NAUTICAL REMARKS. 
637 
amounting to thirty-eight miles. After losing the trade-wind we had no current of con- 
sequence, excepting on three days in lat. about 35° N. and long. 194° W. during very light 
winds. On one of these days it ran S. 45^’ E. forty miles, on another S. six miles, and on the 
third S. 31" E. nineteen miles. The whole effect of the current between Oneehow and 
Petrapaulski was N. 25" 30' W . fifty-two miles. 
FROM AWATSKA BAY TO KOTZEBUE SOUND. 
July 5th to 22d, 1826, and July 2^th to 5th August, 1827. 
After clearing the outer bay, between Cape Gavarea and Chepoonski Noss, in both years 
we experienced much fog; but it cleared away in the vicinity of the islands of Beering and 
of St. Lawrence. The weather in both seasons was fine, and we met no impediments from 
winds until after passing the island of St. Lawrence, and then only for a day. The situation 
of Beering’s Island is now well fixed, and so far it may be approached with safety ; but the 
soundings decrease very fast near the land. Fifty-three miles S. W. by W. from the island 
we had no bottom with four hundred and twenty fathoms ; twenty-seven miles in the same 
direction no bottom at two hundred fathoms ; but at four miles we sounded in sixty fathoms fine 
dark sand. It is not advisable to stand within two miles of the western shore of this island, 
as there are breakers and low rocky points projecting from that part of the coast ; two miles 
and a half from these breakers we had only nineteen fathoms dark sand ; nor should the 
southern shore be approached within six miles, on account of Seal Rock, unless the weather 
be fine. From here I would recommend steering for St. Lawrence Island, in preference 
to the main land. Ships will come into soundings of fifty-four fathoms’ mud in about the 
latitude 61° 25' N. and 175° 17' W. long., which depth will gradually decrease to thirty- 
one fathoms, when the bottom will almost immediately change from mud to fine dark sand. 
Two miles and a half S. 73° W. from the S. W. cape there are fifteen fathoms ; but off the 
N. W. end of the island there is a shoal upon which there are only nine fathoms, stony 
bottom, four miles’ distance from the land. It is narrow, and the water soon deepens again, 
and the bottom changes to fine sand as before. 
From St. Lawrence Island there appears to be a current running to the northward at 
the rate of about three quarters of a mile an hour, which increases as the sea narrows towards 
the Strait of Beeriiig. Ships may pass either side of the Diomede Islands, but they should 
not run between them, as the passage is not yet explored. Cook passed between the Fan- 
Way Rock and Krusenstern Island, and had deep water; but no person has, as yet, I believe, 
been between Ratmonoff and the next island. Near these islands the water deepens to 
twenty-seven and thirty fathoms, and the bottom in some places changes to stones. The 
channel to the eastward of the Diomede Islands is the widest ; and the only precaution 
necessary is to avoid the shoal to the northward of Cape Prince of Wales, upon which the 
water shoals almost immediately from twenty fathoms to four and a half. Its outer edge lies 
about north (true) from Cape Prince of Wales. From here, ships may run along shore in 
safety in ten fathoms near the land. 
It is unnecessary to give any directions for the sea to the northward of Kotzebue Sound, 
