THE MINERVA LIBRARY OF FAMOUS BOOKS, Edited by G. T. BETTANY, M.A., B.Sc. JOURNAL OF RESEARCHES INTO THE Natural History and Geology OF THE COUNTRIES VISITED DURING THE VOYAGE OF H.M.S. Under the Command of Capt. Fitz Roy, R.A. BY CHARLES DARWIN, M.A., F.R.S. (FROM THE CORRECTED AND ENLARGED EDITION OF 1845.) WITH A BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION ELEVENTH EDITION. Geogr. XV.83 BIBLIOTHECA 1935 2650 WARD, LOCK, BOWDEN AND CO., NEW YORK: BOND STREET. MELBOURNE: ST. JAMES'S STREET. SYDNEY: YORK STREET. INTRODUCTION. C ·HARLES DARWIN, the Newton of biology, as he has been well called, was the grandson of Erasmus Darwin, physician, speculative naturalist and poet, and of Josiah Wedgwood, the great potter; and was born at Shrewsbury on the 12th February, 1809. From his father and paternal grandfather, both physicians, he may be presumed to have derived a leaning to natural history studies; and to his maternal grandfather he probably was indebted for his intensely practical methods of working. Schooling at Shrewsbury Grammar School, under a narrow classical system, did the youth no good except to let the real bent of his mind develop without coercion. As a youth he was fond of making collections of coins, seals, minerals, etc., and he also studied chemistry and tried to make out the names of plants. He became very fond of sporting and shooting as he grew up, and his father once said to him in anger, "You care for nothing but shooting, dogs, and ratcatching, and you will be a disgrace to yourself and all your family." Clearly the future great naturalist was not plainly discernible in the youth, though the father was doubtless unjust to the lad who took long solitary walks, and delighted in reading Shakespeare, Scott, and Byron. There was nothing, however, in Charles Darwin which, to his father's mind, disqualified him for medical practice, for in 1825, at sixteen, he sent him to join his elder brother Erasmus at Edinburgh University, as a medical student. But the result of two years' stay was rather to bring out his natural history tastes, especially in the direction of insect collecting; and he made two interesting discoveries about embryos of marine animals. He decidedly objected to medicine, so his father suggested his entering the Church, to which after a little demur he agreed, and accordingly went to Christ's College, Cambridge, in January, 1828. Here, again, he says that, as far as the academical studies were concerned, his time was wasted, as neither mathematics nor classics interested him. It is humiliating to think how little his educators could do for Darwin; but circumstance was soon to do for him what the skill of man could not, showing that in the order of this world there is an element which can far surpass the devices of human educators. He continued to collect insects, and learned a little botany from Professor Henslow, the Cambridge man who most influenced him. His friendship and stimulating conversation did more to rouse the young man's soul to enthusiasm for science than anything else. During his last year at Cambridge, he read with profound interest Humboldt's " Personal Narrative," that charming book of travel, and Sir John Herschel's "Introduction to the Study of Natural Philosophy." These two books, he says, "stirred up in me a burning zeal to add even the most humble contribution to the noble structure of the Natural Science." By answering well in Paley and Euclid, the only Cambridge subjects he worked heartily at, he managed to come out tenth in the pass or "poll" examination for the B.A. degree in January. After this Henslow persuaded him to study geology, and in the summer he went on a geological excursion in Wales with Professor Sedgwick, on returning from which he found a letter from Henslow inviting him to go with Captain Fitz Roy in H.M.S. Beagle, as naturalist without pay, during a voyage round the world. After due deliberation this offer was accepted, and to the voyage thus undertaken we owe the famous "Journal." "The voyage of the Beagle," says Darwin, "has been by far the most important event of my life, and has determined my whole career." He always felt that he owed to it the first real training of his mind. He was led to attend closely to various branches of natural history and geology, and the isolation of the voyage drove him to inward reflection. Energetic industry and concentrated attention to whatever he was engaged in, these were the habits he then acquired and ever afterwards displayed. They availed him unspeakably, when in after life his effective working time was limited by constant and painful ill-health to a very few hours a day. During the voyage, as is abundantly shown by the 'Journal," everything about which he thought or read was made to bear directly upon what he had seen or was likely to see. thus unconsciously came to feel that the pleasure of observing and reasoning was a much higher one than that of the skilful sportsman. He The voyage of the Beagle, lasting from the 27th December, 1831, |