t 



300 THE POLAR WORLD. 



Nor could the Government prevent the accumulation of usurious debts, nor 

 the leasing of the best pasturages or fishing-stations for a trifling sum quite out 

 of proportion to their value ; so that the natives no longer had the means of 

 feeding their herds, and sank deeper and deeper into poverty. 



And if we consider, finally, of what elements Yermak's band was originally 

 composed, we can easily conceive that, under such masters, the lot of the Sibe- 

 rian natives was by no means to be envied. 



The year 1734 opens a new epoch in the history of Siberian discoveries. 

 Until then they had been merely undertaken for purposes of traffic ; bold Cos- 

 sacks and Promyschlcnniki (or fur-hunters) had gradually extended their ex- 

 cursions to the Sea of Bering ; but now, for the first time, scientific expeditions 

 were sent out, for the more (|ccurate investigation of the northern coasts of 

 Siberia. 



Prontschischtschevv, who sailed westward from the Lena to circumnavigate 

 the icy capes of Taimurland, was accompanied by his youthful wife, who win- 

 tered with him at the Olenek, in 12° 54' of latitude, and in the following sum- 

 mer took part in his fruitless endeavors to double those most northerly points 

 of Asia. He died in consequence of the fatigues he had to undergo, and a few 

 days after she followed him to the grave. A similar example of female devo- 

 tion is not to be met with in the annals of Arctic discovery. 



After Prontschischtschew's death, Lieutenant Chariton Laptew was ap- 

 pointed to carry out the project in which the former had failed. Having been 

 repulsed by the drift-ice, he was obliged to winter on the Chatanga (1739-40) ; 

 but renewed the attempt in the following summer, which however exposed him 

 to still severer trials. The vessel was wrecked in the ice ; the crew reached 

 the shore with difficulty, and many of them perished from fatigue and famine 

 before the rivers were sufficiently frozen to enable the feeble survivors to return 

 to their former winter-station at Chatanga. Notwithstanding the hardships 

 wliich he and his party had endured, Laptew prosecuted the survey of the 

 promontory in the following spring. 



Setting out with a sledge-party across the Tundra on April 24, 1741, he 

 reached Taimur Lake on the 30th ; and following the Taimur River, as it flows 

 from the lake, ascertained its mouth to be situated in lat. 75° 36' N. On Au- 

 gust 29 he safely returned to Jeniseisk, after one of the most difficult voyages 

 ever performed by man. The resolution with which he overcame difficulties, 

 and his perseverance amid the severest distresses, entitle him to a high rank 

 among Arctic discoverers. 



While Chariton Laptew was thus gaining distinction in the wilds of Tai- 

 murland, his brother, Dimitri Laptew, was busy extending geographical knowl- 

 edge to the east of the Lena. He doubled the Sviatoi-noss, wintered on the 

 banks of the Indigirka, surveyed the Bear Islands, passed a second winter on 

 the borders of the Kolyma, and in a fourth season extended his survey of the 

 coast to the Baranow Rock, which he vainly endeavored to double during two 

 successive summers. After having passed seven years on the coasts of the 

 Polar Ocean, he returned to Jakutsk in 1743. 



