20 JAPANESE WRECKS IN THE 



North Atlantic, especially in their origin at latitude 23°, their being nearly 

 180 degrees of longitude apart,^ their general course, etc., etc. 



There is a branch of the Euro Shiwo, which shoots off northward near 

 Kamschatka, and is felt 50 or 100 miles oft' this promontory; whilst close in 

 shore, a cold current flows southward from the Arctic through the western 

 part of Behring's Straits. On Kamschatka, the Kurile and Aleutian Islands, 

 and on Alaska, great number of disabled Japanese junks must have been 

 stranded in past centuries. 



Professor Davidson, who has had occasion to examine the Spanish, Eng- 

 lish, Russian and American records of discoveries in this ocean, assures me 

 that he has found mention of at least a dozen or more janks, wrecked on the 

 coasts of Kamschatka, within a Comparatively recent period; and in the earlier 

 descriptions of the Kurile Islands, and of the Kamschatka Peninsula, he 

 says frequent mention is made of the wrecks of Japanese junks upon these 

 coasts. 



Both winds and currents of the North Pacific assist in driving disabled 

 Japanese junks around the great circle of the Kuro Shiwo. A junk disabled 

 in the latitude of Tokio would be swept by alternate southwest and northwest 

 winds, and the existing northeasterly current, towards the northwest coast of 

 America. The distance from Cape King to San Francisco is about 4,500 

 nautical miles. We have here abundant proof of the track taken by these 

 disabled vessels, by a study of their positions when found drifting at sea in the 

 Pacific, at the mercy of winds and waves. 



For many, many centuries the coasting trade of Japan has employed a large 

 fleet of junks in exchanging rice from their southern, for salt fish from their 

 northern ports. Although it may be presumed that the large number of 

 their vessels thus disabled and rendered unmanageable, undoubtedl}' founder 

 in the heavy gales they experience; yet comparatively large numbers having 

 cargoes suitable for food, and crossing a region subject to much raio, which 

 is easily caught, are enabled to sustain life until eithei' picked up, or stranded 

 somewhere on the American coast, or some island in their course. 



In the above sixty cases enumerated, there were, from 1613 to 1694, four 

 cases; from 1710 to 1782, three cases; 1804 to 1820, six cases; 1831 to 1848, 

 eleven cases; and since the rapid settlement of this coast in 1850 to 1876, only 

 28 years, we have a list of 36 wrecks reported. This apparent increase is not 

 owing to their increased number, but solely to the fact, that increase of com- 

 merce on the Pacific has distributed there a large fleet, whose presence has 

 materially increased the chances of rescue to disabled vessels, and the likeli- 

 hood of receiving reports from stranded wrecks. 



In addition to the list we have enumerated, are the Hawaiian traditions that 

 several such junks were wrecked on Hawaii before the year 1778; to which 

 add the wrecks from which the 18 Japanese were returned from Honolulu in 

 1834, also those from which came the junk full of shipwreck Japanese, who 

 attempted to, and failed in returning, by Cheefoo to Nagasaki ; also the dozen 

 additional ones, alluded to by Professor Davidson, as stranded on the penin- 

 sula of Kamschatka, within a comparatively recent period; and the frequent 

 mention of similar wrecks on the Kurile Islands. These all taken together, 

 with yet others not fully verified, could scarcely have been less than forty 



