The expedition intrusted to Roggewein having proved abortive by the failure to find a Southern continent, we shall follow his adventures no farther. It will suffice to say that his ships were confiscated at Batavia by the Dutch East India Company,--a proceeding which the West India Company resented by commencing an action for damages. After a long litigation, the States-General decreed that the former Company should furnish the latter with two ships better than those confiscated, should refund the full value of their cargoes, should pay the wages of both crews to the day of their return to Holland, together with the costs, and a heavy fine by way of punishment for having so manifestly abused their authority. We come now to the first expedition at sea made by Russia for the purpose of extending and promoting the science of geography. Vitus Behring was a Dane in the Russian service, having been tempted by the encouragements held out to foreign mariners by Peter the Great. He had risen to the rank of captain in 1725, when the Empress Catherine, who was anxious to promote discovery in the Northeast of Asia and to settle the question, then doubtful, as to the existence of a strait between Asia and America, appointed him to the command of an expedition fitted out for that purpose. During a period of seven years, having travelled overland to Kamschatka, he explored rivers, sounded and surveyed the coasts, and sailed as far to the northward as the season and the strength of his very inferior boats would permit. In 1732, he was made captain-commander, and the next year was ordered to conduct an expedition fitted out on a very extensive scale for purposes of discovery. In 1740, he reached Okhotsk, where vessels had previously been built for him. He sailed for Awatska Bay, where he founded the settlement of Petropaulowski, known in English as the Harbor of Peter and Paul. Sailing to the northward, he landed upon the American coast, giving name to Mount St. Elias, and then, returning to the westward, struck the continent of Asia, finding a strait fifty miles wide between the two continents at the point where they approach each other the nearest. This, in honor of its discoverer, is called Behring's Strait.