PACIFIC AND BEERING'S STRAIT. 337 



During the day we saw a great number of whales, 

 seals, and birds ; but none, I believe, that are not 

 mentioned in Pennant's Arctic Zoology. 1826. 



We noticed upon the island abreast of us, which 

 we conjectured to be the westernmost Diomede, se- 

 veral tents and yourts, and, also, two or three bai- 

 dars, hauled upon the beach. On the declivity of the 

 hill were several frames, apparently for drying fish 

 and skins, and depositing canoes and sledges upon. 

 It was nearly calm when we were off this place, but 

 the current, which still ran to the northward, car- 

 ried us fast along the land. I steered for the situa- 

 tion of the supposed additional island, until by our 

 reckoning we ought to have been upon it, and then 

 hauled over towards the American shore. In the 

 evening the fog cleared away, and our curiosity was 

 at last satisfied. The extremities of the two great 

 continents were distinctly seen, and the islands in 

 the strait clearly ascertained to be only three in 

 number, and occupying nearly the same situations 

 in which they were placed in the chart of Captain 

 Cook. 



The south-eastern of the three islands is a high 

 square rock ; the next, or middle one, is an island 

 with perpendicular cliffs, and a flat surface ; and the 

 third, or north-western, which is the largest, is three 

 miles long, high to the southward, and terminates, 

 in the opposite direction, in low cliffs with small 

 rocky points off them. East Cape in almost every 

 direction is so like an island, that I have no doubt 

 it was the occasion of the mistake which the Rus- 

 sian navigator has committed. 



For the sake of convenience, I named each of 

 these islands. The eastern one I called Fairway 



voi,. i. z 



