22 THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. 



Deschnev's voyage, from the Lena, through Behring's Straits 

 to the mouth of the Anadir, in 1648, became completely forgotten 

 in the course of about a century, until Miiller, by searches in 

 the Siberian archives, recovered the details of these and various 

 other voyages along the north coast of Siberia. That the 

 memory of these remarkable voyages has been preserved to 

 after-times, however, depends, as has been already stated, upon 

 accidental circumstances, lawsuits, and such like, which led to 

 correspondence with the authorities. Of other similar under- 

 takings we have certainly no knowledge, although now and then 

 we find it noted that the Polar Sea had in former times often 

 been traversed. In accounts of the expeditions fitted out by 

 the authorities, it, for instance, often happens that mention is 

 made of meeting with hunters and traders, who were sailing 

 along the coast in the prosecution of private enterprise. Little 

 attention was, however, given to these voyages, and, eighty-one 

 years after Deschnev's voyage, the existence of straits between 

 the north-eastern extremity of Asia and the north-western ex- 

 tremity of America was quite unknown, or at least doubted. 

 Finally, in 1729, Behring anew sailed through the Sound, and 

 attached his name to it. He did not sail, however, very far (to 

 172° W. Long.) along the north coast of Asia, although he does 

 not appear to have met with any obstacle from ice. Nearly fifty 

 years afterwards Cook concluded in these waters the series of 

 splendid discoveries with which he enriched geographical 

 science. After havincr, in 1778, sailed a good wav eastwards 

 along the north coast of America, he turned towards the west, 

 and reached the 180th degree of longitude on the 29th August : 

 the fear of meeting with ice deterred him from sailing further 

 westward, and his vessel appears to have scarcely been equipped 

 or fitted for sailing among ice. 



After Cook's time we know of only three expeditions which 

 have sailed westwards from Behring's Straits. The first was an 

 American expedition, under Captain Rodgers, in 1855. He 

 reached, through what appears to have been open water, the 

 longitude of Cape Yakan (176° E. from Greenwich). The second 

 was that of the English steam-whaler Long, who, in 1867, in search 

 of a new profitable whale-fishing ground, sailed further west than 

 any before him. By the 10th August he had reached the 

 longitude of Tschaun Bay (170° E. from Greenwich). He was 

 engaged in whale-fishing, not in an exploring expedition, and 

 turned here ; but, in the short account he has given of his 

 voyage, he expresses the decided conviction that a voyage from 

 Behring's Straits to the Atlantic belongs to the region of possi- 

 bilities, and adds that, even if this sea-route does not come to 

 be of any commercial importance, that between the Lena and 

 Behring's Straits ought to be useful for turnincj to account the 



