272 cook's voyage TO SEPT. 



of improvement. It fell out very opportunely, that 

 the water afforded us a little prey ; for besides our 

 ill success in the chase by land, we had also been 

 disappointed in our expectations of shooting wild 

 fowl, on a supply of which we had in some measure 

 depended for our subsistence ; and on its failure, 

 began to think that we had been full long absent 

 from head-quarters. 



Our Kamtschadales now discovered, that the want 

 of success, in not meeting with game, was owing to 

 the party being too large, and to the unavoidable 

 noise that was the consequence of it. We, therefore, 

 agreed to separate ; Ivaskin, the corporal, and my- 

 self, forming one party ; Captain Gore and the rest 

 of the company, the other. 



Accordingly, after passing the night under our 

 tent, we set out on the morning of the 19th, by dif- 

 ferent routes, meaning to take a circuit round the 

 country, and meet at Saint Peter and Saint Paul. 

 The party to which I belonged took the course of 

 the river, at the mouth of which we had fished for 

 the salmon ; and, after being thoroughly soaked by 

 the heavy rains that fell all the morning, we came 

 about three in the afternoon to some old balagans, 

 where a Kamtschadale village had been formerly 

 situated, without meeting with a single bear during 

 the whole of a long and tedious walk. It was our 

 first intention to have remained here all night, in 

 order to have resumed our chace early the next 

 morning ; but the weather clearing, and at the same 

 time a fresh breeze springing up from a quarter un- 

 favourable to our designs, the Hospodin, whom 

 former sufferings had made very unfit to bear much 

 fatigue, and who seemed at present more particularly 

 distressed from having emptied his snuff-box, began 

 to be very importunate with us to return home. It 

 was some time before the old corporal consented, 

 alleging, that we were at a great distance from the 

 harbour ; and that, on account of the badness of the 



