triking even
to the most uninitiated. It abounds in hot and salutary springs. To the
botanist it offers great varieties of plants, little if at all known;
and the zoologist would find here, amongst the animal tribes deserving
his attention, besides several kinds of bears, wolves and foxes, the
celebrated sable whose skin is sold for so great a price, and the native
wild sheep, which inhabits the tops of the highest mountains. It attains
the size of a large goat; the head resembles that of an ordinary sheep,
but is furnished with strong, crooked horns: the skin and form of the
body are like the reindeer, and it feeds chiefly on moss. It is fleet
and active, achieving, like the chamois, prodigious springs among the
rocks and precipices, and is, consequently, with difficulty killed or
taken. In preparing for these leaps, its eye measures the distance with
surprising accuracy; the animal then contracts its legs, and darts
forward head-foremost to the destined spot, where it alights upon its
feet, nor is it ever known to miss, although the point may be so small
as to admit its four feet only by their being closely pressed together.
The manner in which it balances itself after such leaps is also
admirable: our ballet-dancers would consider it a model of a perfect _a
plomb_. The monster of the antediluvian world, the mammoth, must have
been an inhabitant of this country, since many of its bones have been
found here.

The forests of Kamtschatka are not enlivened by singing-birds; indeed
land-birds are all scarce; but there are infinite numbers of waterfowl
of many species. Immense flocks of them are to be seen upon the lakes,
rivers, morasses, and even the sea itself, in the vicinity of the shore.
Fish is abundant, especially in the months of June and July. A single
draught of the net provided us with as many as the whole crew could
consume in several days. A sort of salmon, ling, and herrings, are
preferred for winter stock; the latter, dried in the air, supply food
for the dogs.

Kamtschatka was discovered in the year 1696, by a Cossack of Yakutsh, by
name Luca Semenoff, who, on a report being spread of the existence of
this country, set out with sixteen companions to make a journey hither.
In the following years, similar expeditions were repeated in greater
force, till Kamtschatka was subjected and made tributary to the Russian
crown. The conquest of this country cost many Russian lives; and from
the ferocity of the conque