A THOUSAND LEAGUES OF BLUE: The Sierra...

A THOUSAND LEAGUES OF BLUE: The Sierra Club Book of the Pacific: A Literary Voyage edited by John A. Murray (Sierra Club: $16; 426 pp.). The Pacific Ocean and the lands it touches have inspired generations of authors, although only American and British writers appear in this anthology. The selections range from Captain Cook’s description of Easter Island (“Nature has been exceedingly sparing of her favors to this spot,” 1768) and Herman Melville’s wry observation that America would benefit from Marquesan Islanders coming as missionaries (1846) to Barry Lopez’s notes on the changing image of the Galapagos Islands (1993). The selections about the South Pacific are better chosen than the ones about the North; too many of the latter are devoted to Hawaii.