search for the missing voyagers, and one of these expeditions, under Collinson and M'Clure, sailed from Plymouth, Jan. 20, 1850, and reached Behring's strait in August the same year. Sailing eastward the following spring, M'Clure's ship became fixed in the ice, about 60 in. w. of Barrow strait, and the crew were picked up by sir Edward Belcher, who had been sent out in April 1852 to their assistance. Belcher, who had reached Melville sound by the eastern passage through Lancaster sound and Barrow strait, returned the same way; and thus 3.1'Cliae and his company enjoyed the envied honor of being the only ship's crew who had ever penetrated from Behring's strait to Baffin's bay. To M'Clure, then, belongs the honor of having finally set at rest all doubts as to the existence of a n.•. passage. By the various English and American expeditions (1848-59) sent out to search for sir John Franklin, the whole region to the n. of the American mainland as far as lat. 77° n., and long. 106° w., has been thoroughly explored, and various channels of communication between Davis's and Behring's straits have been discovered, such as the route by Hod son's bay, Fox channel, Fury and Recta strait and Bellot strait, into Franklin channel, and thence by either the M'Clintock or the Victoria channel, or the routes by Lancaster sound, and the M'Clintock channel„Prinee Regent inlet, or Prince of Wales strait, to the open sea n. of Alaska, but all these routes are useless in a mercantile point of'view. See POLAR EXPEDITIONS.