396 2 Russian Discoveries. 
they gave the name of Engafio. Holding a northerly course, 
they reached lat. 57° 58’, and then returned. 
Three vears after these Spanish voyages, Cook reconnoitred 
this coast more closely, and proceeded as. high up as the Icy 
Cape; it was subsequently visited by several English ships for 
the purposes of trade; and though every portion of it was ex- 
plored with the greatest accuracy by that most excellent and 
persevering navigator, Vancouver, as far as the head of Cook’s 
Inlet, in lat. 61° 15’; yet, on the ground of priority of discovery, 
it is sufficiently clear that England has no claim to territorial 
possession. On this principle, it would jointly belong to Russia 
and Spain; but, on the same principle, Russia would be com- 
pletely excluded from any portion of it to the southward of 59°. 
She has, however, been tacitly permitted to form an establish- 
ment, named Sitka, at the head of Norfolk Sound, in lat. 57°; 
and this, apparently, must have tempted her to presume, that 
no opposition would be offered to an extension of territory 
down to the fifty-first degree of latitude, which includes all the 
detailed discoveries of Cook and Vancouver, z. e. New Hanover, 
New Cornwall, New Norfolk on the main, and the Islands of. 
King George, Queen Charlotte, and Prince of Wales upon the 
coast. 
There is, however, one trifling circumstance, of which we are 
persuaded His Imperial Majesty was ignorant when he issued his 
sweeping ukase, namely—that the whole country, from lat. 
56° 30’ to the boundary of the United States in lat. 48°, or there- 
abouts, is now, and has long been, in the actual possession of the 
British North-west Company. The communication with this 
vast territory is by the Peace River, which, crossing the Rocky 
Mountains from the westward, in lat. N. 56°, and long. 121° W., 
falls into the Polar Sea by the Mackenzie River. ‘The country 
behind them, to the westward, has been named bythe settlers New 
Caledonia, and is in extent, from north to south, about 500 
miles, and from east to west 300 miles. It is described as very 
beautiful, abounding in fine forests, rivers, and magnificent lakes, 
one of which is not less than 300 miles in circumference, sur- 
rounded by picturesque mountains, clothed to their very summits 
with timber trees of the largest dimensions. From this lake, a 
river falls to the westward into the Pacific, either into Port Es- 
sington, or Observatory Inlet, where Vancouver discovered the 
mouths of two rivers, one in lat. 54° 15’, the other in 54° 59’, 
In the summer season, it swarms with salmon, from which the 
natives derive a considerable part of their subsistence. The 
North-west Company have a post on its borders, in Jat. 54° 30’ 
N., long.125° W., distant about 180 miles from the ‘ Observatory 
Inlet? of Vancouver, the head of which lies in lat. 35° 15'.N, 
long. 
