TO THE COAST OP AMERICA. I9 



it was to fee that hone were injured or opprefTed. By 

 all poffible methods I endeavoured to make it plain to 

 them how they would profper and flourifh, if they de- 

 voted themfelves with fidelity to our moll gracious 

 monarch ; who, on the other hand, had power fuffi- 

 cient to punifh them for their obftinacy and chaftife 

 them for difobedience ; and, by frequent repetitions of 

 my accounts of the order and harmony that prevailed 

 in Ruffia, of the beautiful houfes and edifices that 

 were there, 1 excited the curioiity of fome of them fo 

 far, that forty of them, men, women, and children, 

 expreffed their longing to fee Ruffia, and actually 

 accompanied me to Okhotsk. Fifteen of them pro- 

 ceeded farther, to Irkutzk ; the reft, after having 

 cloathed them and made them fome prefents, I fent 

 back on board my veffels, bound for their ifland. 



In regard to the books they faw in my chamber^ 

 I found it impoffible to give them the fmallefh idea of 

 the nature cf them, and how they could impart infor- 

 mation. — When at times I would fend one of them 

 with a letter to my artelfhiks, or workmen, in other 

 parts of the iflands, they fell into the utmoft aftoni fo- 

 ment, thai they foould fend me back exactly what 

 they knew I wanted from what 1 had faid to them a 

 day or two before, though they had not fpoke a word 

 of it. I fent one of them, for example, with a letter 

 to one of my under-traffickers, deliring him to fend 

 me fome plumbs and other dried fruits. My mellen- 

 ger, unable to refill the temptation, ate up half of 

 them by the way, as I found by comparing the quan- 

 tity he brought me with that mentioned in the letter. 

 For this I chid him : obferving to hini that it had been 



c Qt my 



