Meanwhile, Russia was busily opening up the north-east coast of Siberia, partly with a view to getting some control over the unmanageable Chukches, the only Siberian tribe who succeeded in resisting their somewhat rough and ready methods, and partly with a view to developing trade in that direction and to discovering whether or not the Asiatic and American continents were united. Many expeditions set out with these ends in view, among them being those of Ignatieff, Deshneff, Alexieff, and Ankudinoff, but of these it is impossible to give a detailed account here, and we need not take up the story of exploration in these regions until 1725, when the Great Northern Expedition, conceived by Peter the Great and carried into execution by the Empress Anne, set forth under the command of Vitus Bering, a Dane in the Russian service. Immense difficulties had to be overcome before the expedition could start at all. Long overland journeys had to be made across Siberia, supplies had to be accumulated at Okhotsk and a vessel had to be built there, with the result that it was not until the end of June, 1727, that Spanberg, Bering’s assistant, was able to sail for Bolsheretsk in the _Fortuna_. Here more supplies had to be accumulated and a second ship built, which involved a delay of yet another year. At last, however, on July 24, 1728, Bering sailed gaily down the Kamchatka River, in the _Gabriel_, on his voyage of exploration. The preparations had extended over more than three years, and the voyage occupied about seven weeks, during which no discoveries whatever were made, so that the game seems to have been hardly worth the rather expensive candle. During the following summer he sallied out of his harbour once more, but he does not seem to have prosecuted his work with very much ardour, for he returned at the end of three days, during which he had sailed about a hundred miles. He then made his way to St Petersburg.