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In the second place, he received in Yakutsk
information concerning Deshneff’s journey in 1648 from the
Kolyma to the Anadyr River. Although this journey
was first critically discussed by G. F. Müller,[1] its main
features were nevertheless well known in Siberia, and are
referred to, among other places, in Strahlenberg’s book,
whence the results appear in Bellini’s map in Peter
Charlesvoix’s “Histoire du Japan,” published in 1735.
Unfortunately, however, Bering seems to have had no
knowledge of Popoff’s expedition to the Chukchees
peninsula and his information concerning the adjacent
American continent, or of Strahlenberg’s outline maps, which
were not published until after his departure from St.
Petersburg.
Bering’s two expeditions are unique in the history of
Arctic explorations. His real starting point was on the
extremest outskirts of the earth, where only the hunter
and yassak-collector had preceded him. Kamchatka
was at that time just as wild a region as Boothia or
the coasts of Smith’s Sound are in our day, and,
practically viewed, it was far more distant from St.
Petersburg than any known point now is from us.
One hundred and thirty degrees—several thousand
miles—the earth’s most inhospitable tracts, the coldest
regions on the globe, mountains, endless steppes,
impenetrable forests, morasses, and fields of trackless snow
were still between him and the mouth of the
Kamchatka River, and thither he was to lead, not a small
expedition, but an enormous provision train and large
quantities of material for ship-building. On the journey,
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