THE CONQUEST OF KAMCHATKA 129 



conquest of Kamchatka the Russians were already 

 known to the inhabitants. Long before him Fedotof 

 and a few comrades had made their way into the 

 country and intermarried with native women. They 

 had been held in great honour and almost deified as 

 being evidently of a superior race. For some time it 

 was supposed that no human hand could hurt them, 

 but this belief was rudely shattered when two of the 

 demigods < [uarrelled and fought, and one wounding the 

 other, the blood flowed. That flow of blood was fatal, 

 for the natives, judging that they were but ordinary 

 flesh, took an early opportunity of wiping them out, the 

 name of their leader being still traceable in that of the 

 Fedotcha River on the banks of which they had lived. 

 The Kamchadales had other tales to tell of visitors 

 from the east and south, and Atlassof himself dis- 

 covered on the River Itcha a Japanese who had been 

 wrecked on the coast two years before, from whom he 

 learnt of islands innumerable. But there were no 

 ships on the Pacific coast of Siberia, and nothing in 

 the way of discovery could be done until 1714, when 

 there arrived at Ochotsk a detachment of sailors and 

 shipwrights despatched thither overland. According 

 to one of the sailors, Henry Bush, a Dutchman, the 

 carpenters built a good durable vessel some fifty feet 

 long which was ready for sea in 1716 when the first 

 voyage was undertaken. The coast of Kamchatka was 

 made near the River Itcha, and sailing south they 

 reached the Kompakova, where they wintered and 

 found the whale that had in its body the harpoon of 

 European workmanship marked with Roman letters, 

 mentioned by Scoresby. Bush returned to Ochotsk in 



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