g idea of the size
of the ships, and of the service we were engaged in; Ismyloff, in his
letter, having represented us as two small English packet boats, and
cautioned him to be on his guard; insinuating, that he suspected us to be
no better than pirates. In consequence of this letter, he said there had
been various conjectures formed about us at Bolcheretsk; that the major
thought it most probable we were on a trading scheme, and for that reason
had sent down a merchant to us; but that the officer, who was second in
command, was of opinion we were French, and come with some hostile
intention, and was for taking measures accordingly. It had required, he
added, all the major's authority to keep the inhabitants from leaving the
town, and retiring up into the country, to so extraordinary a pitch had
their fears risen from their persuasion that we were French.

Their extreme apprehensions of that nation were principally occasioned by
some circumstances attending an insurrection that had happened at
Bolcheretsk, a few years before, in which the commander had lost his life.
We were informed, that an exiled Polish officer, named Beniowski, taking
advantage of the confusion into which the town was thrown, had seized upon
a galliot, then lying at the entrance of the Bolchoireka, and had forced on
board a number of Russian sailors, sufficient to navigate her; that he had
put on shore a part of the crew at the Kourile Islands, and among the rest,
Ismyloff, who, as the reader will recollect, had puzzled us exceedingly at
Oonalashka, with the history of this transaction; though, for want of
understanding his language, we could not often make out all the
circumstances attending it; that he passed in sight of Japan; made Luconia;
and was there directed how to steer to Canton; that arriving there, he had
applied to the French, and had got a passage in one of their India ships to
France; and that most of the Russians had likewise returned to Europe in
French ships, and had afterward found their way to Petersburg. We met with
three of Beniowski's crew in the harbour of Saint Peter and Saint Paul; and
from them we learnt the circumstances of the above story.

On our arrival at Canton, we received a farther corroboration, of the facts
from the gentlemen of the English factory; who told us, that a person had
arrived there in a Russian galliot, who said he came from Kamtschatka, and
that he had been furnished by the French factory with a pass