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Article: Ahab's Trade: The Saga of South Seas Whaling.(Review)
- Article from:
- Quadrant
- Article date:
- July 1, 2001
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2001 Quadrant Magazine Company, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Ahab's Trade: The Saga of South Seas Whaling, by Granville Allen Mawer; Allen & Unwin, 2000, $24.95.
BOURN RUSSELL, captain of the Sydney whaler Lady Rowena, sailed his vessel along the coast of Japan in 1831 and, as an entry in his log reveals, he already had an eye to the future. Japan, he wrote, seemed to have no wool, and would undoubtedly make a good market for that Australian product. How right he was.
Japanese trade was at the forefront of his mind. He had earlier burnt down a village on the south coast of Hokkaido, garrisoned by Japanese, because of their refusal to supply him with things he needed for his ship. Later, he had dispatched a letter ...