Page:Enterprise and Adventure.djvu/133

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ENTERPRISE AND ADVENTURE.
113

setting sail in September for Archangel, this brave and adventurous seaman was seized with a sickness on his arrival, and soon afterwards died in that city. Subsequent expeditions have completed the survey of this interesting region.



THE WANDERINGS OF JONAS HANWAY.




Jonas Hanway, the philanthropist—famous as the first man who carried an umbrella in England—was, when a young man, engaged in mercantile pursuits in St. Petersburg. At that time great anxiety was expressed for the opening of a trade through Russia into Persia, by way of the Caspian Sea, a region then little known, and altogether uncivilized. Hanway being naturally of an enterprising turn, offered his services to the Russian government to proceed on a commercial mission to that part, and the offer was accepted.

Hanway published an account of his travels on this occasion, in four huge volumes, which, though now forgotten, are of considerable interest. On the 10th of September, 1743, after making the necessary arrangements for his journey, he set out from St. Petersburg with an interpreter who had been before in Persia, a Russian servant, a Tartar boy, and a guard, having under his care a caravan of thirty-seven bales of English cloth, making twenty carriage loads. On the 1st of October following, he entered the Steppe, or desert, and