PREFACE The following chapters on the origin and evolution of American enterprise and policy in the Pacific and the Far East are the outgrowth of a course of lectures delivered by the author in 1899-1900, before graduate students in the department of history and politics of the Johns Hopkins University. Lectures treating of the relations of the United States with Alaska and Behring Sea, Transandine America, and isthmian transit routes have been reserved for publication elsewhere. For facilitating my investigations at Washington, D. C., my sincere acknowledgments are due to Mr. Andrew H. Allen, Chief of the Bureau of Rolls and Library of the Department of State, and Messrs. A. P. C. Griffin, Chief Bibliographer, and Hugh A. Morrison, of the Library of Congress. For encouragement in this and other fields of research, I am under obligation to Professor Herbert B. Adams, of Johns Hopkins University. Johns Hopkins University, Jan. 1, 1901. JAMES MORTON CALLAHAN. I.-Pioneers in Trade and Discovery: Early Commercial Enterprises between the American Coast and China. IV. Early Relations of Whalers and Traders with the PAGE INTRODUCTION. The Pacific-the sea of Eastern legends-upon whose warm currents unwilling emigrants were carried to primeval America, and a place of interest and excitement which Europe long hoped to reach by some passage across the American continent,' for over a century has mirrored upon its waves the silent and persevering efforts of American 1The Pacific was unknown to Europeans when Columbus sailed in search of the Indies in 1492, and when England sought a northwest passage in 1497. It was first seen by Balboa from an eminence on the Isthmus of Darien; and after the remarkable voyage of Magellan, in 1520, the "South Sea " became a place of interest and excitement. England, through the influence of her daring buccaneers who appeared on the scene, friends to the sea, but foes to all on its waves, soon rose like a sleeping leviathan to rule the deep. The Cape of Good Hope route to the Indies was found to be better than that by Cape Horn, but the idea of cutting a canal through the Isthmus was early suggested, and the hope of a western passage to the Indies did not finally die out for many years. The English, in the days of Gilbert, had visions of reaching the Pacific by the St. Lawrence, and the early settlers of Jamestown sailed up the Chickahominy with the same thought. Fictitious ideas of wealth to be obtained in the South Pacific resulted in the South Sea Bubble" and were soon afterwards dispelled by voyages of Wallis, Carteret and later explorers. While the conflict with her American colonies was in progress, England was putting forth efforts to control the commerce of the Northwest coast. In 1776, Captain James Cook was sent to explore the coast and, after discovering the Sandwich Islands, landed at Nootka sound in 1778. He then sailed through Behring Straits, and returned to the Sandwich Islands. All previous voyagers had sailed along the coast of South America to Panama or California, and then across the Pacific to the south of the Sandwich Islands. Cook did not confine himself to former tracks, but made accurate surveys of his own route for the use of subsequent voyagers. Besides the Sandwich Islands he visited the Friendly and Society islands, and New Zealand. He wrote of his discoveries along luxuriant isles and picturesque shores where perfumes were borne on every breeze, and Vancouver and many other explorers followed. |