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great was their surprise on landing to find the island
teeming with animal life, yet undisturbed by human
habitation. The Commander Islands, as the group is
now called, consist of two large islands and a few rocky
islets. The most easterly of the former is Copper Island
(Mednie), about thirty-five miles long and three miles
wide, covered with high, steep, and jagged mountains,
which lie athwart the main trend of the island, S. E.
to N. W., and terminate precipitously, often
perpendicularly, with a narrow strand at the base scarcely
fifty feet wide. On a somewhat larger scale, the same
description applies to Bering Island, which, according
to Steller, is 23½ geographical miles long and nearly 3¼
wide. It is situated about 30 geographical miles from
Kamchatka, between latitude 54° 40′ and 55° 25′ north,
and longitude 165° 40′ and 166° 40′ east of Greenwich.
Only on the west coast, within the shelter of the Sea
Lion Island (Arii Kamen) and a lesser islet, is there a
fairly good harbor, where the Russians later founded
the only colony of the island, consisting of a few Aleuts
who cultivate some vegetables, but maintain themselves
principally by hunting and fishing. For this purpose
they have built, here and there on the east coast, some
earth-huts which are used only temporarily. The very
high mountains, having a trend from N. W. to S. E., almost
everywhere extend clear to the sea, and only here and
there along the mouths of the brooks do semicircular
coves recede from 700 to 1300 yards into the interior.
In Bering’s day these coves or rookeries contained a
fauna entirely unmolested by human greed and love of
chase, developed according to nature’s own laws, for
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