The visit being ended, and the amicable partnership dissolved, it became
necessary for our traveller to think of raising the supplies for a
journey round the Gulf of Bothnia, which was now rendered impassable,
the distance being not less than twelve hundred miles, chiefly over
trackless snows, in regions thinly peopled, the nights long, and the
cold intense; and, after all, gaining only, in the direct route, about
fifty miles. A Mr. Thompson accepted his bill on Colonel Smith, for a
sum which, he says, "has saved me from perdition, and will enable me to
reach Petersburgh." This journey he accomplished within seven weeks; but
he writes to Mr. Jefferson, "I cannot tell you by what means I came, and
hardly know by what means I shall quit it." Through the influence of
Professor Pallas, but more especially by the assistance of a Russian
officer, he obtained the passport of the empress, then on her route to
the Crimea, in fifteen days. His long and dreary journey having
exhausted his money, and worn out his clothes, he drew on Sir Joseph
Banks for twenty guineas, which that munificent patron of science and
enterprise did not hesitate to pay.

Fortunately, a Scotch physician, of the name of Brown, was proceeding in
the service of the empress as far as the province of Kolyvan, who
offered him a seat in his kabitka, and thus assisted him on his journey
for more than three thousand miles. Having reached Irkutsk, he remained
there about ten days, and left it in company with lieutenant Laxman, a
Swedish officer, to embark on the Lena, at a point one hundred and fifty
miles distant from Irkutsk, with the intention of floating down its
current to Yakutsk. On his arrival at this place, he waited on the
commandant, told him he wished to press forward, with all expedition, to
Okotsk before the winter should shut in, that he might secure an early
passage in the spring to the American continent. The commandant assured
him that such a journey was already impossible; that the