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H D Traill
Published by Good Press, 2022
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1815-1818
IT is noteworthy, as showing the natural bent of the born explorer, that during these years of inaction it was upon maritime discovery rather than naval warfare that Franklin's mind was fixed. It was not to Copenhagen and Trafalgar, but to the shores of Australia and the waters of the Southern Ocean, that his thoughts reverted. His heart was evidently with the crazy old Investigator, mouldering ingloriously as a storehouse hulk at Port Jackson, rather than with the Polyphemus and the Bellerophon, 'twin thunderbolts of war' though they were. He longed for fresh employment in the work of exploration; yet, while all his inquiring and adventurous instincts urged him in this direction, his legitimate professional ambitions acted to some extent as an opposing influence. The difficulty of his position is strikingly brought out in an interesting letter, written in August 1814, in which one sees his shrewd common-sense almost amusingly at odds with his enthusiasm. He had previously written to Mr. Robert Brown, who had sailed with him as naturalist in the Investigator, deploring the fact that Captain Flinders's narrative of his voyage had not reached the public till the very day of its author's death, and reflecting in a somewhat depressed tone on the unlikelihood of any official recognition being given to the services of the younger officers under Flinders's command. Mr. Brown had remarked in his reply on the possibility, and even probability, that another voyage of discovery would soon be thought of, and had intimated that he might have an opportunity of suggesting the employment of his correspondent thereon, 'provided I were certain that you would have no objection, or rather that you would prefer, to embark again in this line of the service.' To this Franklin answers:—
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