He sailed along the east coast of the Caspian, landing at the extremity of the Mangishlāk peninsula, and erected a fort to serve as a base for his advance into the desert. The former bed of the Amū Daryā was examined, and a report was submitted to the Tsar. Peter instructed his lieutenant to build a strong place on the banks of the old channel, and to induce the Khān of Khiva to join in thoroughly investigating its course, in view of a possible diversion of the great water-way. Mercantile expeditions were also to be sent to Bokhārā and India. While preparations were in progress for a second expedition, the friendly Khān died, and his successor was reported to be ill-disposed towards Russia. Nothing daunted, the intrepid adventurer set out in 1717 for Garieff, on the river Ural, at the head of a force of 4000 men, with engineers and marine officers. After struggling across the wind-swept desert of Ust Urt, he reached a lake known as Bara Kilmas, about 200 miles north-west of Khiva. Here he rested his travel-worn troops, and built a fort with a solidity which has resisted the elements for 180 years. The suspicions of the Khān that Russia contemplated the annexation of his country were confirmed by the strength of Bekovitch’s expedition, and the measures adopted by him. But, feeling that his ill-disciplined forces were no match for those of comparative civilisation, he had recourse to treachery. Bekovitch was lulled into security by promises of aid and alliance, and was persuaded to divide his little army into weak detachments, on the plea that it would be easier to furnish them with provisions. Then the Khān fell upon the isolated Russian posts and crushed them in detail. Not a man escaped to give news of the failure of this first plunge into Central Asian politics. To this day the expression “Lost as Bekovitch” is synonymous in Russia for hopeless ruin. So disgusted was the great Tsar with this unexpected failure that when, in 1720, the Khān of Khiva sent an envoy to solicit pardon and a renewal of friendship, he was thrown into prison at St. Petersburg, and died there.[536]