152 VITUS BERING. 



he occupied. He took to his bed, and Lieutenant Waxel 

 assumed charge of the vessel/^ * 



This is not writing history. It is only a series of errors 

 and incivilities. It was not the 18th of July that Bering 

 first saw land. He did not sail north from Kayak, but 

 southwest, and hence could not have lost his course 

 among islands, for here there are no islands. Nor did he 

 sail hither and thither, but kept the course that had 

 been laid out, and charted the coasts he saw in this 

 course. The most ridiculous part of this is what this 

 nautical author tells of the bay between Cape St. Elias 

 and Cape St. Hermogenes (Marmot Island off the coast 

 of Kadiak Island), for these points are farther apart 

 than Copenhagen and Bremen. If, according to this 

 writer, Bering was unpardonably stupid, he must have 

 been, on the other hand, astonishingly *^^ far-sighted.^' 

 After these statements it will surprise no one that this 

 author considers illness a kind of crime, and blames a 

 patient, sixty years of age, suffering with the scurvy, 

 for taking to his bed ! If Mr. Dall had taken the trouble 

 to study the Bering literature to which he himself refers 

 in his bibliography of Alaska, he would have been in a 

 position to pass an independent opinion of the navigator, 

 and would certainly have escaped making this series of 

 stupid statements. His words now simply serve to show 

 how difficult it is to eradicate prejudice, and how tena- 

 cious of life a false or biased judgment can be. Death 

 prevented Bering from defending and explaining his 

 conduct. No one has since that time sought to render 

 him justice. I therefore consider it my duty — even if 



* Note 62. 



