180 VITUS BERING. 



whatever for modifying the results arrived at by Baer, 

 Brandt, and Middendorff.* 



Without this animal wealth it would have gone 

 with Bering's expedition as it did later with the un- 

 fortunate La Perouse, whose monument has found a 

 place in Petropavlovsk by the side of Bering's. It 

 Avould have been hopelessly lost on Bering Island. 

 None of the participants would have seen Asia again, 

 none would even have survived the winter 1741-42, 

 for when the St. Peter stranded, there were on board 

 only a few barrels of junk, a small quantity of groats, 

 and some flour. The flour had been lying in leathern 

 sacks for two years, and in the stranding had been 

 saturated with turbid sea water, and hence was very 

 unfit for food. How fatal, therefore, Waxel's and 

 Khitroff's opposition to Bering might have been. 



It was the night between the 5th and 6th of No- 

 vember that the St. Peter reached this coast. On the 

 6th the weather was calm and clear, but the crew 

 were kept on board from weakness and work, and 

 only Steller and Pleniser could go ashore with a few 

 of the sick. They immediately betook themselves to 

 examining the country, and walked along the coast 

 on either side. Was this an island, or was it the 

 mainland ? Could they expect to find human assist- 

 ance, and could they reach home by land ? After two 

 days of exploration, Steller succeeded in satisfying 



♦Dr. Stejneger says, after a very careful and exhaustive discussion 

 of this question: "It may thus be regarded as fairly proved that the 

 unknown cetacean, which in 1846 was observed near the southern end of 

 Bering Island, was a female narwhal. But, whatever it may have been, 

 one thing is absolutely sure : it was not a sea-cow f' For references see Note 

 65.— Tr. 



