18 VITUS BEBING. 



large quantities from the fifth or sixth island. Through 

 these various expeditions there was collected vast, al- 

 though unscientific, materials for the more correct under- 

 standing of the geography of eastern Asia, the Sea of 

 Okhotsk, Kamchatka, the Kuriles, and Yezo. Even con- 

 cerning the Island of Nipon (Hondo), shipwrecked Jap- 

 anese had given valuable information. Simultaneously, 

 the northern coast about the mouth of the Kolyma, had 

 been explored by the Cossacks Viligin and Amossoff. 

 Through them the first information concerning the Bear 

 Islands and Wrangel Island found its way to Yakutsk. 

 The Cossack chief Shestakoff, who had traveled into the 

 northeastern regions toward the land of the Chukchees, 

 accepted the accounts of the former for his map, but as 

 he could neither read nor write, matters were most bewil- 

 deringly confused. Yet his representations were later 

 accepted by Strahlenberg and Joseph de Tlsle in their 

 maps. 



