Wikipedia:Peer review/Alexis Bachelot/archive1

Alexis Bachelot
This peer review discussion has been closed. I'd appreciate a peer review here, the article passed a Good Article review on the 25th and I'm curious what would be needed to get this to Featured Article status. I've never taken anything to FAC, so I'm a bit unsure what would need to be done here. Feedback on the prose quality/clarity would be particularly appreciated.

Thanks, Mark Arsten (talk) 02:57, 29 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Sorry for the wait. This will be a review of prose and presentation rather than content, as I am unfamiliar with the sublect area. Brianboulton (talk) 16:18, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Great, thanks. Glad to have you as a reviewer again. Mark Arsten (talk) 16:21, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Brianboulton comments: An interesting and, to me, completely unknown story. I have indicated a number of ways in which the prose could be improved, and would like to read the article again after these changes have been effected.
 * Lead
 * "Bachelot, however, was able to quietly minister to a small group of Hawaiian Catholics for four years." Presumably he "converted" them first, since Bachelot's mission was "the first Catholic mission to the Kingdom of Hawaii"?
 * I would introduce Kaʻahumanu as "Queen Kaʻahumanu", to clarify her status and gender. This will help later on.
 * "After being forced to leave, Bachelot traveled to California..." Save a few words thus: "Bachelot then traveled to California..."?
 * "By 1837..." → "In 1937..."
 * I'm fairly certain that would be inaccurate :)
 * "After arriving in Honolulu, he learned that King Kamehameha III had changed his mind and would not allow Catholic priests on the island." .The sentence could end after "had changed his mind", to avoid a repetitive effect
 * Likewise, in "before being freed from the ship after the French and British navies...", the words "from the ship" are not necessary.
 * Early life
 * For the benefit of non-Catholoic readers, can you pipelink professed Look for other possible links, especially for ecclesiastical terms or offices
 * Hawaiian mission
 * "assigned them with the task..." The word "with" is redundant
 * "The priests were faced with a necessitous situation because of the absence of Rives' patronage." I would not use "neccesitous"; it's a pretty obscure word, and a situation of dire poverty" would be much clearer.
 * "he would pay for their passage" Clarifty "he" (Rives, presumably)
 * There are rather a lot of names in the short passage: "...after the death of King Kamehameha II in July 1824. As King Kamehameha III was a child at the time of the death of Kamehameha II, Kaʻahumanu ruled as Kuhina Nui." Can you find a way of simplifing this? You should explain the relationship of Kaʻahumanu to the old and new kings. In the lead we have "kuhina nui", here it is capitalised. Maybe this office should be explained, rather than expecting readers to rely on the link in the lead.
 * "years earlier" gives a wrong impression of many years earlier. According to Bingham's  article the conversion was four years previously, and this is what I would say.
 * Again I wonder how, if Bachelot's mission was the first to Hawaii, they met Boki who was already a Catholic?
 * "The captain, however, refused to do because..." There seems to be a word missing.
 * "where the Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace was dedicated in 1843". Tense error; 1843 was in the future, so "would be" dedicated.
 * "the group avoided drawing attention and studied the Hawaiian language". Drawing attention to themselves?
 * Why is lack of fluency in English relevant?
 * Again the mystery: "Hawaiians who had been converted with Boki"
 * I think you "obtain" taher than "attain" seeds
 * Persecution
 * "Though she steadfastly opposed his work, Bachelot viewed Kaʻahumanu as a good person..." would read better as: "Though Kaʻahumanu steadfastly opposed his work, Bachelot viewed her as a good person..."
 * "appertained" → "appertaining"
 * California
 * "By that time, the ship was running very low on food and water". Is this detail relevant?
 * "the next year" → "the following year"
 * "...asked the Catholic leadership in Santa Barbara to prevent him from leaving, but he insisted on leaving". Slightly rephrase, to avoid the repetition
 * Later life
 * Not an appropriate section heading - he had no "later life". "Final years" would be better.
 * "...they spent 13 days on the island before being confined to the ship on which they had arrived" Reads slightly oddly; I'd make that: "they spent 13 days on the island, but were then confined to the ship on which they had arrived,.."
 * "the HMS Sulpher" - needs a bit more detail: "the British naval vessel HMS Sulpher..." (Are you sure of this spelling of "Sulpher"?)
 * "The ships were commanded by Edward Belcher and Dupetit Thouars" - insert "respectively" after "commanded". Then, "who each tried..." etc
 * "After negotiations proved futile, they blockaded the harbor in mid-July and allowed Bachelot and Short to come ashore." This ic confusing. Does it mean that the captains, by blockading the harbor, enabled Bachelot and Short to land? It's not at all clear how this could work.
 * "By November 1837, he recovered..." Some recovery! I would modify to "By November 1837 he had recovered sufficiently to leave Hawaii".
 * You give the year of Bachelot's death as 1987
 * It was a very long voyage :)
 * "freedom of religion", rather than "the freedom of religion".

As I am not able to watch all my peer reviews, please contact me via my talkpage if you have any issues arising from this review. Brianboulton (talk) 23:45, 13 January 2012 (UTC)
 * You have a good eye! Thanks for the review, hopefully I'll get to this soon. Mark Arsten (talk) 00:03, 14 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Alright, I think I have implemented your suggested changes. I think your feedback has helped the article a lot. I'm interested to see the reception that this would get at WP:FAC. I have a couple questions though: is this change correct? I get confused about those two phrases. Also, when saying "a position similar to queen regent", "queen regent" should be lowercase, right? I did a brief look through Google books and it seems that "Kuhina Nui" is capitalized by some authors, but not by others. Our article has it capitalized so I stuck with that. Mark Arsten (talk) 03:27, 14 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm generally happy with what you've done, though I still have one query. Do I assume that kings Kamehameha II and III were either brothers or perhaps half-brothers? This follows from Kaʻahumanu being described as a wife of their father. I really would like to see these relationships clarified. I don't see why this article shouldn't go to FAC (there's a logjam there at the moment so it might be best to wait for a week or so), as long as you are satisfied that it meets the featured article criteria. Let me know what you decide to do. Brianboulton (talk) 00:51, 15 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I'll clarify that. I'll probably work on another article's FAC first before nominating this one though. Mark Arsten (talk) 23:05, 15 January 2012 (UTC)