ot lost sight of the possibilities of
the North-East Passage, if not for reaching the Spice Islands,
at any rate as a means of tapping the overland route to China,
hitherto monopolised by the Genoese. In 1558 an English gentleman,
named Anthony Jenkinson, was sent as ambassador to the Czar of
Muscovy, and travelled from Moscow as far as Bokhara; but he was
not very fortunate in his venture, and England had to be content
for some time to receive her Indian and Chinese goods from the
Venetian argosies as before. But at last they saw no reason why
they should not attempt direct relations with the East. A company of
Levant merchants was formed in 1583 to open out direct communications
with Aleppo, Bagdad, Ormuz, and Goa. They were unsuccessful at the
two latter places owing to the jealousy of the Portuguese, but
they made arrangements for cheaper transit of Eastern goods to
England, and in 1587 the last of the Venetian argosies, a great
vessel of eleven hundred tons, was wrecked off the Isle of Wight.
Henceforth the English conducted their own business with the East,
and Venetian and Portuguese monopoly was at an end.

[Illustration: RUSSIAN MAP OF ASIA, 1737.]

But the journeys of Chancellor and Jenkinson to the Court of Moscow
had more far-reaching effects; the Russians themselves were thereby
led to contemplate utilising their proximity to one of the best
known routes to the Far East. Shortly after Jenkinson's visit, the
Czar, Ivan the Terrible, began extending his dominions eastward,
sending at first a number of troops to accompany the Russian merchant
Strogonof as far as the Obi in search of sables. Among the troops
were a corps of six thousand Cossacks commanded by one named Vassili
Yermak, who, finding the Tartars an easy prey, determined at first
to set up a new kingdom for himself. In 1579 he was successful in
overcoming the Tartars and their chief town Sibir, near Tobolsk;
but, finding it difficult to retain his position, determined to
return to his allegiance to the Czar on condition of being supported.
This was readily granted, and from that time onward the Russians
steadily pushed on through to the unknown country of the north
of Asia, since named after the little town conquered by Yermak,
of which scarcely any traces now remain. As early as 1639 they
had reached the Pacific under Kupilof. A force was sent out from
Yakutz, on the Lena, in 1643, which reached the Amur, and thus
Russians came for the first tim