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Cover Legend: A Man of the Sandwich Islands in a Mask (c. 1779). Artist: John Webber (c. 1752-1798); engraver: Thomas Cook (c. 1744-1818). At the behest of the Royal Society, London, and underwritten by John Montagu, Fourth Earl of Sandwich, James Cook set out on a series of three monumental voyages between 1768 and 1780 to explore uncharted territories of the Pacific. His crew of 100 men was accompanied by noted naturalists (e.g. Sir Joseph Banks, FRS), astronomers, botanists, physicians, and artists, such as Sydney Parkinson and John Webber. Cook's team collected biological and botanical specimens, kept detailed written records, and produced documentary drawings and maps from Tierra del Fuego to the northernmost regions of the Bering Straits. Cook's expeditions were the most profusely illustrated of any voyage before the advent of photography. Much of this material had never before been reported to the Western world-the novel and often anomalous specimens fueled a passion for taxonomy which became a main theme of 18th century science. In Webber's image, reproduced from Cook's Account of Voyages to the Southern Hemisphere, the rower's mask and arboreal "hair" give this portrait a surreal look. The helmet, crafted from gourds with holes for the eyes and nose, has fern crests sprouting from the top and beardlike strips of tapa (bark cloth) hanging from the chin. None of these masks has survived. Webber's drawings are the only record. From an exhibition curated by Ann Weissmann at the MBL/WHOI library; http://www.mblwhoilibrary.org/exhibits/cook/

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