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Chapter 4
Part Two of Hillsen's Journal

At Sitka
Norfolk Sound, discoverd and surveyed by Captain Van-
couver, is located in Sitka Island (Baranof Island), one of
the innumberable islands consituting the archipelago near the
northwestern shores of America. This sound is formed by a
large harbor and islands, at the end of which is located
Mount Edgecumbe. Norfolk Sound extends 14 miles from the
entrance to a chain of small islands, overgrown with tall
spruce forest, beyond which is the real harbor or port of
Novo-Arkhangelsk. There is no anchoring ground in the bay
until these islands (are reached) but a multitude of underwater and partly
protruding rocks called Vitse-Kari (among which is one now
called Viesokoi Rock) are very dangerous because the current
generally surges toward them during a calm. For this reason
it is possible to enter otherwise than with a completely
favorable wind.

Among the chain of islands forming the harbor there are
three channels usable for the passage of vessels. The others,
so to say, are clogged with underwater rocks, and there is no
way to navigate over them. The pilot sent to meet us guided
the sloop through Lighthouse Channel (Western Channel), and toward evening we dropped anchor at an island by the same name (now called Signal Island), so named because