THE VAKIOUS EXPEDITIOKS. 153 



I should seem to be yielding to the biographer^s beset- 

 ting sin — to produce everything that can be said in 

 Bering^s defense. 



In the first place, then, it must be remembered that 

 on the 21st of July Bering had provisions left for no more 

 than three months, and that these were not good and 

 wholesome. His crew, and he himself, were already suf- 

 fering from scurvy to such an extent that two weeks later 

 one-third of them were on the sick-list. Furthermore, 

 he was over fifty-six degrees of longitude from his nearest 

 port of refuge, with a crew but little accustomed to the 

 sea. The American coast in that latitude was not, 

 according to Bering^'s judgment, nor is it according to our 

 present knowledge, in any way a fit place to winter, and 

 besides, he knew neither the sea nor its islands and depths, 

 its currents and prevailing winds. All this could not but 

 urge him to make no delay. And, in fact, Steller himself 

 expressly says that it was a series of such considerations 

 that determined Bering^s conduct. '' Pusillanimous 

 homesickness^' can scarcely have had any influence on 

 a man who from his youth had roamed about in the 

 world and lived half a generation in the wilds of Sibe- 

 ria. '^ The good Commander, '^ thus Steller expresses him- 

 self, '"^was far superior to all the other officers in divin- 

 ing the future, and in the cabin he once said to myself 

 and Mr. Plenisner: MYe think now that we have found 

 everything, and many are pregnant with great expecta- 

 tions ; but they do not consider where we have landed, 

 how far we are from home, and what yet may befall us. 

 Who knows but what we may meet trade winds that 

 will prevent our return? We are unacquainted with the 



