In Captain Cook’s Footsteps

 Captain James Cook (1728-1779) was a great explorer, a skilled mapmaker and an innovative user of technology: especially a recently-invented chronometer that enabled a ship to establish its longitude. He was a respectful observer of cultures other than his own, which was unusual for his time. He was an admired leader, and the men who traveled on his ships during his three remarkable voyages were loyal because Cook was good to them. He enforced discipline, which is essential at sea, but was never cruel; his use of physical punishments like flogging were far less frequent than the usual practice of sea captains of his era. 

The Wide Wide Sea: Imperial Ambition, First Contact and the Fateful Final Voyage of Captain James Cook by Hampton Sides (published April, 2024) is the latest of many books about Captain Cook that I have read, as I find his life and adventures to be totally fascinating. On this, his third voyage, Cook seemed somewhat different than on earlier voyages — this author suspects that among other reasons, Cook was beginning to fear that his interactions with previously uncontacted or rarely contacted peoples were in fact very harmful to their civilizations and their way of life — a point of view that’s shared by many modern people from many backgrounds. He was especially horrified at the ravages of venereal diseases introduced by his sailors to the willing women in Polynesia and Hawaii.

The author does not belabor this point, but allows it to come out in the process of describing Cook’s visits to a number of destinations where Polynesian and other peoples had lived materially and spiritually good lives for many generations. Unlike some of the other voyagers, Cook was not motivated by a need to convert the natives from their own religious practices to Christianity, or to change their collective morals.

As I read this well-organized and interesting book, I enjoyed recalling my own travel to several of the locations that Cook visited, and in this post, I’m simply going to show some images that recall my own experiences, and reflect on how I remember them. That is, this isn’t a book review, it’s just some thoughts of mine and some quotations.

Captain Cook in Hawaii

I’ve been to both of the Hawaiian islands where Cook spent considerable time on his final voyage; that is, to the Big Island and to Kauaʻi. I’ve especially often been to Kealakekua Bay on the Big Island, which was the center of life on the island at the time of Cook’s visit, and was the site where Cook lost his life in a complex and much-disputed skirmish with the large armed forces of the King of Hawaii. Several things had changed, as the king had previously welcomed Cook, and in fact treated him like a god. Or had in fact believed that Cook was literally the god Lono, returned from his to his worshipers from his far-away home. This disaster has been the subject of many other discussions as well as that of Hampton Sides.

Here are the images that I pictured as I read:

The Captain Cook Monument in Kealakekua Bay as we saw it a few years ago from a snorkeling boat.
It’s supposedly at the site of Cook’s death, or at least where the large native town was located.

Captain Cook’s ship in Kealakekua Bay, along with several native canoes, 1779.

Mahaulepu Beach on Kauaʻi — the most beautiful beach I’ve ever seen.

Mai, a Young Man from Tahiti

One of the missions of Captain Cook’s third voyage was the return of a young man from Polynesia to his native island, Raiatea. Mai had been brought to England on the Adventure, a ship which had accompanied Cook’s ship on his second voyage in 1774. The Adventure had returned directly from Tahiti to England, not continuing with Cook’s further explorations. 

Mai was a very personable fellow, and very popular with the upper class Englishmen of the day, but he longed to return home with the hope of reconquering his native island from the Bora Borans, who had expelled him some years prior to Cook’s arrival.

As I read, I realized that I had visited Mai’s native island, and had respectfully walked around the
sacred site that still stands there. Our host was a priest who had lived all his life on this island.

Hampton Sides explained: 

“Mai was a native of Raiatea, a volcanic island about 130 miles northwest of Tahiti that was considered the Ur of Polynesia, the cradle of this extraordinary seafaring culture. Raiatea, which means ‘faraway heaven,’ is believed to be one of the first places where ancient navigators, coming from the west, landed several millennia ago and developed a rich civilization. Their culture had reached its apogee at Taputapuatea, a complex of marae temples that more or less served as the spiritual center of the South Seas. Taputapuatea was a pilgrimage spot, the birthplace of Oro, the god of war and fertility. There, upon sprawling courts of black volcanic rock, priests from all across Polynesia held elaborate ceremonies, sometimes performing human sacrifices. It was also a gathering place where navigators would compare notes on their distant discoveries.

  

“Mai’s kin owned property and enjoyed some prestige on the island, and his early boyhood seems to have been happy. But then, one day in about 1763, when Mai was ten or so, invaders from the nearby island of Bora Bora, under the command of the great chief Puni, came in their long canoes. They were fierce warriors with an expertise in amphibious attack, known for the ‘silent stroke,’ a stealth technique for paddling their fleets of canoes without making noise. Puni succeeded in conquering Raiatea.” (p. 20)

Mai’s goal was to bring firearms to his countrymen, who were exiled in the bigger island of Tahiti, and to unite them and retake his own island. The British also wanted him to introduce European ways and European agriculture to the natives, though in fact, the natives had very successful agricultural methods and plenty of meat. cultivated produce, and fish — they were in no need of European help. The author of The Wide Wide Sea has quite a lot to say about the European attitudes towards the natives and their civilizations, as well as about the growing doubts reflected in Captain Cook’s journals: questioning whether the European contact was doing anything but harm to the Polynesians and to the Hawaiians.

All the descriptions of the approach of Cook’s ships to the islands and how they were seen reminded me of my visit there in 2019. A few photos:

Bora Bora

The shore of Makatea, another island.

Landing in big waves was a challenge for Captain Cook. (These aren’t that large!)

A portrait of Mai by Sir Joshua Reynolds, 1776.

indeed, Mai was restored to his native land, along with the livestock, the armaments, and other gifts he had received in England. However, it’s not clear that he ever succeeded in restoring his family honor on their native island, and the livestock, rather than being bred, were evidently slaughtered and eaten not long after Cook and the ships departed. 

New Zealand

We visited New Zealand in 2007, where Len attended a scientific conference in Wellington. We took a few guided tours, particularly one overnight to the south island, where Captain Cook spent most of his visit. In the book, the Maori’s beautiful crafts, wood and stone carving, and other decorative forms, were considered remarkable for their skill and artistry. We saw some very wonderful examples in the national museum in Wellington, and also saw the land and sea in a wonderful way.

A Maori stone carving from the museum.

Maori wood carving.

A view from the very small airplane that flew us from one island to another.

What did Captain Cook Eat?

As you can probably tell, I was enchanted by the descriptions in The Wide Wide Sea, especially by the many quotations from Cook himself. A few years ago, I read several books about Captain Cook, and I wrote a post titled What did Captain Cook Eat? Again in reading this book, I found fascinating descriptions of the foods the men on the ship ate, and the concern that Cook showed for the nutritional needs of his men. While scurvy was a death trap for most early voyages, Cook recognized the need for vegetables and fruits (though it would be many decades before the actual discovery of Vitamin C). For example, in New Zealand, he has his men brew beer from a plant that he hoped would prevent scurvy.

The most tempting food descriptions in the book describe the wonderful fish dinners that were served in almost every harbor and stopping place on the long, long voyage.

A traditional Polynesian fish trap from our visit in 2019.

In every port, Cook’s men were happy to eat fresh foods, and to restock the ship’s larders. On Christmas in 1777: “the captain gave all hands the day off  ‘to amuse themselves … and every one had a pint of brandy to make merry and drink health to their friends in Old England.’ The Christmas dinner offerings were large quantities of roasted fish and shark steaks, vats of turtle burgoo, and platters of broiled seabirds.” (p. 198)

In New Zealand — where we remember eating fabulous fish dishes — Cook’s men were treated to a rich seafood meal:

“The Māori fishermen had brought loads of delicious fresh catch. The lobsters were judged very fine, as were the cockles, oysters, and mussels. There was mullet, tarakihi, blue cod, and mackerel. But by far the most popular was the fish the Natives called moki, which yielded fillets that were incredibly moist and delicate, much like sea bass.” (p.119)

Here are a few of the beautiful restaurant offerings and evidence that fishing continues. I enjoyed eating fish in these locations where Captain Cook once visited. Did I appreciate them as well as a sailor who had been at sea for months? Impossible to compare! 

 

Curried New Zealand Mussels from our trip to Wellington, 2007.

Fish that we ate at Merriman’s famous restaurant on the Big Island of Hawaii.

Destination: Alaska

A major goal of Cook’s voyage was to explore the Arctic north of Alaska, searching for the “Northwest Passage” which would allow ships to sail north of the American continent and much more quickly reach Europe from the Pacific. Because ice blocked this route in all seasons, Cook’s search only demonstrated that this was not possible at that time. (Current global heating is changing this). 

I have never been to the far north of Alaska, but I did visit the Arctic a few times, and so I was able to visualize some of what Cook saw. In terms of the food he could find in this forbidding environment, I was impressed by this:discussion of the hunting of walrus meat, and Cook’s enjoyment of a meat that his men all found disgustingly inedible:

“Cook genuinely seemed to like walrus, calling their fat ‘as sweet as marmalade’ and praising their steaks as a form of ‘marine beef.’ Clerke [the captain of the other ship on the expedition] agreed. ‘For my own part,’ he wrote, ‘I think them pleasant and good eating; and they doubtless must be infinitely more nutritive and salutary than any salt provision.’” (p.282)

A walrus on the ice above the Arctic Circle on our trip to the Svalbard Archipelago in 2015.

 

Blog post © 2024 mae sander. Photos © 2007-2024

Shared with Deb’s Sunday Salon.

The Fish Girl and The Four Dutchmen

The Fish Girl, published 2017.
(This review contains spoilers)

The epigraph at the beginning of The Fish Girl, a novella by Mirandi Riwoe, comes from the short story "The Four Dutchmen" by W. Somerset Maugham. It reads:

"One of these days he would buy himself a house on the hills in Java and marry a pretty little Javanese. They were so small and so gentle and they made no noise, and he would dress her in silk sarongs and give her gold chains to wear round her neck and gold bangles to put on her arms." (The Fish Girl, p. 4). 

Riwoe's story begins in a fishing village in Indonesia. It tells in simple language of the life of Mina, a very young daughter who works in her mother's kitchen, mostly preparing the fish her father catches. The first chapter tells how her father sells her to be a servant in a larger town, where she learns to wait on the master and work for the cook, making a variety of local dishes. After I read Riwoe's story, I read the Maugham story. In it, we can recognize Riwoe's girl, but Maugham presents her without any distictive characteristics at all. She's just a toy for men.

The master in Riwoe's story expects the arrival of group of visitors. A servant boy tells Mina: "These men are great friends, but no-one can tell them apart. We just call them 'the four Dutchmen.',... Tonight they are bringing a friend. I heard Master say he’s famous. A famous storyteller. From far away." (The Fish Girl, p. 20). So we can recognize the appearance in Riwoe's story of the humanized characters in the Maugham story -- the white men.

I chose this book cover because I appreciate the connection
to Gauguin's exotic women, maybe a little more human but still
problematic. (I read the Project Gutenberg version.)

I fear that if I read "The Four Dutchmen" without the context of Riwoe's story, I might not come around to fully grasping the cold way that the girl was only a thing: not human, not feeling, not suffering, not even having a name or origin. How could literature -- highly respected literature like Maugham's -- have been so careless with humans as long as they were exotic alien female creatures with dark skin? (He does mention the color of skin.) 

I admire Riwoe's creation of a flesh-and-blood character who has her own village, her own parents, her position in as a servant, her relationships with other servants, deep emotions, and a tragic fate, as well as a name. A much more profoundly depicted character. Maugham's creature is so indistinct that her death isn't even the least tragic, not even sad.

Here is the end of Maugham's story. The girl, having been taken on the tramp ship to be used by the captain, having been raped by one of the men, and then causing a murder and a suicide, becomes nothing but a bulky package as the sailors, who have fought over her, dispose of her, and blame her for her own fate. The narrator searching to know the end of the story reveals:

"But one of the sailors on the watch, just before dawn, had seen the supercargo and the chief engineer carry something up on deck, a bulky package, about the size of a native woman, look about them to see that they were unobserved, and drop it overboard; and it was said all over the ship that these two to avenge their friends had sought the girl out in her cabin and strangled her and flung her body into the sea." (W. Somerset Maugham, "The Four Dutchmen")

In The Fish Girl, we care about this "package," as the innocent girl, whom we've come to know, meets a tragic fate, thrown alive into the sea:

"The first shock of the cold ocean smites the fury from her. She falls through the water, as swiftly as a coin. Blackness smothers her, surrounds her in tiny bubbles. The blurred lights of the tramp waver and dim as she sinks. She panics, inhales salty water through her nostrils. A blank pressure builds inside her head. She feels she might burst. . . . Her descent slows. Specks of seaweed and silt swirl around her head, punctuate the murky depths.  . . . The Ocean Queen whispers to her, wraps her warm arms around Mina’s constricted body. Loosens the folds. Nyai Loro Kidul promises her much, buoys her descent. Mina’s head relaxes back and the tramp is nothing but a glowing spot in the distance. The silken water draws Mina further down into nothingness. Until she is finally back in the sunlight, scaling fish with her mother." (Mirandi Riwoe, The Fish Girl, p. 48)

Review © 2022 mae sander. 

The National Geographic Explorer

On the National Geographic Explorer we visited southern Patagonia from Puerto Natales, Chile, on the Señoret Channel,
then into the fjords near the Strait of Magellan, then onward to a landing at Cape Horn, and finally to Staten Island.
Our final port was Ushuaia, Argentina. While the ship was underway we enjoyed the views from the bow and the decks.

Here's a peek into the ship's kitchen, where numerous cooks prepared 3 meals a day and snacks.
In the depths of the ship are many support systems, such as two enormous frozen-storage rooms,
large stores of canned and processed food, a state-of-the-art garbage processing area, and more.

Breakfast and lunch were served from a buffet. At breakfast, a chef made omelets, poached eggs, or fried eggs to order. There were lots of other choices which varied day by day, including fruit, cereal, ship-made granola, yogurt, pancakes or French toast, bacon, sausages, and many more. At lunch you could choose from several hot entrees and a varying salad bar. Far too many to try them all! An alternate lunch service was upstairs in the observation deck where you could watch the scenery while eating -- we did that several times. Afternoon tea was served at 4 PM, but we were usually either too busy or too tired to go to the dining room for this extra meal.

The final afternoon tea was Swedish pancakes, dished up by the Purser
(who is Swedish) and the head chef. We did enjoy this one!

Dinner was served quite formally. Here are photos of three dinner courses served on various nights:

Duck patè with figs and balsamic glaze.

Roast beef, asparagus in prosciutto, and mashed potatoes. 

A typical dessert. I often opted for ice cream instead!

In the lounge, a briefing is held before dinner each evening. Besides a recap of the day's activity and a
description of possibilities for the following day, we usually heard a brief lecture on a topic such as native people or local vegetation. Before the briefing is a cocktail hour with snacks and hors-d'oeuvres.

The chart room is usually a quiet place with maps of where we had been. One night, however, as shown: we
attended a cocktail party here. From the chart room you can exit onto the bow for dramatic views of sea and shore. 

The bridge of the Explorer is generally open to passengers except in very tricky navigation situations.
At the helm in this photo is Oliver Kruse, the captain of the ship.

The water level door shown here is the exit where we
would board the Zodiac boats for better viewing of the
scenery or for shore landings. The tanks belong to professional
scuba divers who made underwater videos to inform us
of another element of our surroundings. No diving for passengers!

Another area for quietly watching the scenery is the library, which offers many
books about the areas where the Explorer goes. Outside the window is
Cape Horn. Owner of leg pointing to Cape Horn: unidentified.

I've already shown a number of photos of the ship: here's one more, showing a Zodiac
coming to shore to pick up hikers from a beautiful hike on Staten Island.
Staten Island is almost entirely off-limits to vistors, so there are no trails and we used
walking sticks to deal with the rough terrain. Only the Explorer is allowed to anchor there.

In the month of October, we were almost completely occupied with packing and preparing for the trip, traveling, and then returning home to resettle in. Usually, at the end of each month, I share a post about my kitchen with a number of other bloggers, but these photos of the Explorer represent my "kitchen" activities for the month.

Early People of Patagonia

View from inside the Milodon Cave, which we visited on the way to Torres del Paine National Park in Chile.
The discovery here of a well-preserved milodon (giant sloth) in 1895 received a great deal of attention in England and locally.

Inside the cave, we posed with a statue
of a milodon. The early humans aren't
much acknowledged in the cave.

Patagonia has been home to humans for around 11,000 years. An early location where evidence of their presence is found is the Milodon Cave Natural Monument, where we stopped during the land portion of our recent National Geographic tour. The Milodon, or Giant Sloth, whose bones are found throughout Patagonia, was hunted by early people, who probably contributed to the extinction of this one-ton beast. (The Milodon discovery plays a large role in Bruce Chatwin's book In Patagonia, among other things.)

The early Patagonians and Fuegians (natives of Tierra del Fuego, the southern islands that are also part of Patagonia) were descendants of the early humans who walked across the frozen Bering Straight and over many generations spread throughout the Americas. We didn't learn much about these humans between prehistory and the arrival of the first European voyagers, starting with Magellan, and a few others including Captain Cook. I'm not sure that much is known about them.

As Europeans began to arrive in greater numbers and colonize the area during the 19th century, they found several important tribal groups living in Tierra del Fuego. One voyage to that area that's still much remembered is that of the Beagle in 1830. Charles Darwin was onboard as a companion to the ship's captain, Robert FitzRoy. Darwin's journal of their experience in Tierra del Fuego contains quite a lot of observation of the local people.

Model of the ship Beagle of Darwin's visit. (Ushuaia Museum)

A major goal of Captain FitzRoy was to return three Fuegians to their homeland, along with a missionary to their fellow tribesman. These three had been taken a few years earlier (you might say they had been kidnapped) to be educated in English ways. Darwin's account of this part of the voyage describes how these individuals, once back to their tribe, reverted to the local ways and did not achieve the result of "civilizing" the rest of their people. The missionary stayed only a short time, as his goal appeared unachievable.

Two tribal groups in Tierra del Fuego were the Selk'nam and the Yàmana, whom I learned about in the Maritime Museum in Ushuaia, Argentina, and other sources. Some of the territory where they lived is now considered uninhabitable, and makes up the vast and fascinating natural spaces that we enjoyed seeing. I suppose this illustrates how tough these local tribes were, at least until they encountered Europeans!

1890's photos of Fuegians. (Ushuaia Museum)

The museum provided an interesting note about what they ate, a subject that always interests me:

"According to present studies, the Yàmana diet was based on sea lions. This was their main source of energy: both for proteins and calories. They also ate mushrooms, wild fruit such as Calafate, fish, whale meat -- when one ran aground on the beach -- and shellfish." (Museum documentation)

Native Fuegians. The early travelers were especially amazed because the Fuegians,
despite the very cold climate and harsh winds, didn't wear clothing except the occasional
guanaco skin. Fuegians made canoes and sometimes hunted marine mammals. (Ushuaia Museum)

Beached whales, like this one that we photographed, are still frequent.

Later, as more and more Europeans arrived, the fate of these tribes was extinction. The Yàmana population in 1884 was estimated at 1000 (half their original number); by 1925 only 45 of these people remained. The causes of their extinction included introduced diseases, especially smallpox, measles, pneumonia, and TB; reduction in available food supplies, and the takeover of their lands.

Even more upsetting is the fate of the Selk'nam, who were the victims of an intentional genocide. English sheep farmers, who had taken over the area, received a bounty for the slaughter of Selk'nam tribes people. Horrible to say, the bounty was paid when the killers turned in hands, ears, or skulls of their victims.

Tierra del Fuego: a hard place to live.

The Coffee Shack, Captain Cook, Hawaii

This morning at The Coffee Shack in Captain Cook Hawaii:
Geckos are everywhere, coming in the windows.
And outside the windows -- one of the world's most beautiful views!
We arrived in Hawaii last night. Snorkeled this morning. Then brunch. 

A gecko enjoying the view. Miriam's photo.

Miriam and Tom.

Several of us ordered Eggs Benedict with fresh local ahi tuna under the eggs, and oven fries. Fabulous!
And cups of 100% Kona coffee. Don't accept blends, only drink 100% Kona.

Coffee Shack pies are famous: we had one piece of
key lime pie.

Location of the Coffee Shack on the Big Island of Hawaii.

Native Species and Canoe Foods

I had a long discussion today with Julia (above, holding a segment of sugar cane). She was giving out samples of food at a cultural festival at the Kaloko-Honokōhau National Historica Park -- one of my favorite parks in the whole world! We got into a conversation about the food plants that are native to the Hawaiian islands prior to human arrival, "canoe foods" that came with the Polynesian settlers, and foods that Europeans brought after the arrival of Captain Cook. Besides a variety of plants, the canoe foods included pigs, chickens, and dogs. Julia has wondered if eggs from the chickens played a role in cooking in pre-western-contact times -- she has been unable to find any references to the use of eggs.



Served on a ti leaf, the sample foods at the festival included coconut, taro, breadfruit, sugar cane, Hawaiian purple sweet potato, and Kalua pig (not shown). A beverage from a plant that grows up on the higher hills tasted to me like tea. While the sugar cane and sweet potato are very sweet, the taro and breadfruit are rather bland, though not bad at all. I believe that in more recent times, the way people ate these foods may have become more complex and highly flavored.

Cooking in Polynesian times was mainly done in pits dug into the ground and lined with various leaves.  They thus cooked a whole animal. The pit's contents was steamed slowly over a long period of time, and thus quite soft. Other preparations included use of water heated by adding hot stones to water held in gourds, or fermentation as was done with poi. Julia described to me the use of salted fish for long sea voyages, but said she was not aware that other meats would have been preserved by salting. The stone-age Hawaiians had no pottery or metal, so there were no cook pots.



Breadfruit was available at the farmers' market this morning as shown above. I also saw some of the purple Hawaiian sweet potatoes, which are quite small and have a light-colored tan skin.



Here is Julia, getting ready to serve a sample of Hawaiian foods.

What did Captain Cook eat?

“Breadfruit, ripe bananas, taro and pandanus nuts [a kind of pine nuts] mixed with coconut cream and cooked with hot stones from the oven” was the favorite South-Sea baked pudding of Captain James Cook. In his extensive journal, food was always an important subject. The people who traveled with him “relished the local pork, deliciously cool coconuts, and sweet breadfruit.” Motivation for Cook’s voyages included: “discoveries of useful plants.” He documented both new and familiar foods he found on his three remarkable expeditions. (Salmond, p. 362; Thomas p. 78 & 44*)

During his first voyage in 1769, Cook began trading for food with the local inhabitants of his first major stop: Tahiti. At first, two representatives “regularly came out to the ship with gifts of pigs, chickens, coconuts, bananas, yams and breadfruit.” Later, “a set of trading guidelines were established – a spike nail for a small pig; a hatchet for a hog; a small spike nail for a chicken; twenty coconuts or breadfruit for a forty-penny nail; ten for a white glass bead and six for an amber one.” (Salmond, p. 68)

As the voyages proceeded, Cook’s men constantly obtained food from the natives and gathered wild foods on unguarded islands. They had to do so to provision their ships with fresh food, as well as taking on drinking water wherever they could. In time, they tried a wide variety of new foods. The exotic fruits and vegetables cultivated on indigenous farms were usually very pleasing to Cook and his crew. Fish, sea birds, turtles, and shellfish were often more familiar. He described the foods of New Zealand: “The Sea Bays and Rivers abound with a great varity of excellent fish the most of them unknown in England, besides Lobsters which were allow’d by every body to be the best they ever had eat, Oysters and many other sorts of shell fish all excellent in their kind.” (Journals, p. 55)

Here is a photo of islands in the area where Cook had much contact with the Maori of New Zealand:


While exploring the Antarctic region, he wrote: “The Penguin is an amphibious bird so well known to most people that I shall only observe that they are here in prodigious numbers and we could knock down as many as we pleased with a stick. I cannot say they are good eating, I have indeed made several good meals of them but it was for want of better victuals…. Shags [cormorants] breed here in vast numbers and we took on board not a few, as they are very good eating.” (Journals, p. 182)

Domestic animals were fewer and smaller than in Europe; the natives were always amazed at the livestock – sheep, cattle, goats – on board Cook's ships. In Tahiti, Cook wrote: “For tame Animals they have Hogs Fowls and Dogs the latter of which we learnd to eat from them and few were there of us but what allowe’d that a South Sea Dog was next to an English Lamb.” Cook suspected that the dogs’ vegetarian diet (provided by the natives) contributed to making them good to eat. He concluded: “little can be said in favour of their fowles but their Pork is most excellent.” The local diet was undoubtedly more pleasant than shipboard dinners which might include “Pease Soup, Salt Beef and Pork.” On his third and last voyage, Cook’s cargo from London included “a Bull, 2 Cows with their Calves & some sheep … at His Majestys Command and expence” which he was to present to his friends in Tahiti. (Journals, p. 35, 174, & 205)

In contrast to the farmers of Polynesia and New Zealand, the Australian Aboriginals hunted and gathered their food. Cook wrote of them: “Natives know nothing of Cultivation. … Land Animals are scarce, as far as we know confined to a very few species; … the sort that is in the greatest plenty is the Kangooroo, or Kanguru so called by the Natives; we saw a good many of them about Endeavour River, but kill’d only Three which we found very good eating.” Although Cook’s men were open minded, there were exceptions. For example, English sailors didn’t want to eat sharks perhaps because sharks “fed on human flesh.” Cook wrote: “indeed hardly any thing came amiss to us that could be eat by man.” (Journals, p. 82; Thomas, p. 41, Journals, p. 55)

Cook was constantly concerned with providing healthful nutrition to officers, sailors, and accompanying scientists on his voyages. He insisted on the men’s cooperation in eating their rations, and went as far, in one instance, to give two sailors “12 lashes each for refusing to take their allowance of fresh beef.” What he saw in their refusal was mutinous insolence -- not to be tolerated. (Thomas, p. 39)

In 1773, on his second voyage, Cook commanded an ambitious joint expedition of two boats. Throughout this and other voyages he was most worried about scurvy – and considerably more successful in fighting it than many contemporaries. Here is one description of his measures: “Being a fine day I hoisted a boat out and sent aboard the Adventure [the other boat] to inquire into the state of her crew when I learnt that her cook was dead and about Twenty more were attacked with the Scurvy and Flux; at this time we had only three men on the Sick list and only one of them of the Scurvy, several more however began to shew some symptoms of it and were accordingly put upon the Wort, Marmalade of Carrots, Rot of Lemons and Oranges.” Cook’s measures against scurvy included instructing the ship’s cook: “to Brew Beer of the Inspissated juce of Wort, Essence of Spruce and Tea plant … for the Sick, to inlarge their allowance of Sour Krout, to boil Cabbage in their Pease, to serve Wine in lieu of Spirit and lastly to shorten their allowance of Salt Meat.” (Journals, p. 129)

The expedition was not always lucky with unfamiliar foods. Of one incident Cook reported: “The Night before we came out of Port two Red fish about the size of large Bream and not unlike them were caught with hook and line of which Most of the Officers and Some of the Petty officers dined the next day. In the Evening every one who had eat of these fish were seiz’d with Violent pains in the head and Limbs, so as to be unable to stand, together with a kind of Scorching heat all over the Skin, there remained no doubt but that it was occasioned by the fish being of a Poisonous nature and communicated its bad effects to every one who had the ill luck to eat of it even to the Dogs and Hogs.” A dog and a hog died; the men recovered. Another episode of fish poisoning resulted from eating the liver and roe of an unknown fish resembling a sun fish. (Journals, p. 169 & 174)

Cook’s philosophy of how to treat his men was also reflected in how he distributed scarce provisions. In Australia, food was scarce, and the natives were unwilling to barter as the Polynesians had done. He wrote: “The refreshments we got here” -- on the Endeavor River -- “were chiefly Turtle… Whatever refreshment we got that would bear a division I caused to be equally divided amongst the whole compney generally by weight, the meanest person in the Ship had an equal share with my self or any one on board, and this method every commander of a Ship on such a Voyage as this ought ever to observe.” (Journals, p. 74)

In Kauai, Hawaii, in January 1778, Cook made first contact with Hawaiian islanders. Cook’s men were preparing to search north of Alaska for the Northwest Passage. They loaded 200 green turtles on board the ships. They also got to know the Hawaiians: “The sailors were surprised to find that these people spoke a language very like Tahitian, and thrilled when [the Hawaiians] assured them that there were plenty of pigs, chickens, breadfruit, sweet potatoes, plantains, sugar-cane and coconuts on their island.” (Salmond, p. 380)


Returning from the Arctic, on December 1, 1778, Cook reached the island of Hawaii: “Over the following days… canoes flying white flags brought out large quantities of pigs, breadfruit, taro, and sugar-cane. Cook, concerned that his supply of spirits would not last for another season of Arctic exploration, ordered sugar-cane beer to be brewed and served to the sailors.” At the Hikiau Temple south of Kealakekua Bay (shown in photos above) Cook described a number of offerings on a ritual platform: “A rotting hog lay on this stage, which had a pile of sugar-cane, coconuts, breadfruit, plantains.” As Cook stood on a tower near the platform priests chanted the Kumulipo, a cosmological chant. (Salmond, p. 391 & 396)

At the beginning of his visit to the island of Hawaii, Cook enjoyed the admiration and even the worship of the Hawaiian people, who took him for a god named Lono. He was able to acquire large supplies of food, and prepared to continue his voyage. He left with a very high opinion of the Hawaiian natives.

Throughout Cook’s three Pacific expeditions, the most troubling issue relating to food was cannibalism among some of the tribes. The English revulsion was shared by some of the non-cannibal Tahitian natives who traveled with them. For a time, Cook and his company weren’t expecting to find cannibals, and doubted the evidence of cannibalism. But they saw indirect indications like some freshly eaten human bones in a basket that was opened accidentally. Reality jolted them: for example, when some Maoris saw a joint of mutton among the ship’s provisions and expressed the assumption that it was human flesh. The size of sheep’s bones, larger than any animal in their experience, caused this conclusion. It also illuminated their unfortunate experience with eating human flesh.

The English mariners were really unhappy when they had to accept that cannibalism was common among the Maori of New Zealand. These were some of the most easily befriended people Cook encountered, but they habitually killed and ate their enemies. Cook expressed a hope that the Maori “will become more civilized and then and not till then this Custom may be forgot.” (Thomas, p. 212)

The truth became inescapable when a group of Maoris massacred and ate 20 men from Cook’s companion ship, the Adventure. The reaction of their companions, who found the remains, was overwhelming: “Such a shocking scene of Carnage & Barbarity as can never be mentiond or thought of, but with horror” wrote one of the witnesses. (Thomas, p. 253)

In the end, of course, Cook didn't go far from Hawaii. His ship turned out not to be seaworthy. Only a few days after his optimistic farewell, the Hawaiians, who had formerly been so friendly and treated Cook as the incarnation of the god Lono turned on him and at Kealakeua Bay (shown below) he met the same fate as the men from the Adventure.

Like his near-namesake Captain James Kirk on the Starship Enterprise, Captain James Cook went where no one had gone before. I think his voyages were much more exciting.

*References

• A. Grenfell Price, ed. The Explorations of Captain James Cook in the Pacific as told by selections of his own journals 1768-1779. Dover Publications: New York, 1971.
• Anne Salmond. The Trial of the Cannibal Dog: The Remarkable Story of Captain Cook’s Encounters in the South Seas. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003.
• Nicholas Thomas. Cook: The Extraordinary Voyages of Captain James Cook. New York: Walker & Co., 2003.