GEOGRAPHY OP THE SANDWICH ISLANDS. 39 



ivory tusks, are brought by the Esquimaux and Tchukskies from the 

 islands near Bering's Strait and the shores of the Arctic Sea. Several 

 expeditions have been recently made by Russian officers into the interior 

 of these countries, in which two large rivers, the Kwikpak and the 

 Kuskokwim, emptying into the sea between the 60th and the 63d de- 

 grees of latitude, were traced to great distances from their mouths. 



The part of Asia bathed by the Sea of Kamtchatka, like the opposite 

 part of America, is a waste of snow-covered rocks, among which rise 

 chains of lofty mountains. The principal of these chains extends south- 

 ward through the Pacific from the 60th parallel of latitude, forming the great 

 peninsula of Kamtchatka : south of which stretch the Kurile Islands, 

 south of these the Japan Islands, and still farther south, the Philip- 

 pine Islands; all forming parts of the same line of volcanoes which 

 extends along the west coasts of North America. The only place of 

 importance in Kamtchatka is Petropavvlowsk, a small town situated on 

 the Bay of Avatscha, in the south-east part of the peninsula, in latitude 

 of 53 degrees 58 minutes. Near the point where the peninsula joins 

 the continent stands another small town, called Ochotsk, on the north- 

 ernmost shore of the Gulf of Ochotsk, which separates Kamtchatka from 

 the main land on the west. 



The Kurile Islands are twenty-two in number, of which nineteen are 

 subject to Russia, and the others to Japan. The Russian Islands form 

 one district of the Russian American Company's possessions; they are 

 all small, and of little value, many of them being entirely without springs 

 of fresh water. The Russians have but one establishment on them, 

 called Semussir, in Urup, the southernmost of the islands, from which 

 some seal-skins are annually carried to Petropawlowsk and Ochotsk. 



THE SANDWICH ISLANDS. 



These islands, sometimes called the Hawaiian Archipelago, are situ- 

 ated in the north-west division of the Pacific, nearly due south of Aliaska, 

 and west of the southern extremity of California, at nearly equal distances 

 — that is, about two thousand five hundred miles — from each of those 

 parts of America, and from the Bay of San Francisco. Their distance 

 from Canton is about five thousand miles. They are ten in number, 

 extending, in a curved line, about three hundred miles in length, from the 

 19th degree of latitude, north-westward, to the 22d : their whole super- 

 ficial extent is estimated at six thousand six hundred square miles, and 

 the number of their population, by the latest accounts, was about one 

 hundred and fifty thousand. 



The south-easternmost of the islands, embracing two thirds of the 

 surface, and more than half of the population, of the whole, is Owyhee, 

 (or Hawaii, according to the orthography adopted by the American 

 missionaries.*) North-west of Owyhee is Mowee, (or Maui,) the second 

 in size of the islands, with about twenty thousand inhabitants. Near 

 Mowee, on the west, are Tahoorowa, (Kahulawe,) Morokini, (Molokini,) 

 Ranai, (Lanai,) and Morotai, (Molokai,) all of them small and unimpor- 

 tant. Farther in the same direction is Woahoo, (Oahu,) nearly as large 



* See account of this system at p. 330 of the History. 



