Ebooks for the Classroom+Faculty

A Two Years'' Cruise Off Tierra del Fuego, the Falkland Islands, Patagonia, and in the River Plate: A Narrative of Life in the Southern Seas
ISBN: 9781139839303
Platform/Publisher: Cambridge Core / Cambridge University Press
Digital rights: Users: Unlimited; Printing: Unlimited; Download: Unlimited

Following participation in the Arctic search for Sir John Franklin, the mariner and author William Parker Snow (1817-95) volunteered in 1854 to command the schooner Allen Gardiner, named after the man whose work for the South American Missionary Society was to be resumed. Although conceived as 'merely a simple narrative of daily life in the Southern Seas', this illustrated two-volume work becomes simultaneously a first-hand account of a sailor's experiences and observations, and a self-justification against those by whom he felt disappointed, frustrated and deceived. Volume 1 recounts the history of the Falkland Islands and the circumstances of this mission, covering the voyage to Patagonia, the establishment of a station on Keppel Island and the first friendly meetings with 'dreaded savages'. First published in 1857, the book met with some success. Snow, however, wasted the proceeds on a fruitless action against his former employers.