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That Curious Fellow - Captain Basil Hall, RN (Paperback)
Loot Price: R584
Discovery Miles 5 840
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That Curious Fellow - Captain Basil Hall, RN (Paperback)
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Loot Price R584
Discovery Miles 5 840
Expected to ship within 12 - 19 working days
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Son of a scientifically-minded Scottish aristocrat, Basil Hall
joined the Royal Navy at the age of 13 in 1802. His first naval
engagements in America and Spain during the Peninsular War are
described, as are his travels in India and the Far East. His
renowned interview with Napoleon, while still a prisoner on St.
Helena is featured. He was a confidante of Sir Walter Scott,
Dickens and many other distinguished authors of his day. Renowned
for his curiosity and energy, he became a popular writer himself
based on his world-wide travels and adventures, including his
involvement in the liberation of Peru and friendship with General
San Martin. He embarked on an epic, 10,000-mile journey with his
family in North America and twice journeyed across the
sub-continent of India under the patronage of the Admiral Sir
Samuel Hood, providing delightful vignettes of Indian life of the
time. Subsequent travels in Europe introduce personalities such as
Lord Byron and the eccentric Countess Purgstall. Although the
narrative of his journey in the United States earned him great
opprobrium from Americans for his conservative attitudes, his
support in Edinburgh to the great American bird painter, John James
Audubon, was greatly appreciated by the artist. As an amateur
scientist, Hall made important contributions to nautical astronomy,
geology and naval technology, being a Fellow of both the Royal
Society and the Royal Society of Edinburgh. Among his scientific
friends were Sir John Herschel, Mary Somerville, and Sir Humphrey
Davy, among many others. He was in the unusually privileged
position of moving among the upper echelons of British society's
distinguished writers, scientists and politicians thus providing a
fascinating insight into the mores and manners of high society in
Edinburgh and London. The inclusion of previously unpublished and
often revealing correspondence has contributed to the first full
biography of a very colourful individual and his times.
General
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