Captain Cook Arrow Legend It was a great legend
while it lasted, but DNA testing has (51) ended a
two-century-old story of the Hawaiian arrow carved from the bone of British
explorer Captain James Cook (52) died in the Sandwich Islands
in 1779. "There is (53) Cook in the
Australian Museum," museum collection manager Jude Philip said not long ago in
announcing the DNA evidence that the arrow was not made of Cook’s bone. But that
will not stop the museum from continuing to display the arrow in its
(54) "Uncovered: Treasures of the Australian Museum," which
(55) include a feather cape presented to Cook by Hawaiian King
Kalani ’opu’u in 1778. Cook was one of Britain’s great explorers
and is credited with (56) the "Great South Land,"
(57) Australia, in 1770. He was clubbed to death in the Sandwich
Islands, now Hawaii. The legend of Cook’s arrow began in 1824
(58) Hawah’an King Kamehameha on his. deathbed gave the arrow m
William Adams, a London surgeon and relative of Cook’s wife, saying it was made
of Cook’s bone after the fatal (59) with islanders.
In the 1890s the arrow was given to the Australian Museum and the legend
continued (60) it came face-to-face with science.
DNA testing by laboratories in Australia and New Zealand revealed the
arrow was not made of Cook’s bone but was more (61) made of
animal bone, said Philp. However, Cook’s fans (62)
to give up hope that one Cook legend will prove true and that part of
his remains will still be uncovered, as they say there is evidence not all of
Cook’s body was (63) at sea in 1779. "On this occasion
technology has won," said Cliff Thornton, president of the Captain Cook Society,
in a (64) from Britain. "But I am (65)
that one of these days ...one of the Cook legends will prove to be
true and it will happen one day."
