1779' COOK AND CLEKKE. 317 



of America, was low land next the sea, with ele- 

 vated land farther back. It was destitute of 

 wood, and without snow. To a steep and rocky 

 point Captain Cook gave the name of Cape 

 North; its latitude 68° 56\ longitude 180° 51'; 

 no land appearing to the northward of this, it 

 it was concluded that the coast here beo:an to 

 trend to the westvv^ard. " The season," says Cap- 

 tain Cook, ^^ was now so far advanced, and the 

 time when the frost is expected to set in so near at 

 hand, that I did not think it consistent with pru- 

 dence, to make any further attempts to find a 

 passage into the Atlantic this year, in any direc- 

 tion, so little was the prospect of succeeding." 

 Accordingly, on the 30tli August, he stood to the 

 southward, coasting the land of Asia from the 

 Cape Serdze Kamtn of Muller, so called from a 

 heart-shaped rock upon it, round East Cape, 

 passed the mouth of the bay of St. Lawrence, 

 down to Tschukotskoi Noss, from thence to 

 Norton Sound on the American coast, and finally 

 to the Sandwich Islands, where this celebrated 

 navigator lost his life.* 



Captain Clerke was now become Commanding 

 Oflficer, and Lieutenant Gore appointed Com- 

 mander of the Discoverv. On the 15th March, 



XJ 



U79, they left the Sandwich Islands, and stood 

 to the northward, by the way of Kamtschatka, to 

 follow up the discovery of a passage into the 



* Cook's last Voyage into the Pacific, &c. vol. ii. • 



