24 STELLER'S JOURNAL 



St. Paul, under the command of Captain Chirikov, became 

 separated from us and was not seen again during the entire 

 voyage. — Because even thus early a beginning had been made to 

 carry out another scheme, namely not to let the Captain Com- 

 mander, who constantly stayed in the cabin, know more than 

 was considered advisable, another misfortune occurred, in that 

 the story told by some of the men who thought that they had 

 seen land to the north — a story, if not infallible, at least appar- 

 ently very probable — was neither listened to nor considered 

 worthy of any consideration, until during the return voyage, 

 on August 24, ■^^ unexpectedly and to the terror of all, land 

 was sighted on the 51st parallel, whereupon the voices of the 

 penitents were heard too late. This, according to the ship's 



42 Both Pallas and the MS read thus. The date should, however, be 

 September 24 (civil time) : see the log book of the St. Peter (Vol. i, p. 168) 

 and Waxel's report {ibid., p. 275), also, below, p. 112, under September 24. 



Steller's whole argument in this paragraph is fallacious, and in this 

 instance his contempt for the naval officers was not justified. A con- 

 tinuance of the original SE by E course after June 12 would not have 

 led to the discovery of land, as a glance at any chart of the North Pacific 

 will show. 



The statement that the land sighted on September 24 "according to 

 the ship's reckoning must have been the land where we lost Captain 

 Chirikov" must be understood as referring only to the general location. 

 The log of the St. Peter for June 20, the day of separation of the two 

 vessels (Vol. i, p. 65) gives her position as lat. 49° 22' and long. 18'' 06' 

 from Vaua lighthouse at the entrance to Avacha Bay; for September 24 

 {ibid., p. 167) as lat. 51° 27' and long. 20° 45' from Vaua. These two 

 positions are about 160 nautical miles apart; but, owing to the accumu- 

 lated error in longitude in the ship's reckoning (see Vol. i, p. 210, footnote 

 124), the two positions were really about 215 nautical miles apart, as 

 shown on PI. I in Vol. i. The land sighted on September 24 was prob- 

 ably Adak and Atka Islands with the intervening islands (see, below, 

 footnote 260). Even assuming the distance of 160 nautical miles, they 

 would not have been visible from the St. Peter's position on June 20, 



As to the belief of some of the men that they had seen land to the 

 north where the two vessels lost sight of each other, there was no basis 

 for it in fact, as the nearest arc of visibility, that of Amatagnik Island, 

 did not reach to within 40 nautical miles of the ships' northernmost 

 position, just before separation, on June 19 (see Vol. i, PI. I). (J) 



