152 
main pursuit, as it became their standard of value. In a manner pre- 
cisely similar, the northern part of Asia was overrun by traders moving 
in an easterly direction. The Russian expeditions of conquest followed 
in the wake of the Russian fur-traders, and about the beginning of the 
last century, the Russians began to establish themselves on the shores 
of the Pacific Ocean. 
For the Siberian merchants, the chief quest was that of the sable, 
and thus it is that the occupation of Siberia has been described as one 
gigantic sable hunt, beginning at the Ural Mountains and extending to 
the Eastern Ocean. This ocean the Pacific was reached by the 
valley of the Anadyr River, far to the north, and at Okotsk, on the sea 
of the same name. Between these places lay the remarkable volcanic 
peninsular of Kamtschatka. About 1696 its conquest began, and in 
some fifteen years it had been throughout rendered tributary to Russia; 
but the great ocean to the eastward, and what it might contain, still 
remained unknown. 
The enormous extension which the Russian Empire had achieved 
in Asia, naturally attracted the special attention of its ruler, and in the 
last year of her reign, Peter the Great planned an expedition of explora- 
tions from the eastern Asiatic coast toward America. Before the 
expedition could be despatched the Czar died, but his consort, the 
Empress Catherine, anxious in all respects to carry out the wishes of her 
late husband, caused the preparations to be continued, and in 1725 
Vitus Behring was despatched on this mission, in conformity with the 
original intention of the Emperor. Behring was a Dane, engaged in the 
Russian service. He left St. Petersburg provided with a corps of 
assistants and all the facilities which the government could furnish, to 
cross Siberia to Okotsk, which was to be his port of departure for the 
exploration of the unknown North Pacific. 
It is unnecessary to follow his various journeys and the many delays 
which he experienced, nor is it relevant to the present subject to trace 
his first expedition from Okotsk by sea, in which he outlined the northern 
pirt of Asia toward Behring' Straits. His celebrated voyage to the 
American comment, with which we are chiefly concerned, was not 
executed till the year 1741, when he left the Bay of Avacha, in 
