The spirit of discovery continued at St. Petersburg. A Cossack chief, undertaking to conquer the obstinate natives on the northeastern coast, proposed also “to discover the pretended country in the Frozen Sea.” He was killed by an arrow before his enterprise was completed. Little is known of the result; but it is stated that the navigator whom he had selected, by name Gwosdeff, in 1730 succeeded in reaching “a strange coast” between sixty-five and sixty-six degrees of north latitude, where he saw people, but could not speak with them for want of an interpreter. This must have been the coast of North America, and not far from the group of islands in Behring Strait, through which the present boundary passes, separating the United States from Russia, and America from Asia. The Russian desire to get behind the curtain increased. Behring volunteered to undertake the discoveries yet remaining. He was created Commodore, and his old lieutenants were created captains. The Senate, the Admiralty, and the Academy of Sciences at St. Petersburg, all united in the enterprise. Several academicians were appointed to report on the natural history of the coasts visited, among whom was Steller, the naturalist, said to be “immortal” from this association. All of these, with a numerous body of officers, journeyed across Siberia, Northern Asia, and the Sea of Okhotsk, to Kamtchatka, as Behring had journeyed before. Though ordered in 1732, the expedition was not able to leave the eastern coast until 4th June, 1741, when two well-appointed ships set sail in company “to discover the continent of America.” One of these, called the St. Peter, was under Commodore Behring; the other, called the St. Paul, was under Captain Tschirikoff. For some time the two kept together, but in a violent storm and fog they were separated, when each continued the expedition alone.