APPENDIX TO CASE OP GREAT BlllTAIN. 295 



courageous enterprise, before which distance and difiiculty disappeared. 

 He was not a beginner when he entered into tlie service of tlie Telegraph 

 Company. Already he had visited the Youkou country by the way of 

 the Mackenzie River, and contributed to the Smithsonian Institution 

 important informatiou with regard to its geography and natural history, 

 some of which will be found in their Reports, Nature in uovel forms 

 was opeu to him. The birds here maintained their kingdom. All about 

 him was the mysterious breeding place of the canvas-back duck, whose 

 eggs, never before seen by a naturalist, covered acres. 



If we look to mai)S for information, here again we find ourselves dis- 

 appointed. Latterly the coast is outlined and described with reason- 

 able completeness; so also are the islands. This is the contribution of 

 navigators and of recent Russian charts. But the interior is little more 

 than a blank, calling to mind ''the pathless downs,'' where, according 

 to Prior, the old get)grai)hers "place elei)hants instead of towns." I 

 have already referred to what i)urports to be a "General Map of 

 GO the Russian li^nipiie," ])ublish('d by the Academy of Sciences at 

 St. Petersburgii in 1770, and republished at London in 1787, 

 where Russian America does not appear. I might mention also that 

 Captain Cook comi)lained in his day of the Russian maps as " wonder- 

 fully erroneous." On his return English maps recorded his explorations 

 and the names he assigned to different i)arts of the coast. These were 

 rei)roduccd in St. Petersburgii, and the Russian copy was then repro- 

 duced in London, so that geographical knowledge was very little 

 advanced. Some of the best maps of this region are by Germans, who 

 always excel in maps. Here, for instance, is an excellent Map of the 

 Aleutian Islands and the neighbouring coasts, especially to illustrate 

 their orography and geography, which will be found at the end of the 

 volume of "Transactions of the Impei'ial Mineralogical Society" at St. 

 Petersburgh, to which I have already referred. 



Late ma])S attest the tardiness of information. Here, for instance, 

 is an excellent Map of North America, puri^orting to be published by 

 the Geograi)hical Institute of Weimar as late as 1859, on whi(;h we have 

 the Youkon iiictured, very much like the Niger, in Africa, as a large 

 river meandering in the interior without any outlet to the sea. Here, 

 also, is a Russian map of this very region, as late as 18G1, in which the 

 course of the Youkon is left in doubt. On other maps, as in the Atlas 

 of Keith Johnston, it is pictured under another name as entering into 

 the Frozen Ocean. Rut the secret is penetrated at last. Recent dis- 

 covery by the enterprise of our citizens in the service of the Telegraph 

 Company fixes that this river is an aftluentof the Kwichpak, as the 

 Missouri is an affluent of the Mississippi, and enters into Behring Sea, 

 by many mouths, between the parallels of 04° and 05°. After the death 

 of Major Keunicott a division of his party, with nothing but a skin 

 boat, ascended the river to Fort Youkon, where it bifurcates, and 

 descended it again to Nulato, thus establishing the entire course from 

 its sources in the Rocky Mountains for a distance exceeding 1,0U0 miles. 

 I have before me now an outline map just prepared by our Coast Sur- 

 vey, where this correction is made. Ijut this is only the harbinger of 

 the raatui er labours of our accomplished Bureau when the coasts of this 

 region are under the jurisdiction of the United States. 



In closing this abstract of authorities, being the chief sources of orig- 

 inal iriformation on this subject, I cannot forbear expressing my satis- 

 faction that, with the exception of a single work, all these maybe found 

 in the Congressional Library, now so happily enriched by the rare col- 

 lection of the Smithsonian Institution. Sometimes individuals are like 



