CREATION OF THE UNIVERSE ACCORDING GENESIS

HISTORY OF ALASKA.

CHAPTER III.

THE KAMCHATKA EXPEDITIONS. 1725-1740.

The excessive curiosity of Peter the Great extended further than to ship-building, astronomy, and general geography. Vast as was the addition of Siberia to the Russian empire there lay something more beyond, still indistinct and shadowy in the world’s mind, and the astute Peter determined to know what it was. The sea of Okhotsk had been found, and it was in the same latitude as the Baltic; the ostrog of Okhotsk had been built, and it stood upon almost exactly the same parallel as St Petersburg. Might not there be for him an American Russia, as already there was a European and an Asiatic Russia? And might not this new Russia, occupying the same relative position to America that the old Russia did to Europe, be worth more to him than a dozen Siberias? He would see. And he would know, too, and that at once, whether the continents of Asia and America joined. This would be a good opportunity likewise to try his new ships, his new discipline, and see what the skilled gentlemen whom he had invited from Austria, and Prussia, and Holland could do for him. There were many around him whom his enthusiasm had inspired, and who wished to try their mettle in strange adventure.

Such were the thoughts arising in the fertile brain of the great Peter which led to what may be called the two Kamchatka expeditions; that is, two principal expeditions from Kamchatka, with several subordinate and collateral voyages, the first of which was to ascertain whether Asia and America joined or were separate, and the second to thoroughly explore eastern Siberia, to discover and examine the American coast opposite, and to learn something more of the Kurile Islands and Japan. Both explorations were under the command of Vitus Bering, a Danish captain in the Russian service, who was engaged on the first about five years, the second series occupying some sixteen years, not wholly, however, under this commander.

For the guidance of his admiral, Count Apraxin, the tsar drew up instructions with his own hand. Two decked boats were to be built at Kamchatka, and, to assist Bering in the command, lieutenants Martin Spanberg and Alexei Chirikof were appointed. Other officers as well as ship-builders and seamen were chosen, and on February 5, 1725, the expedition set out overland through Siberia. Three days thereafter the monarch died; but his instructions were faithfully carried out by his successors, Catherine the wife and Elizabeth the daughter.  

Much trouble was experienced in crossing the continent, in obtaining provisions, and in making ready the ships; so that it was not until the 21st of August 1727 that Bering with Chirikof set sail in the Fortuna, from Okhotsk, for the southern end of the Kamchatka peninsula, where by July of the following year they had ready another vessel, the Gavril, or Gabriel. Leaving the river Kamchatka the 20th of July, they coasted the eastern shore of the peninsula northward, till on the 8th of August they found themselves in latitude 64° 30', at the river Anadir. The Chukchi there told them that after rounding East Cape the coast turned toward the west. Continuing, they passed and named St Lawrence Island, and the 16th of August they were in latitude 67° 18', having passed the easternmost point of Asia, and through the strait of Bering. There the coast turned abruptly westward, as they had been told. If it continued in that direction, as was more than probable, Asia and America were not united. Bering’s mission was accomplished, and he therefore returned, reaching Kamchatka in September.

In connection with this first voyage of Bering, two expeditions were undertaken in the same direction under the auspices of Afanassiy Shestakof, a chief of the Yakutsk Cossacks. This bold man, whose energy was of that reckless, obstinate type that knows no defeat, went to St Petersburg and made several proposals to the senate for the subjection of the independent Chukchi and Koriaks and the unruly Kamchatkans. The eloquence with which he advanced his scheme procured him applause and success. He was appointed chief of an expedition in which to accomplish his heart’s desire.

The admiralty appointed a Hollander, Jacob Hens, pilot; Ivan Fedorof, second in command, Mikhail Gvozdef, “geodesist,” or surveyor; Herdebal, searcher of ores, and ten sailors. He was to proceed both by land and by sea. From the arsenal at Catherineburg, Siberia, he was to be provided with small cannons and mortars, and ammunition, and a captain of the Siberian regiment of dragoons at Tobolsk, Dmitri Pavlutzki, was ordered to join him, each receiving command over four hundred Cossacks, while at the same time all the Cossacks stationed in ostrogs and simovies, or winter-quarters, in the Chukchi district, were placed at their disposal. With these instructions Shestakof returned to Siberia in June 1727. At Tobolsk he remained till late in November, wintered on the upper Lena, and arrived at Yakutsk the next summer. There a dispute arose between Shestakof and Pavlutzki, which caused their separation. In 1729 Shestakof went to Okhotsk and there took possession, for the purposes of his expedition, of the vessels with which Bering had lately returned from Kamchatka. On the 1st of September he despatched his cousin, the synboyarski, or bastard noble, Ivan Shestakof, in the Gavril to the River Ud, whence he was to proceed to Kamchatka and begin explorations, while he himself sailed in the Fortuna. This vessel was wrecked near Taniski ostrog, and nearly all on board perished, Shestakof barely saving his life in a canoe. With a small rem­nant of his men and some friendly Tunguses and Koriaks he set out for Kamchatka on foot, but on the 14th of March 1730 he was overpowered near the gulf of Penshinsk by a numerous body of Chukchi and received a mortal wound. Only three days before this Shestakof had sent orders to Taniski ostrog that the Cossack Tryfon Krupischef should embark for Bolsheretsk in a sea-going vessel, thence make his way round the southern point of the peninsula, touch at Nishekamchatsk, and proceed to the river Anadir. The inhabitants of the “large country lying opposite to this river” he must ask to pay tribute to Russia. Gvozdef, the navigator, was to be taken on board if he desired, and shown every respect.

GVOZDEF'S LAND

After battling with adverse winds and misfortunes for about two years, the explorers passed northward along the Asiatic shore, by the gulf of Anadir, noting the Diomede Islands, and perhaps catching a glimpse of the American shore. The leaders were quarrelling continually, and Fedorof, the navigator in command, was lame and confined to his bed during nearly all the voyage. On their return to Kamchatka they made the most contradictory statements before the authorities. From Gvozdef’s report we are told that at some time during the year 1730 he found himself between latitude 65° and 66°, “on a strange coast, situated opposite, at a small distance from the country of the Chukchi, and that he found people there, but could not speak with them for want of an interpreter.”

The land expedition was more successful. In September 1730 Jacob Hens, the pilot, received intelli­gence from Pavlutzki, dated at Nishnekolimsk, to the effect that Shestakof’s death would not delay the expedition. Hens was to go with one of the vessels left at Okhotsk by Bering, to the river Anadir, to the head-waters of which Pavlutzki was shortly to march. Whereupon Hens proceeded in the Gavril to the mouth of the Kamchatka, where he arrived in July 1731, and was told that a rebellious band of Kamchatkans had come to Nishnekamchatsk ostrog, killed most of the Russians there, and set fire to the houses. The few remaining Russians took shelter in the vessel, and Hens sent men and reduced the Kamchatkans to obedience. This, however, prevented his going to the Anadir River.

Meanwhile Pavlutzki had arrived at Anadirskoi ostrog in September 1730, and the following year he undertook a campaign against the obstinate Chukchi. On the 12th of March 1731 he put in motion his column, composed of 215 Russians, 160 Koriaks, and 60 Yukagirs, moving along the head-waters of some of the northern tributaries of the Anadir, and then turning northward to the coast of the Arctic. After marching two months at the rate of about ten versts a day, stopping frequently to rest, Pav­lutzki arrived at the frozen sea, near the mouth of a river. For two weeks he travelled eastward along the coast, mostly upon the ice and far from the shore. This was done, probably, for the purpose of avoiding an encounter with the natives, but at last, on the 7th of June, a large body of Chukchi was seen advancing, and as they would not listen to Pavlutzki’s summons to obedience, he attacked and put them to flight. About the last of June another battle was fought and with the same result. After a rest of three days the march toward Chukotskoi Noss was resumed, but another larger body of natives was met with there and a third battle ensued, during which some articles were recovered which had been in possession of Shestakof. Pavlutzki claimed this engagement, also, as a victory and declared his total loss in the three battles to have been but three Russians, one Yukagir, and five Koriaks killed. But the Chukchi were by no means subdued. After reaching the cape the expedition re­turned across the country in a south-easterly direction and in October reached ostrog Anadirskoi. Pav­lutzki finally died at Yakutsk with the rank of voivod. His explorations were carried on with indomitable courage and rare ability, and altogether his achieve­ments furnish a worthy prelude to those of Bering and Chirikof a few years later. The feat of marching across the country of the warlike Chukchi was not repeated till half a century later, when a party under Billings, not as an army defying interference, but as an humble expedition, were suffered to pass by the insolent natives, who robbed them at every step with impunity.

The second Kamchatka expedition, under the auspices of the empress Elizabeth, was the most brilliant effort toward scientific discovery which up to this time had been made by any government. It must be borne in mind that Siberia, discovered and named by the Cossacks in the sixteenth century, was in the earlier part of the eighteenth but little known to European Russia, and the region round Kamchatka scarcely at all. The maps of the day were problematical. The semi-geographical mission of the surveyors Lushin and Yevreinof to the Kurile Islands in 1719-21 had been barren of results. The first expedition of Bering from 1725 to 1730 had advanced along the river routes to Okhotsk, thence by sea to Kamchatka, and northward to the straits subsequently named after him, but made few discoveries of importance, determining the astronomical positions of points and places only by latitude without longitude, but revealing the trend of the Kamchatka coast to the northward. The expedition of Shestakof from 1727 to 1732 was more of a military nature, and resulted in little scientific information. The ex­ploration of Hens, Fedorof, and Gvozdef, made about the same time, was scarcely more satisfactory in its results, though it served to confirm some things reported by Bering during his first voyage.

Russia wished to know more of this vast uncovered region, wished to map its boundaries, and mark off her claim. The California coast had been explored as far as Cape Mendocino, but over the broad area thence to the Arctic there still hung the great Northern Mystery, with its Anian Strait, and silver mountains, and divers other fabulous tales. The northern provinces of Japan were likewise unknown to the enlightened world; and now the Muscovite, who had sat so long in deep darkness, would teach even the Celt and Saxon, a thing or two.

Soon after the return of Bering from his first expedition, namely, on the 30th of April 1730, the commander presented to the empress two letters called by him, “Proposals for the Organization of Okhotsk and Kamchatka country,” and advised an immediate discovery of routes to America and Japan for the purpose of establishing commercial relations with these countries. He also recommended that the northern coast of the empire between the rivers Ob and Lena be thoroughly explored. The organization of the country already known, commanded the first attention of the empress, to which end she issued, on the 10th of May 1731, an oukaz ordering the former chief prokuror, or sergeant-at-arms of the senate, Skorniakof Pisaref, then in exile, to assume control of the extreme eastern country, and be furnished with the necessary means to advance its interests. The residence of the new official was to be Okhotsk, to which point laborers and settlers were to be sent from Yakutsk, together with a boat-builder, three mates, and a few mechanics. The exile-governor did not however long hold his position. Scarcely had he assumed office when the second Kamchatka expedition was decided upon and Vitus Bering received the supreme command of all the territory included in his explorations.

At that time several circumstances combined to carry forward the plans of Bering to their highest consummation. The empire was at peace and the imperial cabinet was presided over by Count Ostermann, who had formerly been secretary of Admiral Cruce, and had devoted considerable attention to naval affairs. In the senate the expedition was earnestly supported by the chief secretary Kirilof; in the ad­miralty college Count Golovin presided as the ruling spirit, while the prokuror was Saimonof, the rival of Kirilof. The foreign members of the Academy of Sciences, in order to preserve their prestige, were looking about for fields of activity, anxious to serve their new fatherland. The spirit of Peter the Great was yet alive among the leading subjects of the empire; his plans were still fresh in the memory of men, and all were eager to execute his progressive purposes. And soon all Siberia was flooded with men of science searching out things both larger and smaller than sables, and throwing Cossack and promyshlenik completely into the shade. By toilsome processes the necessary means of subsistence and materials were collected at the central stations throughout Siberia, and along the thirteen hundred leagues of Arc­tic sea-coast were placed at various points magazines of supplies for explorers. From six to seven months were sometimes occupied in transporting from the forest to the seaports trees for ship-building. And many and wide-spread as were the purposes, every man had his place. To every scientist was given his work and his field, to every captain the river he was to reconnoitre, or the coast he was to explore. And when the appointed time came there set forth simultaneously, from all the chief river-mouths in Siberia, like birds of passage, little exploring expeditions, to begin their battle with the ice and the morass. Some brought their work to a quick and successful issue; others encountered the sternest difficulties.

But the adventures which chiefly concern us are those pointing toward the American continent, which were indeed the central idea of all these undertakings, and by far the most important outcome from this Siberian invasion by the scientists. Before embark­ing on the first great eastern voyage of discovery, let us glance at the personnel of the expedition.

Captain-commander Ivan Ivanovich Bering, so the Russians called him, notwithstanding his baptismal name of Vitus, was a Dane by birth, as I have said, who had been in the Russian naval service about thirty years, advancing gradually from the rank of sub-lieutenant since 1704. Ho was strong in body and clear of mind even when nearly sixty; an acknowledged man of intelligence, honesty, and irreproachable conduct, though in his later years he displayed excessive carefulness and indecision of character, governed too much by temper and caprice, and submitting too easily to the influence of subordinates. This may have been the effect of age, or of disease; but whatever the cause, he was rendered thereby less fit to command, especially so important and hazardous an adventure in so inhospitable a region as Siberia at the beginning of the eighteenth century. He had been selected by Peter the Great to command the first expedition upon the representations of admirals Seniavin and Sievers, because “he had been to India and knew all the approaches to that country.” After his return he had advanced gradually to the rank of captain-commander, and had received a cash reward of a thousand rubles, an amount commonly granted at that time to envoys returning from distant countries. He was now anxious to ob­tain the rank of contre-admiral for his long services and discoveries. The admiralty college made repre­sentations to that effect to the imperial cabinet, but no reply was received.

Next in command, appointed with Bering, and who had served as junior officer on the first expedition, and now a captain, was Alexei Ilich Chirikof, one of the best officers of his day, the pride and hope of the fleet. Russian historians are perhaps a little inclined to magnify the faults of Bering the Dane as well as the merits of Chirikof the Russian. The latter they say was well educated, courageous, and straightforward, bright of intellect as well as thoughtful, and whose kind heart the exigencies of the cruel naval service had never been able wholly to debase. He had graduated from the naval academy in 1721, and had been at once promoted to a sub-lieutenancy, skipping the rank of midshipman. He was at first attached to the fleet, but subsequently received an appointment at the naval academy as instructor of the marines of the guard. While in that position he was presented to Peter the Great by Sievers and Seniavin as one of the officers selected to join the first Bering expedition. He was placed under the immediate command of Bering, together with Spanberg, in 1725. Before setting out he was promoted to lieutenant, and gave evidence throughout the expedition of great courage and com­mon-sense. On his return in 1730 he was made a captain-lieutenant; two years later, in 1732, he was again promoted and made full captain, “not by seniority but on account of superior knowledge and worth,” as they said. At the time of his appointment he was on special duty at Kazan, and he returned to St Petersburg only a few days before the departure of the expedition in February 1733; but he still found time to give most valuable assistance in framing the final instructions.

The third in command was Captain Martin Petrovich Spanberg, a countryman of Bering, a native of Denmark. It is not known when he entered the Russian service, but he accompanied the first expedition as senior officer. He was illiterate, with a reckless audacity, rough, and exceedingly cruel, avaricious and selfish, but strong in mind, body, and purpose, of great energy, and a good seaman. His bad reputation extended over all Siberia, and was long preserved in the memory of the people. Sibiriaks feared him and his wanton oppression. Some of them thought him a great general, while others called him an escaped executioner. He was always accompanied by a dog of huge dimensions, which it was said would tear people to pieces at his master’s command. Chirikof thought him possessed of some sparks of a noble ambition, but all was put down by his subordinates to a love of tyranny. His knowledge of the Russian language was exceedingly limited. Having been made a captain lieutenant during the first expedition, he was now a captain, like Chirikof, but higher on the list Little is said of his share in the work performed by the expedition, but his name occurs in hundreds of complaints and petitions from victims of his licentiousness, cruelty, and avarice. He was just the man to become rich. On his return from Siberia he brought with him a thousand yards of army cloth, a thousand bales of fur, and whole herds of horses. He carried to Siberia his wife and son, and they accompanied him at sea. Such is the character of the man as presented by Russian authorities, which are all we have on the subject. Again it will be noticed that while Chirikof, the Russian, is highly praised, Spanberg, the Dane, is roundly rated, and we may make allowance accordingly.

Of the other officers of the expedition there is not much to be said, as they were not prominently connected with the discovery of the American coast. Lieutenant Walton, the companion of Spanberg, was an Englishman who had entered the Russian service only two years before. Midshipman Schelting was an illegitimate son of Contre-admiral Petrovski, a Hollander. He was twenty-five years of age and had been attached to the fleet only two years. Lieutenant Lassenius, the senior officer of the Arctic detachments, who was instructed to explore the coast beyond the Lena river, was a Dane. He had also but recently entered the Russian service. According to Gmelin he was a skilful and experienced officer; later he was relieved by Lieutenant Laptief, also an old lieutenant who had been recommended to Peter the Great for the first expedition as a considerate and courageous man. The less said of the morals of any of these mariners the better. Neither the age nor the nation was conspicuous for justice or refinement. Drinking and gambling were among the more innocent amusements, at least in the eyes of the sailors, among whom were the most hardened villains that could be picked out from the black sheep of' the naval service. There can be no doubt that an almost brutal discipline was sometimes necessary, but the practice of it was com­mon. In regard to honesty, we must not suppose that the appropriation of public property by officers of the government was then regarded as a greater crime than now.

Upon the request of the senate the imperial academy had instructed its member, Joseph de L’Isle, to compile a map of Kamchatka and adjoining countries; but not satisfied with this, the senate demanded the appointment of an astronomer to join the expedition accompanied by some students advanced in astronomy, and two or three versed in mineralogy. Two volunteers for this service were found among the academicians, Johann Gmelin, professor of chemistry and natural history, and Louis de L’Isle de la Croyère, a brother of the map-maker and professor of astron­omy. These were joined by a third, Gerhard Muller, professor of history and geography. The senate accepted these, but ordered further twelve students from the Slavo-Latin school at Moscow to be trained io the academy for the proposed expedition. The admiralty college urged the necessity of extending the exploration over the whole northern coast of Siberia, and it was then that were appointed as commanders subordinate to Bering, Spanberg, and Chirikof, one lieutenant, three sub-lieutenants, and a command of servants and soldiers numbering one hundred and fifty-seven in all. A few members of the college proposed to send the whole expedition to the coast of Kamchatka round the world by sea, the earliest plan toward circumnavigation conceived by a Russian; but their counsel did not prevail.

The command of the proposed expedition to Japan was given to Captain Spanberg, assisted by Lieutenant Walton and Midshipman Schelting. The exploration of the northern coast was intrusted to lieutenants Muravief and Pavlof; lieutenants Meygin, Skuratof, and Ovtzin were also appointed but subsequently relieved by Masters Minnin, Pronchishchef, and Lassenius. The two latter died and were replaced by two brothers, the lieutenants Hariton and Dmitri Laptief. Another detail consisted of three lieutenants, Waxel, Plunting, and Endogarof, four masters, twelve master’s mates, ship and boat builders, three surgeons, nine assistant surgeons, a chaplain, six monks, commissaries, navigators, a number of cadets and sailors, all numbering five hundred and seventy men. From the academy the final appointments were the naturalist Gmelin and the historian Muller, who were subsequently relieved by Steller and Fisher; the astronomer De L’Isle de la Croyère, with five students, four surveyors, who were increased in Siberia by four more, an interpreter, an instrument-maker, two artists, and a special escort of fourteen men. An engineer and architect named Frederick Stael was also attached to the expedition for the construction of roads and harbors, but he died on his way to Siberia.

Muller and Gmelin were both young men, the first being twenty-eight and the other twenty-four. They were learned and enthusiastic German scientists who had come to Russia several years before, one as a doctor of medicine and professor of chemistry and natural history, the other as professor of history and geography. Both attained distinction in the scientific world. De L’Isle de la Croyère was also well educated, though conspicuous rather as a lover of good eating and drinking, than as a learned man.

Another scientific member of the expedition, who joined it somewhat later, was George Wilhelm Steller. He was born in Winsheim, Franconia, on the 10th of March 1709. He studied theology and natural science in the universities of Wittenberg, Leipsic, and Jena, and settled in Halle, devoting himself chiefly to anatomy, botany, and medicine. He proceeded to Berlin and passed a brilliant examination, and in 1734 he joined the Russian army before Dantzig, doing duty as staff-surgeon. In December he was sent to St Petersburg with a ship-load of wounded soldiers. Here he accepted the position of leib medicus, or body-­surgeon to the famous bishop of Novgorod, Theophanos Prokopovich, a favorite of Peter the Great, and with him he remained till his death, except when serving in Siberia.

When Bering left St Petersburg to enter upon his second expedition, Steller, then of the imperial academy, was ordered to join the expedition specially to examine the natural history of Kamchatka. He reached his new field in 1738. In 1740, after giving ample proof of his ability and energy by making frequent and valuable shipments of specimens for the museum of the academy, he forwarded a petition to the senate for permission to accompany Lieutenant Spanberg on his voyage to Japan. While awaiting an answer he was importuned by Bering to join his expedition. Steller replied that in the absence of orders he would draw upon himself the displeasure of the authorities, but the commander said he would assume all responsibility and provide him with an official memorandum to that effect, and a regular appointment to take charge of the department of natural science in his expedition. Steller finally consented, and we are indebted to him for some of the most reliable information concerning the Russian discoveries on the American coast.

In consideration of distance and privations the empress doubled every salary. The departure of the expedition began in February 1733. Bering and Chirikof were instructed to build at Okhotsk or in Kamchatka, wherever it was most convenient, two vessels of the class then called packet-boats, and then to proceed, in accordance with the plans of Professor De la Croyère, without separating, to the exploration of the American coast, which was supposed to lie but a short distance from Kamchatka. After reaching that shore they were to coast southward to the forty-fifth parallel, and then return to the north, crossing back to Asia at Bering Strait. If the season proved too short they were authorized to go into winter-quarters, and conclude the work the following season. Captain Spanberg was to proceed from Okhotsk in the direction of Japan with one ship and two sloops, beginning his explorations at the Kurile Islands. In order to facilitate the progress of the expedition the local Siberian authorities were instructed to erect on the banks of the principal rivers, and on the Arctic, beacons to indicate the location of the magazines of provisions and stores for the various detachments, and also to inform all the nomadic natives of Siberia and the promyshleniki, that they must assist the members of the expedition as far as lay in their power.

One important purpose of the expedition was to discover a new route to the Okhotsk Sea without passing Yakutsk, by going through the southern districts of Siberia, and striking the head-waters of the Yuda, which had been reported navigable. A warn­ing was attached to the instructions against crossing the Amoor, “in order not to awaken the suspicions of the Chinese government.” The academicians Gmelin and Muller were intrusted with the exploration of the interior of Siberia and Kamchatka, assisting each other in their researches, and making a general geographical survey with the assistance of the cadet engineers attached to their detachment. Croyère, with some of the students who had been in training at the observatory of the academy for several years, was to make astronomical observations along the route of progress, and accompany Bering to the coast of America. He was granted great liberty of action, and furnished with ample means, the best instruments to be obtained at that time, and a numerous escort of soldiers and laborers.

It was an unknown country to which they were all going, and for an unknown time. The admiralty college had thought six years sufficient, but most were going for sixteen years, and many forever. Besides nearly all the officers, a number of the rank and file were taking with them their wives and children. Lieutenant Ovtzin and one naval officer were the first to leave for Kazan in order to begin their preparations. Captain Spanberg with ten mechanics set out next to erect temporary buildings along the road and in the towns of Siberia, for the accommodation of the expedition. In March 1733 other members took their departure, followed by lengthy caravans loaded with supplies from the storehouses of the admiralty. The scientists from the academy tarried in St Petersburg till August, and then proceeded to Kazan to join their companions. At the beginning of winter the whole force had advanced as far as Tobolsk, where they went into winter-quarters. In the spring of 1734 the expedition embarked on small vessels built during the winter on the rivers Ob, Irtish, and Yenissei. The main body arrived at Yakutsk in the summer of 1735, after having wintered at some point beyond Irkutsk. Bering himself had proceeded by land from Tobolsk and reached Yakutsk in October 1734, in advance of nearly all his assistants. Here the winter was again utilized for the construction of boats, and in the spring of 1735 the lieutenants Pronchishchef and Lassenius proceeded northward down the Lena River, with the intention of sailing eastward along the Arctic coast. The transportation of men and stores to Okhotsk was accomplished partly in boats, and partly on horse­back over a rugged chain of mountains. This proved to be the most laborious part of the journey. Captain Spanberg had been the first to arrive at Okhotsk, having travelled in advance of the expedition; but on arrival he discovered, to his dismay, that nothing had been done by the local commander to prepare for the reception of so large a body. Not a building had been erected, not a keel laid, and the only available logs were still standing in the forest. Spanberg went to work at once with his force of mechanics, but lack of provisions caused frequent interruptions as the men were obliged to go fishing and hunting. After a while the commander of the Okhotsk country, Skorniakof Pisaref, made his appearance. He offered no excuse and his presence did not mend matters. Pisaref and Spanberg had both been invested with extraordinary powers, independent of each other, and both were stubborn and inclined to quarrel. The former lived in a fort a short distance up the river, while the latter had built a house for himself at the mouth of the river, where he intended to establish the port. Each had his separate command, and each called himself the senior officer, threatening his opponent with swift annihilation. Each lorded it over his dependants and exacted abject obedience, and we may well imagine that the subordinates led a wretched life.

Bering at Yakutsk encountered much the same difficulties as Spanberg, but on a larger scale. His supplies were scattered along the road from the frontier of Asia to Yakutsk awaiting transportation, and the most urgent appeals to the Siberian authorities failed to secure the requisite means. It had been the captain-commander’s intention to facilitate his intercourse with the natives of Kamchatka by means of missionary labor. Immediately after his return from the first expedition, he had petitioned the holy synod for missionaries to undertake the conversion of the Kamchatkans. The senate promulgated a law exempting all baptized natives of that country for ten years from the payment of tribute to the government. The first missionary selected for the new field was the monk Filevski, a great preacher and pillar of the church, but before reaching Kamchatka he was arrested on the river Aldan, for assaulting and half killing one of the monks of his suite, and for refusing to hold divine services or to read the prayers for the imperial family. Religion in Siberia had seemingly run mad. After his arrival in Kamchatka he added much to the general confusion by acts of violence and a meddlesome spirit, which stirred up strife alike among clergy and laity, Russians and natives.

The position of Bering was exceedingly trying; on him must fall the odium attending the faults and misfortunes of them all. Throughout the journey, and afterward to the end, complaints were forwarded to Irkutsk, Tobolsk, and St Petersburg. That he was a foreigner made it none the less a pleasure for the Russians to curse him. The senate and admiralty college were exasperated by reason of the slow movement, being ignorant of the insurmountable obstacles. First among the accusers was the infamous Pisaref, who charged both Bering and Spanberg with licentiousness and “excessive use of tobacco and brandy.” He reported that up to that time, 1737, nothing had been accomplished for the objects of the expedition, and nothing could be expected beyond loss to the imperial treasury; that the leaders of the expedition had come to Siberia only to fill their pockets, not only Bering, but his wife, who was about to return to Moscow; and that Bering had received valuable presents at Irkutsk from contractors for supplies. Another officer in exile, a captain-lieutenant of the navy, named Kozantzof, represented that Bering’s force was in a state of anarchy, that all its operations were carried on at a wasteful expenditure, and that in his opinion nothing would come of it all. Spanberg himself began to refuse obedience to Bering, complaining bitterly of the delay in obtaining stores for his voyage to Japan. Bering’s immediate assistant, Chirikof, received instructions from St Petersburg to inquire into some of these complaints. Another of the officers of the expedition, Plunting, being dissatisfied with Bering’s non-interference in his quarrel with Pisaref, insulted the former and was tried by court-martial and sentenced to the ranks for two months. To revenge himself, the young lieutenant sent charges to St Petersburg, reflecting on Bering’s conduct, one of which was illicit manufacture of brandy and the expenditure of powder in making fireworks, as well as the “employment of the drum corps for his own amusement, though there was nothing to rejoice over.”

The members of the academy also became dissatisfied and complained of abuse and ill-treatment on the part of Bering, asking to be relieved from obedience to him as commander. In 1738 the expense of the expedition, which had not then left the sea-coast, was over three hundred thousand rubles in cash paid from the imperial treasury, without counting the great quantities of supplies furnished by the various districts in kind. At this rate Alaska would cost more than it could be sold for a hundred years hence. The empress issued an oukaz on the 15th of September 1738, instructing the senate and the admiralty col­lege to review the accounts of the Kamchatka expedition, and ascertain if it could not be carried on without such a drain on the treasury. The senate reported that the cost thus far made it necessary to continue the work or all would be lost. Much time was wasted in correspondence on these matters, and only at the beginning of 1739 did the main body reach Okhotsk. In July an officer named Tolbukhin arrived with orders from the empress to investigate the “doings of Bering.” He was followed in September by Larionof, another officer who had been ordered to assist him. The supply of provisions at Okhotsk was alto­gether inadequate to the large number of men stationed there. During the winter following the suffering became so great that Bering was obliged to send large detachments away to regions where they could support themselves by hunting. At that time the whole force consisted of 141 men at Okhotsk, 192 employed in the magazines and in the transportation of stores, 70 at Irkutsk, 39 in attendance upon the various officers and scientists, and 141 on the three vessels already built, in all 583 men. Under Spanberg’s active supervision two vessels had been built, the brigantine, Arkhangel Mikhail, and the double sloop, Nadeshda, or Hope; and two old craft, the Fortuna, reconstructed in some degree from the first of that name, and the Gavril, had been repaired. Spanberg was ready to go to sea in September, but lack of provisions detained him. In October the sloop Fortuna was sent to Kamchatka for a cargo of pitch for the ship-building at Okhotsk. The mate Kodichef, and the surveyor Svitunof, in charge, were instructed to carry the provisions that had accumulated in the Kamchatkan magazines to Bolsheretsk, as the most convenient port from which to transfer them to the vessels of Bering’s expedition. The student Krashennikof also went to Kamchatka in the Fortuna. On the 13th of October, when about to enter the river at Bolsheretsk, the wretched craft was overtaken by a gale and thrown upon the shore. The future historian of Kamchatka, Krashennikof, reached the land “clad in one garment only.”

Plan of Okhotsk.

Despite the apparently insurmountable difficulties resulting from want of transportation and lack of supplies, Bering and Chirikof found themselves in readiness to go to sea in the month of August 1740. At that time the number of men at Okhotsk belonging to the expedition was 166, with 80 engaged in the transportation of stores over the mountain trails. During the summer the astronomer Croyère with his suite had arrived at Okhotsk, accompanied by the naturalist Steller. Toward the end of August an event occurred that filled Bering and his officers with joy. The great stumbling-block of the expedition and its most persistent enemy, Pisaref, was relieved from his official position by another exile, Antoine Devière, a former favorite of Peter the Great, and chief of police of St Petersburg. According to Sgibnef, Devière was the first honorable and efficient commander of Okhotsk. He sold the property which his predecessors had dishonestly obtained, and with the proceeds paid the arrears of salaries. Under his active supervision buildings were erected, a school established, and everything arranged for a quick despatch of the American expedition.

CHAPTER IV.

DISCOVERY OF ALASKA.