CHAPTER VI. 



THE TASK ASSIGNED BY PETER THE GREAT ACCOM- 

 PLISHED. — HISTORY OF THE CARTOGRAPHY OF EAST 

 SIBERIA. — CAPTAIN COOK'S DEFENSE OF BERING. 



BERING- turned back because he felt convinced that 

 he had sailed around the northeastern corner of 

 Asia, and had demonstrated that in this part of the 

 earth the two great continents were not connected. 

 The third point in his orders was of course dropped, 

 for along the Siberian coasts of the Arctic sea, he could 

 expect to find neither European colonists nor ships ; 

 hence, further search with this object in view would be 

 vain. He had a very clear idea of the general outline 

 of eastern Asia, and this knowledge was based upon the 

 facts of his own voyage, the information he had ob- 

 tained in Yakutsk about Deshneff's expedition from 

 Kolyma to Anadyr, and upon the account which the 

 natives gave of the country and of their commercial 

 journeys westward to Olenek. 



He was, moreover, convinced that he had given the 

 search for a Northeast passage a rational foundation, 

 and his thoughts on this subject are found clearly pre- 

 sented in a correspondence from St. Petersburg to a 

 Copenhagen periodical, Nye Tidende, in 1730, whence 

 the following : " Be7'ing has ascertained that there really 



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