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Updated: September 3, 2025
By November 8 a rude pit-shelter had been constructed to house the invalided crew; but the sudden transition from the putrid hold to the open, frosty air caused the death of many as they were lowered on stretchers. Amid a heavy snow Bering was wrapped in furs and carried ashore. The dauntless Steller faced the situation with judgment and courage.
Suddenly Steller noticed that the ebb-tide was causing huge combing rollers that might dash the ship against the rocks. Rushing below decks he besought Bering's permission to sound and anchor. The early darkness of those northern latitudes had been followed by moon-light bright as day.
Schonfeld relates this wolf-fish will seize on an anchor and leave the marks of its teeth in it, and Steller mentions one on the coast of Kamschatka, which he saw lay hold of a cutlass, with which a man was attempting to kill it, and break it to bits as if it had been made of glass.
Peter moved slowly landward against a head wind. Khitroff and Steller put off in the small boats with fifteen men to reconnoitre. Both found traces of inhabitants timbered huts, fire holes, shells, smoked fish, footprints in the grass. Steller left some kettles, knives, glass beads, and trinkets in the huts to replace the possessions of the natives, which the Russians took.
On the 10th of August, with such cheers as the island never heard before or since, the single-master was launched from the skids and named the St. Peter. Cannon balls and cartridges were thrown in bottom as ballast. Luckily, eight hundred pounds of meal had been reserved for the return voyage, and Steller had salted down steaks of whale meat and sea-cow.
Wrapped in furs, fastened to a stretcher, the Dane was lowered over the ship, carried ashore, and laid in a sand pit. All that day it had been dull and leaden; and just as Bering was being carried, it began to snow heavily. Steller occupied the sand pit next to the commander; and in addition to acting as cook and physician to the entire crew, became Bering's devoted attendant.
The Steller jays were of course making more noisy stir than all the other birds combined; ever coming and going with loud bluster, screaming as if each had a lump of melting sludge in his throat, and taking good care to improve the favorable opportunity afforded by the storm to steal from the acorn stores of the woodpeckers.
Nay, even foxes, which, as a rule, live isolated in our civilized countries, have been seen combining for hunting purposes. Even some bears live in societies where they are not disturbed by man. Thus Steller saw the black bear of Kamtchatka in numerous packs, and the polar bears are occasionally found in small groups. Even the unintelligent insectivores do not always disdain association.
The underling officers still upon their feet, whose false theories had led Bering into all this disaster, were now quarrelling furiously among themselves, blaming one another. Only Ofzyn, the lieutenant, who had opposed the landing, and Steller, the scientist, remained on the lookout with eyes alert for the impending destruction threatened from the white fret of the endless reefs.
The myriad birds become fewer. Steller, the scientist, leans over the rail to listen if the huge sperm whale, there, "hums" as it "blows." The white rollers come from the north, rolling rolling down to the tropics. A gray thing hangs over the northern offing, a grayish brown thing called "fog" of which they will know more anon.
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