This gives value to his statements in reference to Bering's efforts to find land east of Avatscha bay, whereof Waxel quotes de l'Isle as saying: "On his return to Kamtschatka (in 1729) M. Bering learned that there was a land to the east, which could be seen in clear, fine weather. He attempted to go thither, after having repaired the damage his vessel had suffered in a storm. The second attempt was fruitless, for after sailing about forty leagues to the east without seeing land, he was assailed by a violent tempest and a contrary wind, which quickly drove him back to the port whence he had emerged." In criticism Waxel adds: "Would not this narrative lead one to believe that the second attempt of M. Bering had been made immediately after the first voyage [in 1729]? However, it was entirely otherwise: Before making this journey M. Bering wintered at Kamtschatka, set sail only on June 5, 1729, and, _without intending to return to the port which he was quitting_, doubled the southern point of Kamtschatka and went straight to the mouth of the river Bolschaia-Reka and thence to Ochozk." He further says: "Perhaps it may appear strange that M. Bering during this voyage did not fall in with the island (Bering island) whereon he was shipwrecked during his second expedition; but the isle might have been hidden by fogs, which are very common in that sea." Waxel's account of the second voyage is worth translating, being the plain tale of a participant, who is as modest as he is truthful, for Waxel nowhere mentions his own name nor the {224} efficient service he rendered first to his chief and later to his shipwrecked comrades. He writes in "Une Lettre" as follows: "Let us now come to the details of the second expedition, which M. de l'Isle pretends owes its origin to a map of _his_ and was undertaken according to a memoir made by himself. 'I had the honor,' he says, 'in 1731 to present this chart to the Empress Anne and to the Senate, in order to stimulate the Russians to explorations of what still remained to be discovered, and it had its effect.' Was it time or age which caused M. de l'Isle to commit this error? Could he have forgotten the orders which led him to make the chart in question? Had he remembered it, perhaps he would not have said that he presented the chart to the Empress, and still less that he made it in order to excite the Russians to new discoveries. At that time I visited M. de l'Isle; I was a witness of his geographical labors, as far as they had new discoveries for their object; I acted as interpreter to M. Bering in the conversations which he had with him; and I can assert positively that when M. de l'Isle began that chart the second expedition was already ordered, and Captain Bering, knowing what was still wanting to his discoveries, offered to continue them and his lieutenants with him; and they each received promotion in consequence.