114 STELLER'S JOURNAL 



Chirikov.2«2 And it is quite true that on that occasion, when we 

 went south after having weathered the storm, we were told by 

 the men that land had been seen to the north, which at the time 

 we would not believe, and thus missed the right way. Captain 

 Chirikov has without doubt touched land here,263 a circumstance 

 of which I have already made mention in the beginning of this 

 account.* 



On September 25 with an increasing and continuous storm we 

 scudded until noon under the lower sails, spanker, and fore- 

 course (just as on the night before) in order to get away from the 

 land in a southeasterly direction, being in constant danger of 

 losing spars and masts because of the very violent wind. In the 



262 On this point see, above, footnote 42, last two paragraphs. 



2" Chirikov did touch land in this region, anchoring off Adak Island on 

 September 9 (see Vol. i, pp. 302-306, 319-320, 346-347). Steller knew 

 that Chirikov had struck land on that date, for, although Steller reached 

 Petropavlosk after Chirikov had left for Okhotsk (see Vol. i, pp. 280 and 

 329), copies of Chirikov's journal and report were doubtless available to 

 him, either there or at Bolsheretsk, right across the peninsula, where he 

 prepared the present journal during the winter of 1 742-1 743 (see below, 

 p. 190, footnote i). However, from that information he must have 

 assumed that the landfall of the St. Peter on September 24 was about 

 2)4:° in longitude to the ivest of the landing place of the St. Paul on Sep- 

 tember 9 (longitude of the former vessel from Vaua, 20°45', according 

 to the log book. Vol. i, p. 167; longitude of the latter, about 23°, accord- 

 ing to the implication of the corrected distance in Chirikov's report. 

 Vol. I, p. 320; see also map in Zapiski Hydrogr. Depart., Vol. 9, 1851, men- 

 tioned in footnote 260; see Vol. i, PI. I) while it really was about i^° to 

 the east. 



By his previous reference to Chirikov to which Steller alludes in the 

 next clause, he probably means his mention, on pp. 24-25, above, of the 

 land alleged to have been seen to the north at the time the two ships 

 parted company. (J) 



* The location of the land here mentioned and noticed during Bering's 

 outward voyage and on the return on the 51st parallel agrees fairly well 

 with the now well-known Aleutian Islands, and the actual difference is 

 doubtless attributable to the chances of a stormy navigation. — P. [That 

 this land could not have been noticed on Bering's outward voyage has 

 already been dealt with in footnote 42, last paragraph. This does not, 

 of course, affect the correctness of Pallas' identification of the landfall 

 of September 24. (J)] 



