Lost Paradise

The Exploration of the Pacific

by Ian Cameron

Salem House Publishers, 1987, b/w photographs, illustrations and maps throughout, hardcover, dustjacket, ISBN 0881622753

Fine Condition, very minor edge and shelf wear

'Ian Cameron's book describes the physical creation of the Pacific, and suggests how the ocean's multitude of island may have been first populated by those true discoverers of the ocean, the Polynesians.  It brings vividly to life the epic voyages of the Spanish, Dutch, British, French, Russian and American explorers as they battled against the vast distances of the Pacific and the appalling weather conditions of the ocean's polar approaches.  It recounts the excesses of the exploiters - the freebooters, sealers, whalers, missionaries and traders - who followed in the explorers' wake.
Making extensive use of contemporary diaries and of material and illustrations from the archives of the Royal Geographical Society, Ian Cameron chronicles, in a narrative of extreme readability, both the triumph of the Pacific voyages and the tragedy of their aftermath.'