462 
APPENDIX, N° II. 
The junc- 
tion of the 
Volga with 
the .Don, by 
means of 
the S/uila. 
Vitchdgda. But the canal remains unfinished ; 
and the only advantage that resulted from the 
attempt was, the opening of a new track, or 
road, by land, through a country then totally 
waste and uninhabited. This canal could have 
supplied Archangel, at a trifling expense, with 
merchandize, not only from the province • of 
Viaiha, but through the river Belaya, from the 
Government of Oujimsk and Tznsiovaya from 
that of Perrnia, in the course of one summer. 
The importance of this canal is enhanced, by 
the facility it affords of conveying timber for 
ship-building to Archangel, from the immense 
forests in its vicinity, abounding, particularly, 
in the Listvinitzna wood, at Tchardina. 
The junction of the Volga and the Don was 
ever an object in view with Peter the First; 
and he himself discovered two practical tracks; 
one from the Lower Volga, by the union of the 
rivulet Kamishinha with that called Hajla, by 
a canal of four versts: the other was by 
uniting the source of the Don, twenty-five 
versts from the town Ghepisan, with the ri- 
vulet Shat a, which falls into the Oupa, one of 
the chief branches of the Oka, which empties 
itself into the Volga. Of the latter, a consi- 
derable part was carried into execution ; 
twenty-four sluices of limestone were built; 
and the canal dug the extent of the Vale of 
