[1] BEHRING STRAITS, and Sea, take their name from this navigator,—Vitus Behring, or Bering. According to a map published by the Imperial Academy of St. Petersburg, Behring touched his farthest southerly point on our coast closely under the sixtieth parallel, at what is called, on some maps, Admiralty or Behring's Bay. His consort Tchirikow's track is extended to 55° 36´. In the narrowest part of Behring's Straits it is only thirty-six miles from Asia to America, showing how slight were the obstacles to communication, as compared with the three thousand miles separating America from Europe. [2] PERMANENT TRADING-POSTS were begun on Oonalaska about 1773, and Kodiak 1783. In 1789 there were eight of these posts, with two hundred and fifty Russians. A Russian post was also established at St. Michael's, Norton Sound. [3] SITKA was founded to check the encroachments of the Hudson's Bay Company. Alaska was purchased by the United States in 1867, during the presidency of Andrew Johnson. ENGLAND ON THE PACIFIC. "_Ye mariners of England!_"—_Campbell_. England's conquest of Canada[1] (1763) put a wholly new face upon the situation in America. She was now, beyond dispute, the foremost power of this continent. Hardly had the echoes of this conflict died away, when a new power arose to contend with England for what she had just torn from the grasp of France. This was her own American colonies, whose people had now been driven to take up arms (1775) against the mother country, in defence of their dearest political rights. So England gained Canada, but lost her own colonies. She wrested power from France, only to see it snatched from her own grasp in the moment of victory, though, after all, it was no less a victory for the English-speaking race over all her Latin-speaking rivals. It must be seen that events like these would have far-reaching effects in shaping our history. Yet while the conflict with her colonies was going on, and both parties were in the thick of the actual fighting, England was putting forth efforts to control the commerce of the North-west Coast. For this purpose it would be essential to have accurate surveys of all important harbors and sounds, in order to select sites for future settlements, and above all of any navigable rivers flowing from the east out upon the coast, that might afford a practicable route into the interior, and so connect this coast with the settlements of the Hudson's Bay Company. With this end in view, two discovery ships were sent out (1776), in command of Captain James Cook,[2] with orders to search the coast of New Albion for any navigable river north of the forty-fifth parallel. England clearly meant to re-assert her claim to sovereignty,[3] set up so long ago in her behalf by Sir Francis Drake.