The following morning, on our observing two sledges drive into the village, Captain Clerke sent me on shore, to enquire whether any message was arrived from the commander of Kamtschatka, which, according to the serjeant's account, might now be expected, in consequence of the intelligence that had been sent of our arrival. Bolcheretsk, by the usual route, is about one hundred and thirty-five English miles from Saint Peter and Saint Paul's. Our dispatches were sent off in a sledge drawn by dogs, on the 29th, about noon. And the answer arrived, as we afterward found, early this morning; so that they were only a little more than three days and a half in performing a journey of two hundred and seventy miles. The return of the commander's answer was, however, concealed from us for the present; and I was told, on my arrival at the serjeant's, that we should hear from him the next day. Whilst I was on shore, the boat which had brought me, together with another belonging to the Discovery, were set fast in the ice, which a southerly wind had driven from the other side of the bay. On seeing them entangled, the Discovery's launch had been sent to their assistance, but shared the same fate; and in a short time the ice had surrounded them near a quarter of a mile deep. This obliged us to stay on shore till evening, when, finding no prospect of getting the boats off, some of us went in sledges to the edge of the ice, and were taken off by boats sent from the ship, and the rest staid on shore all night. It continued to freeze hard during the night; but before morning, on the 4th, a change of wind drifted away the floating ice, and set the boats at liberty, without their having sustained the smallest damage. About ten o'clock in the forenoon, we saw several sledges driving down to the edge of the ice, and sent a boat to conduct the persons who were in them on board. One of these was a Russian merchant, from Bolcheretsk, named Fedositch, and the other a German, called Port, who had brought a letter from Major Behm, the commander of Kamtschatka, to Captain Clerke. When they got to the edge of the ice, and saw distinctly the size of the ships, which lay within about two hundred yards from them, they appeared to be exceedingly alarmed; and, before they would venture to embark, desired two of our boat's crew might be left on shore as hostages for their safety. We afterward found, that Ismyloff, in his letter to the commander, had misrepresented us, for what reasons we could not conceive, as two small trading boats; and that the serjeant, who had only seen the ships at a distance, had not in his dispatches rectified the mistake.