TXTUODUCTIOX. 



under the direction of some enterprising American 

 captain, for wliich purpose the Count had ah'cady 

 o})ened a correspondence with America. This 

 latter attempt, however, was not made j because 

 it was my opinion, tliat it sliould not be com- 

 menced till the first expedition had returned : it 

 might then have the advantage of being under- 

 taken from Russia ; and not by Americans, but by 

 Russians. The expedition fitted out from England 

 two years later, of course rendered the execution 

 of this second part of the plan quite unnecessary. 

 With regard to the attempt to find a passage from 

 the sea of Kamtschatka to the Atlantic Ocean, or 

 from west to east, the endeavours of Captains Cook 

 and Clerke in Beering's Straits, left but little hope 

 of penetrating farther to the north than they had 

 done ; but there were parts of the coast of Ame- 

 rica, both to the north and south of Beering's 

 Straits, which those celebrated navigators could not 

 explore ; a circumstance which, at least, lefl a 

 spark of hope that some inlet might be found in 

 those parts, connected, if not directly with Baffin's 

 Bay, yet with some river fldling into the Frozen 

 Sea, (of which we already know two, the Copper- 

 mine River and Mackenzie River), from which it 

 would be easier to penetrate into the Atlantic 

 Ocean than through Beering's Straits and round 

 Icy Cape. However little jjrobability there might 

 appear of finding a passage just here, its existence 

 cannot be positively denied, till this part of the 



