DIAGRAM ILLUSTRATING THE EVOLUTION OF THE HORSE 62 THE PATAGONIAN CAVY-From Brehm's "Natural History". THE CAPYBARA-From Brehm's "Natural History" DARWIN SHOOTING AT A CONDOR CAPE FROWARD, STRAITS OF MAGELLAN-From Spry's" Voyage of the Challenger" 76 78 MUD VOLCANOES, TURBACO, SOUTH AMERICA-From 80 90 ELEPHANT TORTOISE, GALAPAGOS ISLANDS-From Brehm's "Natural History" DARWIN TESTING THE SPEED OF AN ELEPHANT TORTOISE (GALAPAGOS ISLANDS) 106 A CORAL ISLAND, OR ATOLL-From Figuier's" Ocean 128 DARWIN'S STUDY-From " The Century Magazine" The First Paper-Taste for Natural History-Birthplace-Early NE evening, in the year others information which he had acquired regarding natural objects. At this time Darwin was seventeen years of age; yet his paper, which was on the common Flustra, or sea-mat, attracted no little attention, and was the first in an ever increasing series that gave him in later years a world-wide reputation. While this was Darwin's first public appearance as a naturalist, he had long been an ardent collector. When but nine years of age he was the happy possessor of a collection of seals, franks, coins, and minerals which were the admiration of his young friends and acquaintances. Our hero was born at Shrewsbury in 1809, and began his school-boy life at a day-school, later, in 1818, attending the large establishment of Dr. Butler, a mile from the old homestead. This school, like many of the time, was a strictly classical institution, where the young mind was regaled with ancient geography and history almost exclusively. The lessons, so he tells us, were "learned by heart," with interminable verses, a feature much esteemed by educators of the day, and were mastered in boyish fashion by a combination of the talent of the school. He was singularly deficient in language, yet possessed, like other members of his family, a remarkable memory, so that, as he writes in his quaint Autobiography: "Much attention was paid to learning by heart the lessons of the previous day; this I could effect with great facility, learning forty or fifty lines of Virgil or Homer whilst I was in morning chapel; but this exercise was utterly useless, for every verse was forgotten in forty-eight hours." Our young hero, while manly and thoughtful, was simple-hearted, and often a victim to the deceptions practised by boys upon each other. Among his comrades was a boy named Garnett, who one day invited young Darwin into a store and treated him to cakes. Darwin noticed that his friend did not pay for them, and the occurrence, so unusual, moved him to ask for an explanation. Mischievous Garnett eyed his young schoolmate a moment, much as Mr. Jingle did Mr. Pickwick on their famous ride, and replied: "Why, my uncle left a large sum to each tradesman in the town with the understanding that anyone who wore his old hat and moved it in a peculiar way should obtain what he wished free." Young Darwin was naturally seized with a burning desire to exercise this wonderful power, which his comrade was only too eager to grant; so the next store they came to Darwin took the hat, walked bravely in, and ordered a supply of good things, giving the old hat a move as directed. He was passing out, when the storekeeper, who was at first amazed, dashed over the counter after the singular customer, who stood not upon the order of going, but dropped hat and cakes and ran as if for his life to the measure of the hearty laughter of his companion. While Darwin was fond of sport and a true boy in his pranks and games, there was a vein of unconscious dignity in him that the average youth did not possess. He tells us that in running to school he prayed to the Lord to aid him in arriving before it was too late, which would show a strong religious nature; and that he was humane and honourable to a marked degree is well known. How many boys in collecting eggs think of the rights of the birds? Yet our young naturalist, while an indefatigable collector of birds' eggs and nests, was invariably careful to take but one egg from each nest,-recognising in this the rights of the lower animals. His humanitarian ideas were carried to what some would consider extremes; thus, hearing at his uncle Josiah Wedgwood's, that it was cruel to spit living worms, he killed them first by a bath of salt and water. As a boy he was fond of solitary walks, and often rambled away by himself, loving the quiet seclusion of the forests, the haunts and fishing-pools at Maer, or the old fortifications about Shrewsbury. At such times he frequently became lost in meditation, so that in one instance, while deeply absorbed, he walked over a parapet, falling a distance of seven or eight feet. In referring to this, he naïvely remarks: "The number of thoughts which passed through my mind during this very short, but sudden and wholly unexpected, fall was astonishing, and seem hardly compatible with what physiologists have, I believe, proved about each thought requiring quite an appreciable amount of time.” The young naturalist early developed habits of observation, and entered into investigations, especially of difficult and complex subjects, with an ardour and interest that was infectious. He experienced intense pleasure in geometrical problems, enjoying the reasoning that was involved, and showed marked evidence of the care and patience in attaining certain ends that produced such results in his later career. The books which influenced his |