As the season was now so far advanced, I was fearful lest any delay or hindrance should arise, on our parts, to Captain Gore's farther views of discovery, and therefore gave orders that no more sheathing should be ripped off than was absolutely necessary for repairing the damages sustained by the ice. This I did, being apprehensive of their meeting with more decayed planks, which, I judged, had much better remain in that state, than be filled up with green birch, upon a supposition that such was to be had. All hands were at present busily employed in separate duties, that every thing might be in readiness for sea against the time our carpenters should have finished their work. We set apart four men to haul the seine for salmon, which were caught in great abundance, and found to be of an excellent quality. After supplying the immediate wants of both ships, we salted down near a hogshead a day. The invalids, who were four in number, were employed in gathering greens, and in cooking for the parties on shore. Our powder was also landed, in order to be dried; and the seahorse blubber, with which both ships, in our passage to the north, (as has been before related,) had stored themselves, was now boiled down for oil, which was become a necessary article, our candles having long since been expended. The cooper was fully engaged in his department; and in this manner were both ships' companies employed in their several occupations, till Saturday afternoon, which was given up to all our men, except the carpenters, for the purpose of washing their linen, and getting their clothes in some little order, that they might make a decent appearance on Sunday.
In the afternoon of that day, we paid the last offices to Captain Clerke. The officers and men of both ships walked in procession to the grave, whilst the ships fired minute-guns; and the service being ended, the marines fired three vollies. He was interred under a tree which stands on rising ground, in the valley to the north side of the harbour, where the hospital and store-houses are situated; Captain Gore having judged this situation most agreeable to the last wishes of the deceased, for the reasons above-mentioned; and the priest of Paratounca having pointed out a spot for his grave, which, he said, would be, as near as he could guess, in the centre of the new church. This reverend pastor walked in the procession along with the gentleman who read the service; and all the Russians in the garrison were assembled, and attended with great respect and solemnity.
On the 30th, the different parties returned to their respective employments, as mentioned in the course of the preceding week; and, on the 2d of September, the carpenters having shifted the rotten and damaged planks, and repaired and caulked the sheathing of the larboard bow, proceeded to rip off the sheathing that had been injured by the ice, from the starboard side. Here again they discovered four feet of a plank, in the third strake under the wale, so shaken, as to make it necessary to be replaced. This was accordingly done, and the sheathing repaired on the 3d. In the afternoon of the same day, we got on board some ballast, unhung the rudder, and sent it on shore, the lead of the pintles being found entirely worn away, and a great part of the sheathing rubbed off. As the carpenters of the Resolution were not yet wanted, we got this set to rights the next day, but finding the rudder out of all proportion heavy, even heavier than that of the Resolution, we let it remain on shore in order to dry and lighten.
The same day an ensign arrived from Bolcheretsk with a letter from the commander to Captain Gore, which we put into the serjeant's hands, and, by his assistance, were made to understand, that orders had been given about the cattle, and that they might be expected here in the course of a few days; and, moreover, that Captain Shmaleff, the present commander, would himself pay us a visit immediately on the arrival of a sloop which was daily expected from Okotzk. The young officer who brought the letter was the son of the Captain-lieutenant Synd, who commanded an expedition on discovery, between Asia and America, eleven years ago, and resided at this time at Okotzk.[35] He informed us, that he was sent to receive our directions, and to take care to get us supplied with whatever our service might require; and that he should remain with us till the commander was himself able to leave Bolcheretsk; after which he was to return, that the garrison there might not be left without an officer.
[35] See all that is known of this voyage, and a chart of discoveries, in Mr Coxe's Account of Russian-Discoveries between Asia and America. We were not able to learn from the Russians in Kamtschatka, a more perfect account of Synd than we now find is given by Mr Coxe; and yet they seemed disposed to communicate all that they really knew. Major Behm could only inform us, in general, that the expedition had miscarried as to its object, and that the commander had fallen under much blame. It appeared evidently that he had been on the coast of America, to the southward of Cape Prince of Wales, between the latitudes 64° and 65° and it is most probable that his having got too far to the northward to meet with sea-otters, which the Russians, in all their attempts at discoveries, seem to have principally, in view, and his returning without having made any that promised commercial advantages, was the cause of his disgrace, and of the great contempt with which the Russians always spoke of this officer's voyage.
The cluster of islands placed in Synd's chart, between the latitudes of 61° and 65°, is undoubtedly the same with the island called by Beering St Laurence's, and those we named Clerke's, Anderson's, and King's Islands; but their proportionate size, and relative situation, are exceedingly erroneous.
On the 5th, the parties that were on shore returned on board, and were employed in scrubbing the ship's bottom, and getting in eight tons of shingle ballast. We also got up two of our guns that had been stowed in the fore-hold, and mounted them on the deck, being now about to visit nations, our reception amongst whom might a good deal depend on the respectability of our appearance.
The Resolution hauled on shore on the 8th, to repair some damage which she had also received among the ice, in her cut-water, and our carpenters in their turn, were sent to her assistance.
About this time we began to brew a strong decoction of a species of dwarf- pine that grows here in great abundance, thinking that it might hereafter be useful in making beer, and that we should probably be able to procure sugar or molasses to ferment with it at Canton. At all events I was sure it would be serviceable as a medicine for the scurvy; and was more particularly desirous of supplying myself with as much of it as I could procure, because most of the preventatives we had brought out were either used, or spoiled by keeping. By the time we had prepared a hogshead of it, the ship's copper was discovered to be very thin, and cracked in many places. This obliged me to desist, and to give orders that it should be used as sparingly for the future as possible. It might, perhaps, be an useful precaution for those who may hereafter be engaged in long voyages of this kind, either to provide themselves with a spare copper, or to see that the copper usually furnished be of the strongest kind. The various extra- services, in which it will be found necessary to employ them, and especially the important one of making antiscorbutic decoctions, seem absolutely to require some such provision; and I should rather recommend the former, on account of the additional quantity of fuel that would be consumed in heating thick coppers.
In the morning of the 10th, the boats from both ships were sent to tow into the harbour a Russian galliot from Okotzk. She had been thirty-five days on her passage, and had been seen from the light-house a fortnight ago, beating up toward the mouth of the bay. At that time the crew had sent their only boat on shore for water, of which they now began to be in great want; and the wind freshening, the boat was lost on its return, and the galliot, being driven out to sea again, had suffered exceedingly.
There were fifty soldiers in her, with their wives and children, and several other passengers, besides the crew, which consisted of twenty-five, so that they had upward of an hundred souls on board. A great number for a vessel of eighty tons; and that was also heavy laden with stores and provisions. Both this galliot, and the sloop we saw here in May, are built like the Dutch doggers. Soon after she had come to anchor, we received a visit from a put-parouchick, or sub-lieutenant, who was a passenger in the galliot, and sent to take the command of this place. Part of the soldiers, we understood, were also designed to reinforce the garrison; and two pieces of small cannon were landed, as an additional defence to the town. It should seem, from these circumstances, that our visit here had drawn the attention of the Russian commanders in Siberia, to the defenceless situation of the place; and I was told by the honest serjeant, with many significant shrugs, that, as we had found our way into it, other nations might do the same, some of whom might not be altogether so welcome.[36]