shifted suddenly to the north, and continued in the same quarter the
following day. However, although it retarded our progress, yet the fair
weather it brought was no small refreshment to us. In the forenoon of the
21st we saw a whale and a land-bird; and in the afternoon the water looking
muddy, we sounded, but got no ground with an hundred and forty fathoms of
line. During the three preceding days, we saw large flocks of wild fowl, of
a species resembling ducks. This is usually considered as a proof of the
vicinity of land, but we had no other signs of it since the 16th, in which
time we had run upwards of an hundred and fifty leagues.

On the 22d the wind shifted to the N.E., attended with misty weather. The
cold was exceedingly severe, and the ropes were so frozen that it was with
difficulty we could force them through the blocks. At noon, the latitude,
by account, was 51° 38', longitude 160° 7'; and on comparing our present
position with that given to the southern parts of Kamtschatka in the
Russian charts, Captain Clerke did not think it prudent to run on toward
the land all night. We therefore tacked at ten, and having found, had
ground agreeably to our conjectures, with seventy fathoms of line.

On the 23d, at six in the morning, being in latitude 52° 09', and longitude
160° 07', on the fog clearing away, the land appeared in mountains covered
with snow; and extending from N. 3/4 E., to S.W.; a high conical rock,
bearing S.W., 3/4 W., at three or four leagues distance. We had no sooner
taken this imperfect view, than we were again covered with a thick fog.
Being now, according to our maps, only eight leagues from the entrance of
Awatska Bay, as soon as the weather cleared up we stood in to take a nearer
view of the land; and a more dismal and dreary prospect I never beheld. The
coast appears strait and uniform, having no inlets or bays; the ground from
the shore rises in hills of a moderate elevation, behind which are ranges
of mountains, whose summits were lost in the clouds. The whole scene was