110 VITUS BERING. 



the last, he found himself in a narrow strait, from ten to 

 twenty yards wide, and he did not stop until there was 

 scarcely a bucketful of water between the polar ice and 

 the rocky shore. But Cape Schelagskii, on the northeast 

 coast, where Deshneff a century before had shown the 

 way, he did not succeed in doubling. 



As a result of the labors of this great Northern 

 Expedition, the northern coast of the Old World 

 got substantially the same cartographical outline that 

 it now has. The determinations of latitude made by 

 the Russian officers were very accurate, but those of 

 longitude, based on nautical calculations, were not so 

 satisfactory. Their successors, Wrangell, Anjou, Mid- 

 dendorff, and even Nordenskjold, have therefore found 

 opportunity to make corrections of but minor import- 

 ance, especially in regard to longitude. 



But it is necessary to dwell a little longer on 

 these expeditions. Their principal object was not so 

 much the charting of northern Siberia as the dis- 

 covery and navigation of the Northeast passage. 

 From this point of view alone they must be consid- 

 ered. This is the connecting thought, the central 

 point in these scattered labors. They were an indi- 

 rect continuation of the West European expeditions 

 for the same purpose, but far more rational than 

 these. For this reason Bering had, on his expedi- 

 tion of reconnoissance (1725-30), first sought that 

 thoroughfare between the two hemispheres without 

 which a Northeast and a Northwest passage could 

 not exist. For this reason also he had, on his far- 

 sighted plan, undertaken the navigation of the Arctic 



