140 VITUS BEEING. 



right up to the Aleutian reef, their soundings gave them 

 no clue to land, although they were sailing almost paral- 

 lel with this chain of islands. But Bering was now con- 

 fined to his cabin. The troubles he had passed through, 

 his sixty years of age, and the incipient stages of scurvy, 

 had crushed his powers of resistance, while his officers, 

 Waxel and KhitrofP, dismissed Steller's observations with 

 scornful sarcasm. Not until the 12th of July did they 

 take any precautions against a sudden landing. They 

 took in some of the sails during the night and hove to. 

 They had then been on the sea about six weeks. Their 

 supply of water was about half gone, and according to the 

 ship^s calculations, which show an error of 8°, they had 

 sailed 46^° {i. e., 54^°) from the meridian of Avacha. 

 The ship^s council therefore concluded, on the 13th of 

 July, to sail due north, heading N. N. E., and at noon 

 on the 16th of July, in a latitude by observation of 

 58° 14' and a longitude of 49|° east of Avacha, they 

 finally saw land to the north.* The country was ele- 

 vated, the coast was jagged, covered with snow, inhosi3i- 

 table, and girt with islands, behind which a snow-capped 

 mountain peak towered so high into the clouds that it 

 could be seen at a distance of seventy miles. "1 do not 

 remember," says Steller, '' of having seen a higher moun- 

 tain in all Siberia and Kamchatka." This mountain 



* H. H. Bancroft, History of Alaska, p. 79, has the following note: " The 

 date of Bering's discovery, or the day when land was first sighted by the 

 lookout, has been variously stated. Miiller makes it the 20th of July, and 

 Steller the 18th; the 16th is in accordance with Bering's journal, and accord- 

 ing to Bering's observation the latitude was 58° 28'. This date is confirmed 

 by a manuscript chart compiled by Petroff and Waxel, with the help of the 

 original log-books of both vessels. The claim set up by certain Spanish 

 writers in favor of Francisco Gali as first discoverer of this region is based 

 on a misprint in an early account of his voyage. For particulars see Hist. 

 Cal., I., this series."— Tr. 



