Note 4 — Chapter XLII · THE WALLS OF ISOLATION SAPPED.
Reading edition
Other nations besides France now began to learn something of the twin hermits of the East, Chō-sen and Nippon. During 1852, the Russian frigate Pallas sailed along the east coast up to the Tumen River, making no landing, but keeping at a distance of from two to five miles from the shore in order to avoid shoals and rocks. The object of the Pallas was to trace and map the shore line. In 1855, the French war-vessel Virginie continued the work begun by the Pallas, and at the end of her voyage the whole coast from Fusan to the Tumen was known with some accuracy, and mapped out with European names, at once numerous and prophetic. The coast line of Tartary or Manchuria—at that time a Chinese province—was also surveyed, mapped, and made ready for the Czar’s use and that of his ambassador in 1860.
Pallas and Virginie! The names are suggestive of the maiden diplomatic victory of General Ignatieff, of whom more anon. ↑