{"product_id":"2940013681569","title":"Pitcairn's Island","description":"On a day late in December, in the year of 1789, while the earth turned\u003cbr\u003esteadily on its course, a moment came when the sunlight illuminated San\u003cbr\u003eRoque, easternmost cape of the three Americas. Moving swiftly westward, a\u003cbr\u003ethousand miles each hour, the light swept over the jungle of the Amazon,\u003cbr\u003eand glittered along the icy summits of the Andes. Presently the level\u003cbr\u003erays brought day to the Peruvian coast and moved on, across a vast\u003cbr\u003estretch of lonely sea.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn all that desert of wrinkled blue there was no sail, nor any land till\u003cbr\u003ethe light touched the windy downs of Easter Island, where the statues of\u003cbr\u003eRapa Nui's old kings kept watch along the cliffs. An hour passed as the\u003cbr\u003edawn sped westward another thousand miles, to a lone rock rising from the\u003cbr\u003esea, tall, ridged, foam-fringed at its base, with innumerable sea fowl\u003cbr\u003ehovering along the cliffs. A boat's crew might have pulled around this\u003cbr\u003efragment of land in two hours or less, but the fronds of scattered\u003cbr\u003ecoconut palms rose above rich vegetation in the valleys and on the upper\u003cbr\u003eslopes, and at one place a slender cascade fell into the sea. Peace,\u003cbr\u003ebeauty, and utter loneliness were here, in a little world set in the\u003cbr\u003emidst of the widest of oceans--the peace of the deep sea, and of nature\u003cbr\u003ehidden from the world of men. The brown people who had once lived here\u003cbr\u003ewere long since gone. Moss covered the rude paving of their temples, and\u003cbr\u003ethe images of their gods, on the cliffs above, were roosting places for\u003cbr\u003egannet and frigate bird.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe horizon to the east was cloudless, and, as the sun rose, flock after\u003cbr\u003eflock of birds swung away toward their fishing grounds offshore. The\u003cbr\u003efledglings, in the dizzy nests where they had been hatched, settled\u003cbr\u003ethemselves for the long hours of waiting, to doze, and twitch, and sprawl\u003cbr\u003ein the sun. The new day was like a million other mornings in the past,\u003cbr\u003ebut away to the east and still below the horizon a vessel--the only ship\u003cbr\u003ein all that vast region--was approaching the land.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHis Majesty's armed transport _Bounty_ had set sail from Spithead,\u003cbr\u003etwo years before, bound for Tahiti in the South Sea. Her errand was an\u003cbr\u003eunusual one: to procure on that remote island a thousand or more young\u003cbr\u003eplants of the breadfruit tree, and to convey them to the British\u003cbr\u003eplantations in the West Indies, where it was hoped that they might\u003cbr\u003eprovide a supply of cheap food for the slaves. When her mission on Tahiti\u003cbr\u003ehad been accomplished and she was westward bound, among the islands of\u003cbr\u003ethe Tongan Group, Fletcher Christian, second-in-command of the vessel,\u003cbr\u003eraised the men in revolt against Captain William Bligh, whose conduct he\u003cbr\u003econsidered cruel and insupportable. The mutiny was suddenly planned and\u003cbr\u003ecarried swiftly into execution, on the morning of April 28, 1789. Captain\u003cbr\u003eBligh was set adrift in the ship's launch, with eighteen loyal men, and\u003cbr\u003ethe mutineers saw them no more. After a disastrous attempt to settle on\u003cbr\u003ethe island of Tupuai, the _Bounty_ returned to Tahiti, where some of\u003cbr\u003ethe mutineers, as well as a number of innocent men who had been compelled\u003cbr\u003eto remain with the ship, were allowed to establish themselves on shore.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe _Bounty_ was a little ship, of about two hundred tons burthen,\u003cbr\u003estoutly rigged and built strongly of English oak. Her sails were patched\u003cbr\u003eand weather-beaten, her copper sheathing grown over with trailing weed,\u003cbr\u003eand the paint on her sides, once a smart black, was now a scaling, rusty\u003cbr\u003ebrown. She was on the starboard tack, with the light southwesterly Wind\u003cbr\u003eabaft the beam. Only nine mutineers were now on board, including Fletcher\u003cbr\u003eChristian and Midshipman Edward Young. With the six Polynesian men and\u003cbr\u003etwelve women whom they had persuaded to accompany them, they were\u003cbr\u003esearching for a permanent refuge: an island so little known, so remote,\u003cbr\u003ethat even the long arm of the Admiralty would never reach them.","brand":"WDS Publishing","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47069094772976,"sku":"2940013681569","price":2.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013681569_p0.jpg?v=1763584429","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013681569","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}