1790.] VOYAGES OF BILLINGS AND QUIMPER. 221 



Ochotsk, that the vessels were not ready for sea until 1789, and 

 then one of them was wrecked immediately after leaving the port. 

 With the other vessel Billings took his departure, on the 2d of 

 May, 1790, and sailed eastward, stopping, in his way, at Unalashka, 

 Kodiak, and Prince William's Sound, as far as Mount St. Elias ; 

 but there his provisions began to fail, and he returned to Petro- 

 pawlowsk, soon after reaching which he abandoned the command 

 of the enterprise. In the following year, the same vessel, with 

 another, which had been built in Kamtchatka, quitted the Bay of 

 Avatscha, under Captains Hall and Sarytscheff, neither of whom 

 advanced beyond Bering's Strait on the north, or Aliaska on the 

 east, or collected any information of value within those limits. A 

 melancholy picture of the sufferings experienced in these vessels 

 has been presented in the narrative of Martin Sauer, a German, 

 who, in an unlucky moment, agreed to act as secretary to the expe- 

 dition : another account, contradicting that of Sauer in many 

 particulars, has been published by Sarytscheff, who attributes the 

 failure of the enterprise to the incapacity of Billings. 



In the summer of 1790, an attempt was also made, by the 

 Spaniards, to explore the supposed Strait of Juan de Fuca. For 

 that purpose, Elisa, the commandant of Nootka, detached Lieu- 

 tenant Quimper, in the sloop Princess Royal, who traced the pas- 

 sage in an eastwardly direction, examining both its shores, to the 

 distance of about a hundred miles from its mouth, where it was 

 observed to branch off into a number of smaller passages, towards 

 the south, the east, and the north, some of which were channels 

 between islands, while others appeared to extend far into the 

 interior. Quimper was unable, from want of time, to penetrate 

 any of these passages ; and he could do no more than note the 

 positions of their entrances, and of several harbors, all of which 

 are now well known, though they are generally distinguished by 

 names different from those assigned to them by the Spaniards. 

 Among these passages and harbors were the Canal de Caamano, 

 afterwards named by Vancouver Admiralty Inlet; the Boca de 

 Flon, or Deception Passage ; the Canal de Guemes, and Canal de 

 Haro, which may still be found under those names in English 

 charts, extending northward from the eastern end of the strait; 

 Port Quadra, the Port Discovery of Vancouver, said to be one of 

 the best harbors on the Pacific side of America, with Port Quimper, 

 near it on the west ; and Port Nunez Gaona, called Poverty Cove 

 by the American fur traders, situated a few miles east of Cape 



