We reached the mouth of the river late in the evening, and were met at the landing by one of the Cossacks from the beacon-tower.

“What ship is it?” I inquired.

“We don’t know,” he replied.  “We saw dark smoke, like the smoke of a steamer, off Matuga Island just before we fired the cannon, but in a little while it blew away and we have seen nothing since.”

“If it’s a whaler trying out oil,” said Robinson, “we’ll find her there in the morning.”

Leaving the Cossack to take our baggage out of the lodka, we all climbed up to the beacon-tower, with the hope that, as it was still fairly light, we might be able to see with a glass the vessel that had made the smoke; but from the high black cliffs of Matuga Island on one side of the Gulf, to the steep slope of Cape Catherine on the other, there was nothing to break the horizon line except here and there a field of drifting ice.  Returning to the Cossack barrack, we spread our bearskins and blankets down on the rough plank floor and went disconsolate to bed.

Early the next morning, I was awakened by one of the Cossacks with the welcome news that there was a large square-rigged vessel in the offing, five or six miles beyond Matuga Island.  I climbed hastily up the bluff, and had no difficulty in making out with a glass the masts and sails of a good-sized bark, evidently a whaler, which, although hull down, was apparently cruising back and forth with a light southerly breeze across the Gulf.

We ate breakfast hastily, put on our fur kukhlankas and caps, and started in a whale-boat under oars for the ship, which was distant about fifteen miles.  Although the wind was light and the sea comparatively smooth, it was a hard, tedious pull; and we did not get alongside until after ten o’clock.  Pacing the quarter-deck, as we climbed on board was a good-looking, ruddy-faced, gray-haired man whom I took to be the captain.  He evidently thought, from our outer fur dress, that we were only a party of natives come off to trade; and he paid no attention whatever to us until I walked aft and said:  “Are you the captain of this bark?”

At the first word of English, he stopped as if transfixed, stared at me for a moment in silence, and then exclaimed in a tone of profound astonishment:  “Well!  I’ll be dod-gasted!  Has the universal Yankee got up here?”

“Yes, Captain,” I replied, “he is not only here, but he has been here for two years or more.  What bark is this?”

“The Sea Breeze, of New Bedford, Massachusetts,” he replied, “and I am Captain Hamilton.  But what are you doing up in this God-forsaken country?  Have you been shipwrecked?”

“No,” I said, “we’re up here trying to build a telegraph line.”

“A telegraph line!” he shouted.  “Well, if that ain’t the craziest thing I ever heard of!  Who’s going to telegraph from here?”

I explained to him that we were trying to establish telegraphic communication between America and Europe by way of Alaska, Bering Strait, and Siberia, and asked him if he had never heard of the Russian-American Telegraph Company.