4 A SHOOTING TRIP TO KAMCHATKA 



Crown. The beginning of the seventeenth century 

 found Russian dominion extended to the banks of the 

 Yenissei River and later to the Lena, where, in 1638, 

 the Government actively supported the work of the 

 Cossacks by founding the town of Yakoutsk on the 

 spot where six years before a small fort had been 

 built, and by placing the district under the administra- 

 tion of an appointed governor or voievoda. Hence- 

 forward Yakoutsk was to be the central point from 

 which started the subsequent invading parties of 

 Cossacks, who gradually reached the Okhotsk Sea, on 

 whose shores they erected an ostrog, or fort, and 

 eventually poured down from the north into the 

 Kamchatkan Peninsula. In 1643 an expedition of 

 a hundred Cossacks, under the leadership of V^assili 

 Poiarkoff, crossed the Stanovoi range and discovered 

 the Amur. 



In 1644 another party reached the Arctic Ocean by 

 descending the Kolyma River on rafts, and took up 

 a firm position at its mouth. Officials were despatched 

 to those distant parts with orders to collect taxes from 

 the subdued natives, followed not only by adventurers 

 of all kinds, but also by tradesmen, who were attracted 

 by the rich furs of the country. In 1648 seven 

 boats, with Cossacks on board, started from KoKinsk 

 along the northern coast of Siberia, under the com- 



