This day, I think it was, marked what may be considered a new item in the history of typography. We had on board one of the little engines, which from the days of Faustus have evolved more power, than the ponderous ones, that revolved our paddles, and by its aid, in a sea-way, an intelligent midshipman, familiar with the art preservative of arts, “wet sheets,” and printer’s ink, caused to be struck off copies of the commodore’s correspondence with the Japanese, and of the surveys of Lieutenant Maury. That little press deserves a place in the patent-office, near the one, from which came “Poor Richard’s Almanack.” After a run of three days, standing in for the shore during the day, and off during the night, making soundings at intervals, seeing an occasional school of whales, and our daily observations and reckonings showing a strong current in our favor, going to prove—what has been advanced by many—the existence of a continuous current on the coast of Japan, similar in character and direction to the Gulf stream on our coast, we made the entrance to the straits of Sangar. The land on either side was quite notable. That on the northern or island of Yeso side, bold and sharply defined, while a singular conformation on the Niphon or southern side, looked exactly the profile of the Leviathans that frequent the waters in its vicinity—“wery like a whale.” On entering we found a strong eastwardly tide running through and against us. By sundown we had run some distance in, under the high shores of the northern side, when it came on thick, and the heads of both steamers were put outward. We had made during the day a point of longitude further to the east than any, that we had reached since leaving the United States. Soundings were made every fifteen minutes during the night, and daylight found us enveloped in one of the dense fogs, from which the Japanese empire in this section, according to Golownin, is seldom free during the entire year. Both ships had to announce their proximity for some hours, to one another, by the use of their steam-whistles and the striking of their bells. When the fog lifted on the morning of the 17th, we found that the tidal current during the night, had set us in, rather than out, and holding on westwardly for a short time, we discovered over a low peninsula nearly ahead, described by the Russian captain Ricord, in his voyages for the liberation of Golownin, the Macedonian, Vandalia, and Southampton, at anchor inside of the harbor of Hakodadi. We soon rounded a high promontory, and stood into a magnificent bay. The distance we had run from Simoda was six hundred and nine miles. About 11 o’clock we anchored within gun-shot of the town; it may be near the spot, where forty-one years before lay the imperial Russian brig Diana, to procure the release from an imprisonment in stockade cages of three years, of her former commander and his companions, by the Japanese—after three voyages, in which she was successful.