14 ACCOUNT OF THE ARCTIC REGIONS. 



From near Taimourska, therefore, to near the Pia- 

 cina, was not accomplished *. In the same sum- 

 mer, Lieutenant Lassenius sailed from the Lena 

 eastward towards Kamtchatka, and wintered in the 

 river Charaulack, lying between the Lena and the 

 Jana, where, of 52 persons composing his crew, 

 46 died of the scurvy. Lieutenant Dmitri Lap- 

 tieff, after an attempt which failed in 1736, was 

 again sent from the Lena in 1739 towards the east. 

 He wintered in the Indighirsa, where he lost his 

 vessel, but prosecuted his voyage in another, the 

 following spring, as far as the river Kovima, from 

 whence he crossed the Isthmus of the Tchuktchi 

 country to the river Anadir, communicating with 

 the sea of Kamtchatka f . The navigation round 

 the great promontory of the Tchuktchi, constitu- 

 ting the north-eastern termination of Asia, was ac- 

 complished by one of three vessels which sailed from 

 the Kovima, in order to penetrate into the Eastern 

 Ocean, on the 20th of June 1648. This expedi- 

 tion, indeed, is said to have originally consisted of 

 seven kotches, four of which were never heard of 

 after they sailed. One of the other three, vv^hich 

 proceeded for some time in company, was wrecked 



* Muller mentions^ that in 1738 Lieutenant Chariton Lap- 

 tiefF was sent from Petersburgh, to take up the task assigned 

 to ProntschitschefF, and to go through with it by sea or land ; 

 but it appears he also failed. — Translation, p. I9. 



+ Muller's Voyages^ — Translation, p. ig, 20. 



