Description
pp. 290, “Scott Huler was working as a copy editor for a small publisher when he stumbled across the Beaufort Wind Scale in his Merriam Webster Collegiate Dictionary. It was one of those moments of discovery that writers live for. Written centuries ago, its 110 words launched Huler on a remarkable journey over land and sea into a fascinating world of explorers, mariners, scientists, and writers. After falling in love with what he decided was the best, clearest, and most vigorous piece of descriptive writing I had ever seen, Huler went in search of Admiral Francis Beaufort himself: hydrographer to the British Admiralty, man of science, and authorHuler assumedof the Beaufort Wind Scale. But what Huler discovered is that the scale that carries Beauforts name has a long and complex evolution, and to properly understand it he had to keep reaching farther back in history, into the lives and works of figures from Daniel Defoe and Charles Darwin to Captains Bligh, of the Bounty, and Cook, of the Endeavor. “