1728.] Bering's voyage to the arctic sea. 129 



the purpose by Peter, on account of his approved courage and 

 nautical skill ; his lieutenants were Alexei Tchirikof, a Russian, and 

 Martin Spangberg, a German, each of whom afterwards acquired 

 reputation as a navigator. 



Bering was instructed, first — to examine the coasts north and 

 east from Kamtchatka, in order to determine whether or not they 

 were connected with, or contiguous to, America ; and next — to 

 reach, if possible, some port belonging to Europeans on the same 

 sea. With these objects he sailed from Kamtchatka River, t)n the 

 14th of July, 1728, and, taking a northward course along the Asiatic 

 shore, he traced it to the latitude of 67 degrees 18 minutes: there 

 he found the coast turning almost directly westward, and presenting 

 nothing but rocks and snow, as far as it could be perceived, whilst 

 no land was visible in the north or east. From these circumstances 

 the navigator concluded that he had reached the north-eastern ex- 

 tremity of Asia, that the waters in which he was sailing were those 

 of the Icy or Arctic Sea, bounding that continent on the north, and, 

 consequently, that he had ascertained the fact of the separation of 

 Asia from America. Being satisfied, therefore, that he had attained 

 the objects of his voyage in that direction, and fearing that, if he 

 should attempt to advance farther, he might be obliged to winter in 

 those desolate regions, for which he was unprepared, he returned 

 to Kamtchatka, where he arrived on the 2d of September. All his 

 conclusions have been since verified ; he, however, little suspected 

 that he had, as was the fact, twice passed within a few leagues of 

 the American continent, through the only channel connecting the 

 Pacific with the Arctic Sea. When the existence of this channel 

 was satisfactorily determined, it received, by universal consent, the 

 name of Bering's Strait, which it still bears. 



In the ensuing year, Bering attempted to reach the American 

 continent, by sailing directly eastward from Kamtchatka ; but, ere 

 he had proceeded far in that course, he was assailed by violent 

 adverse storms, which forced his vessel around the southern extrem- 

 ity of the peninsula, into the Gulf of Ochotsk. He then went to 

 St. Petersburg, from which he did not return to engage in another 

 voyage of discovery until twelve years afterwards. 



While Bering thus remained at the Russian capital, the existence 

 of a direct communication between the sea which bathes the shores 

 of Kamtchatka and the Pacific was proved, — first, in 1729, by the 

 wreck of a Japanese vessel on the coast of the peninsula, — and, ten 

 years afterwards, by the voyages of two Russian vessels, under 

 17 



