Delightful! There's nothing angry or frightening in this dreamy account of a voyage of "author's curiosity" and it's interruption by a wrecking of the vessel employed on a coral atoll some 900 miles from his home. I say "dreamy" because Mr. Hall gives us some of his musings during the voyage, both before and after the wrecking, most of which were about Captain Bligh, Fletcher Christian, Pitcairn and the great open-boat crossing of the Pacific to Timor. He gives us his thoughts and a really good sense of the timelessness of the Polynesian lifestyle. I have a new appreciation of "Hieru!" which seems to be able to be translated as 'wait', 'presently', 'by and by', or even, 'one of these days.' We in the America of the 21st Century would profit from a reintroduction of such a word into our daily discourse - we could do away with Prilosec and Rolaids.
The book is illustrated with nicely printed renderings of watercolors by W. Alister MacDonald. I would love to see the originals. There is a short bio of this artist at http://www.tahiti1.com/art/art-william-alister-en.htm. ( )