The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online

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Charles Darwin in Western Australia: A young scientist's perception of an environment. Nedlands: University of Western Australia Press, 1985. Text

Under the blue vault of heaven: A study of Charles Darwin's sojourn in the Cocos (Keeling) Islands. Nedlands: Indian Ocean Centre for Peace Studies, 1991. Text

Darwin's desolate islands: A naturalist in the Falklands, 1833 and 1834. Chippenham: Picton Publishing, 1992. Text

All Things Darwin: An Encyclopedia of Darwin's World. Greenwood: Connecticut, 2 vols., 2007.

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Charles Darwin, a couple of years after his return from the Beagle voyage Source: N. Barlow, Charles Darwin's Diary of the Voyage of HMS Beagle (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1933). The drawing is probably by George Richmond.

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Darwin's Other Islands

Patrick Armstrong

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CONTINUUM

The Tower Building 80 Maiden Lane

11 York Road Suite 704

London SE1 7NX New York, NY 10038

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmittted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Patrick Armstrong has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identied as Author of this work.

First published 2004

Reprinted 2006 (twice)

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN: 0-8264-7531-0 (hardback)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

Typeset by Servis Filmsetting Ltd, Manchester

Printed and bound in Great Britain by Antony Rowe, Chippenham, Wiltshire

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Contents

Acknowledgements vii

List of Figures ix

Chronology xi

Abbreviations xiii

1 Introduction: The Origins of the Darwin Voyage, and an Overview 1

2 Darwin's Islands in Context 11

3 The Mystique and Myth of the Galapagos - and the Reality 20

4 The Islands That Never Were 31

5 St Jago, Cape Verde: Source of Inspiration 38

6 The Smallest Rocks in the Tropical Seas: St Paul's Rocks and Fernando Noronha 46

7 Brief Interlude in the Abrolhos 55

8 The End of the Earth: Tierra del Fuego 59

9 Changing Environments, Changing Ideas: The Desolate Falklands 79

10 Chiloe: A Fine Island 107

11 The Chonos Archipelago: A Multitude of Islets 131

12 Across the Wide Pacific: To Tahiti and Beyond 138

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Contents

13 New Zealand: Maoris and Missionaries 155

14 Australia: The Great Princess of the South 166

15 Tasmania: A Geological Laboratory 183

16 T am glad that we have visited these Islands': The Cocos

(Keeling) Atoll 196

17 Mauritian Interlude 214

18 A Rock and a Cinder: St Helena and Ascension 223

19 The Last Island: Terceira, Azores 233

20 Conclusion: Islands, Inspiration and Ideas 246

Index 259

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Acknowledgements

My interest in Charles Darwin began very early in my Cambridge childhood, when I used to see his granddaughter, Gwen Raverat, painting with an easel mounted on her invalid carriage, along the Backs of the colleges and elsewhere on the banks of the River Cam. She was regarded locally with something akin to awe. I clearly recall, as a very young lad, watching from a discreet distance as she painted a view over the Mill Pond, adjacent to the Silver Street Bridge, from Laundress Green, just a stone's throw from Newnham Grange, the house in which the Darwin family lived for generations, and the adjoining Old Granary. These were the properties that Gwen immortalized in her book Period Piece: A Cambridge Childhood, and which in 1964 formed the basis for Darwin College, where in the 1980s I was able to spend two wonderful periods of sabbatical leave, undertaking some of the research upon which this book is based. Over a century earlier Charles used to walk along the Backs, sometimes with his mentor, the Reverend Professor John Stevens Henslow, past King's College Chapel (sometimes he would attend evensong), and so he must have followed a similar route to my regular peregrination during those periods of study-leave, from Darwin College to the University Library (open fields in Darwin's day) wherein the greater number of his manuscripts and notebooks are now preserved. I cannot, therefore, avoid expressing my heartfelt thanks to my parents, the late Edward and Eunice Armstrong, who chose to live in Cambridge during the formative period of my youth, and to the University of Western Australia, my present employer, who enabled me to return there many decades later, as well as to those at Darwin College and the Cambridge University Library Manuscripts Collection who provided assistance.

Funding for field research, in Darwin's footsteps, and in the Beagle's

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Acknowledgements

wake, was provided by the Centre for Indian Ocean Studies (Perth, Western Australia) and the Committee for Exploration and Research of the National Geographic Society (Washington, DC), as well as the University of Western Australia. St Deiniol's Library, Hawarden, North Wales, with its incomparable resources for the study of nineteenth-century thought, has on several occasions provided exactly the right environment for thinking and writing. Other institutions that have allowed me access to archives or specimens include: The Natural History Museum (London), the University Zoological Museum (Cambridge), the Public Record Office (Kew), which holds the Beagle log and other material relating to the voyage, Shrewsbury School, the Royal Naval Hydrographic Office (Taunton), the American Philosophical Society (Philadelphia) and Yale University Library (New Haven).

I thank also, with all my heart, my dear wife Moyra, who has had to live with Darwin, as well as a sometimes-preoccupied husband for nearly two decades. Other individuals who have encouraged, supported, discussed, disagreed, accommodated or fed me, or just 'been there' for a Darwin-hunter, in several continents include: Alan and Robyn Cadwallader, Viv Forbes, Peter Francis, Peter Gautrey, Brian Shaw, Kenn Back, Jim Moore, Alun Cooper, Geof Martin, Mark and Vanessa Seaward, Pauline Bunce, Jill and Phil Rutherford, Andrew Allott, Bob and Marion Keegan, John and Alison Underwood, Sarah Lumley, Marion Hercock, Arthur Conacher, Tim and Paula Armstrong, Nick and Ros Philpott, Sheelagh and Robert Hethering-ton, Nancy Hudson-Rodd, Brook and Eileen Hardcastle, Jim McAdam, Mike and Sue Morrisey. And many more.

viii

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List of Figures

Note: Unless otherwise indicated on the figures, all photographs are by the author and all maps and diagrams were drawn at the School of Earth and Geographical Sciences, University of Western Australia.

Frontispiece Charles Darwin, a couple of years after his return from the Beagle voyage

1.1 Map to show the approximate route of HMS Beagle (1831-36),

and positions of some of the islands visited 6

6.1 Map of St Paul's, Atlantic Ocean 47

8.1 Map of Tierra del Fuego, showing some of the places mentioned in the text 62

8.2 The Beagle Channel, looking south 63

8.3 'Darwin's fungus' (Cyttaria darwinii), growing on Nothofagus trunk, Tierra del Fuego 72

9.1 Map of the Falkland Islands 82

9.2 Map of Berkeley Sound, East Falkland, showing the various Beagle anchorages, and other places mentioned in the text 83

9.3 Darwin's excursion with the gauchos, March 1834 85

9.4 Settlement of Port Louis, East Falkland, in the 1830s 86

9.5 Settlement of Port Louis, East Falkland, in the 1980s 87

9.6 Darwin's geological notes of the folding of rocks in the Falklands 88

9.7 Darwin's 'zone of upheaval' (anticline), south of Berkeley

Sound, East Falkland 89

9.8 Fossils from rock exposures, Berkeley Sound 91

9.9 Berkeley Sound, East Falkland 91

9.10 Stone-runs, East Falkland 94

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List of Figures

9.11 Kelp-bed, East Falkland 98

9.12 Desolate moorland, East Falkland 102

9.13 The Falklands fox or warrah 103

10.1 Map of Chiloe, showing some of the places mentioned in the text 108

10.2 Gunnera at Cucao, Chiloe 113

10.3 Temperate forest, Chiloe 115

12.1 Map of Tahiti, showing valley of the River Tuauru, along which Darwin explored 140

12.2 Map of Tuauru Valley, Tahiti 141

12.3 Breadfruit still flourish in the gardens of Tahiti 142

12.4 Coast of Tahiti, from Point Venus 143

12.5 Darwin's theory of coral reefs: the transformation of a fringing reef into a barrier reef and ultimately an atoll, through the subsidence of an island or a rise in sea level 152

13.1 Map of the Bay of Islands area, North Island, New Zealand, showing places mentioned in the text and Darwin's route to Waimate mission 157

13.2 Haruru Falls 158

13.3 Kauri trees, North Island, New Zealand 158

14.1 Map of King George's Sound, Western Australia 175

14.2 Dykes intruding into granite, shore of King George's Sound 177

14.3 Grass-tree (Kingia), King George's Sound 177

14.4 Aborigines, King George's Sound 180

16.1 Map showing the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, Indian Ocean 198

16.2 Exposed coast, West Island, Cocos 199

19.1 Map of Terceira, with Darwin's probable routes 235

19.2 Volcanic landscape, Terceira 238

Table 1 Darwin's theory of coral reefs 249

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Chronology

1809 February

1825-27 1828-31

1828 August

December

1830 June

1831 August

December

1832 January

January-February February February-March December

1833 January-February

March-April 1833-34

Birth of Charles Robert Darwin, Shrewsbury

Medical training in Edinburgh

Studies at Christ's College, Cambridge; meets

the Revd Professors John Henslow and Adam

Sedgwick

Suicide of Captain Pringle Stokes,

Commander of HMS Beagle, Tierra del

Fuego

Robert FitzRoy assumes command of Beagle

HMS Beagle departs Tierra del Fuego with

Fuegian hostages

Charles Darwin's geological excursion

through North Wales with Professor

Sedgwick; received invitation to join HMS

Beagle on a voyage around the world

Departure of Beagle from England

Abortive visit to Tenerife; landing prevented

by quarantine restrictions

Visit to Cape Verde Islands

Visit to St Paul's Rocks

First landfall in South America; Bahia, Brazil

Beagle's return to Tierra del Fuego

Attempt by FitzRoy to establish mission

settlement at Woollya; exploration of Tierra

del Fuego

First visit to Falkland Islands

Explorations of mainland South America

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Chronology

1834	January-March
	March-April
	May-June
	June
	November-
	December
1835	January
	January-February
	March-September
	September
	November
	December
1836	January
	February
	March
	April
	April-May
	May
	July
	August
	August-September
	September
	October
1837	March
1839	January
	May

1859 November 1882 April

Return to Woollya, Tierra del Fuego

Second visit to Falkland Islands

Passage through Magellan Strait

First visit to Chiloe

Second visit to Chiloe and surrounding

islands

Cruising in Chonos Archipelago

Third visit to Chiloe

Exploration on mainland South America

(west coast)

Visit to Galapagos Islands

Visit to Tahiti

Visit to Bay of Islands, New Zealand

Visit to New South Wales, Australia

Visit to Tasmania

Visit to King George's Sound, Western

Australia

Visit to Cocos Islands, Indian Ocean

Visit to Mauritius, Indian Ocean

Visit to Cape of Good Hope; called on Sir

John Herschel

Visits to St Helena and Ascension Island,

Atlantic Ocean

Final call on South American mainland,

Bahia, Brazil; completion of 'chain of

meridians around the world'

Second visit to Cape Verde Islands

Visit to Terceira, Azores

Landfall at Falmouth, England; Darwin's

return to Shrewsbury

Approximate date of Darwin's 'conversion'

to an evolutionary outlook

Marriage to Emma Wedgwood

Publication of edited version of Darwin's

Beagle diary as final part of Captain

FitzRoy's Narrative of the Surveying Voyages

of the Beagle

Publication of On the Origin of Species

Death of Darwin at Downe, Kent; burial in

Westminster Abbey

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Abbreviations

ADM

Autobiography

Correspondence

DAR

Diary

Geological Diary

Geology of the Voyage

Little Notebooks

Narrative

Admiralty archives, Public Record Office, Kew.

N. Barlow (ed.), The Autobiography of Charles

Darwin, 1809-1882, with the Original Omissions

Restored (London: Collins, 1958).

F. Burkhardt and S. Smith, The Correspondence of

Charles Darwin, Vol. 1, 1821-1836 (Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 1985).

Darwin archives, Cambridge University Library.

N. Barlow (ed.), Charles Darwin's Diary of the

Voyage ofHMS 'Beagle' (Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, 1934; 1st edn, 1933).

Darwin's geological notes from the Beagle voyage,

DAR 32-5.

C. R. Darwin, The Geology of the Voyage of the

Beagle (London: Smith, Elder &c Co, 1842-46): Part

1, The Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs,

1842; Part 2, Geological Observations on Volcanic

Islands, 1844; Part 3, Geological Observations on

South America, 1846 (repr. London: William

Pickering, 1986).

Darwin had many small leather-covered notebooks.

These are at Downe House; microfilm copies are

held in DAR, Cambridge University Library.

R. FitzRoy, Part 2 of Narrative of the Surveying

Voyages of His Majesty's Ships Adventure and

Beagle between the years 1826 and 1836, describing

their Examination of the Southern Shores of South

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Abbreviations

Origin of Species

Red Notebook

Volcanic Islands Voyage

Zoological Diary

Zoology of the Voyage

America, and the Beagle's Circumnavigation of the

Globe (London: Henry Colburn, 1839). Part 1 was

Captain King's account of the first voyage; Part 3

was Charles Darwin's original account.

C. R. Darwin, On the Origin of Species by Means of

Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured

Races in the Struggle for Life (London: John Murray,

1859).

S. Herbert (ed.), The Red Notebook of Charles

Darwin (London and Ithaca, NY: British Museum

[Natural History] and Cornell University Press,

1980).

See Geology of the Voyage, Vol. 2.

C. R. Darwin, The Voyage of the Beagle; originally

published as Journal of Researches into the Geology

and Natural History of the various countries visited

by H.M.S. 'Beagle', in FitzRoy, Narrative.

Darwin's zoological notes from the Beagle voyage,

DAR 30-31

The Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle, 'edited and

supervised by Charles Darwin' (London: Smith,

Elder & Co, 1840-43). Part 1, R. Owen, Fossil

Mammalia; Part 2, G. R. Waterhouse, Mammalia;

Part 3, J. Gould, Birds; Part 4, L. Jenyns, Fish; Part

5, T. Bell, Reptiles (repr. London: William Pickering,

1986).

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1. Introduction: The Origins of the Darwin Voyage, and an Overview

The first decades of the nineteenth century constituted the Great Age of British Hydrography. The empire was expanding. Although the American colonies had been lost following the War of Independence, Canada (British North America) remained loyal, and following 1788, when New South Wales was settled (partly as a dumping ground for convicts who could no longer be transported to America), expansion in Australasia accelerated. The other Australian colonies followed in brisk succession. Tasmania was first settled from New South Wales in 1803 and established as a separate colony in 1825. Victoria was settled from Tasmania in 1834, separating in 1855, and the first settlement in Western Australia, at King George's Sound was established (to forestall the French) in 1826, the Swan River Colony following in 1829. New Zealand had been claimed by Captain Cook in 1769-70, although organized British government did not follow for many decades. Meanwhile, the East India Company had established its first coastal settlements in 1609, expansion accelerating from 1757. The Company had also acquired staging posts, such as that of St Helena, settled in 1661, although that island did not come directly under the Crown until 1834. The defeat of Napoleon, and his confinement on that island, led to the occupation of the nearby islet of Ascension by the Royal Navy in 1815. Cape Colony was seized from the Dutch in 1795, and Mauritius, another useful staging post, was acquired from the French in 1810. And so on. Between 1783 and 1870, by conquest, settlement and treaty, there was a period of almost uninterrupted expansion, and with this expansion came trade; with international trade came the need for accurate charts. Thus it was, in early August of 1828, HMS Beagle, along with the Adventure and a small vessel purchased to assist with hydrographic survey,

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Darwin's Other Islands

the Adelaide, was examining the coasts around the southern tip of South America. The Beagle was then under the command of Captain Pringle Stokes. As the result of serious depression, brought on by the privations suffered through the terrible weather, Captain Stokes shot himself. Mortally wounded, he died in great pain on 12 August. The ship limped northwards to Rio de Janeiro to onload supplies and effect repairs. There, Admiral Otway, Commander-in-Chief of the Royal Navy's South American station, appointed the young Lieutenant Robert FitzRoy to command the Beagle, and survey work was resumed. Although much of this task was completed successfully (FitzRoy was a competent leader and a brilliant surveyor) there were difficulties; there were confusing magnetic anomalies and on one occasion, in late January 1830, one of the ship's boats was stolen, near Cape Desolation, Tierra del Fuego, by the local people. FitzRoy took hostages, hoping to exchange them for the boat. The plan was unsuccessful, for the inhabitants of these wild regions seemed disinclined to surrender the boat in exchange for their comrades, to whom the names Jemmy Button, Boat Memory and Fuegia Basket were given. Fuegia Basket was a young girl of about nine or ten, 'as broad as she was high'. Later, another young man, York Minster (after the island from whence he came, itself named for its alleged resemblance to the ecclesiastical building), was picked up.1

FitzRoy resolved to transport the extraordinary little group to England, where they were to be educated and then eventually returned. The Admiralty was not enthusiastic, but agreed not to interfere with FitzRoy's plans, to assist with the care of the Fuegians and afford them passage home. They were provided with medical care in the Royal Naval Hospital in Plymouth and then given schooling by the Reverend William Wilson, of Walthamstow (east of London). They became something of a curiosity and were presented to King William IV and Queen Adelaide.2

For a while it seemed as though their Lordships of the Admiralty might be reluctant to fulfil the bargain, to return the group - by now reduced to three in number, as Boat Memory had died of smallpox - to South America. Captain FitzRoy made plans to charter a vessel himself, at his own expense, but as the result of a certain amount of influence, for he was extremely well-connected, their Lordships were persuaded to allow the Beagle, under the command of Robert FitzRoy, to resume the survey, and for the Fuegians to be returned. They were to be accompanied by a Mr Richard Matthews, a missionary who was to attempt to start a mission colony in Tierra del Fuego. FitzRoy, as well as completing hydrographic charts of large parts of South America, was also charged with compiling 'a chain of meridians around the world'. Thus at every port of call he had to set up instruments in order to make navigational, astronomical and magnetic measurements.

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Introduction: The Origins of the Darwin Voyage, and an Overview

One further incident should be recounted. In January 1830 Captain FitzRoy was surveying around the islets west of the main mass of Tierra del Fuego, attempting to explain the anomalies in his compass bearings. He formed the view that there might be magnetic rocks in some of the mountains of Tierra del Fuego, and regretted the fact that there was no one aboard the Beagle who knew much about geology or mineralogy. He resolved 'that if ever I left England again on a similar expedition, I would endeavour to carry out a person qualified to examine the land; while the officers and myself would attend to hydrography'.3

Thus the remote southern island of Tierra del Fuego has claims to be the trigger for the 1831-36 voyage of HMS Beagle, and also for Charles Darwin's presence on it. However, before we follow the young naturalist on his epoch-making voyage, perhaps it might be appropriate to review the early years of his life.

Charles Robert Darwin was born into a reasonably prosperous doctor's family in Shrewsbury on 11 February 1809.4 His father was Dr Robert Waring Darwin (1766-1848), himself the son of Erasmus Darwin (1733-1802; doctor, philosopher, poet, polymath). His mother was Susannah Darwin {nee Wedgwood); she died when Charles was eight and in later life he said he had little recollection of her. After a few years at a small school run by a Mr Case, the young Darwin went to Shrewsbury School, then in a chunky, several-storey stone building not too far from the modern centre of Shrewsbury.5 He did not perform particularly well academically, and left the school, not altogether unwillingly, at the age of sixteen. Thereafter, for a few months in the summer of 1825, he served as a sort of apprentice to his doctor father, helping with patients and the preparation of prescriptions, before he was dispatched to Edinburgh Medical School, where his elder brother (also called Erasmus Darwin) was completing his training. Although he attended a few rather unexciting lectures on geology there, made contact with the freethinking Dr Robert Grant, a specialist in the biology of sponges, and enjoyed fossicking along the coast of the Firth of Forth looking for seashore life, he detested the medical training itself. The sight of operations (performed, of course, without anaesthetic) appalled him, and after a couple years he left, unqualified. His father was not impressed; but it was decided that although it was rather outside the tradition of the family, he might make a Church of England parson; he was therefore sent to Christ's College Cambridge to take a general degree in Arts. There a modest amount of theology, philosophy, mathematics and New Testament Greek was studied, good food eaten, wine consumed and friends made. (It does not take too much imagination to know what membership of the 'Glutton Club' involved!) In 1831 he graduated as a Bachelor of

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Darwin's Other Islands

Arts. Particularly important influences in Cambridge days were his friendships with the young don, the Revd John Stevens Henslow, Professor of Botany, with whom he used to go for botanizing walks into the Cambridgeshire countryside,6 and with the Revd Adam Sedgwick, the Professor of Geology. Both encouraged his interest in natural history. In the summer of 1831 Sedgwick took the young Darwin on a geological expedition. In his autobiography Darwin recalled the incident as follows:

As I had come up to Cambridge at Christmas, I was forced to keep two terms after passing my final examination, at the commencement of 1831; and Henslow then persuaded me to begin the study of geology. Therefore on my return to Shropshire I examined sections and coloured a map of parts round Shrewsbury. Professor Sedgwick in the beginning of August intended to visit North Wales to pursue his famous geological investigation amongst the older rocks, and Henslow asked him to allow me to accompany him. Accordingly he came and slept in my Father's house . . .

Next morning we started for Llangollen, Conway, Bangor and Capel Curig. This tour was of decided use in teaching me a little how to make out the geology of a country. Sedgwick often sent me on a line parallel to his, telling me to bring back specimens of the rocks and to mark the stratification on a map. I have little doubt that he did this for my own good, as I was too ignorant to have aided him... At Capel Curig I left Sedgwick and went in a straight line by compass and map across the mountains to Barmouth, never following any track unless it coincided with my course. I thus came on some strange wild places and enjoyed much this manner of travelling.7

In his explorations during the Beagle voyage Darwin used almost every aspect of what he had learned from Sedgwick and what he had taught himself that summer in the Welsh Borderland and North Wales. These included the direct transect-line across country, the inspection of sections and exposures, the marking of stratification on a map, the collection of rock specimens, the use of clinometer (an instrument for measuring the dip of strata) and compass. Darwin regretted his 'incapacity to draw', and certainly some of his geological cross-section drawings and sketch-maps are a little crude. They are, however, adequate, and it is quite clear that he had the knack of 'making out the geology of a country' in three dimensions. He had good cause to write to Henslow on 11 April 1833, just after he had left the Falklands, asking him to tell Professor Sedgwick that he had 'never ceased to be thankful for that short tour in Wales'.8

Charles returned to Shrewsbury from the Welsh excursion to find a letter

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Introduction: The Origins of the Darwin Voyage, and an Overview

from Henslow suggesting that he might be interested in accompanying Captain FitzRoy on the Beagle voyage as a 'supernumerary'. Dr Darwin initially was not in favour, but with the help of friends Charles managed to swing him round. An interview with FitzRoy in London followed. The next few months were spent in a frantic round of assembling equipment and materials for the voyage, and obtaining instruction in the best methods of preparing specimens. As well as his geological hammer, clinometer and compass, Darwin had with him on the ship several guns (for taking birds and mammals), an anaeroid barometer (for estimating heights of mountains), a telescope and microscope. He had several nets, including at least one 'sweep-net' for taking terrestrial insects, and others for catching aquatic life. He records in his notes that he took some of his fish specimens 'on hook' so he may have had other fishing equipment. He would have had to acquire a large number of containers for storing specimens, and dissecting instruments and materials for skinning and preserving them. Many fish, reptiles, some birds and insects he preserved in 'spirits of wine'; while some stores were replenished en route, presumably substantial quantities of spirits and other chemicals were taken aboard before the ship left.9 For the last few weeks before the ship departed, the enthusiastic Charles was in residence at Plymouth, supervising the taking aboard of some of his supplies.

There were delays due to poor weather, and other difficulties, and indeed a couple of false starts, but on 27 December 1832 the Beagle departed on her voyage around the world. Darwin, FitzRoy and one or two others had had a good lunch with local naval bigwigs before they left and the young naturalist blamed 'mutton chops and champagne' for the absence of sentiment he felt on leaving his native land on his great adventure.

From Devonport the ship proceeded, after a brief hesitation at Tenerife, to the Cape Verde Islands, off the African coast (January 1832), and from thence to St Paul's Rocks and Fernando Noronha, tiny islets in the South Atlantic (February 1832). At these, and at many other islands and ports visited, Captain FitzRoy's task was to establish their position very precisely. He had over 20 chronometers to assist him to determine longitude accurately. From St Paul's and Fernando Noronha the Beagle proceeded to the mainland of South America, where the main programme of hydrographic survey commenced. The first islands accurately surveyed were the Abrolhos, off the coast of Brazil (March 1832). There were then surveys along the coast of Patagonia. A detailed survey of Tierra del Fuego followed, providing FitzRoy with the opportunity of completing his commitment to the Fuegians to return them to their home (December 1832-February 1833). Visits to the Falklands (March/April 1833 and 1834) alternated with the visits to Tierra del Fuego. Eventually, in mid-1834 the Magellan Strait,

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Figure 1.1 Map to show the approximate route of HMS Beagle (1831-36), and positions of some of the islands

visited

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Introduction: The Origins of the Darwin Voyage, and an Overview

between Tierra del Fuego and the South American mainland, was traversed, and the expedition set out northwards, to Chiloe (visited three times in 1834 and 1835), and the scattering of islands that constitute the Chonos Archipelago. Surveys along the coast of Chile and Peru allowed Darwin the opportunity of making a number of excursions inland in South America. In September 1835 the Beagle set out across the Pacific, calling first, as is well known, at the Galapagos Islands (September-October 1835), which, as we shall see, Charles Darwin did not particularly like. Then followed the longest leg of the entire voyage, to Tahiti (November 1835); this allowed Darwin to glimpse several coral atolls from afar. Tahiti, especially the missionaries working there, left positive images in his mind, and he was sorry to leave. New Zealand (Christmas 1835), where again he was impressed by the work of missionaries, he liked less. Australia, with its brashness, the convicts and the dry, stark landscape, was not a great deal to be preferred, although some of the observations he made there were important (New South Wales, January 1836; King George's Sound, March): he preferred green, mild Tasmania (February 1836).

From Australia, perhaps because of some change of plans at a late stage, FitzRoy decided to go to the Cocos (Keeling) Islands in the Indian Ocean; he had been instructed to 'fix their position' if possible (April 1836). Darwin enjoyed his time there as much as he had disliked New South Wales and Western Australia: they were also very important to him in the development of his 'theory of coral reefs'. A short 'dissipated' visit to Mauritius (April-May 1836) was followed by a brief sojourn at the Cape of Good Hope: Madagascar may have been glimpsed from afar.

Back in the Atlantic, there were visits to St Helena and Ascension (July 1836), and then to 'complete the chain of meridians', Bahia in Brazil was visited once again (August). Another return visit, to the Cape Verdes, was followed by a very few days at Terceira in the Azores (September 1836) before Falmouth in Cornwall was gained on 2 October 1836.

Thus Darwin had the opportunity of examining as well as South American, and, much more briefly, African environments (outside the scope of this book), islands in the Atlantic (north and south), Pacific and Indian Oceans. He experienced the large island continent of Australia and tiny St Paul's. He explored volcanic islands (St Helena, Ascension, Fernando Noronha, Terceira) and coral atolls (Cocos), and composites (Mauritius, Tahiti). Chiloe, Tierra del Fuego and the Chonos group are of continental rocks, and so different again. The Falklands are sub-antarctic in climate; Cocos, Tahiti and Mauritius are tropical. St Jago in the Cape Verdes has some characteristics of a 'desert island'. Some were inhabited; some were devoid of human habitation. The range was enormous: Darwin

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Darwin's Other Islands

was interested in them all. Almost all in some way contributed to the development of his ideas.

It is perhaps appropriate at this point very briefly to document the written sources that allow Darwin's voyage, his activities, and even his thoughts, to be reconstructed in some detail. First his diary or journal; this was published in more or less its original form, edited by his granddaughter, Norah Barlow, in 1933.10 (There are other editions, but this is the best known.) Darwin edited, and considerably improved the style of this, and it became part 3 of the Narrative of the Surveying Voyages.11 Later versions, after further slight revision, are generally titled The Voyage of the Beagle. There are also his letters - those he wrote to his family and friends and those he received. Some of these have been lost. Some of the letters are, with other Darwin materials, deposited by the family in the Darwin Archive in the Manuscript Collection in Cambridge University Library (they are indicated here by the abbreviation DAR). Letters written by Darwin are scattered all over the world, although many are in Cambridge. Known Darwin letters have been published in the impressive Correspondence of Charles Darwin, Volume 1 of which has those from the Beagle period.12 He also kept separate Zoological and Geological Diaries, many parts of which are unpublished; these are in Cambridge, along with lists of specimens. There was also a series of 'little note books', perhaps used in the field, or for single ideas or references. The most famous of these is the Red Note Book 'RN', in which the first evolutionary thoughts were put to paper (after the return to England, although the notebook was opened during the voyage).13 Captain FitzRoy kept a diary, one that formed the basis of Volume 2 of the Narrative of the Surveying Voyages. The young man who became Darwin's servant part-way through the voyage, Syms Covington, also kept a diary, now held by the Mitchell Library, Sydney, New South Wales. The official log of the Beagle is available at the Public Record Office at Kew, along with certain other Admiralty documents relating to the voyage. Some of FitzRoy's manuscript charts, other notes and manuscripts are in the Hydrographic Department Office in Taunton, Somerset. From the time of his return to Britain (indeed from slightly before) Darwin was publishing papers and articles, in scientific journals and elsewhere. The most important publications from the voyage were The Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle (in five volumes)14 and The Geology of the Voyage (in three volumes, on Coral Reefs, Volcanic Islands and The Geology of South America).15

All the above (and other primary and secondary sources) were consulted during the research on which this book is based. I have also been privileged to visit a number of the islands that the Beagle visited, and these landscapes,

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Introduction: The Origins of the Darwin Voyage, and an Overview

much changed as some of them are, can also be regarded as part of the archival sources of the voyage.

My purpose is to show that there was more to the Beagle voyage than the Galapagos Islands. The visit to the Galapagos was significant; it was, however, just one incident on a journey, one bead on the thread. The thread stretched around the world, and linked dozens of islands. It was Darwin's ability to observe and to compare these islands, from an early stage in the voyage, and to arrange the information he collected around a limited number of conceptual frameworks, that transformed a routine survey expedition into one of the most significant voyages of all time.

Notes

1. Robert FitzRoy, Part 2 of Narrative of the Surveying Voyages of His Majesty's Ships Adventure and Beagle between the years 1826 and 1836, describing their Examination of the Southern Shores of South America, and the Beagle's Circumnavigation of the Globe (London: Henry Colburn, 1839). Part 1 was Captain King's account of the first voyage; Part 3 was Charles Darwin's account. Hereafter in these notes, FitzRoy's memoir will be referred to as Narrative.

2. An account of the whole affair is given in N. Halewood, Savage: The Life and Times of Jemmy Button (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 2000). A summary appears in R. Keynes, Fossils, Finches and Fuegians (London: HarperCollins, 2002). See also P. Nichols, Evolution's Captain (New York and London: HarperCollins, 2003).

3. Fitzroy, Narrative, page xi

4. The Darwin home at The Mount is still there; a rather austere redbrick building, now housing the local income tax office.

5. The building is now the Shrewsbury Public Library. The modern school, with a statue of its most famous son in a prominent position (Galapagos iguanas at his feet), is on the outskirts of the old city.

6. The young Cambridge Darwin became known as 'The man who walks with Henslow'.

7. N. Barlow (ed.), The Autobiography of Charles Darwin, 1809-1882, with the Original Omissions Restored (London: Collins, 1958), pp. 68-71.

8. Original at Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. See F. Burkhard and S. Smith, The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, Vol. 1, 1821-36 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), p. 308.

9. An account of Darwin's specimens and what became of them is given in D. M. Porter, 'The Beagle Collector and His Collections', in D. Kohn, The Darwinian Heritage (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1985), pp. 973-1019.

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Darwin's Other Islands

Darwin improvised a good deal in collecting during the voyage: for example, he had prepared a net made out of bunting for trailing behind the ship to collect planktonic life.

10. N. Barlow (ed.), Charles Darwin's Diary of the Voyage of H.M.S. 'Beagle' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1933). Referred to here as the Diary.

11. Darwin's account will be referred to in these notes as Voyage.

12. F. Burkhardt and S. Smith, The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, Vol. 1, 1821-1836 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985). (Hereafter Correspondence.)

13. S. Herbert (ed.), The Red Notebook of Charles Darwin (London and Ithaca, NY: British Museum [Natural History] and Cornell University Press, 1980).

14. The Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle, 'edited and supervised by Charles Darwin' (London: Smith, Elder & Co, 1840-43): Part 1, R. Owen, Fossil Mammalia; Part 2, G. R. Waterhouse, Mammalia; Part 3, J. Gould, Birds; Part 4, L. Jenyns, Fish; Part 5, T. Bell, Reptiles (repr. London: William Pickering, 1986). (Hereafter Zoology of the Voyage.)

15. C. R. Darwin, The Geology of the Voyage of the Beagle (London: Smith, Elder & Co.): Part 1, The Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs, 1842; Part 2, Geological Observations on Volcanic Islands, 1844; Part 3, Geological Observations in South America, 1836 (repr. London: William Pickering, 1986).

There are a number of websites devoted to the life and work of Charles Darwin.

The Darwin Correspondence Project can be accessed through www.lib.cam.ac. uk/Departments/Darwin

Syms Covington's diary is at www.asap.unimelb.edu.au/bsparcs/covingto/ contents.htm

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2. Darwin's Islands in Context

[A]s a number of isolated facts soon becomes uninteresting, the habit of comparison leads to generalization . . -1

[T]he zoology of Archipelagoes will be well worth examining.2

These two quotations go a long way towards an explanation of the success of Charles Robert Darwin. The first was written in his diary at the very end of the voyage, between HMS Beagle's brief visit to Terceira in the Azores (19-23 September 1836) and the little ship's berthing in Falmouth (2 October), in a few pages of recollection and reflection, in which he summarized his conclusions from and feelings about the voyage as a whole. The second was written in his notes concerning the Galapagos Islands. He had noticed that the islands were 'possessed of but a scanty stock of animals', and that there were similarities between the biota of the various islands 'in sight of each other', but also significant differences.

These two themes, the comparative approach and a fascination with remote islands, run through the entire corpus of Darwin's writings from the Beagle period and through the thinking that gave rise to them. The twin themes are interconnected. Darwin was fortunate enough to visit some 40 islands, possibly more (in a very few cases it is difficult from his notes and other documents that survive from the voyage to be absolutely sure whether he landed on a particular islet or simply viewed it from offshore), and it is perhaps unsurprising that he often compared them. But there was more to it than that. Darwin's notes show the comparative approach ran very deep. Not only was he constantly comparing his observations on one island with those from another, and these with impressions of continental (non-island) environments, but he was constantly comparing his own ideas with those

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Darwin's Other Islands

of others. The Beagle cabin was filled with books - the accounts of the great voyagers of the past.3 He was self-critical too, and time and again reread his notes, revising, and sometimes completely rewriting them as new information came to hand: in this way he compared his ideas of one time and place with those of another. Darwin's notes from the voyage, and from later decades, have largely been retained in the order in which he left them, and thus the modern enquirer is able to trace the route of his developing ideas, as well his route across the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans.

Darwin may have learned this comparative approach, in part at least, from his reading of John HerschePs Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy in his last year at Christ's College, Cambridge. The laws of nature had to be established by testing a hypothesis again and again under a variety of conditions. The following passage was marked in Darwin's copy of Herschel's little book, still preserved in the Darwin Collection in the University Library, Cambridge.

It is in precise proportion that a law once obtained endures this extreme severity of trial, that its value and importance are to be estimated; and our next step must therefore consist in extending its application to cases not originally contemplated; in studiously varying the circumstances under which our causes exist, with a view to ascertain whether their effect is general; and in pushing the application of our laws to extreme cases.4

In the case of the experimental sciences - physics, chemistry and to some extent biology - one could repeat an experiment again and again, and Charles Darwin quite frequently did this. In the case of the field sciences -geology, geography and ecology, and although Darwin did not use this word, he applied its concepts - one had to make use of 'nature's experiments' and 'natural laboratories', by examining analogous phenomena repeatedly under different environments: in other words by using the comparative method. The many islands Darwin visited lent themselves to this comparative treatment: each one is a unique 'natural experiment'; whereas the number of continents can be counted on one hand (or two if one separates North from South America and Europe from Asia). Here is an example. Darwin is comparing the volcanic rocks and land-forms at the last island group he visited, the Azores, with those of islands he had visited earlier in the voyage.

The degree of [volcanic] activity about equal to the Galapagos, & Cape Verd & Canary . . .

. . . lavas of a smooth texture, of a blackish colour with crystals of glassy felspar [sic] similar to some on James Is.

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Darwin's Islands in Context

Both these islands [i.e. Terceira and Sao Miguel] in their general form, number of craters, few scattered mounds, Lithological nature of the rocks ... degree of activity, general dimensions appear very closely to agree with the Galapagos Archipelago.5

From comparisons such as these, theories emerged, as we shall see. Charles Darwin was forever searching for the vera causa, the underlying cause of a phenomenon, rather than the immediate, short-term explanation. He was trying to see the 'big picture'. Here he is, still in the reflective mood that characterizes the last few pages of his diary: he is again preoccupied with the nature, relationships and size of islands. It should be remembered that he was writing while parts of the world map were still far from clear.

There are several. . . sources of enjoyment in a long voyage . . . The map of the world ceases to be a blank; it becomes a picture full of the most varied and animated figures. Each part assumes its true dimensions: large continents are not looked at in the light of islands, or islands considered as mere specks, which in truth are larger than many kingdoms of Europe.6

On the other hand, as well as seeing, or at least seeking, the 'grand design', the young naturalist had a fine eye for detail. He was immensely curious, he wanted to know. He wanted to see what was the other side of the mountain, what a particular organism looked like under a microscope (he had a small Bancks microscope with him on the Beagle) and what were the physical effects of a sea-creature's sting on a human. Such a curiosity was linked to excellent powers of observation. Here is a quotation from his zoological notebook on a type of coral from the Cocos (Keeling) Islands in the Indian Ocean.

1836 April Keeling Is.

Madrepora 3560 This stony branching elegant coral is very abundant in the shallow still waters of the lagoon: it lives in the ... parts which are always covered by water to a depth of 15 ft & perhaps more. Its color [sic] is nearly white or pale brown. The orifice is either nearly simple or protected by a strong hood; the polypus is similar in both. The upper extremity or mouth of the polypus is attached to the edge of the orifice: it cannot be drawn back out of sight; it consists of a narrow fleshy lip which is divided into 12 tentacula or subdivisions of the lip. These tentacula are very short & minute &c are flattened vertically; are brown colored, tipped with white. The animal possesses very little irritability on being pricked, the mouth is folded into an elongate figure & partially drawn back. The body of the polypus fills

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Darwin's Other Islands

up the cell & is so excessively delicate transparent & adhesive, that I in vain tried to examine its structure. I could see a sort of abdominal sack & attached to the side of this were intestinal folds of a whitish color. These when separated from the body possessed a sort of peristaltic motion. I examined the Madrepora (3584) also common in the lagoon & found the same sort of polypus & from a shorter examination I believe such will be likewise found in kinds (3612, 3586).7

The passage is in many ways typical. It reveals Darwin's attention to detail and his very careful observation at both the macroscopic and microscopic level. He compares several different forms. He also comments on the organism's behaviour (or at least its irritability): a feature of Darwin's work was his interest in the behaviour of organisms - he was paying attention to this at a time when the science of ethology, the scientific study of the behaviour of animals, was still in the future.

This close attention to detail and powerful skill in observation was no doubt partly innate; inklings of it can be seen in his enthusiasm for natural history and in particular for the collection of beetles, not one of the most conspicuous groups of organisms, in the Shropshire countryside of his boyhood. It was probably fostered by his medical training, gained both in the brief time he assisted his father with patients and in the two unfortunate years of medical training in Edinburgh. At Edinburgh Medical School, despite the boredom of the lectures and the horrific operations (one on a child), he probably picked up some skill in detailed observation and also curiosity about his fellow humans. Here is one place where the medical training shines through in the writings of the medecin manque; Darwin is still on the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and still examining corals, comparing a branched and a plate-like form of 'Millepora':

They ... agree in the very remarkable property, hitherto unnoticed in such productions, of producing on contact a stinging sensation . . . The power appears to be, very generally speaking, on pressing or rubbing a fragment [of the plate kind] on tender skin of the face or arm, a pricking sensation will be felt after the interval of a second, which lasts a very short time. But on rapidly touching with the specimen (3609) of the branching kind the side of the face the pain was instantaneous, but increased as usual after a short interval; the sensation continued strong for a few minutes but was perceptible half an hour afterwards. The sensation was as bad as a sting of a Physa.8 -On touching the tender skin of the arm, red spots were produced, & which had the appearance, if the stimulation had been a little stronger of producing watery pustules.9

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Darwin's Islands in Context

Here again one may note the firm comparative treatment and the exceptionally fine level of detailed observation. But the experimental approach, the detailed notes on sensations, their duration and intensity, and the use of terms such as 'pustules', seem to reflect the days of medical training. So too some of his observations on the physiognomy and appearance of some of his fellow humans. He commented in detail on the light-coloured skin, short stature and the shape of the temple and cheekbones of the 'Hottentots, or Hodmadods' of Cape Colony, which 'project so much that the whole face is hidden from a person standing in the same side position, in which he would be enabled to see part of the features of a Europaean [s/c]'.10 He makes comparable observations on the detailed appearance of the Indian convicts he encountered on the island of Mauritius; of one unfortunate individual, perhaps recalling patients he had seen in Edinburgh, he wrote: '[TJhis poor man was remarkable as being a confirmed opium eater, of which fact his emaciated body & strange drowsy expression bore witness.'11

There is yet another characteristic of Darwin's observations and comments on island (and other) environments: they are remarkably integrative. Here is his account of the island of Terceira in the Azores:

The island is moderately lofty & has a rounded outline with detached conical hills of volcanic origin. The land is well cultivated, & is divided into a multitude of rectangular fields by stone walls, extending from the water's edge to high up on the central hills. There are few or no trees, & the yellow stubble land at this time of year gives a burnt up & unpleasant character to the scenery. Small hamlets & single white-washed houses are scattered in all parts.12

Darwin conveys the essential 'feel' of a landscape vividly and yet with economy. He appreciates that what he sees is the result of the subtle interplay of human activities and the biophysical landscape. He was quite happy to allow his own appraisal to intrude on objective description; he frequently made clear in his writings what he regarded as an attractive view: the fields are well cultivated, but the burned-up stubble had given the landscape an unpleasant appearance - views that to some extent reflected upper-middle-class English tastes of his day.

In the final few pages of The Voyage of the Beagle he wrote:

. . . there is a growing pleasure in comparing the character of the scenery of different countries, which to a certain degree is distinct from admiring its beauty. It depends chiefly on an acquaintance with the individual parts of each view: I am strongly induced to believe that, as in music, the person who understands every note will, if he

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Darwin's Other Islands

also possesses a proper taste, more thoroughly enjoy the whole, so he who examines each part of a fine view may also thoroughly comprehend the full and combined effect.13

He goes on to say how a landscape may be analysed in terms of geology: 'great masses of naked rocks . . . afford a sublime spectacle', and botany, for in many views 'plants form the chief embellishment'. His approach is both analytical, in attempting to see how the components of an environment relate to one another, and integrative, showing how a whole system worked. He applied this twofold approach to humanized or cultural landscapes and to wild places, to the grand vistas and to the tiny details of nature. On East Falkland, in April 1834 he wrote of the flightless steamer-duck (Tachyeres pteneres), a distinctive element of the local avifauna:

A logger-headed duck called by former navigators .. . race-horses, &C now steamers has been described from its extraordinary manner of splashing & paddling along: they here abound in large flocks; In the evening when preening themselves make the very same mixture of noises which bull-frogs do in the Tropics: their head is remarkably strong (my big geological hammer can hardly break it) & their beak likewise; this must fit them well for their mode of subsistence: which from their dung must chiefly be shell-fish obtained at low water & from kelp - They can dive but little, are very tenacious to life, so as to be (as all our sportsmen experienced) very difficult to kill; They build amongst bushes & grass near the sea.14

The account mentions several aspects of behaviour; but it is rather more than a straightforward account of 'exquisite adaptation' - a phrase often used by Darwin - to which notes on voice, nesting and locomotion have been added. Here is an account - imperfect perhaps, but nevertheless far ahead of its day - that aims to show how the steamer duck slotted into its habitat, and which reveals an understanding of how morphology, behaviour, food supply and habitat are related to each other. The heavy head and bill 'fit them well for their mode of subsistence'; the ducks seldom dive but 'feed from shell-fish obtained at low water & from kelp'; they are strongly social and 'abound in large flocks', and thus are very vocal, with a vigorous 'splashing' display. Darwin does not actually suggest that their 'remarkably strong head', the tenaciousness with which they hold to life, and flocking behaviour might to some extent compensate for flightlessness, but the account shows what might now be called ecological awareness, and the integrative pattern in the way in which he recorded his observations.

It can be seen in this brief preliminary overview of some of Darwin's island

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Darwin's Islands in Context

experiences that the great Victorian naturalist had a very distinctive way of accumulating, recording and processing his information. He had an extraordinary eye for detail, developed partly perhaps from his medical training, partly from his natural history excursions into the Shropshire and East Anglian countryside. Yet at the same time he looked for the overall pattern, the way in which the part fitted with the whole, and attempted to seek relationships and causes, indeed 'natural laws'. His approach was thus analytic, yet integrative. In this search for pattern he was enormously assisted by 'the habit of comparison' (from Herschel) and a fascination with islands.

A brief note on the nature of islands is perhaps apposite. They can, very broadly, be assigned to two categories. Continental islands are those that, perhaps some time in the geological past, have been parts of the world's continents. Such islands are made up of rocks that form in, on or close to continents such as granites, folded and metamorphosed rocks (i.e. those that have been affected by heat or pressure) such as slates, and sedimentary rocks such as sandstones. These last are assumed to have formed in shallow seas on the margins of continents, or occasionally under desert conditions. Separation of such an island from its parent continent may have occurred within the last few thousand years as the result of the rise in sea level that accompanied the melting of the ice sheets that covered large parts of continents during the last Ice Age, or minor local earth movement. Examples include (as well as Britain and Ireland), Tasmania, Tierra del Fuego and Chiloe, off the Chilean coast. Alternatively, a fragment of a continent may have broken away from a larger land mass as the result of the movement of the plates that make up the earth's crust. Today it is believed that these plates have moved in relation to one another throughout geological time, as the result of convectional currents deep within the earth. The Falklands, for example, are now thought to be a tiny segment of the African plate that separated from the east coast of southern Africa millions of years ago. New Zealand once adjoined eastern Australia; the island continent of Australia was once part of a massive supercontinent, Gondwana, that broke up in the Mesozoic period, over a hundred million years ago.

Oceanic islands are those that have never been a part of, or connected to, a continental land mass: they have literally risen out of the sea. Some are volcanic. Where, as along the mid-Atlantic rift system, the crustal plates are gradually pulling apart, liquid magma spills out onto the ocean floor, eventually reaching the surface. St Helena and Ascension Island provide examples. In tropical regions coral organisms may establish themselves on such volcanic islands, forming a coral skirt around the island; sometimes where the volcanic core sinks oc^fae-.^ea level rises the growing coral overtops the

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Darwin's Other Islands

original volcanic island, and no volcanic rock is visible at the surface. Tahiti and Mauritius are islands with a fringing skirt of coral reef; the Cocos Islands - now known by the clumsy name of the Cocos (Keeling) Islands -show no volcanic material at the surface. The origin and nature of coral islands were of great interest to Charles Darwin, and will be discussed in much greater detail later.

Just as continental and oceanic islands differ from each other in their geology, so too they differ biologically. Usually continental islands support biotas (assemblages of plants and animals) from the continents of which they formed parts. Chiloe and Tierra del Fuego share many organisms with the nearby South American mainland. Tasmania has many plants and animals in common with Australia. New Zealand's biota differs from that of Australia to a much greater degree because it has been separated longer. Australia, because of the ancient Gondwanan connection, has a few groups in common with South America.

Oceanic islands have a depauperate biota in comparison with continental islands. When they formed as the result of volcanic activity or coral growth (or very often a combination of the two) they will have been devoid of terrestrial life-forms. All plants and animals (or their ancestors), be they flowering plants, ferns, mosses, fungi, birds, insects or reptiles, must at some time have made the journey from some other landmass. Seeds and fruits (such as coconuts) floated. Birds and insects may have been blown by the wind. Some seeds, and perhaps tiny insects and other invertebrates (or their eggs) might have adhered to the feathers or other parts of birds. Other seeds could well have travelled in the guts of birds. Very occasionally a reptile, or even a small mammal, may have been transported to an island by rafting, aboard a floating tree-trunk or a mass of vegetation debris. Conditions may have been difficult on a small remote island; for sexually reproducing organisms it might have been a long time before the arrival of a mate of the same species; there is the risk of being blown into the sea. Extinction rates may therefore be high. There is thus a 'chanciness' or serendipity about the assemblage of plants and animals on an island: what is found there depends on what has been carried thither and has survived. However, some types of creature, for example freshwater fish and amphibians that cannot survive salt water, are rare, while plants with tiny spores that can be blown by the wind (ferns, mosses) are often quite well represented.

Darwin, on his travels, as we shall see, noticed the differences in richness between island and continental environments: these have important evolutionary significance. If all life is derived from a very limited number of original forms, the life-forms found on remote islands must have made the journey thither, and will be distinctive in the manner described. In the

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Darwin's Islands in Context

theory of independent creation there is no reason why there should be significant differences in the forms the Creator placed on islands and those on continents.

Finally it may be noted that there is a high degree of endemism or uniqueness on islands: there are often organisms that are unique to a single island or archipelago, the result of periods of isolation. This too makes for the distinctiveness of island biotas, and this fact too was occasionally noted by Darwin.

Notes

1. N. Barlow (ed.), Charles Darwin's Diary of the Voyage of H.M.S. 'Beagle' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1934) (referred to subsequently as Diary), p. 430; written late September 1836.

2. Darwin's 'Ornithological Notes' (DAR 29.3) have been dated to about June 1836, towards the end of the voyage. They are transcribed in: N. Barlow (ed.), Darwin's Ornithological Notes, Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), Series 2.7 (1963); see p. 134.

3. A list of the books known to be aboard the Beagle is given in Appendix 4 of Correspondence, Vol. 1.

4. J. F. W. Herschel, Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy (London: Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown & Green, 1830). Darwin's edition was rebound as part of the 'Cabinet Cyclopaedia', 1831. The quotation is from Part 3, Chapter 6, p. 167. John Frederick William Herschel (1792-1871) was the son of William Herschel (1738-1822) and nephew of Caroline Herschel (1750-1848), both of whom were also astronomers. John was something of a polymath: classical scholar, pioneer photographer, instrument-maker and philosopher of science, as well as astronomer. Darwin met him in Cape Town in May 1835, while he was living in South Africa, mapping the southern stars. It may be that the two had important discussions on scientific matters at this meeting.

5. Geological Diary, DAR 38.2/957-60.

6. Diary, probably September 1836, p. 429.

7. Zoological Diary, DAR 31.2/354-5.

8. Physa is the scientific name for a type of gastropod (snail). Perhaps the young naturalist meant Physalia, the Portuguese man-of-war, a stinging jellyfish.

9. Zoological Diary, DAR 31.2/359-60.

10. Diary, 4 June 1836, p. 407.

11. Ibid., 30 April 1836, p. 402.

12. Ibid., 20 September 1836, p. 421.

13. Voyage, p. 483.

14. Zoological Diary,DAK 31.2.

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3. The Mystique and Myth of the Galapagos - and the Reality

All remote islands possess a certain romantic mystique. But Charles Darwin has raised the mystique of the Galapagos Islands to a level that finds virtually no rivals in the history of scientific thought. Both for the biology textbooks and for the history of science, these 'enchanted islands' have become the highly acclaimed symbol of one of the greatest revolutions in Western intellectual thought. Indeed, that this momentous scientific revolution sprang from insights that Charles Darwin garnered during a brief five-week visit to the Galapagos in 1835 has made them into the symbolic equivalent of Newton's famous apple among the great stories of scientific discovery. But unlike Newton's apple, with its fleeting but historic fall, the Galapagos Islands have remained a permanent showcase of the fundamental insights that Charles Darwin first divined. For those who have visited the Galapagos in Darwin's historic wake, there is inevitably a feeling of being on hallowed ground and standing intellectually in Darwin's awesome and ever-present shadow.1

So wrote Frank Sulloway, a distinguished Darwin scholar.2 Darwin himself, in his Autobiography, recalled:

During the voyage of the Beagle I had been deeply impressed ... by the South American character of most of the productions of the Galapagos archipelago, and more especially by the manner in which they differ slightly on each island of the group; none of these islands appearing very old in a geological sense.3

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The Mystique and Myth of the Galapagos - and the Reality

David Lack, later Director of the Edward Grey Institute of Field Ornithology, in Oxford, who undertook fieldwork on the Galapagos in the 1930s, asserted: 'Darwin first questioned the [im]mutability of species when actually in the Galapagos, through finding different forms of mockingbird and tortoise on different islands.'4 However, a careful scrutiny of the archives reveals there was no Eureka-like experience in the Galapagos. Although Darwin was deeply impressed by the archipelago, and made many extremely important observations there, it was only some years later, and indeed many months after his return to England, that he was 'converted' to an evolutionary position. Nevertheless, the idea of the mutability of species seems to have passed fleetingly through his mind earlier. While actually on the islands he was uncertain about which region it was to which they had closest biological affinities. He was puzzled on seeing seals, penguins, palms and tropical birds. His recollection in the Autobiography, written late in his life, well over 40 years after the event, seems to be either mistaken or gives an incorrect impression.

In fact Darwin spent only nineteen days, in some cases only in part (and in a few instances only for a period of an hour or two), on land in the Galapagos archipelago. The remainder of the 40 or so days he was aboard the Beagle, as she made her way from island to island engaged in hydro-graphic survey work. It seems that he landed on only four islands, although he had quite good shipboard views of a further eight. Let us examine the details of this sojourn, remembering that by the time he went ashore on the Galapagos he had been voyaging for four years and eight months, and explorations of dozens of islands and many parts of the continent of South America lay behind him.

HMS Beagle left the mainland of South America on 7 September 1835, and by the 15th was surveying the eastern coasts of Chatham (San Cristobal) Island; the following day the ship came close to Hood (Espanola) Island, but Darwin did not disembark. He noted, however, the presence of a couple of American whaling-ships. The Beagle then swept away northwards to Chatham once more, where Darwin spent an hour at Wreck Point, on the western side of the island. He wrote in his diary:

These islands at a distance have a sloping uniform outline, excepting where broken by sundry paps & hillocks; the whole black Lava, completely covered by small leafless brushwood & low trees. The fragments of Lava where most porous are reddish like cinders; the stunted trees show little signs of life. The black rocks heated by the rays of the Vertical sun, like a stove, give to the air a close & sultry feeling. The

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plants also smell unpleasantly. The country was compared to what we might imagine the cultivated parts of the Infernal regions to be.5

Certainly Darwin's initial impression of the Galapagos was not very favourable. On 17 September the ship moved to Stephen's Bay (Darwin refers to 'St Stephen's harbor [sic]') and the day started more propitiously:

The Bay swarmed with animals; Fish, Shark & Turtles were popping their heads up in all parts. Fishing lines were soon put overboard & great numbers of fine fish 2 &c even 3 feet long were caught. This sport makes all hands very merry; loud laughter & the heavy flapping of fish are heard on every side.6

But in his account of the latter part of the day, negative images appear once more:

After dinner a party went on shore to try to catch Tortoises, but were unsuccessful. The islands appear paradises for the whole family of Reptiles. Besides three kinds of Turtles, the Tortoise is so abundant that [a] single ship's company here caught 500-800 in a short time. The black Lava rocks on the beach are frequented by large (2-3 ft) most disgusting, clumsy Lizards. They are as black as the porous rocks over which they crawl & seek their prey from the Sea. Somebody calls them 'imps of darkness'. They assuredly well become the land they inhabit. When on shore I proceeded to botanize &c obtained 10 different flowers; but such insignificant, ugly little flowers, as would better become an Arctic than a Tropical country.7

The tortoise hunt was 'unsuccessful'; the number of negative adjectives is high: disgusting, clumsy, insignificant, ugly. The image of the 'imps of darkness' fits well with that of the 'Infernal regions' mentioned in the account of the previous day, along with the heat and the dark, black rock. Perhaps one of his shipmates suggested the comparison (he seldom adopted religious imagery), but for a while at least Darwin seems to have caught the notion of the Galapagos Islands as some sort of Hell on Earth. Nevertheless, there was much of interest: the tortoises and birds were extremely tame. Little birds, probably some of them the finches that now bear Darwin's name, hopped in the bushes within three or four feet. 'Mr King killed one with his hat', he noted; and Darwin himself pushed a large hawk from a branch with his gun.

On 18 September the ship moved again, to Terrapin Road, close to the northernmost tip of Chatham Island, and Darwin went ashore and made careful observations of the rocks and volcanic land-forms. The 19th and 20th were spent almost entirely at sea on hydrographic survey on the

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The Mystique and Myth of the Galapagos - and the Reality

eastern side of the island, which he noted seemed to have more surface streams than other parts, and indeed he described a 'small cascade'; the valleys were a brighter shade of green. On 21 September the Beagle returned to Stephen's Bay. Darwin and his servant, Syms Covington, were again landed for studies of the small volcanic cones that dot the area, and that day and the next they 'collected many new plants, birds & shells & insects'. Darwin was also pleased to see the volcanic forms: 'long familiar, but only by description'. Despite the interest, however, he seems to have had no great affection for the place: the negative and 'infernal' images recur. The day was 'glowing hot', and the chimney-like volcanic features reminded him of 'the iron furnaces near Wolverhampton'. The bare volcanic rock, devoid of vegetation, was 'rough and horrid'. Darwin came up close to some of the giant tortoises, one of which hissed at him! He thought they 'appeared most old-fashioned antediluvian animals or rather inhabitants of some other planet'. He and his servant slept on the beach, and continued collecting on the 22nd, returning to the ship in the evening.

On 23 September the ship followed a somewhat irregular course to Charles (Santa Maria) Island, passing quite close to Barrington (Santa Fe), small and low but steeply cliffed. The next few days were spent exploring various parts of Charles Island, a ship's boat sometimes delivering Darwin to a place that he wanted to explore. On one occasion he met a Mr Lawson, an Englishman, currently acting as governor, who took him and one or two companions about four and a half miles (7 km) inland to view the settlement, just six years established. The volcanic soil here was more fertile than elsewhere and there were freshwater springs. Sweet potatoes and plantains were grown; and the population of 200-300 (mainly persons convicted of political crimes in Ecuador) lived in houses 'built of poles & thatched with grass' scattered over the cultivated area. The people existed by hunting goats, wild pigs and tortoises. The depredations of residents and visiting ships on the tortoises were already serious: they had 'formerly swarmed' close to the pools, but were now much scarcer. 'The ship's company of a Frigate brought down to the beach in one day more than 200.' Mr Lawson thought that there would be few left in another 20 years, and already he was seeking supplies from James Island (San Salvador).

Some of the animals there are so very large that upwards of 200 lbs of meat have been procured from one. Mr Lawson recollects having seen a Terrapin, which 6 men could scarcely lift & two could not turn over on its back. These immense creatures must be very old; in the year 1830 one was caught (which required 6 men to lift it. . .) which had various dates carved on its shell: one was 1786.8

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Darwin's Other Islands

Collecting continued on 26 and 27 September. Darwin wrote in his diary: 'I industriously collected all the animals, plants, insects & reptiles from this Island.' This implies that he felt that he had made a nearly complete collection: certainly he seems to have collected more insect specimens on Charles Island than on the others, although occasionally it seems he may have intermingled specimens from different islands.9 His notes show that many dozens of Coleoptera (beetles), Diptera (flies), Hemiptera (bugs), Hymenoptera (ants, bees, wasps) and Orthoptera (grasshoppers) were collected, probably many of them by using a sweep-net in the vegetation high on the island. He wondered 'from what district or "centre of creation" future comparison might show that the organized beings of this archipelago must be attached.'10 He ascended to the summit of Saddle Mountain, the highest hill on the island. He estimated it at 2,000 feet (610 m) (modern maps show it at 2,700 feet [825 m]), finding there 'the remains of an old crater' covered with 'coarse grass & Shrubs'. Darwin was extremely interested in the volcanic land-forms, counting 39 conical hills on the comparatively small island, in the summit of each of which 'there was a more or less circular depression'. From the thickness and fertility of the soil, the relatively smooth outline, and from the covering of vegetation, he deduced that it had been 'long' since the lava streams that covered the lower part of the island had flowed from these craters.

On the morning of the 28 September HMS Beagle sailed from Charles Island to the southern tip of Albemarle (Isabela) Island, Captain FitzRoy surveying its southern approaches. As the ship came to anchor in Iguana Cove, Darwin recorded that this island was 'the highest & boldest' they had seen. The volcanic landscape continued to fascinate him; he noticed onshore a landscape 'studded with little truncated cones'; the craters were 'very perfect' and generally had reddish interiors. 'The whole had even a more workshop appearance than that described at Chatham Island', he noted. Darwin did not land here; instead the ship sailed northwards between the upright of the reversed 'L' of Albemarle Island, and Narborough (Fernandina). His generally unfavourable reactions continued: Narborough had 'a more rough & horrid' aspect than any other; the shortage of water (each man was reduced to half a gallon for all purposes) was a 'sad drawback' in the 'overpowering' heat; when they found some water in small depressions on northern Albemarle it was 'not good'; the country was 'arid &C sterile'; lizards he found were 'clumsy' and 'hideous'. A day or two later he wrote of the same island that he thought it would be difficult to find 'in the intertropical latitudes a piece of land 75 miles long, so entirely useless to man or the larger animals'. Nevertheless, he continued to make thoughtful observations, although he did not see any tortoises.

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The Mystique and Myth of the Galapagos - and the Reality

He describes the suite of volcanic forms and his exploration of them very lucidly:

To the South of the Cove [Targus Cove] I found a most beautiful Crater, elliptic in form, less than a mile in its longer axis & about 500 feet deep. Its bottom was occupied by a lake, out of which a tiny Crater formed an Island ... The ... lake looked blue & clear. I hurried down the cindery side, choked with dust, to my disgust on tasting the water found it Salt as brine. This crater & some other neighbouring ones have only poured mud or Sandstone containing fragments of Volcanic rocks; but from the mountain behind, great bare streams have flowed, sometimes from the summit, or from small Craters on the side, expanding in their descent, have at base formed plains of Lava.11

Despite the heat, thirst and dust his observation of animals remained astute. He carefully compared the terrestrial lizards he found in the mountains with the marine forms he had encountered by the shore; he thought from their structure that they were 'closely allied' to the 'imps of darkness'; he noted that this species lived in burrows, into which it hurried when frightened; the creatures had a ridge and spines along the back and were orange-yellow with the hinder part of the back brick-red in colour; they weighed 10-15 lb (4.5-6.8 kg) and were 2-4 ft (0.6-1.2 m) in length. They were considered good eating. Darwin commented, 'this day forty were collected'.

On 2 October the Beagle sailed from what Darwin called 'Crater Harbor, [sic]' but the ship was becalmed between Narborough and Albemarle Islands, and made her way slowly round the north of the latter. Darwin continued to study the coastline, noting that it remained 'studded with small craters', although there were some 'great Volcanic mounds' from which streams of black lava had flowed. The ship, having rounded the north point of Albemarle, seems to have been swept over 100 nautical miles back to the east, and the next week was spent 'most unpleasantly . . . struggling to get about 50 miles to Windward against a strong current'. Darwin was pleased when they eventually reached James Island (San Salvador), on 8 October. He was landed, along with Mr Bynoe,12 some provisions and three seamen, while the Beagle returned to Chatham Island to take on water, supplies of which were now depleted. The group set up camp in a small valley a little inland from the beach at Buccaneer Cove, somewhat to the north of James Bay. Initially at least Darwin was little more impressed with James Island than the others he had visited or seen from shipboard: 'there was a miserable little Spring of Water', and the seamen had to work hard to keep the group supplied. One day the group found a human skull in the bushes at the point where a few years previously the crew of a sealing vessel had murdered

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Darwin's Other Islands

their captain. It was hot, dry and dusty, and on the lower ground the vegetation was sparse, prickly and sometimes leafless. Darwin's observations on the weather and microclimate, written in his diary on 16 October, are worth repeating in full:

The weather during nearly all the time has been cloudless & the sun very powerful; if by chance the trade wind fails for an hour the heat is very oppressive. During the last two days, the Thermometer within the Tents has stood for some hours at 93° [F, about 34°C]. In the open air, in the wind & sun, only [at] 85° [29.4°C]. The sand was intensely hot, the Thermometer placed in the brown kind immediately rose to 137° [58°C]; and how much higher it would have done I do not know: for it was not graduated above this. The black Sand felt far hotter, so that in thick boots it was very disagreeable to pass over it.13

Despite the difficult conditions, Darwin found a good deal of interest on James Island. There was a group of men from Charles Island hunting tortoises, and Darwin and his companions fell in with them on occasions, making use of their local knowledge. On 9 October they ventured about six miles inland, and climbed to an estimated 2,000 feet (610 m; the highest point on the island is given on modern maps as 2,974 feet, about 910 m). They found some small rather wretched dwellings that Darwin described as hovels. At higher altitudes on the island it was green; during part of each day cloud gathered over the higher ground - the effect of the unidirectional trade winds and convection - and 'the vapour condensed by the trees drips down like rain'. The trees were gnarled and their branches 'low & crooked'; there were many ferns and a mimosa; many of the trees had flowers. The situation was similar to that of Charles Island - a striking contrast between the arid coastlands and the damp, productive uplands, with the relatively slight difference in elevation. There were springs, small ones, but the water was good and deliciously cold. The tortoises assembled in numbers at the springs, pushing their heads right into the water to drink. Some of the tortoises were extremely large, and the great reptiles had worn pathways to the springs. The group of companions ate their meat, fried in the tortoises' own oil. Darwin thought that it was 'indifferent food'; he also measured several of them and timed them when moving at maximum speed - about 360 yards (about 330 m) an hour. They could carry him with ease.

The yellow terrestrial lizards (iguanas) were also found on James Island, and Darwin seems to have spent some time watching their behaviour. They were mainly vegetarian, eating berries and leaves and often climbing trees for food. He records that they never drank water; they often, however, ate the succulent cactus (which of course contained water), and for a piece of it

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they would struggle 'like dogs' seizing it from each other. The burrows were, in places, so numerous that it was difficult to find a spot to pitch a tent.

On 11 October a local official took them on a boat trip about six miles down the coast to a salina (or salt lake). They crossed an apparently recent stream of lava that had flowed around 'an ancient but very perfect Crater' at the bottom of which was a perfectly circular lake; it was only three or four inches (about 10 cm) deep and lay 'on layers of pure & beautifully Crystallized Salt'. The lake was fringed with green succulent plants, and the sides of the crater were steep and wooded, so that the whole had 'a rather pretty appearance'.

One further incident that occurred on James Island is perhaps worthy of notice, as it provides an insight into Darwin's personality; he had a 'Whiggish' background (in contrast to Captain FitzRoy's high Toryism) and he tried to be on good terms with all races and nationalities, and friendly to all sorts and conditions of men. The tiny spring on which Darwin, Bynoe and their companions depended for water was very close to the beach; at one stage a heavy swell from the north set in and the surf broke over and spoiled the freshwater source. Darwin continues:

We should have been distressed if an American Whaler had not very kindly given us three casks of water (& made us a present of a bucket of Onions). Several times during the Voyage Americans have showed themselves at least as obliging, if not more so, than any of our Countrymen would have been. Their liberality moreover has always been offered in the most hearty manner. If their prejudices against the English are as strong as ours against the Americans, they forget & smother them in an admirable manner.14

Elsewhere in his notebooks he wrote of the 'extraordinary kindness of Yankeys'. It was not just Americans of course - French and South Americans, the inhabitants of Pacific Islands, Maoris and Australian Aboriginals, Africans and Malays - Darwin worked hard to be on open and friendly terms with all. He talked to as many of those with whom he came into contact as possible, and often gained valuable information from them.

On the afternoon of 17 October HMS Beagle sent boats to take the group back on board; the hydrographic survey of the eastern side of Albemarle was then completed on the 18th: Darwin noticed that this coast of the island was 'nearly black with recent uncovered lavas'. Overnight the ship sailed north-east to Abington Island (Pinta), where on 19 October they picked up the ship's yawl, which had been conducting a survey of that island, with another small group. The Beagle then set off due north-west, to briefly examine two tiny islets, Culpepper (now appropriately known as

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Darwin's Other Islands

Isla Darwin) and Wenman (Isla Wolf), about 100 miles (160 km) to the north of the main archipelago. On 20 October Darwin recorded, 'the Ship's head was put towards Otaheite [Tahiti] & we commenced our long passage of 3,200 miles'.

Darwin's pattern of work, with a small group of companions, was entirely typical of many island visits. When he was not using his cabin on the Beagle as a base, he set up a temporary camp ashore from which he made daily excursions. We see him using a sweep-net to catch insects and his geological hammer to obtain rock specimens. His observations were extremely detailed. We have already noted his careful descriptions of the reptiles, animal behaviour and volcanic landscapes. Here are two of his descriptions, based on his James Island experiences that provide an insight into his observational powers:

. . . one side of Fresh-water Bay, in James Island, is bounded by a promontory, which forms the last wreck of a large crater. On the beach of this promontory, a quadrant-shaped segment of a small subordinate point of eruption stands exposed. It consists of nine separate little streams of lava piled upon each other; and an irregular pinnacle, about fifteen feet in height, of reddish brown vesicular basalt, abounding with large crystals of glassy albite and fused augite . . .

In the lava and in the scoriae of this little crater, I found several fragments, which, from their angular form and their granular structure, their freedom from air-cells, their brittle and burnt condition, closely resembled those fragments of primary rocks which are occasionally ejected . . . from volcanoes. These fragments consist of glassy albite, much mackled, with very imperfect cleavage, mingled with semi-rounded grains, having tarnished glassy surfaces of a steel-blue mineral . . .15

Whether at the scale of the whole landscape, the individual land-form, the rock hand-specimen, or the individual grain or crystal, Darwin's observation is superb. He collected hundreds of specimens: plants, insects, molluscs, fish, reptiles, birds, rocks. His last few days on James Island seem to have a been particularly frenetic collecting time: he wrote: 'We were all busily employed in these days in collecting all sorts of Specimens.' He obtained specimens from the islands he did not visit from the officers who did, and he also obtained information from local people.

There is thus no evidence in Darwin's notes and accounts of his Galapagos sojourn of any sudden, Road-to-Damascus-like awakening. He found many

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The Mystique and Myth of the Galapagos - and the Reality

aspects of the archipelago's geology and natural history fascinating: he was again and again struck by the apparent recency of the volcanic forms and the poverty of the biota. He worked hard; his notes and collections were an important basis for later work. Nevertheless, he made mistakes; he did not (at the time) understand the significance of the differences in the shells of the tortoises on the different islands, or of the birds. Had he done so, he would have collected more tortoise shells and held on to those that he had in his possession. He later expressed surprise that islands so close together, so similar in their geology and apparently so young, should be 'differently tenanted'. He noted some similarities between some of the birds of the islands and those he had seen in South America.16 He was not very enthusiastic about the place: it was hot, for the most part dry, dusty and bare, and poverty-stricken. In his descriptions, as we have seen, he frequently uses such adjectives as 'miserable', 'hideous' and 'infernal'. The comparatively short visits to islands were separated by frustrating periods spent moving from island to island, while the ship's company undertook routine survey work or languished at the whim of contrary current and wind. He uses the term 'old-fashioned' for some of the organisms he saw, but this is just a turn of phrase and cannot be thought of as having any evolutionary significance. He speculated as to the possible affinities between the Galapagos creatures and those elsewhere: but this for the most part is what his ruminations were - just speculation. Later, his Galapagos observations were to have considerable significance, but in the context of his comparisons with other islands and island biotas, and only after much thought.

One thing that does come through from the Galapagos account is his comparative approach. Darwin was always comparing; he compared the terrestrial iguanas with the marine; he compared the volcanic land-forms of one of the Galapagos Islands with those of another, and the vegetation of the coastal lava fields with that of the damp uplands. And by this stage in the voyage he had sufficient experience to be able to compare suites of features, not just individual organisms or characteristics, and to compare archipelagoes, not just islands. He noted similar altitudinal zonation patterns on James and Charles Islands. Here he is comparing the Galapagos group with an island he had seen in the Atlantic Ocean three years earlier:

In all these islands the dry parts reminded me of Fernando Noronha; perhaps the affinity is only in the similar circumstances of an arid Volcanic soil, a flowering leafless Vegetation in an Intertropical region, but without the beauty which generally accompanies such a position.17

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The Galapagos were important, but not all-important. Their importance only emerged from what Darwin found elsewhere on other island groups, and it is to these that we must now turn.

Notes

1. F. J. Sulloway, 'Darwin and the Galapagos', Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 21 (1985): 29-59.

2. Albeit in an article that places Darwin's alleged conversion to the evolutionary viewpoint some years after his actual visit to the islands.

3. N. Barlow (ed.), The Autobiography of Charles Darwin (London: Collins, 1958), p. 118. (Hereafter Autobiography.) The autobiography was written by Charles Darwin, solely for his family, late in his life, between the ages of 67 and 73.

4. D. Lack, Darwin's Finches (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1947), p. 9. Lack's text refers to Darwin questioning the mutability of species; clearly, from the context, an unfortunate misprint for immutability; the word immutable is used in the previous sentence.

5. Diary, 16 September 1835, pp. 333-4.

6. Ibid., p. 334.

7. Ibid.

8. Ibid., 24 September 1835, p. 337.

9. K. G. V. Smith (ed.), 'Darwin's Insects: Charles Darwin's Entomological Notes', Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), 14.1 (1987): 90-6.

10. Diary, 26 September 1835, p. 337.

11. Diary, 28 September 1835, p. 339.

12. Benjamin Bynoe was acting ship's surgeon, and a good friend of Darwin; he looked after him when Darwin was ill in South America. Bynoe was in fact the official ship's naturalist (Darwin was always a supernumerary), but the amount of observations he undertook does not seem to have been great. Perhaps assisting the young philosopher provided an opportunity to redress the balance a little.

13. Diary, p. 342.

14. Diary, 12 October 1835, p. 342.

15. C. Darwin, The Geology of the Voyage of HMS Beagle, Part 2, Geological Observations on the Volcanic Islands (London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1844), pp. 109-11. (Hereafter Geology of the Voyage.)

16. DAR 31.2/341-2.

17. Diary, 9 October 1835, p. 341.

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4. The Islands That Never Were

During his final few months in Cambridge, in the spring and early summer of 1831, Darwin's friend and teacher Professor John Henslow seems to have lent his protege a copy of the English translation (by Helen Maria Williams) of Alexander von Humboldt's1 Personal Narrative of a Voyage to the Equinoctial Regions of a New Continent, 1799-1804. This book made a tremendous impression on Darwin. He later wrote that he read this work 'with care and profound interest'. Amongst other things, it may be that it was from Humboldt that Darwin got part of his sense of integration - of the relationships amongst rocks, land-forms, vegetation, animal life, climate and human activities - that can be seen in his own writing. He went on to say that it was this book, along with Sir J. Herschel's Introduction to the Study of Natural Philosophy, that stirred in him 'a burning zeal to add even the most humble contribution to the noble structure of natural science'. He went on: 'No one or a dozen books' influenced him as much as these two. In his Autobiography, written late in life, he noted that he 'copied out from Humboldt, long passages about Teneriffe, and read them aloud'.2

These readings seem to have occurred during the course of excursions into the Cambridgeshire countryside, with John Henslow, Richard Dawes3 and Marmaduke Ramsay4 and other young dons. Possibly the young Darwin slightly overwhelmed his older friends with his enthusiasm: 'I . . . talked about the glories of Teneriffe, and some of the party declared that they would go there; but I think they were only half in earnest. I was, however, quite in earnest, and got an introduction to a merchant in London to enquire about ships . . .'5

His letters of this period confirm his near-obsession with Humboldt's detailed account of the Island of Tenerife. Here he is, in a letter to his sister Caroline, written from Cambridge on 28 April 1831:

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All the while I am writing now my head is running about the Tropics: in the morning I go and gaze at Palm trees in the hot-house and come home and read Humboldt: my enthusiasm is so great I cannot hardly [sic] sit still in my chair. Henslow & other Dons give us great credit for our plan: Henslow promises to cram me in geology. I will never be easy till I see the peak of Teneriffe and the great Dragon tree... I am working regularly at Spanish ... I have written myself into a Tropical glow.6

In a letter to his cousin W. D. Fox, some two weeks later, he wrote: 'As for my Canary scheme, it is rash of you to ask questions: My other friends sincerely wish me there, I plague them so with talking about tropical scenery &c &c. Eyton7 will go next summer, & I am learning Spainish [sic]. How I wish we could meet. You would soon be tired of the subject.'8

He wrote a couple more letters in the same vein to his long-suffering cousin from his home in Shrewsbury in July and early August 1831, and also one in reply to his teacher Henslow in Cambridge:

And now for the Canaries. I wrote to Mr Ramsay, a little information I got in town ... Passage 20£; ships touch & return during the months of June to February. But not seeing myself the Broker, the 2 most important questions remain unanswered, viz. whether it means June inclusive & how often they sail. I will find this out before very long. I hope you continue to fan your Canary ardor [sic]: I read and reread Humboldt: do you do the same, & I am sure nothing will prevent us seeing the Great Dragon tree.9

Humboldt's description of the dragon tree seems to have been a particularly powerful influence.

Although we were acquainted, from the narratives of so many travellers, with the dragon tree ... we were not the less struck with its enormous magnitude. We were told, that the trunk of this tree, which is mentioned in several very ancient documents as marking the boundaries of a field, was as gigantic in the fifteenth century. Its height appeared to be about 50 or 60 feet; its circumference near the roots is 45 feet. . . The trunk has a great number of branches, which rise to form a candelabrum, and are terminated by tufts of leaves. [It] bears still every year both flowers and fruit. Its aspect feelingly recalls to mind 'the eternal youth of nature', which is an inexhaustible source of motion and life.10

There is more, including a note on the plant's limited distribution on the Atlantic islands, and affinity with Asia, hinting at a distribution by humans

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from there. There was much here to excite the young traveller. In the 'Picturesque Atlas' accompanying the text, a fine picture of the Orotava dragon tree is included, based on a sketch made in 1776. It is not clear whether Darwin had access to the Atlas with this illustration, but in view of his extraordinary interest in the tree and his mention of it in several letters it seems possible.11

Eyton, Dawes, Henslow, Fox and Ramsay did not have to put up with Darwin's avalanche of enthusiasm for Tenerife in general and the dragon tree in particular (poor Ramsay had died by the end of August 1831), for, as Darwin himself later put it, the scheme was 'knocked on the head by the voyage of the Beagle'; for after his brief geological walk through North Wales with Sedgwick the letter from Henslow containing the suggestion that he join Captain FitzRoy's voyage awaited him. But it was as if a trigger had been pulled. Had it not been for the 'reading and rereading' of Humboldt in the spring and summer of 1831 Darwin might never have developed his enthusiasm for remote volcanic islands, strange plants and the brilliant light of the tropics. He might not have spent as much of that summer teaching himself geology (with Sedgwick's help), or picking up sufficient Spanish to be useful in South America.

Let us take up the story on 5 January 1832. The voyage of the Beagle was nine days old. Darwin had been extremely unwell as the ship tossed its way across the notorious Bay of Biscay: he describes in his diary his 'great and unceasing suffering' and how he 'very nearly fainted from exhaustion'. He lay in his hammock in the poop cabin feeling miserable. He was 'so sick' that he did 'not get up even to see Madeira' when the ship passed twelve miles to the east of that island. On the 5th, however, he was much better. He wrote, with eager anticipation, that at noon on that day they were 100 miles from Tenerife. The day was beautiful and Darwin was able to enjoy it: the air was 'mild & warm; something like a spring day in England', but the sky was much brighter and the atmosphere clearer. The following day was equally fine, and by daybreak the ship was within sight of Tererife. 'Everything', he wrote, 'had a beautiful appearance.' He continued: 'the colours are so rich &c soft. The peak or sugar loaf has just shown itself above the clouds. It towers in the sky twice as high as I should have dreamed of looking for it. A dense bank of clouds entirely separates the snowy top from its rugged base.'12

He goes on to describe the 'coloured houses of white, yellow & red', the raking masts of the vessels in the harbour against the background of dark volcanic rock, the patches of dark green vegetation and the 'oriental-looking churches'. The low, dark fortifications with the bright Spanish flag waving above them appeared picturesque and exciting.

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Alas, Darwin was not to set foot on what he called 'this long wished for object of my ambition'. He was within sight of Tenerife, but

0 misery, misery, we were just preparing to drop anchor within half a mile of Santa Cruz, when a boat came alongside, bringing our death-warrant. The consul declared we must perform a rigorous quarantine of twelve days. Those who have never experienced it can scarcely conceive what a gloom it cast on every one.13

Captain FitzRoy was not going to have his ship and his crew languish just offshore for twelve wasted days. He ordered sails to be set for the Cape Verde Islands. The effect on Darwin was profound: there was an immediate change in his style of writing. As the visit to Tenerife was eagerly anticipated he used the present tense in his descriptions: 'Everything has a beautiful appearance: the colours are rich and soft.' After the devastating news was given he moves to the past tense: 'The vallies [sic]... were spotted with patches of a light green vegetation and & gave the scenery ... a novel appearance.' He tried to console himself in a desultory way: 'I suppose Volcanic islands under the same zone have much the same character.'

'It is past', he wrote, and 'we have left perhaps one of the most interesting places in the world, just at the moment when we were near enough for every object to create without satisfying our utmost curiosity.' The tantalizing glimpses continued. The next day (7 January), as the ship zig-zagged around in a 'baffling' wind in the channel between Tenerife and Gran Canaria, he wrote:

[I]n the morning a most glorious view broke upon us. The sun was rising behind the Grand Canary & defined with clearest outline its rugged form. Teneriffe, grey as yet from the morning mist, lay to the West: some clouds having floated past, the snowy peak was seen in all its grandeur. As the sun rose, it illumined this massive pyramid . . . relieved against the blue sky . . .14

The young naturalist's morale soon improved. The weather was warm; skies were blue; it was relatively calm. Darwin read Humboldt, made a makeshift net out of bunting, and by 11 January was writing delightedly that he had worked all day 'at the produce of my net'. He marvelled at the range of marine life he had found and their variety in form, size and colour, although he remained wistful, writing on the 13th: 'I cannot help much regretting that we were unable to stay in Teneriffe.'

So poor Darwin had stayed in his hammock, hideously seasick, while the Beagle passed Madeira, although he had glimpsed the tiny islet of Porto Santo, a little to the north, on the morning of 3 January 1832, and two days

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The Islands That Never Were

later the Beagle 'passed within a few miles of the Piton rock, the most Southern of the Salvages: it is a wild abrupt rock &c uninhabited'. The ship was excluded from Tenerife, the visit which he had been so long planning, and Gran Canaria also had to be viewed from afar. He might well have wondered when he really was going to set foot on an island!

There is one other incident that may have contributed to this frustration, and although it is noted in just a couple of lines in his diary, it may have been quite important to him. On 3 January he recorded: 'We looked for the eight stones & passed over the spot where they are laid down on the charts. Perhaps their origin might have been Volcanic &c [they] have since disappeared.'15 Disappearing islands have been part of the lore of the sea for ever and a day. A glimpse of a breaking wave, some mirage or optical effect, in some parts of the world a far-travelled iceberg, particularly if it carries a good deal of dark morainic material (i.e. rock material eroded by glaciers), or perhaps even whales or other marine life when seen under certain conditions have triggered reports of isolated rocks or islets. Very occasionally such a glimpse might have been gained through a mist of rum! These reports might find their way into 'Instructions for Mariners' or onto Admiralty charts. In the interests of safety, they might remain there for decades, long after other observers had indicated that they did not exist. As late as 1968, no lesser authority than The Times Atlas showed Swain's Island, just a few degrees north of the Antarctic Circle in the Pacific sector of the Southern Ocean, albeit with 'E.D.' (existence doubtful) by the name.

On the other hand volcanic islands do come and go. To take a single example: Graham Island (also known as Ferdinandea), in the Mediterranean south of Sicily, made its first recorded appearance in 10 BC, and last rose from the sea in July 1831; fountains of lava gushed out along a fissure, the lava exploding on contact with water; there were billowing clouds of black ash. A painting made at the time shows quite a large, dark, jagged islet, towering high above sailing craft, with the orange and red of an actual eruption at its peak. The island was said to be 70 metres high and 700 metres in diameter. A diplomatic explosion seemed as though it might accompany the volcanic event, as three countries claimed the island. However, these difficulties were avoided, as, within a few months the island crumbled in on itself, the volcanic material collapsing back into an exhausted magma chamber, perhaps. By January 1832 - the very time that the Beagle was searching for the Eight Stones - it had disappeared. There are other active seamounts in the Mediterranean, and indeed in the Atlantic, and thus a volcanic explanation for the origin and disappearance for the Stones is not completely impossible: shallow areas of sea do exist north of Madeira.16

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Darwin's Other Islands

Whatever the true explanation for the origin and disappearance of the mysterious Eight Stones, the fact that Darwin thought that they might be volcanic is interesting. He was by now reading Charles Lyell's Principles of Geology17 during the voyage: this book emphasizes the notion of uniformi-tarianism, or gradualism, that the world is to be understood to have developed its present features over long periods of gradual change. Later in the voyage, Darwin was to embrace these ideas firmly, and it is of note that just a week into the voyage he was speculating that islands might appear and disappear through the action of natural geological processes, and appreciating that he lived in a changing, dynamic world.18

Tenerife, that long-hoped-for island, was never visited; yet the hoping and the planning, the reading and rereading of Humboldt fired Darwin with enthusiasm for islands, the tropical environment and for travel. The Eight Stones were not where they were marked on the charts; perhaps they never existed: nevertheless their image encouraged the raw, 'unfinished naturalist' to think along lines that were to be of importance later. Both Tenerife and the Stones were, each in their way, islands of imagination for Darwin, and of immense importance.

Notes

1. Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), sometimes designated the 'Father of modern geography'. Darwin had his own copy of Vols 1 and 2 (in one) aboard the Beagle.

2. Autobiography, pp. 67-8.

3. The Reverend Richard Dawes (1793-1854), later Dean of Hereford.

4. Marmaduke Ramsay (cl796-1831), Fellow of Jesus College.

5. Autobiography, p. 68. Darwin frequently used the spelling 'Teneriffe'; his spelling is used here in quotations.

6. DAR 154; reprinted in Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 122. In fact the Isle of Tenerife is about 4° north of the Tropic of Cancer.

7. Thomas Campbell Eyton (1809-80) was younger that the rest of the group. He was Charles Darwin's close contemporary, and also came from Shropshire.

8. Christ's College, Cambridge, Library, Fox 40; Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 123.

9. C. R. Darwin to J. S. Henslow, 11 July 1831; original: Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Correspondence, Vol. 1, pp. 125-6.

10. H. M. Williams, Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of the New Continent during the years 1799-1804, a translation into English of Alexander von Humboldt's 1816 work (London: Longman Rees, Orme, Brown and Green, 1818). (A facsimile edition was prepared by Orbis, Amsterdam, in 1971.) Darwin had his own copy of Vols 1 and 2 (in one) aboard the Beagle.

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The Islands That Never Were

The copy is in the Darwin Collection in the Cambridge University Library, and bears an inscription from J. S. Henslow, to Charles, 'on his departure'.

11. The scientific name of the species is Dracoena draco; the specimen described by Humboldt, and mentioned by Darwin was apparently blown down in 1868; it then had a trunk with a girth of 45 feet (approximately 14 metres) and a height of 70 feet (about 22 metres).

12. Diary, 6 January 1832, p. 21.

13. Ibid.

14. Ibid., 7 January 1832, p. 22.

15. Ibid., p. 20.

16. Time, 20 March 2000.

17. There is little evidence that Darwin read much of Charles Lyell (1797-1875) before the voyage; indeed his copy of Lyell's Principles of Geology, Vol. 1 (1830), was given to him by FitzRoy shortly before departure, the two other volumes reaching him in South America. However, this work profoundly influenced Darwin's thinking during the voyage. Lyell challenged the French geologist George Cuvier's (1769-1832) notion that the history of the earth was to be understood in terms of a series of sudden, catastrophic events. Rather it was to be interpreted in terms of uniformitarianism, the idea that the earth has evolved as the result of the long-continued action of processes that can be observed today. Lyell and Darwin came to know one another well.

18. Captain FitzRoy, with the seaman's practicality rather than the philosopher's speculative approach, was convinced, after a thorough searching, that the 'Eight Stones' did not exist. He wrote:

On the 3d of January we were occupied in looking for the 'Eight Stones'; but nothing was seen to indicate either rocks, or shoals or even shallow water. The sun was shining brightly on a deep blue sea, of one uniform colour: no soundings could be obtained; and had there been a shoal or a rock within seven miles of us at any hour of that day, it could not have passed unnoticed. So many vessels have searched, in vain, for this alleged group of rocks, that their existence can now hardly be thought possible. (Narrative)

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5. St Jago, Cape Verde: Source of Inspiration

The weather for the next few days, as they ploughed southwards through the North Atlantic, following the abortive search for the Eight Stones and the tantalizing glimpse of Tenerife, was warm: 'beautiful and very little hotter than the middle of our summer', wrote Darwin. He spent many hours each day working on the sea-life collected in his net: he commented on their 'most exquisite . . . forms & rich colours', musing philosophically, '[i]t creates a feeling of wonder that so much beauty should apparently [be] created for so little purpose'. However, Darwin was already beginning to think ecologically when he wrote: 'The number of animals that the net collects is very great & fully explains the manner so many animals of large size live so far from land'. (He was presumably thinking of whales and dolphins that feed on plankton, or on fish that feed on plankton.)

But the opportunities he felt he had missed still rankled. It looks as though the Cape Verde Islands were getting a 'bad press' from his shipmates, as to his diary he grumbled: 'I cannot help much regretting we were unable to stay at Teneriffe. St Jago is so miserable a place that my first landing in a Tropical country will not make that lasting impression of beauty that so many have described.'1

The sense of frustration, and of isolation, continued for the next day or two; 14 and 15 January: 'glided past with nothing to mark their transit'; the breezes were light, and 'very annoying', and as the ship was able to make very little way against a strong current, they hovered around to the north-west of St Jago (San Tiago). A large, brightly coloured cricket found an insecure resting place within reach of Darwin's 'fly-nippers'! It 'must at least have flown 370 miles from the coast of Africa'. Long-distance dispersal seems to have been on his mind, for he recorded in his notes that at 8.00 a.m. on 16 January the vane was taken from the mast-head and found

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St ]ago, Cape Verde: Source of Inspiration

to be caked with a 'soft yellow brown dust', which he though had 'most probably . . . [come] owing to wind from the coast of Africa'.2 Later Darwin would become very interested in the problems of dispersal to remote islands.

The young naturalist's initial impressions after going on shore at St Jago were unfavourable. Volcanic activity in the past and the overhead tropical sun had rendered the soil 'sterile'. The landscape at first appeared 'desolate'; the town of Porto Praya was a miserable place: the children appeared to live in a state of 'degradation', half-naked, playing in the dust with pigs and goats; the houses were poorly furnished. He tasted a banana but did not like it, finding it 'maukish'; sweet and with little flavour, he thought.

He was expecting a lot, for he had 'read and reread' Humboldt's accounts of the place and 'was afraid of disappointments'. He need not have worried, however, for at the end of the day he was to write that his fears had been 'utterly vain'. Although his initial impressions of the town had been unfavourable, he walked across town and entered a deep valley. The effect was mind-blowing:

Here I first saw the glory of tropical vegetation: Tamarinds, Bananas and Palms were flourishing at my feet... It is not only the gracefulness of their forms or the novel richness of their colours, it is the numberless & confused associations that rush together on the mind, & produce the effect. I returned to the shore, treading on Volcanic rocks, hearing the notes of unknown birds, & seeing new insects fluttering about still newer flowers. It has been for me a glorious day, like giving to a blind man eyes, he is overwhelmed with what he sees &c cannot justly comprehend it. Such are my feelings, & such may they remain.3

Darwin spent most of the next couple of days on Quail Island, where Captain FitzRoy had established a sort of tented base from which to make navigational, magnetic and astronomical observations, for this was one of the Beagle's principal tasks. Darwin carefully examined the volcanic rocks, and also the marine organisms that he found along the rocky shore. The sense of euphoria remained:

The first examining of Volcanic rocks must to a Geologist be a memorable epoch, & little less so to the naturalist is the first burst of admiration at seeing Corals growing on their native rock. Often whilst in Edinburgh, have I gazed at the little pools of water left by the tide: & from the minute corals on our own shore pictured to myself those of larger growth: little did I think how exquisite their beauty is & still less did I expect my hopes of seeing them would ever be realised.4

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Darwin's Other Islands

Even at this early stage, Darwin is using the comparative approach - the corals of the Cape Verde Islands are compared with their diminutive relatives along the Scottish coast. Perhaps too in his mind he was comparing the young volcanic rocks beneath his feet with the much older equivalents of Arthur's Seat, Edinburgh.

Darwin had before him a copy of the first volume of Lyell's Principles of Geology, given to him by FitzRoy, and Sedgwick's geological instruction in North Wales was still clear in his mind. Late in life he wrote:

The investigation of the geology of all the places visited was far more important than natural history, as reasoning here comes into play. On first examining a new district nothing can appear more hopeless than the chaos of rocks; but by recording the stratification and nature of rocks and fossils at many points, always reasoning and predicting what will be found elsewhere, light soon begins to dawn . . . and the structure of the whole becomes more or less intelligible.5

Detailed observation, comparison of one place with another and logical reasoning: Darwin took to field geology like a duck to water, and the little, desolate Quail Island was his nursery. There he studied the relationship of one rock-type to another; he found fossils and noted how they occurred in relation to each other:

At Quail Island, the calcareous deposit is replaced in its lowest part by a soft, brown, earthy tuff, full of Turritelli: this is covered by a bed of pebbles, passing into sandstone, and mixed with fragments of echini, claws of crabs, and shells; the oyster-shells still adhering to the rock on which they grew.6

He tested Quail Island rocks with his blow-pipe and chemicals; not for nothing had he been called 'Gas' in childhood, when he did experiments with his brother Erasmus in the garden shed. He noted the form of the landscape - the rounded volcanic cones, the craters, the cliffs, the valleys - and thus he was 'able to make out the geology of the district'.

Late in life he recalled how on tiny Quail Island - 'less than a mile in circumference' - and on the nearby main island, things suddenly 'clicked' for him geologically. The reading of Lyell and the grasping of his uniformitar-ian approach (the emphasis on gradual change); the field techniques acquired in North Wales; the bare landscape, for the most part devoid of the smothering soil and vegetation cover; his own powers of detailed observation; his comparative approach - all these probably contributed to things 'coming together' for him in a remarkable way.

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St ]ago, Cape Verde: Source of Inspiration

The geology of St Jago is very striking yet simple: a stream of lava formerly flowed over the bed of the sea, formed of triurated recent shells and corals, which it has baked into a hard white rock. Since then the whole island has been upheaved. But the line of white rock revealed to me a new and important fact, namely that there had been afterwards subsidence round the craters, which had been in action, and poured forth lava. It then first dawned on me that I might perhaps write a book on the geology of the various countries visited, and this made me thrill with delight. That was a memorable hour to me, and how distinctly I can call to mind the low cliff of lava beneath which I rested, with the sun glowing hot, a few strange desert plants growing near, and with living corals in the tidal pools at my feet. 7

As well as getting the feel for seeing in three dimensions, and appreciating that both rises and falls of the sea level in relation to the land had taken place at a not-too-far-distant geological time, Darwin was getting the feel for the span of time. There were the fossil corals and close by, in the sea at the foot of the cliff, were the living forms.

Running through Darwin's diary entries on the Cape Verde Island is the contrast between the 'utterly barren' volcanic country, where 'nothing meets the eye but plains strewed over with black & burnt rocks', and the valleys with watercourses, dark green palm groves, tamarind trees, banana and pawpaw plantations and orange orchards. Yet even the volcanic country was not totally devoid of life. 'Nature is here sterile; nothing breaks the absolute stillness; nothing is seen to move . . .', he reports, although he adds as an afterthought: 'except the gay coloured kingfisher & its prey, the less gaudy grasshopper' - again we see a hint of Darwin thinking ecologically.

One valley contained baobab trees (Adansonia digitata), a distinctive African species. 'I had forgotten its existence', wrote Darwin, 'but the sight immediately recalled a description of it that I had formerly read.' The description will have been that in Humboldt's Personal Narrative, the reading of which had so encouraged him to embark on his voyage of discovery. The largest tree was carefully measured, by climbing and letting down a string, and using a pocket sextant: it was 45 feet (about 14 m) in height, and its circumference two feet from the ground was 35 feet (10.5 m).

Another ravine was different again: it had very steep rocky sides, about 30 yards across and with walls about 200 feet (60 m) high:

In this wild dell we found the building places for several birds, Hawks &c Ravens & the beautiful tropic birds were soaring about us: a large wild cat bounded across . . . The place seemed formed for wild animals: large blocks of rocks, entwined with succulent creepers & the

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Darwin's Other Islands

ground strewn over with bleached bones of goats would have been a fine habitation for a Tiger.

The sterile volcanic landscape contrasted not only with the better-watered valleys but also with the relative richness of the marine fauna. Besides the corals and their relatives the sea-anemones, together with molluscs, sea-urchins and sea-slugs, the young naturalist, while on 28 January 1832 poking around in the rockpools of Quail Island at low tide, encountered an octopus. The account from his Zoological Diary is worth quoting at some length, as it exemplifies not only the carefulness of Darwin the observer at this early stage of his voyage but his interest in the behaviour of organisms - an interest that developed throughout his career, culminating in his Expression of Emotions in Animals and Man in 1872.

Octopus

Found amongst the rocks West of Quail Island at low water ... When first discovered he was in a hole & it was difficult to perceive what it was. As soon as I drove him from his den he shot with great rapidity across the pool of water, leaving in his train a large quantity of ink. Even when in a shallow place it was difficult to catch him, for he twisted his body with great ease between the stones & by his suckers stuck very fast to them. When in the water the animal was of a brownish purple, but immediately on the beach the colour changed to a yellowish green. When I had the animal in a basin of Salt water on board this fact was explained by its having the Chamaelion [sic] like power of changing the colour of its body. The general colour of the animal was French grey, with numerous spots of bright yellow. The former of these colours varied in intensity, the other entirely disappeared and then returned. Over the whole body there were continually passing clouds, varying in colour from a 'hyacinth red' to a 'Chestnut brown'.8 As seen under a lens these clouds consisted of minute points apparently injected with a coloured fluid. The whole animal presented a most extraordinary mottled appearance, & much surprised every body who saw it. The edges of the sheath were orange, this likewise varied in tint. The animal seemed susceptible to small shocks of galvanism: contracting itself & the parts between the points of contact of the wires, [and] became almost black. This in a lesser degree followed the scratching [of] the animal with a needle ... The animal was slightly phosphorescent at night.9

Darwin compared these observations with others made a few days later (3 February):

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St Jago, Cape Verde: Source of Inspiration

Another upon seeing me instantly changed its colour. When in a deep hole being of a dark, but [when it was] in shallow of a much paler colour. From this cause & the stealthy way in which it creeps along, occasionally darting foward [I] had much difficulty in watching it.10

Darwin wrote of these findings to Professor Henslow, hoping that the observations were new, but must have been disappointed when his former teacher wrote back, nearly a year later (12 January 1833), to say that they were not original, 'but any fresh observations will be highly important'. He added that Darwin's observations on the behaviour of the creature were of 'great perfection'. Darwin also later noted that Cuvier had commented on the ability of octopi to change colour, and noted this on the blank page opposite the original annotations in his Zoological Diary. He was constantly comparing his own observations at different times and places, and comparing his own with those of others.

Throughout his journeying Darwin was interested in his fellow humans, their customs, ways of life and settlements, as well as the rock, plants and animals and landscapes he encountered. He commented in detail on the people of the first island upon which he set foot and on the last (Terceira in the Azores). He had occasionally come across persons of African descent in Britain and seems to have been remarkably open, friendly and lacking in prejudice towards such folk. He met some 'black men' on the road in St Jago and bought some goat's milk from them. 'These merry simple hearted men left us in roars of laughter', he recorded, continuing, T never saw anything more intelligent than the negros [sic].' On a later occasion he recorded meeting '20 young black girls, dressed in most excellent taste; their black skins & snow white linen were adorned with gay coloured turbans & large shawls'. Another day he noted sympathetically that both the men and women of a particular village looked overworked. He made several trips on horseback into the local countryside with one or two of his shipmates, describing the villages through which he passed and the people he met. He travelled to Ribeira Grande, about nine miles (14.5 km) to the west of Porto Praya, to see the ruins of an old fort and church; the settlement, in a little valley at the foot of a dark cliff, with palm-trees nearby, presented 'a melancholy, but very picturesque appearance'. He noted that the former governors and captains-general of the islands were buried here, and that some of the tombstones recorded dates from the fourteenth century: 'the heraldic ornaments were the only things in this retired place that reminded one of Europe', he commented lyrically.

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Darwin's Other Islands

Darwin spent some three weeks exploring his first island. He seems to have almost lost count of time, for after three days he looked back on that first exploration as a 'period long gone by', and he acknowledges that the last few dates in his diary are wrong - by a day or so. But those three weeks were of fundamental importance. He had thrilled to the brightness of tropical landscapes and the brilliant light. He had worked out the 'geology of a district' for himself, using the principles he had learned from Sedgwick and Henslow, modified in the light of Lyell's uniformitarian views. He had noted, for example, evidence that the islands seemed to have both risen and subsided in relation to the level of the sea, and he made efforts to reconstruct the geological history of the place. He had stood with his boots on volcanic lava and seen growing corals. He had collected sea-creatures, rock specimens and insects (the Coleoptera, or the beetles, that were his special interest in his early youth in the Shropshire countryside were well represented). In the study of plants and animals too he was beginning to arrange his material around conceptual frameworks that were of great importance later. He was starting to think ecologically; he did not use the terms 'food-chain' and 'food-web', but he noted the links between the kingfisher, the lizard and the grasshopper; the habitat of organisms was as interesting as their form. He also was studying the behaviour of organisms: the account of the octopus colour change, locomotion, concealment, ink-production and response to electric shocks and touch stimulation is remarkable for its day. He had resolved to write a book. Above all he was beginning to use the comparative method; as yet he was usually only able to compare his observations with those he had made in the British Isles (though he had travelled widely in England, Scotland and Wales), or with the observations of earlier explorers and naturalists (including Humboldt) whose books were aboard the Beagle.

It is almost as though St Jago in the Cape Verde Islands formed a template. Time and again when he was writing his notes about the geology and natural history of other islands, he makes a comparison. Later still, when writing up his observations for the book that he vowed to write that hot, hot day, he compared features of St Jago and Quail with those of Mauritius, St Helena and the Galapagos. He compared across time too: when he revisited St Jago four and a half years later (31 August-4 September 1836), he compared his new observations with those made earlier: 'Our old friend the great Baobab tree was clothed in a thick green foliage, which much altered its appearance' from the spiky, bare appearance seen before. Darwin went through his geological notes on Quail Island, added to them, and modified them. By then the comparative method was almost second nature to him.

Looking through his writings from the first island visit we see again and again the use of upbeat, positive language and superlatives: 'novel richness',

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St]ago, Cape Verde: Source of Inspiration

'overwhelmed', 'exquisite', 'beauty', 'never in the wildest castles in the air . . .', 'grandeur', 'vivid interest', 'most pleasing appearance', 'brilliancy', 'extreme interest', and so on. In a letter to his family he summarized: '[T]his island . . . has given me . . . much instruction and delight.'11

If there were a Eureka moment for Darwin on the voyage of the Beagle, it was on St Jago, or perhaps the nearby tiny islet of Quail, not in the Galapagos, important though the sojourn at the latter was. By then techniques were well formed, and the brilliant light and the heat of the Tropics were no longer a novelty.

Notes

1. Diary, 12-13 January 1832, p. 23.

2. DAR 30.1/2-4.

3. Diary, 16 January 1832, pp. 24-5.

4. Ibid., 17 January 1832, p. 25.

5. Autobiography, p. 77.

6. C. R. Darwin, Geology of the Voyage, Part 2, Chapter 1, 'St Jago', account based on his geological field-notes. (Turritella = a spiral shell, echini = sea-urchins.) Darwin's original geological notes on St Jago are at DAR 31.1/15-36.

7. Autobiography, p. 81.

8. There was a colour-chart aboard the Beagle, and Darwin often used it in the description of organisms.

9. DAR 30.1/5, 28 January 1832.

10. DAR 30.1/4 (reverse).

11. DAR 223, 8 February-1 March 1832; Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 202.

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6. The Smallest Rocks in the Tropical Seas: St Paul's Rocks and Fernando Noronha

Captain FitzRoy's navigation was exemplary, and a week after leaving the Cape Verde Islands - a week that Darwin had spent relaxing and working on his collections of marine life - late on 15 February 1832, the ship's company of the Beagle 'saw the rocks of St Paul's right ahead'. The vessel hove to for the night. On the 16th they moved a little closer, and when three miles distant boats were lowered: one with a surveying party led by Lieutenant Stokes and one with Lieutenant Wickham and Darwin 'for geologizing & shooting'.

St Paul's are a cluster of rocks almost on the Equator (in fact 0°58'N, 29°15'W). The islet is 540 miles (870 km) from the coast of South America. The highest point is about 60 feet (18.3 m) above sea level, and the circumference of the little group is only three-quarters of a mile (about 2 km). Darwin and his shipmates had seen large flocks of seabirds soaring above the islands, and noticed the brilliant white appearance of the bird droppings on the rocks. The boats had some difficulty in landing as 'the long swell of the open sea broke with violence on the rocky coast', but when they landed 'a most extraordinary scene was presented'. They were surrounded on all sides by birds 'so unaccustomed to men that they would not move'. The birds were knocked down with stones and by Darwin's geological hammer. FitzRoy's account gives an interesting glimpse:

The first impulse of our invaders of this bird-covered rock, was to lay about them like school-boys; even the geological hammer at last became a missile. 'Lend me the hammer?' asked one. 'No, no', replied the owner, 'You'll break the handle'; but hardly had he said so, when

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The Smallest Rocks in the Tropical Seas

0°55'10N

Beagle Rock

Cabral Islet

Beacon (16.8 m)

Belmonte Islet

BoobyH

(13 m)

Coutinno Rock Erebus Rook Q&

•

"4 *»€ Pillar Rock (6 m)

Cambridge Rock J

Challenger Islet

Noddy Pool

South Islet

29°20'33W

ATLANTIC OCEAN

50 100m

Figure 6.1 Map of St Paul's, Atlantic Ocean

overcome by the novelty of the scene, and the example of those around him, away went the hammer with all the force of his own right arm.1

'Shooting was out of the question', Darwin wrote, 'so we got two of the boat's crew & the work of slaughter commenced.' They collected a pile of birds and hats full of eggs.

While we were so active on shore, the men in the boat were not less so. They caught a great number of fine large fish & would have succeeded much better had not the sharks broken so many of their hooks and lines: they contrived to land three of these latter fish, & during our absence 2 large ones were caught from the ship.2

FitzRoy described the scene even more vividly:

While our party were scrambling over the rock, a determined struggle was going on in the water, between the boats' crews and sharks.

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Darwin's Other Islands

Numbers of fine fish, like the groupars (or garoupas) of the Bermuda Islands, bit eagerly at baited hooks . . . but as soon as a fish was caught, a rush of voracious sharks was made at him, and notwithstanding blows of oars and boat hooks, the ravenous monsters could not be deterred from seizing and taking away more than half the fish that were hooked.3

Amongst the fish Darwin collected at St Paul's was a Remora or sucker-fish, attached to a shark. Darwin notes that they returned with their prey triumphant, but after clambering over the rocks and brandishing his geological hammer at the birds, he was 'a good deal fatigued', and also exhausted by the 'glaring heat' reflected from the brilliantly white rocks, only 50 miles, as they were, from the Equator.

Although Darwin was on land at St Paul's Rocks for a very few hours, his scientific observations were remarkable. There were, according to Darwin, only two sorts of birds: boobies and noddies. The boobies are a species of gannet; the noddies are terns.4 He noted in his diary that 'these with a few insects were the only organized beings that inhabited this desolate spot'. He obviously made a much more detailed study of the life-forms of the island than these superficial notes imply. He expands in the Voyage of the Beagle, to what amounts to an almost complete inventory of the island's biota. Like many scientists since, he perhaps found that the inherent simplicity of an island's ecosystem aided study, and allowed relationships to emerge that in a more complex community would be more difficult to discern. Here is his summary from the Voyage of the Beagle (the edited version of his diary prepared for publication a couple of years after the voyage):

The booby lays her eggs on the bare rock: but the tern makes a very simple nest with seaweed. By the side of many of these nests a small flying fish was placed, which I suppose had been brought by the male bird for its partner.5 It was amusing to watch how quickly a large and active crab (Graspus), which inhabits the crevices of the rock, stole the fish from the side of the nest, as soon as we had disturbed the parent birds . . . Not a single plant, not even a lichen, grows on the islet; yet it is inhabited by several insects and spiders. The following list completes, I believe, the terrestrial fauna: a fly (Olfersia) living on the booby, and a tick which must have come here as a parasite; a small brown moth, belonging to a genus that feeds on feathers: a beetle (Quedius) and a woodlouse from beneath the dung; and lastly numerous spiders, which I suppose prey on these small attendants and scavengers of the waterfowl.. . The smallest rock in the tropical seas, by

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The Smallest Rocks in the Tropical Seas

giving a foundation for the growth of innumerable kinds of seaweed and compound animals, supports likewise a large number of fish . . . [including] sharks . . .6

It must be remembered that Darwin wrote this integrated account after his visit, but it is remarkable for its ecological awareness. The subject of ecology, with its concepts of ecological niches, food-chains and food-webs, lay far in the future. Yet these few lines, written in about 1838, based on his notes and recollections of six years before, indicate an awareness of the unity of the ecosystem, of food relationships and the links between the terrestrial and marine environment. It would be entirely possible to construct a food-web diagram from Darwin's observations. The account is of interest in other ways too: he is ahead of his time in mentioning aspects of the behaviour of organisms - the bringing of food for the mate, the scavenging of the crabs in the absence of adult birds. Trivial annotations in themselves, but they are the precursors of ideas that were later of great importance in Darwin's work.

But there was still more. The passage that follows comes immediately after the account of the rocky islet biota in the Voyage of the Beagle:

The often repeated description of the stately palm and other noble tropical plants, then birds, and lastly man, taking possession of the coral islets as soon as formed, in the Pacific, is probably not quite correct; I fear it destroys the poetry of this story, that feather and dirt-feeding and parasitic insects and spiders should be the first inhabitants of newly formed oceanic land.7

Darwin was profoundly influenced by geologist Charles LyelPs ideas both during and after the voyage, and Lyell uses the example of the development of the community on a coral islet. Darwin had a copy of Volume 1 of the Principles of Geology with him in the Beagle's cabin even as he scrambled ashore at St Paul's. Here we see ideas of gradual change in a plant and animal community over time akin to the notion of ecological succession developed by Frederic Clements in 1916.8 Just how much of this conceptual framework existed in Darwin's mind in February 1832, and how much he built later, is unclear, but many of the ingredients were there, and the comparative approach in the above quotation is also typical.

Darwin was using his geological hammer for other purposes than killing seabirds. He collected rock specimens at St Paul's and made intelligent observations on the rock-types he observed. Here is his summary, based on his Beagle notes but modified somewhat for publication:

The simplest, and one of the most abundant kinds [of rock] is a very compact, greenish black rock, having an angular irregular fracture,

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Darwin's Other Islands

with some points just hard enough to scratch glass and infusible. This variety passes into others of paler green tints, but with a more crystalline fracture, and translucent on their edges ... Several other varieties are chiefly characterised by containing innumerable threads of dark-green serpentine ... These rocks have an obscure concretionary structure, and are full of variously coloured angular pseudo fragments . . . of the first-described dark green rock . . . There is no distinct stratification, but parts are imperfectly laminated; and the whole abounds with innumerable veins . . .9

Typically Darwin is good on detail, and his account agrees remarkably with those of modern geologists who have studied the site. The rocks are now identified as peridotites, rich in olivine and pyroxenes, but which have been heavily mylonitized (sheared). They are regarded as being derived from the sub-oceanic mantle (i.e. the layer below the crust), perhaps some 45 km from the surface. The rocks themselves have given very high ages (835 million years), but were emplaced much more recently, during the fracturing associated with the opening of the Atlantic, perhaps 100 million years ago.10

The notion of plate tectonics (see Chapter 1) lay far in the future. So too did very accurate methods of analysing and dating rocks, but Darwin did notice that the rocks of St Paul's were highly distinctive. He introduced the description above as follows: 'It is composed of rocks, unlike any which I have met with, and which I cannot characterise by any name and must therefore describe.'11 The 'mineralogical constitution' of St Paul's rock 'is not simple', he stressed in the Voyage of the Beagle. But, he emphasized strongly, 'It is not of volcanic origin.' Only 'this little point of rock' and the Seychelles (which he did not visit), of all the remote islands that he knew were not of volcanic or coralline origin.12 Darwin did not grasp the full importance of this fact, although, as we shall see later, he went some way towards doing so.

Later in the evening of 16 February 1832, the officer of the watch reported a boat ahead; the ship hove to, and Captain FitzRoy purported to have a conversation with 'Mr Neptune' over the side of the ship, with the aid of a speaking trumpet, 'the result of which was that he would in the morning pay us a visit'. At nine o'clock, on the morning of 17th, four of Mr Neptune's constables conducted the hapless Charles Darwin into the sea-god's presence, and had his face lathered with pitch and paint, and 'scraped some of it off with a piece of roughed iron hoop'. He was then ceremonially ducked in a large bath of water. 'The whole ship was a shower bath ... of course not one person, even the Captain, got clear of being wet through.'

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The Smallest Rocks in the Tropical Seas

On the evening of 18 February he recollected:

At last I am certainly in the Southern hemisphere, & whilst enjoying the cool air of the evening I can gaze at the Southern Cross, Magellan's cloud & the great crown of the South. In August quietly wandering about Wales: in February in a different hemisphere; nothing ever in this life ought to surprise me.13

One day later, at about the same time of the evening, the Beagle hove to within sight of Fernando Noronha (Ilha Fernando de Noronha), about 350 miles (600 km) south-west of St Paul's, at 3°50'S, and 230 miles (370 km) from the 'shoulder' of Brazil. The island was 'very grand' by moonlight, although the quietness of the occasion was disturbed by Lieutenant Sulivan harpooning a large porpoise. The harpoon had been propelled with such force that it passed through the entire body! A few minutes later the 'fine animal, about five feet long' was on the deck, and in less time still 'a dozen knives were skinning him for supper'. At daybreak on the 20th, Darwin was a little disappointed that the hills were not more 'lofty'. The whole island was forested, and he spent a most delightful day 'wandering about the woods'. Fernando Noronha is larger than St Paul's, although it is pretty small, with a surface area of 10 sq. miles (about 26 sq. km), and like the Rocks, is under Brazilian sovereignty. It had been a penal colony since the eighteenth century, and FitzRoy notes euphemistically that the inhabitants are 'exiles' from Brazil, although he also noted there were 'two hundred black troops',14 but Darwin does not mention any human population at all, although he clearly liked the place and describes the vegetation and geology in considerable detail. The contrast with St Paul's could hardly be greater: 'The whole island is one forest, & this is so thickly intertwined that it requires great exertion to crawl along. The scenery was very beautiful... [with] large Magnolias tk. Laurels & trees covered with delicate flowers.'15 In The Voyage of the Beagle he wrote: 'Halfway up the mountain, some great masses of columnar rock, shaded by laurellike trees, and ornamented by others covered by fine pink flowers but without a single leaf, gave a pleasing effect to the nearer parts of the scenery.'16

There is another aspect of the natural history of this island that Darwin obviously found interesting, but of which he says little in his published references to the island. In his insect notes, he lists 'Termites and Part of their nest' (specimens 304 and 305 respectively, although both these specimens seem to have been lost).17 All in all, it was an environment that the young traveller found attractive, but although the forest was thick 'from the dryness of the climate there is no appearance of luxuriance'. The flowers, the forests, the attractive scenery 'ought to have satisfied me', he wrote, but he was looking forward to the thick tropical rain forests of the South

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Darwin's Other Islands

American mainland, of which he had been reading in Humboldt and picturing in his mind's eye for many months. He reflected:

I am sure all the grandeur of the Tropics has not yet been seen by me. We had no gaudy birds, no humming birds, no large flowers: I am glad that I have seen these islands ... All the trees either bearing some fruit or large flower is perhaps one of the most striking things that meet one whilst wandering in a wood in these glorious regions.

In contrast to the mysterious geological nature of St Paul's, Darwin noted of Fernando Noronha: 'The whole seems to be of volcanic origin', although there were no visible craters.

The most remarkable feature is a hill 1,000 feet high [c. 300 m], of which the upper 400 feet consist of a precipitous, singularly shaped pinnacle, formed of columnar phonolite, containing numerous crystals of glassy feldspar. From the highest accessible point of this hill, I could see several other conical hills, apparently of the same nature .. . Near the base of this, I observed beds of white tuff, interspersed with numerous dikes, some of amygdaloidal basalt and others of trachyte.18

Denudation, he thought, must have been on an enormous scale, to reveal the pinnacle, which had originally been injected as a fluid.

The Beagle sailed in the evening of the same day that she had arrived: landing in the surf was difficult, and FitzRoy, though he had managed to land with instruments to take a few observations, did not feel it was a suitable locale for an extended stay and did not even take on water. Winds, however, were variable and disappointing, and for next couple of days the ship drifted listlessly and by 22 February was still within sight of the island.

Thus, just before the end of February 1832, Charles Darwin had been at sea for less than two months. He had landed on three very different islands and groups of islands. He had seen others, and speculated about the disappearance of yet more. He had collected numerous rocks and insects, and observed plants, fish and marine invertebrates - many of these last he had collected from the deep ocean using a ship-made net. He was beginning to integrate his observations, comparing one locality with another. He had noted the geological complexity of some islands, and the biological simplicity of others. There are fragmentary observations that suggest he was thinking about the behaviour of animals and the relationships between organisms; that he was looking at processes - processes that were operating now and those of the more remote past. He was speculating, if only in the privacy of his notebooks, about how island environments functioned.

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The Smallest Rocks in the Tropical Seas

He found sleep in the hammock difficult; the heat was sometimes oppressive; the Bay of Biscay had been dreadful. But he was enjoying himself. He was comparing his reading of Humboldt and Lyell with the reality he saw about him. He was learning techniques: the practicalities of collecting marine life and rock specimens and notetaking under difficult conditions. He was also developing conceptual techniques: those of comparison; of speculation on origins and processes; of reconstruction of the past; of analysing relationships. He had cut his teeth, so to speak, on the simple biota of St Paul's and the uncluttered geology of St Jago. He was fortunate that it was so, before he moved on to the complexities of Tierra del Fuego, Tahiti, New Zealand and Australia, not to mention the rain forests of South America, just over a week ahead. He wrote, at the end of his diary entry for Fernando Noronha: 'I am glad that I have seen these islands. I shall enjoy the greater wonders all the more from having a guess what to look for.'

Notes

1. FitzRoy, Narrative, Vol. 2, p. 56.

2. Diary, 16 February 1832, p. 36.

3. FitzRoy, Narrative, loc. cit.

4. The gannets were probably brown boobies Sula leucogaster, shown on modern distribution maps to breed on St Paul's Rocks. Two rather similar species of noddy tern seem to breed on St Paul's, the common or brown noddy (Anous stolidus) and the white-capped noddy (A. minutus): A. Edwards and R. Lubbock, 'The Ecology of Saint Paul's Rocks (Equatorial Atlantic)', journal of the Zoological Society of London, 200 (1983): 51-69; G. S. Tuck, Guide to the Seabirds of Britain and the World (London: Collins, 1978), pp. 68 and 120-1.

5. In Zoology of the Voyage, Part 3, Darwin adds 'to feed on during the labour of incubation', p. 145.

6. C. R. Darwin, The Voyage of the Beagle, Chapter 1, p. 10. (Hereafter Voyage.) The insects Darwin found on St Paul's Rocks are discussed by K. G. V. Smith in 'Darwin's Insects: Charles Darwin's Entomological Notes', Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), 14.1 (1987). The fly specimens (two females) still exist and have been identified as Olfersia aenescens. The beetle specimen has been lost, but may have been the widespread Quedius mesomel-inus or Philonthus cliens; the latter has been found subsequently at St Paul's. The moth was probably Erechthias darwini, which, it has been suggested, feeds on the dry seaweed of nesting material rather than feathers. An expedition to St Paul's in 1979 found a very similar range of organisms to Darwin 150 years earlier. See Edwards and Lubbock, 'The Ecology of St Paul's Rocks', note 4.

7. Voyage, Chapter 1, p. 10.

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Darwin's Other Islands

8. F. Clements, Ecological Succession (Washington, DC: Carnegie Institute, 1916).

9. Geology of the Voyage, Part 2, p. 32.

10. W. G. Melson, S. R. Hart and G. Thompson, 'St. Paul's Rocks, Equatorial Atlantic: Petrogenesis, Radiometric Ages, and Implications on Sea-floor Spreading', Geological Society of America, Memoir 132 (1972): 241-72.

11. Geology of the Voyage, Part 2, p. 32.

12. Voyage, Chapter 1, p. 8.

13. Diary, p. 37.

14. FitzRoy, Narrative, p. 59.

15. Diary, p. 37.

16. Voyage, Chapter 1, p. 11.

17. Smith, 'Darwin's Insects', p. 47.

18. Geology of the Voyage, Part 2, pp. 23—4. Amygdaloidal basalt = basalt with 'amygdales' or bubble-like structures preserved in the rock. Trachyte = an acid (silica-containing) igneous rock.

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7. Brief Interlude in the Abrolhos

Before we consider Darwin's adventures on islands very different from the tropical Atlantic volcanic islands and the strange islet of St Paul's, we must briefly consider his short visit to the Abrolhos, an archipelago of low, small, coral islets, about 20 miles (32 km) off the Brazilian coast (about 18°S, 38°W). They are set in a large area of shallow sea, and "constituted (and still constitute) a hazard to navigation, and so Captain FitzRoy was diligent in surveying them. A little surprisingly, Darwin does not report on them in great detail. Perhaps this was because the visit followed a period of over two weeks (28 February-18 March 1832) in the Brazilian coastal town of Bahia (Salvador), where he had experienced Latin American culture with a vengeance (including a carnival), wandered through the luxuriant tropical forests and explored the narrow, bustling alleys of the old town. As the ship sailed south, in the last week of March, Darwin seems to have been quietly busy with sorting his collections, as there was often 'little to interest one' for long periods. The sight of a waterspout enlivened one day, and a successful attempt at shark-fishing another. A flying fish landed on deck with a crab in its mouth. Darwin also reported seeing 'Mother Carey's chickens', or storm petrels,1 birds that do from time to time follow ships. At night he admired the southern hemisphere constellations - the Southern Cross, the Magellanic Clouds, the Southern Crown - recalling Humboldt's kindred feeling of enthusiasm when he saw the southern stars for the first time.

On 27 and 28 March things became more lively. At intervals over the preceding few days the lead had been let down, but at last some real hydro-graphic survey work was to commence. Darwin found this of great interest:

We have laid down the soundings on parts of the Abrolhos, which were left undone by Baron Roussin. The depth varied to an unusual

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Darwin's Other Islands

extent: at one cast of the lead there would be 20 fathoms & in a few minutes only 5. The scene being quite new to me, was very interesting. Everything in such a state of preparation; sails all shortened & snug: anchor ready to let fall: no voice or noise to be heard, excepting the alternate cry of the leadsman in the chains.2

Here are Darwin's biological notes on the Abrolhos:

Gen. Obs

The Abrolhos Islands seen from a distance are of a bright green colour. The vegetation consists of succulent plants (b) & graminia, interspersed with a few bushes & cactuses. Birds of the family Icthyalmes[?]/ Tothpalmes [?] are exceedingly abundant, such as gannets, Tropic birds & Frigates. The number of Saurians is perhaps the most surprising thing, almost every stone has its accompanying lizard. Spiders are in great numbers & likewise rats.3

An economical account, but one that adequately describes the organisms found in relation to their environment. What is particularly interesting is the annotation to which the '(b)' refers, on the facing page (and therefore perhaps added later): '(b) Small as my collection is from the Abrolhos, I think it contains nearly every species then flowering.'

Besides confirming the thoroughness with which Darwin went about his collection on islands, it also suggests that he was aware of the poverty of island biota - the very limited number of species of plants and animals on small islands: a theme that recurs in Darwin's writings on islands from the Beagle voyage. Darwin's diary adds a few details:

The Abrolhos consist of 5 small rocky islands, which although uninhabited are not infrequently visited by fishermen. Two parties landed directly after breakfast. I commenced an attack on the rocks & insects & plants: the rest a more bloody one on the birds. Of these an enormous number were slaughtered by sticks, stones & guns; indeed there were killed more than the boats could hold ... Whilst pulling back to the ship we saw a turtle; it immediately went down.4

He also compared the terrestrial biota with that of the adjacent sea, as he often did on his island visits:

The bottom of the nearby sea is thickly covered by enormous brain stones [brain corals]; many of these could not be less than a yard in diameter. - Without being in the immediate presence of Limestone there how extraordinary (c) these polypi should be able to obtain such an enormous stock of Carb of Lime.5

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Brief Interlude in the Abrolhos

Again Darwin included later thoughts on a facing page:

(c) This is an instance (perhaps not a strongly marked one) where there is a great formation of Corals: & therefore of lime obtained without the [illeg] of Volcanic action. The movements of the ocean would however I think be sufficient for a ridge like this.

It is of interest that Darwin, at this early stage was noting a possible association between volcanic activity and coral island development (although in this case he seemed to be wondering about the source of the calcium carbonate in the coral structures more than some geological or geomorphologi-cal association).

Just after midnight on 1 April, as the ship moved with a 'fine rattling breeze' from the Abrolhos archipelago towards Rio, 'AH hands [were] employed in making April fools.' The carpenters in the watch below decks 'were called up in their shirts' to repair a leak, the quartermasters were yelled at 'that a mast was sprung', the midshipmen were summoned to reef the top-sails.

The hook was much too easily baited for me not to be caught: Sulivan cried out 'Darwin, did you ever see a Grampus: Bear a hand then.' I therefore rushed out in a transport of Enthusiasm, & was received by a roar of laughter from the whole watch.6

Some of Darwin's notes on the Abrolhos are covered in inkstains. Could they have been the result of his excitedly leaping up to see the 'Grampus', or the flying fish, or Mother Carey's chickens, or a shark, or a porpoise, or a turtle, or some other creature? Probably not, but this light-hearted incident seems to typify the cheerful mood that seems to have come over the whole ship now tropical waters had been entered and serious hydrographic survey commenced. Darwin had every reason to be positive about things. He had completed over three months aboard and, despite bouts of seasickness, was feeling that he was becoming a sailor, 'knowing ropes & how to put the ship about &c'.7 He had, besides examining the South American rain forest near Bahia, visited four island groups, and glimpsed more. He had had his feet on volcanic islands and coral islets and was able to compare them; he had noted the variation in depth around coral islands, and speculated about a relationship between coral growth and volcanic rocks (he had seen both at St Jago). He worked out procedures for collecting rocks, plants, insects, birds and other organisms in the short time of an island landing and recording his observations succinctly. He had noted the dialogue that existed between the biophysical environment and the human occupation of some islands (the note that the Abrolhos were occasionally

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Darwin's Other Islands

visited by fishermen implies a recognition that they might have had some impact on the biota). He was honing his skills in describing the plants and animals he encountered. (Henslow later congratulated him on some of his descriptions and specimens.) The world was, almost literally, at Darwin's feet.

Notes

1. Mother Carey's chickens = storm petrels = a small seabird, genus Oceanites.

2. Diary, p. 46.

3. Zoological Diary, DAR 30.1 (Abrolhos notes).

4. Diary, p. 46.

5. Zoological Diary, DAR 30.1 (Abrolhos notes).

6. Diary, p. 47.

7. Letter to Caroline Darwin 2-6 April 1832, DAR 223; Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 219.

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8. The End of the Earth: Tierra del Fuego

We saw earlier (Introduction, pp. 2-3) that Tierra del Fuego has claims to be the trigger for the 1831-36 voyage of HMS Beagle, and also a factor in Charles Robert Darwin's presence on it. Whether this was in the forefront of Darwin's mind as he approached the island - or rather group of islands - at the 'end of the earth' is doubtful. But the return of the little group of Fuegians, and their missionary helper Mr Matthews, was, however, of major concern to FitzRoy in mid-December 1832, while the Beagle was working her way south. Conditions were not good and progress was slow. Extracts from Darwin's diary give an idea of the frustrations the crew endured:

Sunday 9th... high irregular swell, there must have been bad weather

to the South . . .

11th ... my stomach plainly declared it was of terrestrial origin & did

not like the sea . . .

12th ... the heaviest squall I have ever seen ... the air has the bracing

feel of an English winter day . . .

13th ... we are ... some leagues further North than we were two days

ago . . .

14th Light variable wind, generally against us.

15th Very foggy; every thing conspires to make our passage long.

Nevertheless, they made the coast of Tierra del Fuego, just south of Cape St Sebastian, on 16 December 1832. The native inhabitants lit fires, which could be seen from the Beagle, just as they had done on the arrival of Magellan, 300 years previously: hence the name Tierra del Fuego - Land of Fire. Darwin saw Fuegians in their native land for the first time, and watched them through a telescope. He also observed the horizontal strata

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Darwin's Other Islands

which in most places formed the cliffs. He commented also on the 'many sloping vallies' [sic], with grassland and scattered thickets. Far to the south could be seen mountains 'the summits of which glittered with snow'. As always, he was observing all aspects of the environment carefully. They ran 50 miles south, and anchored just south of St Paul's Head. For the next two-and-a-half months the Beagle explored the many islets and inlets around Tierra del Fuego, sometimes by ship's boats. Darwin landed, explored and collected where he could. Space precludes a detailed account of every incident. On 17 December the ship passed through the Strait of Le Maire, between 'rugged inhospitable Staten Island' (now called Isla de los Estados) and Cape San Diego, and into Good Success Harbour, on the extreme south-east of the main island of Tierra del Fuego, where Captain Cook had anchored the Endeavour and Joseph Banks had explored in January 1768. Darwin began some serious exploration. On 19 December he made a determined attempt to 'penetrate into the country'. He wrote in his diary:

There is no level ground & all the hills are so quickly clothed with wood as to be quite impassable. The trees are so close together & send their branches so low down, that I found extreme difficulty ... In every direction were irregular masses of rock and uptorn trees. The whole wood was composed of antarctic Beech [Notbofagus, and the rarer] . . . winter's bark [Drimys winteri].

The description remains entirely accurate; over much of southern Tierra del Fuego the three species of Nothofagus and Drimys winteri dominate the community; the thick, tangled vegetation, with its downward swooping branches and abundance of dead trunks, is indeed almost impenetrable. Darwin noted the 'number of decaying &c fallen trees', and also that 'their curved and bent trunks are covered with lichens, as their trunks are with moss'. He used the words 'monstrous' and 'sombre', and anyone who has explored these forests will accept these adjectives, and I can confirm that some eight or ten species of lichens can be found in a few minutes.

Many difficult days followed. The 22nd marked good progress as the ship passed the Barnveldt Islands and Cape Deceit, and by 3.00 p.m. she had rounded 'old-weather-beaten Cape Horn'. The luck did not hold, and on Christmas Eve there were 'great black clouds rolling across the sky' with 'squalls of rain and hail... [of] great violence'. The ship eased her way into Wigwam Cove, near Cape Spencer on Hermit Island (Isla Hermite). All duties were suspended on Christmas Day and the crew indulged in games and sports, probably in a fairly drunken manner. Firearms were discharged, and there was a good deal of noise. Darwin wondered what the nearby Fuegians would make of the festivities. He spent the morning with

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The End of the Earth: Tierra del Fuego

Lieutenants Sulivan and Hammond climbing the nearby mountain - Kater's Peak. Darwin gave the estimated height of the peak as 1,700 feet; modern maps and charts show he was entirely accurate.

More bad weather followed. Darwin's writings are full of phrases such as 'tremendous gale', 'bleak and raw', 'unpleasant', 'snow falls' and 'continual succession of rain or hail storms'. Despite the bad weather, during the last few days of the year, Captain FitzRoy, Darwin and one or two others set off by boat to explore the islands 'at the back of (i.e. to the north and east of) Hermit Isle. There was a good deal of evidence of Fuegian habitation, but they do not seem to have met many natives.

On New Year's Day 1833 the weather 'did not look quite so bad', and the Beagle put to sea. Probably she should not have done so, for there followed two weeks of the vilest weather that FitzRoy had ever experienced. He was trying to steer the ship to the island, less than 100 nautical miles to the north-west, that Captain Cook had called York Minster, the home of one of the Fuegians. Once they got close, but were blown back. The storm on 13 January was particularly vicious, and a good deal of water was taken by the Beagle, and Darwin's papers and plant specimens were damaged by seawater. The decks were frequently awash and one of the ship's whale-boats was lost. Sometimes in those frightening days those aboard the Beagle did not know where they were. The ship was blown close to the Ildefonso Islands and the Diego Ramirez Rocks, far to the south. On about 6 January they drifted down to 57°23'S. This is well to the south of any South American land, and is indeed within a few hundred nautical miles of some of the islands off the Antarctic Peninsula! Darwin was almost continuously seasick. After the worst of the storm (on the 4th) the ship limped into calmer waters to the north in the lee of False Cape Horn, on the Hardy Peninsula. FitzRoy gave up the plan to return York Minster to the island after which he was named, and decided to settle him with Missionary Matthews and the other Fuegians. York Minster apparently agreed to this. The next day or two were spent evaluating land around the Goeree (or Goree) Channel, between Lennox Island and the much larger Navarin (Navarino) Island, for a possible site for a missionary settlement. Flat land suitable for small-scale cultivation was sought, but all the sites examined were too swampy or stony.

FitzRoy therefore resolved to establish the missionary community on the northwestern corner of Navarin Island, close to the area from which Jemmy Button originally came, on Ponsonby Sound. On the morning of 19 January, three whaleboats and the yawl set off for the entrance to the Beagle Channel, named by FitzRoy during the previous voyage. There were 28 persons in the group - FitzRoy, Darwin, Matthews, the Fuegians and a good number of the

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0 20 40 60 80 100 km

0 10 20 30 40 60 mite

ATLANTIC OCEAN

Cape San Diego

Pictonls Good Success

1 Bay

Staten Is (Isla de los Eslados)

PACIFIC OCEAN

False Cape Horn

Herrnitls

Figure 8.1 Map of Tierra del Fuego, showing some of the places mentioned in the text

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The End of the Earth: Tierra del Fuego

Beagle's crew. Darwin was scathing about the 'outfit' the missionary society had provided: beaver hats, wine glasses, soup tureens, tea-trays and a mahogany dressing-case. 'Culpable folly and negligence' he called the spending of money on such inappropriate items: 'The means absolutely wasted on such things would have purchased an immense stock of really useful articles.' Missionary Matthews he described as being 'of quiet resolution', 'eccentric', and lacking in the energy necessary for the enterprise ahead. Nevertheless Darwin enjoyed the journey in the open boat, the narrow channel winding slightly and offering a succession of little coves; the steep sides were usually covered in forest lower down, but above an abrupt tree-line the mountains were rocky and jagged. The country was much more densely inhabited than that previously seen; the people were initially friendly, but became 'troublesome', wanting items, particularly knives, and taking them when they were not given. Stones were thrown and Darwin was afraid it might have come to a skirmish. Firing pistols close to the intruders and waving a cutlass failed to scare them off: the Fuegians just laughed. Jemmy Button had excellent eyesight, and his eye for country was most useful.

Late in the evening of 22 January the flotilla of little boats arrived at the junction of the Beagle Channel and Ponsonby Sound; as they camped overnight, they were joined round their fire by Jemmy's relatives. As they turned south into the Sound, the Beagle's boats were surrounded by a group of a

Figure 8.2 The Beagle Channel, looking south (the snowcapped mountains are on Navarin Island)

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dozen canoes, each containing four or five Fuegians. Jemmy had forgotten his own language and spoke to his compatriots in an almost unintelligible mixture of broken English and Spanish. The party arrived at Woollya or 'Jemmy's Cove' on 24 January, and Jemmy's relatives and friends began to pour in - 120 of them. This place was considered appropriate for the missionary establishment, having suitable flat land on which it was hoped European vegetables would grow. Darwin's Journal continues: 'Everything went on very peacibly [sic] for some days. Three houses were built, & two gardens dug &c planted; & what was of more consequence the Fuegians were quiet and peacible.'1

After a while though things deteriorated:

They asked for everything & stole what they could . . . On 27th . . . suddenly every woman & child & nearly all the men removed themselves & we were watched from a neighbouring hill. We were all uneasy about this, as neither Jemmy or York understood what it meant... it did not promise peace in the establishment.2

There was a nasty quarrel between one of the camp's sentries and an old Fuegian man. When told to keep his distance the elderly man spat at the seaman and made gestures that implied he would kill, cut up and eat the intruders. It did not bode well.

Things settled down, however, and Captain FitzRoy sent two of the four boats back to the Beagle. The others, with FitzRoy and Darwin in them, set out to explore the western reaches of the Channel. Surprisingly, 28 January was very hot, and some of the party got sunburned! On the morning of the 29th they arrived at the point where the Beagle Channel divides, and took the northern arm. The scenery became very grand: the mountains nearby were snowcapped, and meltwater tumbled through the woods into the channel in great cascades. Darwin's observations are as detailed as ever. He described the mountains along the northern shore of the channel as terminating 'in very sharp broken peaks', many ascending 'in one abrupt rise from the water's edge to 14 or 1500 feet'. The slopes were covered in dense forest. Darwin also describes the remarkably straight and abrupt transition from the forest to the rocky, snowy land above: a situation that impresses the modern observer.

'Magnificent glaciers extended from the mountains to the water's edge', Darwin continued, impressed by the 'beryl blue' of the glaciers. On one occasion, however, while the group was admiring the face of a glacier, 'a large mass fell roaring into the water', setting up a great wave that nearly smashed or carried away the boats; one seaman was knocked off his feet. Darwin was amongst those who ran to secure the boats before they were

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carried away, and perhaps partly in commemoration of the event, FitzRoy named a nearby mountain 'Mt Darwin'. The party pressed on, however, threading their way through the scattering of islets that mark the western approaches to the Channel. '[T]his part was entirely unknown', said Darwin, 'it rained continually & the weather well became its bad character . . . The country was desolate, barren & unfrequented.' The most westerly point of the expedition was a brief landing on the eastern end of Stuart Island (Isla Stewart); they were at this point 150 miles from the ship.

The pair of boats returned via the southern arm of the Beagle Channel (i.e. to the south of the Isla Gordon). Although the weather was poor, the voyage was uneventful. On about 4 February they met a large party of Fuegians, and with 'old buttons & bits of red cloth', Darwin recounts, 'we purchased an excellent supper of fish'. On 6 February they arrived back at Woollya, the missionary settlement, to find the place in chaos.

From the moment of our leaving, a regular system of plunder commenced, in which not only Matthews, but also York and Jemmy suffered. Matthews had nearly lost all his things; &c the constant watching was most harassing & entirely prevented him from doing anything to obtain food &c. Night & day large parties of the natives surrounded his house. They tryed [sic] to tire him out by making incess. noises. One day, having requested an old man to leave the place, he returned with a large stone in his hand. Another day, a whole party advanced with stones & stakes ... I think we returned just in time to save his life.3

Jemmy's own brother was party to some of this, and there were feuds amongst the Fuegians. Jemmy said, 'They were all very bad men.' Darwin concluded that the excursion of the three Fuegians to England would 'not be conducive to their happiness'. The Captain advised Matthews to return to the ship, and recovering what he could of his belongings he did so. In due course he joined the missionary community in New Zealand. The experiment was at an end. FitzRoy later reluctantly wrote that the whole undertaking had been on far too small a scale.4

The group then took the route to the south of Navarin Island and arrived back at the ship on 7 February after 20 days' absence. Darwin felt, however, that the transect along the Channel had 'afforded an excellent geological section of the country'.

For the remaining weeks of February the Beagle continued with the survey around the southern islets and headlands and bays of Tierra del Fuego. Darwin made a couple of forays inland on some of the islands before they set sail, on 26 February 1833, for the Falkland Islands. Captain

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FitzRoy, after the discreet interval of a few days, returned to Woollya, where Fuegia Basket, York and Jemmy had been deposited, and found things 'peacible'; some of the vegetables in the gardens were sprouting. Darwin hoped that the little settlement might eventually be a 'means of producing great good' and effecting a change in the 'habits of the truly savage inhabitants'. FitzRoy himself was also mildly optimistic, but their hopes were ultimately misplaced.

Eleven months later, on 23 January 1834, after visits to the Falklands (see Chapter 9), and Patagonia, the Beagle was back in the waters around Tierra del Fuego, entering the Straits of Magellan, between the mainland of South America and the island. The ship seems for the most part to have kept to the northern shore, although she touched at Elizabeth Island (Isla Isabel), in the midst of the strait, and from time to time the crew of the Beagle noticed smoke from fires, as of old, from the distant southern shore. Once or twice they saw groups of canoes. On 7 February Darwin noted in his diary: 'The day has been splendidly clear': and on the 11th: 'It is an extraordinary contrast to last season.' They met a sealer who had been on the southern islands and had had weeks of fine weather; at exactly the same time that the previous year the Beagle (and the sealer) had endured 'a gale of a month'! Mount Sarimento could be seen covered with snow away to the south; the weather was sometimes so clear that it dominated the scene although 90 miles distant. The better weather meant that the officers of the Beagle could continue with the surveying work, and this seems to have gone very well, although at one time (13 February) in the 'first' (i.e. northern) narrows of the Strait: 'There are many & dangerous banks: on one of which we ran a very good chance of sticking; to escape it was necessary to get in three Fathom water.'5

For the next week the ship's crew surveyed the bleak, rather featureless, eastern coast of Tierra del Fuego; they landed only once, at the mouth of 'what was formerly supposed to be S Sebastian's Channel, it now turns out to be a large wild bay'. Darwin noted that the landscape was similar to that of Patagonia, open and almost park-like, compared to further south in Tierra del Fuego. An account of animal behaviour that he witnessed is worth repeating in full; it shows his excellent eye (and ear) for detail.

In St Sebastian bay, there was a curious spectacle of very many Spermaceti whales, some of which were jumping straight up out of the water; every part of the body was visible excepting the fin of the tail. As they fell sideways into the water, the noise was as loud as a distant great gun.6

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Shortly after this the weather deteriorated, to 'her old winning way', as Darwin put it. A tidal rip and a bubbling sea left them far too close to Staten Island - 'desolate... peaked, castellated & most rugged' it appeared to him. The ship came to anchor at Wollaston Island, and several days of further survey followed. On 25 February Darwin 'walked or rather crawled to the tops of some of the hills'; he noted that the rock was not slate, as it had been in many places elsewhere in Tierra del Fuego, and thus there were few trees. He again came into contact with the local people, and closely observed their way of life and habits, particularly the way they made canoes, and that their dialect differed considerably from other groups he had met before.

In early March they made their way back to Woollya. The sight was not particularly encouraging. The houses lay empty; the gardens were in poor state. York Minster had left some months before to return to the land of his own people, but had denuded Jemmy of most of his belongings. Jemmy himself looked pitiful: when left a year before he had been plump and well-fed, but he now had lost weight and was pale and unkempt. His hair was long and straggly, and he wore little but a blanket. There had been raids by other tribes, and the Woollya folk had been compelled to take refuge on the smaller islands. Despite all this, Jemmy pronounced himself in good health. Although he refused to return to England, he still spoke good English and behaved well when dining with the Captain, remembering his old friends with affection. He gave FitzRoy a couple of otterskins and Darwin some spearheads. He was loaded down with gifts of clothing and other items. Darwin wrote:

Every soul on board was sorry to shake hands with poor Jemmy for the last time, as we were glad to have seen him. I hope & have little doubt he will be as happy as if he had never left his country; which is much more than I formerly thought. He lighted a farewell signal fire as the ship stood out of Ponsonby Sound, on her course to East Falkland Island.7

Darwin was over-optimistic here: his initial assessment that the trip to England would not contribute to Jemmy's long-term contentment was probably nearer the mark. A number of explorers, traders, missionaries and others made occasional contact with Jemmy (and also with York Minster and Fuegia Basket) in the decades that followed, being surprised to encounter someone 'at the end of the earth' who spoke English and knew about London and Plymouth. At one stage Jemmy was taken to the Falkland Islands by the South American Missionary Society, but this was not a success. Even the farewell to Woollya and Jemmy was not Darwin's last glimpse of Tierra del Fuego, for, after the unhappy second visit to the Falklands (see

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Chapter 9), the Beagle re-entered the Magellan Strait on 21 May; the ship surveyed her way through, pausing once or twice to take on water and firewood. It was midwinter, and in the relatively high latitudes the days were short for active work. It snowed and they again admired the magnificent snow-covered height of Mount Sarimento and saw glaciers reaching the sea, sometimes like frozen Niagaras. Darwin wrote of 'jagged points, cones of snow, blue glaciers, strong outlines marked on a lurid sky'. Again the Fuegians 'plagued' them; they seem to have been for the most part well-meaning, but with their propensity to steal almost anything the Captain was taking no chances and ordered that they be driven away. Once a 'great gun' from the Beagle was fired, but the natives remained defiant, merely throwing stones at the ship.

Despite these difficulties, and on one occasion coming dangerously close to the rocks in a narrow channel, the Beagle, with all sails set, made the open waters of the Pacific on the morning of 10 June, through the 'lately discovered' channel, traversed by very few ships. Let Darwin's diary give the final impressions of the Magellan Strait and islands of the Tierra del Fuego Archipelago:

The Western coast generally consists of low, rounded, quite barren hills of Granite. Sir J. Newborough called one part of it South Desolation [now Isla Desolacion], 'because it is so desolate land to behold'; well indeed he might say so. Outside the main islands are numberless rocks & breakers, on which the long swell of the open Pacific incessantly rages. We passed out between the 'East & West Furies'; a little further to the North, the Captain from a number of breakers called the sea the 'Milky Way'. The sight of such a coast is enough to make a landsman dream for a week about death, peril &C shipwreck.8

Darwin spent a total of several months in and around Tierra del Fuego, crossing and recrossing some of the most savage seas in the world, threading through a previously largely uncharted maze of islets and channels, several times coming close to mishap. He had, with the crew of the Beagle endured storm and tempest, nearly been swamped by a wave caused by an avalanche, been harassed by Fuegians, climbed mountains probably never before ascended by Europeans, thrashed his way through scrub and forest. If we add up all the time, on land and sea in the general area of the Fuegian archipelago, it was longer than that spent on any other group of islands, although Darwin probably spent more time on land, or on the Beagle anchored close to land, in the Falklands. What had he got out of it all? First, geology. Darwin acknowledged at one stage that his notes on the

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geology of Tierra del Fuego were 'copious';9 indeed they were; he was enjoying himself. Writing to Professor John Henslow, his 'President & Master', in March 1834, having just left the 'Island of Fires' he gave a very brief summary of some of his findings and continued: T am quite charmed with Geology but like the wise animal between the two bundles of hay, I do not know which to like the best, the old crystalline group of rocks or the softer & fossiliferous beds.'10 Here he is at the detailed level, first on the 'softer and fossiliferous' sedimentary rocks, obviously examined intensively when he landed on San Sebastian's Bay. The remarks are based upon his 'copious notes', but polished up for publication:

[T]he eastern coast of Tierra del Fuego . . . probably belongs to the great Patagonian Tertiary formation . . . The cliffs in Sebastian's Bay are 200 feet in height, are composed of fine sandstones often in curvilinear layers, including hard concretions of calcareous sandstone, and layers of gravel. In these beds there are fragments of wood, legs of crabs, barnacles encrusted with corallines still partially retaining their colour, imperfect fragments of Pholas distinct from any known species, and of a Venus . . . Leaves of trees are numerous between the laminae of muddy sandstone . . .n

A modern geological map shows that this area is indeed underlain by Tertiary rocks, with some superficial glacial material.

Here he is with 'the old crystalline group' of igneous and metamorphic rocks of the southern tip:

The southern part of Wollaston Island and the whole of Hermit and Horn Islands, seem formed of cones of greenstone ... In crossing Hardy Peninsula, the slate, still retaining traces of its usual cleavage, passes into columnar feldspathic rocks, which are succeeded by an irregular tract of trappean and basaltic rocks, containing glassy feldspar and much iron pyrites; there is, also, some harsh red claystone porphyry, and an almost true trachyte with needles of hornblende.12

Darwin always gives first-rate detail, whether he is describing the petrology, the mineralogy or the palaeontology (fossils) of rocks.

Although his excursions and landings in Tierra del Fuego were piecemeal and fragmentary, Darwin was able to integrate his observations from a mountain climb here and a landing at an isolated cove there into a fairly coherent account of the geology of the island and to put it into the context of the structure of the whole continent.13 Here is just one extract that shows his capacity to draw a 'big picture': it is from the 'brief sketch' in Geology of the Voyage (Part 3), but is based on his notes:

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The East coast from the St of Magellan ... to St Polycarp's Bay, is formed of horizontal tertiary strata, bounded some way towards the interior by a mountainous band of clay slate. This great clay-slate formation extends from St Le Mairie [sic] westward for 140 miles, along both sides of the Beagle channel to near its bifurcation. South of this channel it forms all of Navarin Island, and the eastern half of Hoste Island and of Hardy peninsula; north of the Beagle channel it extends in a north-west line on both sides of Admiralty Sound.14

Darwin repeatedly made the statement that while the north-east of the main island of Tierra del Fuego had geological links with Patagonia, the southern portion, in the trend of the mountains, the types of the metamor-phic rocks found and the arrangement of the cleavage planes within them, was effectively a continuation of the Cordilleras. There was a geological continuity from the eastern tip of jagged, barren Staten Island (Isla de los Estados), across southern Tierra del Fuego, through to the main mass of the Andean system. Interestingly, modern tectonic maps clearly show the boundary between the South American tectonic plate, and the smaller Scotia plate running east-west across the island of Tierra del Fuego, just north of Staten Island. Darwin would have been interested to know, as he wrestled with uniformitarian and catastrophist views of the world, that movement along this plate boundary is estimated at 5 cm per year.15

Darwin was also extremely active in the main fields of natural history. He collected plants, he took particular note of the structure of the forests, with their thick undergrowth; he liked the Nothofagus (Antarctic/southern beech) forests. He was extremely active in collecting insects (particularly beetles), looking under stones, under the bark of trees and amongst rotting wood in the forests. He collected shells along the strandline; he found tiny insects and collembora amongst the rock in the alpine zone of some of the mountains. He acquired about half a dozen species of fish: an eel from amongst the holdfasts of kelp, three specimens of Apochiton taeniatus in the mouth of a freshwater stream on Goree Sound (always something of an experimentalist, he put them into salt water, where they immediately died). Mesites alpinus he found in a mountain lake on Hardy Peninsula. I will return to Darwin's remarks on animal behaviour shortly, but here I give extracts from his notes on Myxine australis, caught by hook amongst kelp at Goree Sound and other parts of Tierra del Fuego:

... very vivacious, and retained its life for a long time; that it had great powers of twisting itself, and could swim tail first. When irritated it struck any object with its teeth; and by protruding them, in its manner,

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much resembled an adder striking with its fangs. It vomited up a Sipunculus when caught ... [I] observed a milky fluid transuding through the row of lateral pores.16

The habitat and food of the creature are noted - it is put in its ecological setting. There is an element of comparison; there is evidence of some experimentation; the locomotion of the organism is described. Typical Darwin. Here is another example of his appreciation of networks of relationships, this time from the Nothofagus forest ecosystem. This extract, partly based on his contemporary observations, was reworked for the Voyage of the Beagle.

There is one vegetable production deserving notice from its importance as an article of food to the Fuegians. It is a globular, bright-yellow fungus, which grows in vast numbers on the beech-trees. When young it is elastic and turgid, with a smooth surface; but when mature, it shrinks, becomes tougher, and has its entire surface deeply pitted or honey-combed. This fungus belongs to a new and curious genus; I found a second species on another species of beech in Chile; and Dr Hooker informs me, that just lately a third species has been discovered in Van Diemen's Land. How singular is this relationship between parasitical fungi and the trees on which they grow, in distant parts of the world! In Tierra del Fuego the fungus in its tough and mature state is collected in large quantities by the women and children, and is eaten uncooked. It has a mucilaginous, slightly sweet taste, with a faint smell like that of a mushroom. With the exception of a few berries, chiefly of a dwarf arbutus, the natives eat no vegetable food besides the fungus.17

There is more. The fungus had other species dependent on it. Darwin describes how he found large numbers of a small carabid beetle (later identified as Abropus splendidus) 'flying about sea coast in the evening. These insects live amongst the soft yellow balls which are excrescencies [sic]; or rather fungi growing on the Fagus antarcticus, and which are eaten by the Fuegians.'18

Darwin has some appreciation of the whole complex: the Nothofagus trees, the fungus, the insect, the Fuegians. He compares his own observations on geographical distribution with those of others. Today the southern hemisphere distribution of Nothofagus and of fungi dependent upon it, is seen as evidence for the existence of the former southern continent of Gondwana, and its break-up. Darwin knew nothing about plate tectonics, but he appreciated that these southern distributions were significant.

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Figure 8.3 'Darwin's fungus' (Cyttaria darwinii), growing on Notbofagus trunk, Tierra del Fuego

Similar relationships can be illustrated from Darwin's notes and publications on the dozens of birds, mammals and invertebrates that he saw in the 'Land of Fires' at the end of the earth.

We can also trace the development of Darwin's interest in animal behaviour from his visit to the Cape Verde Islands onwards. During his journeyings in South America, as well as collecting bird and mammal specimens (usually it was his servant Covington that shot, skinned and prepared the specimens)19 he was at pains to study their behaviour. His entries in his Zoological Diary, made at the time,20 include many observations on the nesting habits, feeding and flight or locomotion of the creatures he collected. In his letter to his cousin W.D. Fox, in reply to a question in a letter on what he had been doing 'in Ornithology', after saying he had collected 70 species of birds and nineteen mammals, he answered: 'I have watched the manners of the whole set.'21 His detailed notes on the display of the whales (see p. 66) provide one example. Here are some musings from his diary, written during a period exploring the small islands and bays 'at the back of Hermit's [Island]' just after Christmas 1832:

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The sea here is tenanted by many curious birds, amongst which the Steamer is remarkable; this [is] a large sort of goose, which is quite unable to fly, but uses its wings to flapper along the water; from this beating it takes its name.22 Here also are many Penguins,23 which in their habits are like fish, so much time do they spend under water, & when on the surface they show little of their bodies excepting their head; their wings are merely covered with short feathers. So that there are three sorts of birds which use their wings for more purposes than flying; the Steamer as paddles, the penguin as fins, & the Ostrich24 spreads its plumes like sails to the breeze.25

The 'ostriches' (rheas) Darwin had seen in Patagonia, of course, not Tierra del Fuego, but he could never stop comparing one thing with another. At first sight, these few lines seem to be just a few comments about weird creatures from out-of-the-way places. But in fact Darwin, with his threefold comparison, is showing the relationships amongst the organisms' forms, environments and to some extent behaviour. There is no claim that Darwin was already an evolutionist by Christmas 1833, but he was already making important comparisons and closely linking environment, form and way of life. The memory seems to have stuck, for 25 years later, in the Origin of Species, he used the same series of examples, and indeed some of the same words, in a discussion of the adaptation of different species of birds to their environment:

If about a dozen genera of birds had become extinct or were unknown, who would have ventured to have surmised that birds might have used their wings only as flappers like the logger-headed duck26...; as fins in the water and front legs on land, like the penguin; as sails, like the ostrich . . . Yet the structure of each of these birds is good for it, under the conditions of life to which it is exposed, for each has to live by a struggle . . P

The remarks, as well as containing several of Darwin's key evolutionary ideas (struggle, adaptation to environment, a link between form and behaviour, similarities in the basic 'design' of organisms notwithstanding differences), are part of a discussion of the problems of finding transitional forms. If certain critical taxa were to become extinct, it would be difficult to trace the ancestry of unusual forms. The heading of the section is a key one: 'On the origin and transitions of organic beings with peculiar habits and structure.' Although ideas were incompletely formed (while he was aboard the Beagle), certain lineaments were already developing in Darwin's mind; both his approach, at once remarkably integrated

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and comparative, and the variety of his island experiences had an important part to play.

Darwin, certainly by the time of his visits to Tierra del Fuego, was developing clear ways of arranging some of his material on natural history and geology. Sometimes they can be crudely discerned in his contemporary notes, but became clarified later. Sometimes they seem fully developed even while he was in the field. Examples include the uniformitarian ideas he was assimilating from Lyell's Principles of Geology, and also the more traditional catastrophism, the concept of organisms being 'exquisitely adapted' to their environment, later so important, but partly gained from his undergraduate study of William Paley's Natural Theology.2* He was less well-equipped for the study of human communities. His descriptions of the Fuegians are detailed; he notes (as has been shown) their food, their clothing (or lack or it) the construction of their 'wigwams' and canoes, their weapons, their face-painting. But his approach is mainly to compare - unfavourably - their primitiveness with Western, civilized humanity. Words with negative connotations such as 'savage', 'hideous', 'primitive', 'hostile', 'miserable', 'filthy', 'wretched' predominate. Here are extracts from his diary for 25 February 1834:

I never saw more miserable creatures; stunted in their growth, their hideous faces bedaubed with white paint & quite naked. One full aged woman absolutely so . . . Their red skins filthy & greasy, their hair entangled, their voices discordant, their gesticulation violent &C without any dignity. . . . They cannot know the feeling of having a home & still less that of domestic affection . . . How little can the higher powers of the mind come into play: what is there for imagination to paint, for reason to compare, for judgement to decide upon? To knock a limpet from a rock does not even require cunning of the lowest power of the mind. Their skill like the instinct of animals, is not improved by experience; the canoe, their most ingenious work, poor as it may be, we know has remained the same for 300 years. Although essentially the same creature, how little must the mind of one of these beings resemble that of an educated man. What a scale of improvement is comprehended between the faculties of a Fuegian savage & a Sir Isaac Newton!29

A modern commentator might see here a case of racial, social and even gender prejudice of a severe kind. A more appropriate view is perhaps to be reminded that Darwin had never before seen tribal people; elsewhere in South America he had been within a 'European' sphere of influence. He, of

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course, saw the world through the lens of his upbringing and background. He wrote that they had a sense of equality and no social hierarchy. No one, therefore 'took charge' and directed operations; he felt that little social progress would be made until some sort of social structure or hierarchy emerged. It was a view not altogether unsurprising in one imbued with the English class system, who had stepped off a Royal Naval ship-of-war with its rigid stratification of captain, officers, petty officers, midshipmen and common seamen.

Some of his comments were astute. He noted that different tribes had different dialects. Nevertheless, he was sometimes in error; he thought they had little notion of spirituality, while in fact they had a shamanistic religion of some complexity and a wealth of tales and myths concerning the origins of things.30

In view of his later ideas on evolution of all life, including those expressed in the Descent of Man, it is of interest that he sometimes falls back on biological allegories, models and comparisons. Anthropology was an infant science (compared with geology, botany or zoology), and one of which Darwin knew little. Ideas had to be borrowed from elsewhere, and the animal comparison is the most frequently used: sometimes successfully, sometimes less so. He compares the Fuegians' 'skill' to the instinct of animals, about which he later wrote much. Animals migrate and colonize new environments and, Darwin speculated, partly using this analogy but partly also clinging to creationist ideas:

Whence have these people come? Have they remained in the same state since the creation of the world? What could have tempted a tribe of men leaving the fine regions of the North to travel down the Cordilleras, the backbone of America, to invent & build canoes, & then to enter one of the most inhospitable countries of the world?31

The biological analogy perhaps continues, when he saw the 'primitiveness' of the Fuegians as part of their adaptation to environment.

There can be no reason for supposing the race of Fuegians are decreasing, we may therefore be sure that he enjoys a sufficient share of happiness (whatever its kind may be) to render life worth living. Nature, by making habit omnipotent, has fitted the Fuegian to the climate & productions of his country.32

The appreciation of the idea of a stable human population adapted to its environment is interesting. Just a few lines earlier Darwin described the state of almost constant warfare between the different groups, noting that competition for food - berries, fungi, fish, shellfish and the occasional

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guanaco (a type of llama-like animal, the skins of which were used as clothing) - seemed to be the basis of the conflicts: '[T]he cause of their warfare would appear to be the means of subsistence.'33

While Darwin's reading of Thomas Malthus's Essay on Population lay nearly five years in the future, here is another example of the way in which he was beginning to argue from animals to humans. When Malthus's mechanisms had been assimilated, Darwin was in a position to draw on his own experience to fit them to his own theories. There is even a trace of the notion that organisms, including humans, become adapted to their environment over time: 'Nature, by making habit omnipotent, has fitted the Fuegian to the climate and productions of his country.'34

Darwin had relatively little experience of people of non-European origin before arriving in Tierra del Fuego; later he met the 'Indians' of southern Chile, including Chiloe, the Polynesians in Tahiti, the Maoris, Australian Aborigines and the 'Malay' people of the Cocos Islands. At one stage, late in the voyage, he attempted to arrange some of these groups as steps on a ladder or hierarchy: the Fuegians were on the lowest rung. Unsophisticated perhaps, but it provides another instance in the way in which the 'island stories' provided raw material for his gropings towards his evolutionary theories.

Notes

1. Diary, 24 January 1833, p. 132.

2. Ibid., 27 January 1833, p. 133.

3. Ibid., 6 February 1833, p. 136.

4. Narrative, pp. 326-7.

5. Diary, 13 February 1834, p. 211.

6. Diary, 14-21 February 1834. The whales were possibly Pbyseter tnacro-cephalus, the sperm whale.

7. Ibid., 6 March 1834, p. 216.

8. Diary, 10 June 1834, p. 230.

9. Geology of the Voyage, Part 3, p. 151.

10. Letter to J. S. Henslow, March 1834 (original in Botanic Gardens Kew), Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 365.

11. Geology of the Voyage, Part 3, pp. 117-18.

12. Ibid., p. 153. The terms trappean and trap-rock are derived from trap, an old word meaning a staircase. The terms were formerly used to describe volcanic rocks, which present a step-like topography.

13. Although he described his observations on the island as 'unimportant': Geology of the Voyage of the Beagle, Part 3, p. 151.

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14. Geology of the Voyage, Part 3, p. 151.

15. British Antarctic Survey, Tectonic Map of the Scotia Arc (Cambridge: British Antarctic Survey, 1985); G. G. Bujalesky, Quaternary Environments of Tierra del Fuego (Field Guidebook) (Argentina: Argentine Committee for IGCP, 2000).

16. Zoology of the Voyage, Part 4, p. 159.

17. Voyage, pp. 224-5.

18. K.G.V. Smith, 'Darwin's Insects: Charles Darwin's Entomological Notes', Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), 14.1 (1987): 67, quoting Darwin's insect notes. I found this species of fungus (Cyttaria dartvinii) -Darwin's fungus, Indian bread, pan de Indio - common on Nothofagus trees in October 2003. Where it grows, the branches swell into a 'burr' or knot.

19. Letter to Catherine Darwin, 22 May 1833, concerning Syms Covington: 'I have taught him to shoot & skin birds.' DAR 223, Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 312. Also letter to W. D. Fox, 23 May 1833, Christ's College Library, Fox 41b, Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 316.

20. DAR 30.2: 77-86

21. Letter to W. D. Fox, 23 May 1833, DAR 30.2: 77-86. The words 'watched' and 'set' are not very clearly legible. The editors of the Correspondence, however strongly imply (and I concur) that this suggests that Charles 'observed the habits of the species he collected'.

22. Flightless steamer-duck (Tachyeres pteneres); so named because of its alleged resemblance to a paddle-steamer when churning through the water. Still / common around the coasts and islands of the southern tip of South America.

23. There are about eight species of penguins that occur around the shores of Tierra del Fuego, and Darwin may have encountered several of them. He also knew them well from the Falklands (see Chapter 9).

24. Darwin appreciated that there were two species of rhea in South America, Rhea americana and Pterocnemia pennata; his thoughts on them were later to prove of importance in his development of evolutionary ideas. The latter species was named Rhea darwinii by J. Gould. See also Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London, 5 (1837): 35-6; Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle, Part 3; and Red Notebook, pp. 127, 130, 153. The use of the plumes may be part of a display.

25. Diary, 27-29 December 1832, p. 126. 16. An alternative name for the steamer.

27. Origin of Species, Chapter 6, 'Difficulties of the Theory'.

28. W. Paley, Natural Theology: Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity collected from the Appearances of Nature (London, 1802).

29. Diary, IS February 1834, pp. 212-13.

30. See E. L. Bridges, Uttermost Part of the Earth (London: Hodder &c Stoughton, 1948).

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31. Diary, 25 February 1834, p. 213

32. Ibid.

33. Ibid., 25 February 1834, p. 212.

34. Ibid., 25 February 1834, p. 213.

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9. Changing Environments, Changing Ideas: The Desolate Falklands

There were some places that Charles Darwin liked - the Cape Verde Islands, after some initial shock, and the Cocos archipelago in the Indian Ocean -and some that he did not. The Falkland Islands, along with the Bay of Islands in New Zealand, Australia and to some extent the Galapagos, were among the places for which he had no great affection. Interestingly, it was not always the locations that were of the greatest scientific importance to him to which he was most attracted. Social conditions, the landscape, the climate and weather, as well as the geological and biological interest, were all important factors in his evaluation. His own mood also played a part.

HMS Beagle paid two visits to the tiny settlement of Port Louis, Berkeley Sound, in the Falkland Islands: 1 March-4 April 1833 and 9 March-7 April 1834. The two visits were necessary to complete hydrographic survey work and also to restock the Beagle's supplies of food (especially beef) and water, and to effect repairs necessary after many weeks in high latitudes. Darwin thus spent a total of a little less than ten weeks in and aboard the Beagle near the Falklands - entirely East Falkland. This was probably more time than he spent at any other location during the entire voyage. He also covered more pages with notes from East Falkland than any other location, and certainly for some categories of material collected more specimens than from other islands and island groups. Some of the conclusions that Darwin reached as a result of his explorations in the Falklands were extremely important in themselves, but it was the fact that the young naturalist was able to compare the bleak windswept environments of East Falkland with those of the tropical islands, the biota of the Falklands with those of Tierra del Fuego and mainland South America, and the 'continental' rocks (quartzites and sandstones

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for example) of East Falkland with the lavas and ashes of some of his volcanic islands, that was vital to him.1

The log of the Beagle, Darwin's copious notes and letters, writings by other persons aboard and his specimens allow a very accurate reconstruction of the weeks that the little surveying sloop was at Berkeley Sound. Let us briefly accompany the crew as they approached this outpost for the first time.

On the afternoon of Friday, 3 March 1833, Captain FitzRoy was guiding his ship in the face of a brisk west-sou'west force 5 breeze, as she tacked up the long inlet of Berkeley Sound. Good progress had been made on the previous couple of days. The weather was fine but cold; patches of blue sky could be glimpsed through the clouds, although there had been squalls and showers in the previous few hours and adjustments had been made to the sails 'as requisite'. At 1.30 p.m. the sails were shortened and the Beagle came to on the south side of Berkeley Sound, some distance from the settlement, in Uranie Bay, with her bow anchor in ten fathoms (about 18 m). The weather deteriorated, and was described in the ship's log as cloudy, overcast and gloomy during the evening; there were further showers overnight. The commander of one of His Majesty's naval vessels had certain diplomatic and political responsibilities as well as the duties of command, and at several ports on the voyage, Captain FitzRoy was required to exercise them. As the Beagle anchored in Uranie Bay, he noticed, on the opposite shore, a group of tents (mostly improvised from sails) with a French tricolor flying among them. Within minutes of the Beagle coming to rest, a delegation from this encampment came alongside, seeking assistance. Those camped ashore were from a French whaling-ship Le Magellan, which had been wrecked in a terrible squall seven weeks before. FitzRoy spent a good deal of time dealing with this problem over the next couple of weeks: he purchased much of the timber of the French ship as firewood, and had it loaded aboard the Beagle, along with some of the stores. He made arrangements for the removal of cargo and crew to the mainland of South America on other ships. FitzRoy had other enquiries to make: the settlement was in a poor state, buildings were damaged and some of the inhabitants had been driven away and were living rough in the open country (the 'camp' as it is now called), too frightened to return. He discovered from a Captain Brisbane, partner in the settlement enterprise, that much of the damage had been done by a gang of ruffians from the American ship Lexington, in 18 31, who apparently had taken exception to the way in which some American whalers had been treated. He also found that the settlement (and much of the islands) had been under the 'flag of Buenos Aires', but that HMS Clio and HMS Tyne had recently visited the islands and run up the British flag and saluted it. A British flag had been left at Port Louis 'in the charge of an

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Changing Environments, Changing Ideas: The Desolate Falkland's

Irishman', who had been told to hoist the flag on Sundays and when vessels came into port. Apart from the flag-guardian ('who was more loquacious than was wished', according to FitzRoy) there was no constituted authority on the islands, the Argentinians apparently having abandoned them. The crew of visiting ships - mainly sealers and whalers - and some South American gauchos - some with criminal records - and a few others, often behaved in a fairly lawless manner. Captain Robert FitzRoy tried to sort things out as best he could, but he had other matters to attend to, in particular the making of a detailed hydrographic survey of the Sound and adjoining waters.

On 4 March - the day after arrival - FitzRoy's clerk drowned, apparently becoming entangled in kelp (the long fronds of seaweed that flourish in the waters around the islands) while recovering a bird specimen that had been shot. The log of the Beagle records that at 6.00 p.m. there was 'Received on board the body of Mr E. H. Hellyer, Clerk, accidentally drowned near the ship'. Darwin, who evidently took part in the attempted rescue, recorded the interment, which took place on 5 March:

Mr Hellyer was buried on a lonely & dreary headland. The procession was a melancholy one: in front a Union Jack half mast high was carried, & over the coffin the British ensign was thrown; the funeral from its simplicity was the more solemn & suited to the circumstances.2

It is not surprising that both Darwin and FitzRoy had little affection for the Falklands after their first visit. The weather had been poor, and wreckage from the Magellan and other ships that had come to grief nearby was strewn around Berkeley Sound. A shipmate had died. The presence of crews of dozens of whaling and sealing ships, some armed with rifles and some with clubs, together with the locals with their long knives, did not bode well for the peace of the islands; FitzRoy recorded his feelings on leaving on 4 April 1833: '[There was] ... no lack of the elements of discord; and it was with a heavy heart and gloomy forebodings that I looked forward to the months which might elapse without the presence of a man-o-war, or the semblance of any regular authority.'3 His anxieties were not misplaced. The surprises that the crew of the Beagle had received when they first sailed into Port Louis were nothing compared with the 'complicated scenes of coldblooded murder, robbery, plunder, suffering . . . [and] infamous conduct' described to them by Lieutenant Smith, who, by the time they returned nearly a year later, was acting as Governor. They struggled into Berkeley Sound after enduring severe weather as they approached, on 10 March 1834, only to hear that some of the gauchos and 'Indians' had murdered Brisbane, Dickson (the loquacious Irishman in charge of the stores and

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Figure 9.1 Map of the Falkland Islands

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Figure 9.2 Map of Berkeley Sound, East Falkland, showing the various Beagle anchorages and other places mentioned in the text

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Darwin's Other Islands

guardian of the flag), the gaucho captain and two others (whether with knives or firearms is not entirely clear), as part of a robbery.

With poor Brisbane, four others were butchered: the principal murderer, Antuco, has given himself up; he says he knows he shall be hanged but he wishes some of the Englishmen who were implicated, to suffer with him; pure thirst for blood seems to have incited him.4

Darwin was not entirely accurate. The prisoner's name was Antonio Rivero, and catching him seems to have been anything but easy, even if he did eventually surrender. The desperados were brought on board the Beagle, some of them in irons, and were eventually transported to England. Because of legal difficulties, however (arising about uncertainty over the sovereignty of the islands when the murders were committed), they were never convicted. Later in the visit the body of a Lieutenant Clive, who had been drowned some three months before during the visit of the Challenger (that had brought Smith to be acting governor), was found. Clive was buried very quietly in the early morning (no one on the Beagle seems to have known him), not far from the grave of 'our regretted shipmate Hellyer'.

On his second visit Darwin made a four-day trip on horseback, with a couple of gaucho companions, over the main mountain ranges, as far as the narrow isthmus between Brenton Loch and Choiseul Sound, close to the site of the modern settlement of Goose Green. The journey back to the ship was particularly dreadful. There was driving rain much of the way, and he recalled:

From the great quantity of rain this boggy country was in a very bad state. I suppose my horse fell at least a dozen times & sometimes the whole six were floundering in the mud together . . .

To finish our misery, we crossed an arm of the sea which was up to the top of the horses back, & little waves from the violent winds broke over us. . . . Even the Gauchos were not sorry to reach the houses.5

The cross-country horseback trip was full of incident and excitement. Just a single anecdote will be recounted here. Darwin noted that the bulls wandered about in twos and threes and were 'very savage', although, he continued:

I never saw such magnificent beasts: they truly resemble the ancient sculptures, in which the vast neck &C head is but seldom seen amongst tame animals. The young bulls run away for a short distance, but the old ones will not stir a step excepting to rush at a man &c horse; &C many horses have thus been killed. One old bull crossed a boggy stream & took up his stand on the side opposite to us. We in vain tried to drive him away &c failing we were obliged to make a large circuit.

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51 "SO'

5I°30'

10 km

5I°45'-

58°15'

Figure 9.3 Darwin's excursion with the gauchos, March 1834

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The Gauchos in revenge were determined to render him for the future innocuous; it was very interesting to see how art completely mastered huge force. One lazo was thrown over his horns as he rushed at the horse, & another round his hind legs; in a minute the monster was stretched harmless on the ground.6

It is interesting to see how the young English gentleman varies in the degree of delicacy with which he describes the castration of the bull. In the rough field notebook there is the bald annotation 'geld bull'; in the diary, which he envisaged being read by others, including his unmarried sisters, the gauchos 'render him innocuous'. In the Voyage of the Beagle, perhaps because this might not be clear, the phrase becomes 'emasculate him and render him for the future harmless'.

Thus there was much about each visit that was inauspicious. Nonetheless, despite the 'complicated scenes' of foul weather, shipwreck, brutal murder and drowning that Darwin experienced, or of which he had heard tell, and despite occasionally finding himself depressed and even a little bored as he looked out on the the bleak landscape for weeks at a time, he was remarkably active during his time in the Falklands. He explored the area to the north and south of the settlement thoroughly; he walked many miles along the beaches of Berkeley Sound, collecting marine creatures and rock specimens.

On East Falkland, more perhaps than in any other environment that he encountered, the young Darwin was able to employ some of the geological techniques that Professor Sedgwick had taught him in three weeks of field-work in North Wales in the summer of 1831.

Figure 9.4 Settlement of Port Louis, East Falkland, in the 1830s

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Changing Environments, Changing Ideas: The Desolate Falklands

Figure 9.5 Settlement of Port Louis, East Falkland, in the 1980s

The transect method in which Darwin had been trained influenced the manner in which he recorded and used the information he collected. In the accounts he wrote of the geology of the Falklands during the voyage7 (DAR 32.2/136ff.) and in a scientific paper he wrote on the islands in the Proceedings of the Geological Society after his return to England, although he made a number of separate excursions he described the geology in terms of a single transect:

In crossing the eastern island in a N.N.W and a S.S.E. direction, in a line intersecting the head of Berkeley Sound, we find north of it several low, parallel, interrupted east and west ranges, with strata all dipping a little west of south, at angles varying between 20° and 40°. South of Berkeley Sound the first range we come to is a short one, rising like others through the clay-slate formation.8

His notes, and the paper written in 1846, are illustrated by numerous cross-section diagrams. He clearly had that important skill for a geologist: the ability to see in three dimensions (see Chapter 1). He correctly understood that there were two main formations in the northern part of the island, the quartzites that made up the main range of the island, and the 'clay-slate'. He was interested in the patterns of folding in the rocks, and sketched anticlines

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Figure 9.6 Darwin's geological notes of the folding of rocks in the Falklands Source: Cambridge University Library.

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Changing Environments, Changing Ideas: The Desolate Falklands

Figure 9.7 Darwin's 'zone of upheaval' (anticline), south of Berkeley Sound, East Falkland

(upfolds) and synclines (downfolds) in his notes. He paid particular attention to what he called a 'zone of upheaval' south of the Sound. He understood that the rocks had been affected by metamorphism (change by heat and pressure) and he noted, perceptively, the commonality of the directional trend between pressure-induced cleavage structures and mineralogical change, and the grain of the topography of the islands. His geological writings on the Falklands are full of detailed observations on the angles and directions of dip of strata, of descriptions of rock types replete with the minutiae of their mineralogy. But the 'big picture' never escaped him. Here was a landscape that had been profoundly affected by folding and other changes in the geological past.

One of Darwin's main preoccupations during his visits to many of the islands that he visited (and indeed also the mainland of South America) was the notion that the levels of the sea and land had changed in relation to each other. The idea of sea level change, which is obviously connected to the notions of earth movement and of a 'dynamic earth', was to prove an important ingredient of one of Darwin's early 'gradualist' theories. It is worth examining the Falklands writings to see how far this concept was in use during his visits during those southern autumns of 1833 and 1834. He

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was indeed thinking along these lines: he thought that the sea level had once 'stood higher' than at present, and that much of the present topography had been formed when the landscape was beneath the sea: 'When [the land was] at a lower level, the sea has destroyed much of the softer rocks, such as Slates and Sandstones which are easily destroyed.'9 The plain south of the main range was 'undulating like the waves of the sea'. Valleys alternated with low parallel ridges. Darwin thought that 'when the surface was beneath the sea the softer parts would be scooped out in these lines', and that the whole northeastern peninsula in the not too distant past would have been a separate island. By the time of his second visit, he had spent some time on the mainland of Patagonia, where he felt he had seen clear evidence of uplift. He wrote: 'A mass of land has been raised from the sea (as in Patagonia in recent times).' He could not resist the temptation of a comparison, and was clearly thinking at a broad, regional scale, but he operated at the smaller scale too: 'In the NE Peninsula, found at some height above the sea a small flat plain with steepish sides which as it appeared had certainly once formed a bay.'10

In several of the localities that Darwin visited on his voyage he found shells high above the modern beach. He argued from this that the sea level had once been higher (e.g. on the west coast of South America and in Tasmania).11 He found no such evidence in East Falkland, but quotes one reference in his notes to a whale bone being found by an earlier expedition well inland, north of the Sound, above sea level.12

Although in his Falklands writings Darwin frequently mentioned the complex network of long, narrow inlets that cut deep into the Falklands landscape, he did not seem to think of them as drowned river valleys, as would a modern geomorphologist. It is now clear that the post-glacial rise in sea level drowned pre-existing valleys, but Darwin, perhaps because of his South American experiences, was convinced that the uplift of the land relative to the sea was the important influence. Recent research has shown that there are a number of raised beaches in both East and West Falkland, and thus both submergence and uplift have affected the islands over the last few thousand years. Darwin was therefore partly right, but as occurred a number of times in his career, he reached conclusions that were broadly correct on the basis of evidence that a modern scientist might regard as unsatisfactory.

From his examination of the folded and metamorphosed rocks that were widely exposed on East Falkland, and some of the features of the landscape, it was clear to Darwin that he was in an environment that had experienced change. Perhaps this notion was most profoundly reinforced by his finding of fossils in a layer of slatey sandstone that outcropped in a little bay, called

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Figure 9.8 Fossils from rock exposures, Berkeley Sound

Figure 9.9 Berkeley Sound, East Falkland (Darwin walked for many miles along these shores, collecting marine life-forms and examining rock exposures.)

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the Careenage, close to Port Louis. They can still be found there today, and sometimes, weathered out in fragments of rock can be seen lying on the shore of the Sound. Darwin, a little bored perhaps and somewhat depressed after a couple of weeks of staring out at the bleak, windswept, rainsoaked landscape, evidence of shipwreck around him and memories of a shipmate's drowning fresh in his mind, set out from where the ship was at anchor for the tiny settlement on 19 March 1833. He later wrote that his outlook on the Falkland Islands was 'forever changed' by that walk, as on it he found rock 'abounding with shells ... of the most interesting geological aera'.

In his geological notes, after having described the highly cleaved slates that underlie much of the Falklands, and which are unfossiliferous, he continued:

I was therefore the more surprised to find near the settlement within the slate, beds of sandstone which abounded with impressions and casts of shells. The sandstone is fine grained and soft: it is often slaty, in which case it generally contains scales of mica . . . The included organic remains are found in seams or beds between the sandstone strata. In some cases the casts form the whole mass, in others they are embedded in sandstone, and very often in a matrix of hard blue compact rock. The shells belong to Terebratula and its subgenera; there are also species of Entrochitus and vestiges of some other remains the nature of which I could not ascertain.13

Darwin wondered about the exact age of the fossils (they are now thought to be from the Devonian, about 350-400 million years before the present), and how they compared with fossils of similar age from other parts of the world.14 The layer is indeed extremely fossiliferous: it contains dozens of kinds of fossils - of brachiopods, crinoids and trilobites. Darwin's phrase 'abounding with shells' - he used it several times - is entirely appropriate. He was struck by the great contrast between the landscape that surrounded him, bleak and infertile. Over the whole island there was '[t]he same entire absence of trees & the same universal covering of brown wiry grass'. It seemed monotonous; there were few land insects or other invertebrates. Again Darwin used the comparative approach: he compared the cold, bleak environment of the modern Falkland Islands with the prolific seas, perhaps experiencing a much warmer climate that might have existed in the geological past when the sandstones 'abounding with shells' were deposited.

Do not the Entrochitus & other organic remains indicate a climate previously warmer? Where the latitude of the place is 51 degrees in the southern hemisphere ... even a remote possibility on such a point becomes interesting.15

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Changing Environments, Changing Ideas: The Desolate Falklands

Darwin, in the Falklands, was not only appreciating that the earth was being changed by folding and metamorphosis of rocks, and as the result of changes in sea level, but was also speculating that the climate might have changed.

Among the most striking elements in the Falkland Islands landscape are the stone-runs. These are linear, almost glacier-like streams of angular, jumbled, quartzite boulders that run along many of the valleys and down the valley sides. The slabs of rock vary in size from a few centimetres to several metres across. These features may be several kilometres in length and a little less than one kilometre across. They are now thought to have been formed by frost-shattering and periglacial solifluction (downward sludging of surface material - mixtures of mineral matter, ice and water under cold conditions), although their origin has been the subject of a good deal of dispute.

Darwin mentions what he called the 'valley of the fragments' in his notes made on his 1833 visit, but made a more detailed study of this massive stone-run, several kilometres in length, now called Prince's Street, between Long Island Mountain and the Mount Vervet uplands on his second visit. His account, very slightly edited, is as follows:

In very many parts of the island, the bottoms of the valleys are filled up with an astonishing number of large angular fragments of quartz [quartzite]. These are so excessively numerous that I am at a loss to describe the appearance presented by them. The blocks vary in size from a man's chest to 10 or 20 times that size, and, of course occasionally much larger; they must in many places form a mass of considerable depth; the water is often heard trickling deep below, and of course in the centre of the valleys it would soon fill up the crevices of these blocks and thus raise its bed. The peat on each side is daily diminishing the apparent breadth which must vary from a few hundred yards to more than a mile. In the great 'valley of the fragments' as we called a valley it is necessary to cross by jumping from stone to stone, an uninterrupted band [of] over half a mile. But the most curious [aspect] is the very little inclination of these streams of blocks; (even a mail coach would not alter its speed in ascending the inclination). The more inclined beds on the sides of hills I saw dipping at 10°; but in the broad flat valleys, in many places they are only just more than imperceptibly inclined. They can often be traced to the crests of hills, where masses as large as churches have been arrested in their course; the curved plates of the arch-ways lie in immense quantities at the very source; the scene is like a ruined castle, which

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formerly commanded the pass. For the valleys of little inclination, another simile will give a very faithful idea of the appearance; it is as if from every point in the mountains great streams of white trachytic lava had burst forth, and had subsequently been torn into a myriad fragments. Everyone talks of the 'streams of blocks'.16

Several times Darwin used the term 'convulsion' to describe the mechanism that might have formed the stone-runs. He seems to have thought that earthquakes were the primary cause of their formation. Here is part of his revised account, edited for publication in the Voyage of the Beagle:

[I]t seems . . . probable that they [the fragments] have been hurled down from the nearest slopes; and that since, by a vibratory movement of overwhelming force, the fragments have been levelled into one continuous sheet. If during the earthquake which in 1835 overthrew Conception, in Chile, it was thought wonderful that small bodies should have been pitched a few inches from the ground, what must we say to a movement which has caused fragments many tons in weight, to move onwards like so much sand on a vibrating board, and find their level?17

We can see a certain ambivalence about Darwin's writing on the Falklands. In the passages above he seems to be a catastrophist, one who

Figure 9.10 Stone-runs, East Falkland

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Changing Environments, Changing Ideas: The Desolate Falkland's

believed that the history of the earth was to be understood in terms of sudden, dramatic changes. The phrases 'ruined castle', 'torn into a myriad fragments', and 'overwhelming force' seem to imply that he thought that the spectacular and sudden was the keynote to understanding the stone-runs. We know from his notebooks that he asked the gauchos with whom he travelled across the island in 1834 whether the island was affected by earthquakes; he asked Captain Brisbane about the volcanic activity he had observed on the Antarctic islands he (Brisbane) had visited; we see above how he compared the stone-runs with lava flows.

And yet... In amongst the field notebook annotations about the stone-runs we find the fragment: 'Degradation of rocks by snow??' and a little further on: 'Degradation of land by snow'.

Towards the end of his life, 46 years later, Darwin was in correspondence with the great geologist Professor James Geikie (1839-1915) about the role of snow and ice in the accumulation of certain superficial deposits (such as 'head' and other accumulations of angular flints) in southern England. In one such accumulation close to Darwin's home at Downe, in Kent, the remains of a musk ox and woolly mammoth had been found. 'This great accumulation of uneven flints must have been made when the climate was very cold . . . the lower valleys being filled up during part of the year with drifted frozen snow.' Such deposits are now described as periglacial (formed in cold environments close to ice masses) by cryogenic or frost-weathering and solifluction, the slow movement downslope of saturated, seasonally thawed material. In another letter, a few months later, Darwin wrote to Geikie that he was very interested in:

. . . the sliding & travelling of angular debris. Ever since seeing the 'streams of stones' at the Falkland Islands, I have felt uneasy in my mind on this subject. I wish [the] notion could be fully elucidated about frozen snow. Some one ought to observe the movement of fields of snow which supply Glaciers in Switzerland.18

One might be tempted to argue that Darwin was 'being wise after the event', here, saying, 'I thought it might be gradual snow action', when, decades later, much more information had come before him. There is evidence, however, that he was less than certain about his earthquake theory quite soon after his visit to the Falklands. An afterthought at the end of his account of the stone-runs in the Voyage of the Beagle reads thus:

. . . never did any scene, like these 'streams of stones', so forcibly convey to my mind the idea of convulsion . . . yet the progress of knowledge will probably some day give a simple explanation to this

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phenomenon, as it already has of the long-thought inexplicable trans-portal of the erratic boulders . . . strewed over the plains of Europe.19

The spectacular nature of the stone-runs, the information about vulcan-ism on islands to the south, and the evidence of folding and metamorphism throughout the island tempted him towards the catastrophic or 'convulsion' interpretation. This was to some extent confirmed by his own later experience of an earthquake in South America and his seeing Conception wrecked by an earthquake. But by 1834 Darwin had read Charles Lyell's Principles of Geology, which set forth with great erudition uniformitarian ideas - theories that the evolution of the earth was to be understood by assuming that change had for the most part, been gradual, and that the changes that had occurred, substantial though they might have been, were the result of processes that could be seen at work in the modern world.

Certainly by the time of his second visit to the Falklands, Lyell's gradualist or uniformitarian ideas were permeating Darwin's thinking. He mentions in his notes the gradual wearing away of the land, the crumbling of the rocks along the sea coast and the infilling of water-bodies and stream-beds with depositional material:

Subsequent degradation (which I believe in this land has taken present [sic] to a great extent) would remove most cases of direct superposition . . .20

No map exists which pretends to follow all the windings of the many creeks among the islands: if there did, it would almost represent a Medusa's head ... They are generally shallow &C silted up with much mud, their heads being converted to dry land: the water is so still & motionless that it does not carry along decomposing matter.21

I believe the Peat to be formed very slowly from the grass & other plants now growing on the surface.22

We have already noticed the observation of the tinkling of tiny rivulets below the surface of the stone-runs, and the speculation that therefore 'the crevices between the lower fragments must have been filled up with sand', and the bed of the stream raised (p. 93).

Although, as we have seen above, geological observations occupied a good deal of Darwin's energies during his visits to the Falklands, his biological annotations are also extremely important. Again we should recall that by the time of the first Falklands visit he had visited several tropical islands, and by the time of the second visit he had also been to Tierra del Fuego.

From the very earliest stages of the voyage (the St Jago visit), Darwin was to some extent thinking ecologically, noting a creature's habitat and record-

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Changing Environments, Changing Ideas: The Desolate Falklands

ing relationships between different species. At the Falklands he recorded that a holothurian (sea-cucumber) was 'not uncommon under stones'; a 'Creusia' was recorded (13 March 1833) as being 'a little below high water mark in a stream of fresh water .. . this genus is especially fitted for brackish water & for a certain time even in fresh'. Other species of invertebrates were described as 'among the roots or growing on the fronds of the giant Kelp'.23 He dissected birds to see what they had been eating. The Falklands thrush (Turdus falcklandii) was described as 'inhabiting the dryer and more stony hills . . . the sea coast' and was also 'not uncommon around buildings especially any old shed',24 and he noted what living birds were eating. He saw a certain poetry in these relationships, and phrases such as 'the economy of nature' and 'exquisite adaptation' occur frequently in his writings.

Darwin also appreciated the integrity of the whole environment. He spent many hours studying the organisms that inhabited the kelp-bed communities that existed in Berkeley Sound. He wrote the following account in April 1834, combining material from his two sojourns at East Falkland and drawing in material from similar researches he had undertaken in Tierra del Fuego:

The Zoology of the Sea is I believe the same here as in Tierra del Fuego: Its main striking feature is the immense quantity & number of aquatic beings which are intimately connected with the Kelp. The plant (the Fucus giganteus of Solander) is universally attached to rocks, from those which are awash at low water & those being in fathom water: it is frequently attached to round stones lying in mud. From the degree to which these southern lands are intersected by water & the depth in which Kelp grows the quantity may be imagined, but not to a greater degree than it exists. I can only compare these giant forests to terrestrial ones in the most teeming part of the Tropics; yet if the latter in any country were to be destroyed, I do not believe nearly the same number of animals (a) would perish, as would happen in the case of the Kelp: All the fishing quadrupeds & birds (& man) haunt the beds attracted by the infinite number of small fish which live amongst the leaves: (the kinds are not so very numerous, my specimens I believe show nearly all.) Amongst the invertebrates I will mention them in order of their importance. Crustacea of every order swarm, my collection gives no idea of them, especially the minute sorts. Encrusting Corallines & Aztias are excessively numerous. Every leaf (excepting those on the surface,) is white with such Corallines ... & compound Ascidia. Examining these with a strong microscope minute Crustacea will be seen ... On shaking the great entangled roots

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it is curious to see the heap of fish, shells, crabs, sea-eggs, cuttlefish, star fish, Planaria, Nercilae which fall out. This latter tribe I have much neglected. Amongst the Gasteropoda [sic], Herobranchus is common: but Trochus & patelliform shells abound on all the leaves. One single plant forms an immense and most interesting menagerie. If this Fucus was to cease living, with it would go many of the Seals, the Cormorants & certainly the small fish &c sooner or later the Fuegan Man must follow. The greater number of invertebrates would likewise perish, but how many it is hard to conjecture.25

A note on the back of the page refers to the '(a)' added in small handwriting to the text, perhaps when Darwin reviewed his work sometime later. It reads: 'I refer to numbers of individuals as well as kinds.'

This description forms one of the most important passages in Darwin's notes from the Beagle voyage. It reveals how insightful Darwin had become in evaluating environments by April 1834, about half-way through the voyage. He had clearly compared the beds of East Falkland with those of Tierra del Fuego, which the ship visited between the two Falklands visits (see Chapter 8), and there are a number of ecological concepts embedded (in some cases implied) in the account. Darwin is comparing the productivity of the kelp beds on the shores of the southern Ocean with that of the

Figure 9.11 Kelp-bed, East Falkland

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Changing Environments, Changing Ideas: The Desolate Falklands

tropical rainforests he had recently seen in Brazil. He distinguishes carefully between number of individuals (population) and number of species (diversity). He comes close to using the concepts of food-chain, food-web, ecological niche and dominant or perhaps keystone species, although these ecological terms were not coined until a century or more later. He also accepts that humans ('man', 'Fuegan man') are part of the system: they interact with and form part of the environment in a manner comparable with that of other creatures. The young naturalist is describing an environment - a modern scientist would say ecosystem - in a remarkably integrated, holistic way.

Ever since his encounter with the octopus in the Cape Verde Islands (p. 42), just a few weeks into the voyage, one of the things that characterizes Darwin's descriptions of animals is the emphasis on behaviour; long before the science of ethology became a recognized field of study, he was carefully observing the habits of organisms and performing experiments on their irritability and responses to stimuli. This is an interest that he held through his entire career and which manifested itself in a number of papers on psychology and child-development in his later life, especially in his important work On the Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals, published in 1872. Sometimes Darwin managed subtly to combine, in his accounts of organisms, information on behaviour and habitat, appreciating that the form of a creature, its behaviour and its environment - habitat and food supply for example - were all related to one another (see the account of the Falklands steamer duck, p. 73). Ecology and ethology are aspects of the same sphere of enquiry. Many of these observations on behaviour were made during the Beagle's sojourns at remote islands; perhaps the tameness of animals and birds at such places was an advantage. In environments where there have, until relatively recently been no human inhabitants, and where there are few ground predators, birds and other animals are often extremely tame. Darwin compared the tameness of the birds of the Falklands with those of the Galapagos26 and noted the same phenomenon at the Cocos Islands. He contrasted the situation on this archipelago with that at Tierra del Fuego where 'for generations' the birds had been 'persecuted' by humans. He also argued that wildness or tameness, as well as being influenced by environment, might be inherited,27 an interesting precursor to his later evolutionary views.

Here is an account of the behaviour of the Jackass (Magellanic) penguin (Spheniscus magellanicus). Darwin uses an old scientific name:

I was much amused by watching a Demersa, having got between the water and it. It continually rolls its head from side to side (as if it could

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see with [only the] anterior position from [its] eye.) Stands quite upright: can run very fast with its head stretched out & crawls among the tussocks by aid of its little wings so as to extraordinarily resemble a quadruped; throws its head back & makes a noise very like a Jackass, hence its name; but when at sea 6c undisturbed its note is very deep and solemn, often heard at night. When diving (can do so in very shoal [shallow] water) uses its wings very rapidly and looks like a small seal. From its low figure & easy motion looks crafty like a smuggler. It is very brave, regularly fought & drove me back till it reached the sea. Nothing less than heavy blows would have stopped: every inch he gained he kept, standing before me erect and determined.28

Here is his account of the caracara (Phalcoboenus australis):

They build in the cliffs on sea coast, but only in the islands, an odd precaution in such very tame birds. They are excessively numerous in these islands . . . they are true carrion feeders, following a party & rapidly congregating when an animal is killed; are extremely tame, especially when gorged with their crops protruding. In general habits much resemble the Carrancha: same inelegant flight & patient watching position; they however run much faster, like poultry. They have several harsh crys [sic]; one very like an English rook; when making this, they throw their heads quite backwards on their back. Are very quarrelsome, tearing the grass with their passion.29

There is a good deal of anthropomorphism in both these accounts. The behaviour of the birds is described in terms of human attributes: the penguin was 'crafty', 'brave' and 'determined'; the caracara 'patient' or sometimes 'quarrelsome', just as the octopus in the rockpool at St Jago moved in a 'stealthy' manner. Some of this might make a modern student of animal behaviour wince. On the other hand the level of detail is excellent: the careful, vivid accounts of the postures, calls, and locomotion were not the rule in Darwin's day. The comparative approach is always present, and in the case of the caracara, the habitat and food sources are mentioned. In places Darwin seems to be attempting to analyse the behaviour in a rudimentary way, noting the aggressive behaviour of the penguin and the social behaviour of the caracara. He describes the grass-tearing action of the latter species as a display of 'passion': a modern ethologist might use the term 'displacement activity'.

Another glimpse of how Darwin thought ahead of his time was the hint of a suggestion that behaviour might provide clues to the classification of organisms: 'Mr Mellersch having wounded a cormorant it went on shore &

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immediately these birds [caracaras] attacked &c by blows tried to kill it. Connection in habit as well as structure with true Hawkes.'30

There were other ideas in Darwin's mind while he was in the Falkland Islands that touched on the evolutionary ideas that he later developed. Here is a detailed description of the eggs of Doris (sea-slug, Opistobranchia), in the pages of his Zoological Diary, dated 9 March 1833.

Eggs deposited in a ribbon, this adheres by its edge to the rock in a special oval of 4 or 5 turns, is evidently formed by the turning of the animal on its centre, & the distance of the axis is the length from generative aperture to centre of revolution in the foot: Eggs in diameter .003, are collected in number from 2 to 5. generally 4 in a [sic] oval transparent case or ball, length .012: These balls are arranged two deep in transverse rows in the ribbon: In a large collection, the ribbon must be 20 inches long, in breadth .5 of inch; from counting how many balls in a tenth of inch & how many rows in same length, at the smallest computation there could not have been less than the enormous number of six hundred thousand eggs. This is a wonderful instance of fecundity: yet the animal is certainly not common: I saw only seven individuals.31

Darwin also noted that there appeared to be what he, much later, called 'checks' on the populations of feral horses and rabbits; although locally 'numerous' they were restricted in their distribution, and did not seem to build up numbers sufficiently for the animals to colonize new areas. The notion of checks in population growth, in the face of the fecundity of nature, and 'survival of the fittest' or 'natural selection' was a vital component in his evolutionary theory. There is no suggestion that such well-formed ideas were in Darwin's mind at the time of the Falklands visits, but some of these observations did seem to place him on the road. The Doris observations appeared as a footnote in the Voyage of the Beagle. The observations on checks in the numbers of feral animals in the Falklands appeared in the 'Big Species Book', of which the Origin of Species was a 'digest'.

Two chapters of the Origin of Species are on the subject of 'Geographical Distribution', and an important theme is the distinctiveness of island biotas in comparison with those of mainland environments, and also the existence of differences between the 'living beings' on islands with similar climates and in close proximity to each other. There is a link here with notions of long-distance dispersal. If it is assumed that the distinctive assemblages of organisms existing on each island were not brought into existence by special creation then they or their ancestors must have made the journey thither, possibly in the distant past. By the time of his second visit to East Falkland in the southern autumn of 1834, Darwin had undertaken substantial explorations on

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Figure 9.12 Desolate moorland, East Falkland

mainland South America and Tierra del Fuego, and he was indeed, again and again, comparing the plants and animals of the islands with those of Tierra del Fuego and other South American localities. For example, the unique (now extinct) Falklands fox, or warrah (Dusicyon australis), he observed as follows: 'It is very curious, thus having a quadruped peculiar to so small a tract of country: The rat is also aboriginal: it evidently became partly domesticated & attached to the houses.'32

There were other organisms such as 'The freshwater fish (which are found in inland lakes)' which he though might 'belong to the same class'. He noted several times in his notes that there were no reptiles on the Falkland Islands.

On the other hand, Darwin noted that there were some birds that were common to both the Falkland Islands and Tierra del Fuego, despite differences in habitat. There were also a number of plants that were found on both island groups: 'I may mention ... as common to this island & Tierra del F . . . rush-looking plant, tea plant, celery.'33 It is not clear what the 'rush-looking plant' might have been: possibly the native rush (Juncus scbeuchzeriodes); the tea plant was probably teaberry (Myrteola nummu-laria), the 'celery' a local wild celery (Apium graveolis). In one of his notebooks he also noted that the 'Bog plants of Tierra del Fuego' were less numerous in the Berkeley Sound area of the Falklands; he may have meant the pillow-like plant known today to the Falkland Islanders as 'Balsam-bog' (Bolax gummifera), which still grows in the area.

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Cants antarcticus"'

Figure 9.13 The Falklands fox or warrah

Source: Illustration from Zoology of the Voyage, Part 2.

* Darwin and his colleagues placed the warrah in the genus Canis. The modern scientific

name for the creature (now extinct) is Dusicyon australis.

Thus Darwin is suggesting that although there are important singularities about the Falkland Islands biota, there are also appreciable similarities with Tierra del Fuego. 'The plants and insects' common to the two archipelagoes, he noted, 'might easily be transported from Tierra del [Fuego] in the SW furious gales.' He had had proof in his hand of the manner in which insects and dust had been carried hundreds of miles from the coast of Africa, to the Beagle, far out to sea (pp. 38-9).

He thought about the possibility of dispersal by sea for some organisms, but with some creatures he thought this route was unlikely: 'Earth worms, from salt water being so deadly a poison is a difficult animal to account for by accidental transportation.'34 On the other hand, even while he was watching the upland geese feeding on the open hillsides, he seems to have appreciated that migratory birds might provide a mechanism for the carriage of seeds from South America: 'Migrations of geese in Falkland Islnds as connection with Rio Negro.'35

Darwin does not seem to have set foot upon West Falkland. However, some of the crew of the Beagle, Captain Brisbane and others with whom he came into contact did so. Specimens were collected from both islands. The differences between the foxes on the two islands attracted his attention:

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Out of the four specimens of the Foxes on board, the three [larger ones, deleted] are darker and come from the East; there is a smaller & rusty coloured one which comes from West Island; Lowe states that all from this island are smaller & of this shade of colour.36

Darwin spent many weeks at Berkeley Sound, East Falkland, in the southern hemisphere autumns of 1833 and 1834. There was much that he did not like. He saw the results of shipwreck and sudden death. The weather was sometime bad; the landscape was desolate. Yet the two stays were of paramount importance to him. Here he used his comparative approach in a whole series of ways: he compared the desolate landscape he saw with the evidence of the existence of a warm, shallow sea, teeming with life in the geological past. He compared the same bare, stony hillsides with the rich, biodiverse kelp-bed community nearby. This in turn he compared with the rich tropical forests he had seen in Brazil a few months earlier. He compared the biota of the Falklands with that of Tierra del Fuego.

We see the young Darwin, following the 1834 visit, half-way through the voyage. By this time he had gained experience, he knew what to look for and how to collect and observe. We also see him arranging his observations around conceptual frameworks that were to be of importance later: the importance of populations of organisms and fecundity; the uniqueness of islands; the importance of long-distance dispersal; the relationship between organisms and their environment; and the behaviour of organisms as a phenomenon worthy of study. All these ideas were employed as he wrote up his notes, sometimes adding to them when new material came to hand during the Falklands sojourns. Geologically we see him 'betwixt and between' the catastrophic view of the world that saw its development in terms of sudden dramatic changes (for example the erroneous notion that the stone-runs had been formed by earthquakes shaking rocks from the hillsides) and the Lyellian gradualist ideas that he was picking up through The Principles of Geology (e.g. the gradual building up of peat, the erosion of strata, and the infilling of the long, narrow inlets through deposition).

Some of the ideas he toyed with did not stand the test of time or were later proved to be wrong - that the long inlets were cut by the sea when it was higher than at present, that the freshwater fish of the Falklands are unique (some may be but some are definitely not), that the behaviour of animals can be satisfactorily described in terms of human emotions and characteristics. However, this matters less than the fact that they contributed to his intellectual development as they were reworked and revised, during the Beagle voyage and later.

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1. Fuller details of the Falklands visits can be found in P. H. Armstrong, Darwin's Desolate Islands: A Naturalist in the Falklands 1833 and 1834 (Chippenham: Picton Publishing, 1992).

2. Diary, 5 March 1833, p. 139.

3. Narrative, p. 279.

4. Diary, 10 March 1834, pp. 216-17.

5. Ibid., 19 March 1834, p. 219.

6. Ibid., 1 March 1834, p. 216.

7. DAR 32.2/136ff.

8. C. Darwin, 'On the Geology of the Falkland Islands', Proceedings of the Geological Society, 2.1 (1846): 267-74.

9. DAR 32.4/144.

10. DAR 32.2/149, reverse.

11. It should be noted that in at least some of these localities evidence now suggests that the shell accumulations are the result of human activity.

12. As for decades before Darwin's day (and for over a century after) the Falklands was a centre for whaling, this might also have been the result of human activity (see note 11, above). It is interesting to note that, although raised beaches can be clearly seen along the Beagle Channel, Darwin does not seem to have commented on this phenomenon in Tierra del Fuego.

13. DAR 32.2/125 (capitalization and punctuation slightly edited).

14. Darwin handed over the fossils to two Geological Society colleagues, John Morris and Daniel Sharpe, who wrote an account of them in a paper in the Proceedings of the Geological Society, 2.1 (1846).

15. DAR 33/167 (reverse).

16. DAR 32.2/147-8.

17. Voyage, p. 189.

18. Letter, Charles Darwin to James Geikie, 13 December 1880; DAR 144.

19. Voyage, p. 189.

20. DAR 33/197.

21. DAR 32.2/148.

22. DAR 32.2/134 (reverse); March 1834.

23. DAR 30.2159-65. Kelp is a giant seaweed that grows prolifically around cool temperate and cold coastlines.

24. DAR 29.2/33. Falklands thrushes are still to be found 'around any old shed' in the Falklands.

25. DAR 31.1/242-3.

26. DAR 29.2/78.

27. DAR 31.1/241-2.

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28. DAR 31.1/240.

29. DAR 31.1/238-9.

30. DAR 31.1/238 (reverse).

31. DAR 30.2/151-2.

32. DAR 31.1/237, April 1834. Some have speculated that warrahs might have come to the Falklands centuries ago as passengers in the canoes of South American Indians, blown far offshore. But they were certainly established in their Falklands home long enough to become quite distinctive. The rats may also have been brought by humans, on ships, but Darwin thought that they were appreciably different from those elsewhere.

33. DAR 31.1/237 (reverse).

34. Ibid.

35. Little Notebook, 1.14, DAR (microfilm).

36. DAR 31.1/237 (reverse).

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10. Chiloe: A Fine Island

The 27 and 28 June 1834 were not good days aboard the Beagle. The voyage from Santa Cruz on the east coast of South America, through the Straits of Magellan and northwards along the islet-strewn west coast of southern South America, although broken by occasional landings, had lasted 47 days. Anchoring places were hard to find. Once the vessel had to 'stand off & on during a long, pitch-dark night of 14 hours ... in a narrow channel'. The landscape was in places desolate. While the ship threaded her way through narrow channels, the Captain and officers were often in a state of anxiety. Night after night gales made it necessary for the ship to be close-reefed; the log records that the winds were often of force 7 or higher, and as Darwin put it, 'when the wind ceased, the great sea prevented us from making any way'.

To add further to the winter gloom of all on board, at 2.00 p.m. on 27 June, George Rowlett, the oldest officer on board and the 'warmly respected' ship's purser, died; 'he had for some time been sinking under a complication of diseases'. Probably the bad weather hastened his end. He was only 38. At 1.30 p.m. the following day, some 40 miles off the north of the Island of Chiloe, the funeral service was read on the quarter-deck and he was buried at sea. Darwin recalled: '[I]t is an awful & solemn sound, that splash of the waters over the body of an old ship-mate.'

It must have been a relief when just before midnight on 28 June, the ship came to off Sandy Point, at the little port of San Carlos (now called Ancud) on the north-west point of the island, the anchor splashing into five fathoms of water.

Morale improved. Although cold, the northerly wind was less severe (force 5) on the 29 June; the ship's crew were paid. The local people rowed out - they greeted the ship with 'unaffected joy', for the timber and other

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Figure 10.1 Map of Chiloe, showing some of the places mentioned in the text

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Chiloe: A Fine Island

goods bought by ships such as the Beagle represented a substantial input of cash into the community. Over the course of the next twelve days, the Beagle purchased over 1,250 lb (approx. 570 kg) of meat (beef and pork), vegetables, and substantial quantities of wood, to the substantial benefit to the local economy. Daylight on 1 July revealed the Adventure (the ship that FitzRoy had acquired to assist with the survey work), at anchor off the small fort (Fuerte S. Antonio), which still exists, above and a few hundred metres to the north of the little harbour.

Later that day, Darwin explored 'the small straggling dirty village' that was San Carlos, and walked up one of the small, winding creeks, examining the forest and the patches of cleared land, geologizing and botanizing. The next few days he spent in and around the town, similarly occupied, and also collecting large numbers of beetle specimens. One day he walked a few miles along the rough road towards Castro, the old capital of the island, noting that after about two miles (3 km) the track entered the thick forest which covered most of the island.

For most of his first visit to Chiloe the weather was extremely poor, although there were three fine days, and Darwin wrote: 'one morning before sunrise we had a very fine view of the Volcano of Osorno [on the mainland]; it stood out in dark relief. He also complained: 'I do not suppose any part of the world is so rainy as the island of Chiloe' and 'at this time of year nothing but an amphibious animal could tolerate the climate of Chiloe'. It was a 'miserable place'. On 13 July, therefore, all on the Beagle were glad to leave Chiloe, even though they had a false start: the wind failed and they had to anchor for the night. As he departed, Darwin wrote hopefully in his Diary: 'In summer, when we return, I dare say Chiloe will wear a more cheerful face.'

And so she did. As the Beagle approached the northern tip of the island from Valparaiso, on the morning of 21 November 1834, there was a force 4 breeze; it was slightly squally, the sails had to be frequently trimmed and adjusted, and white clouds pulled across a blue sky.1 'The island wore a pleasing aspect', wrote Darwin, 'with the sun shining brightly on the patches of cleared ground & dusky green woods.' Later that evening, however, he recalled: 'we were convinced that it was Chiloe, by torrents of rain & a gale of wind'.

The next day or two saw many of the crew repairing sails and loading food and freshwater, while at 8.00 a.m. on 24 November, Lieutenant Sulivan and a small number of crew left the ship with the whale-boat and yawl, planning to check the correctness of hydrographic charts on the eastern (i.e. mainland-facing) coast of the island. The young naturalist was keen to accompany them, but, hiring mounts in San Carlos, travelled east

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as far as Chacao along the coast on horseback. His servant Syms Covington went along, and summarized the voyage in his own diary in these terms:

Left the ship, the 24th at San Carlos. Went in a yawl to survey [the] different islands of the archipelago, which are very woody and [the] ground moist. [We] came to anchor every night; pitched our tents, and of course slept on shore with a watch, or lookout man, throughout the night. As most of the islands are peopled, we always had plenty of fresh provisions, and [the] expenses of which were very little, as we often bought a sheep for two or three negro-heads of tobacco; pigs, fowls, eggs potatoes & bread in like manner. & also milk. The natives are very sociable and willing to oblige in general. Patches of cultivated ground were seen on all the islands which we passed and stopt [sic] at. We were up with the break of day every morning, took breakfast and sailed; and every afternoon found a creek or inlet to anchor in, allowing sufficient time to get every thing that was necessary on shore before dark. During our passage from place to place, we had many fine views of the Cordillera, and also of some of its active volcanoes, from which we could see from the distance, vast volumes of smoke arising, as if from a furnace only on so great a scale.2

In his own diary, Darwin notes that the expedition took the whale-boat, as well as the yawl, and so it was obviously a fair-sized group. It included a Mr Douglas, surveyor, long resident in Chiloe, who was temporarily employed as a pilot.

Darwin noted that, for much of the way to Chacao that first day, the land was forested. The whole road was built of logs and the ground was so damp that, were it not for this, 'neither man nor horse could pass along'. Round the village, however, the land had been cleared.

By the time he arrived at Chacao, the tents had been pitched. Darwin's comments on the folk he met and their conversation are of interest:

In a short time the bare-footed Governor's son came down to reconnoitre us; seeing the English flag hoisted to the yawl's mast head, he asked with the utmost indifference, whether it was always to fly at Chacao. In several places the inhabitants were much astonished at the appearance of men-of-war's boats, & hoped & believed it was the forerunners of a Spanish fleet coming to recover the island from the patriot Government of Chili . . . Whilst [we were] eating our supper, the Governor paid us a visit; he had been a Lieut. Colonel in the Spanish service, but was now miserably poor. He gave us two

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sheep & accepted in return two cotton handkerchiefs, some brass trinkets & a little tobacco.3

The next day, 25 November, there were 'torrents of rain', and southward progress must have been a struggle, but they managed to get down the coast as far as 'Huapilenou'. I have not been able to locate this with certainty,4 but the latter part of the name might be a contortion of Linao, about 20 km (or about a slow day's direct sail) south of Chacao.

The following day, however, 'rose splendidly clear', and the view toward the north-east and east, the Cordillera standing out against the blue sky, was magnificent. Darwin recorded:

The volcano of Osorno was spouting out volumes of smokes; this most beautiful mountain, formed like a perfect cone & white with snow, stands out in front of the cordillera. Another great volcano, with a saddle shaped summit, also emitted from its immense crater little jets of steam or white smoke. Subsequently we saw the lofty-peaked Corcobado . . . Thus we saw at one point of view three great volcanoes, each of which had an elevation of about seven thousand feet.5

During the course of the day, Darwin and his colleagues landed on a point to take observations, possibly Punta Lobos (which is shown on modern Chilean maps as supporting a triangulation point) and met with a family 'of pure Indian extraction'. Darwin thought that the father was rather like York Minster (see p. 2). They could speak a very little Spanish. He reported that they camped for the night of 26 November in a 'beautiful little cove' to the north of the island of 'Caucahuo' (the modern name is Caucahue).

The next two days were also fine, and by the evening of the 28th the two little boats reached the Island of Quinchao: a relatively low island, running north-west to south-east, about 22 miles (35 km) in length and from one to six miles (1.5-10 km) in width, and which, even in Darwin's day, had been substantially cleared of forest for the raising of pigs and the growing of potatoes.

By the morning of Sunday, 30 November they had reached the ancient capital of the island, Castro. They wandered round, viewing the picturesque wooden church, marvelled at the 'truly deserted city', the streets and plaza of which were covered with a fine green turf on which sheep were grazing. The arrival of the two boatloads of Englishmen was a significant event in this quiet corner, and the few people that lived there came out to watch the tents being pitched. It was another rainy night, and despite this some of the onlookers remained. They were friendly, though: the voyagers were offered

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the use of a house, and given a cask of cider. They paid their respects to the Governor, a 'quiet old man', and in the afternoon Darwin borrowed a horse and went out riding to examine the geology of the neighbourhood.

On Monday, 1 December, the boat was steered southwards along Estero Castro (the Castro Estuary) passing a series of tiny villages, each with its own capella, to the north coast of the Island of Lemuy. Darwin seems to have suggested this landfall as he wanted to examine a coalmine that had been reported to him; it turned out to be of poor-quality lignite. The group had difficulty in finding a camping place, as it was the time of spring tides, and the island was in many places wooded to the high water mark. There were Indian families who wanted to trade (again tobacco and cloth were given in exchange for meat and 'a large bunch of onions'). The local people told them that the visit had been predicted by the large numbers of parrots seen immediately prior to their arrival, and the cheucau (a small bird) had been calling 'beware'. Again the local people gave the shipmates little trouble: they were 'obliging and humble', but no chances were taken:

The Yawl at this place was anchored some way from the shore & we had fears for her safety during the night. Our pilot, Mr Douglas, accordingly told the constable of the district, that we always placed sentinels with loaded arms, & not understanding Spanish, if we saw any person in the dark, we should assuredly shoot him. The constable, with much humility, agreed to the propriety of this consequence & promised us that no one should stir out of his house during the night.6

Little progress was made on 2 December, as the day was calm, and the boats only reached the southern point of the Isle of Lemuy (probably close to the point now known as Punta Detif). Of 3 December, the young naturalist wrote lyrically in his journal:

During our last visit, I fancied Chiloe never enjoyed such a day as this: I cannot imagine a more beautiful scene, than the snowy cones of the Cordilleras seen over the inland sea of glass, only here &c there rippled by a Porpoise or logger-headed duck.7 And I admired this view from a cliff adorned with sweet-smelling evergreens, where the bright colored [sic], smooth trunks, the parasitical plants, the ferns, the arborescent grasses, all reminded me of the Tropics, neither did the temperature recall me to reality.8

On 4 and 5 December the weather was squally. Probably for part of the 4th the yawl was ploughing down the eastern side of the almost completely forested and largely uninhabited island of Tranqui (Darwin writes 'Tanqui'). There were landings for taking survey measurements and botan-

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Figure 10.2 Gunner a at Cucao, Chiloe

izing, for he describes finding large Gunnera plants on soft sandstone cliffs. On the 6th the group reached the island of Cailin ('Caylen' in Darwin's diary), just offshore of what is today the fishing settlement of Quellon. This place he refers to simply as 'el fin del Christiandad'' - the end of Christendom - but of it Darwin says little more. On 7 December they stopped for a few minutes at 'the extreme North point of the Isd of Laylec' (Laitec on modern maps), a small islet about 4 km south of Quellon. There was a single house there, the last house of South American Christendom, and Darwin noted, 'a miserable hovel it was. The people were miserably poor & as usual begged for a little tobacco.' Charles gives the latitude here as about '43°10'S'; this says a lot for Lieutenant Sulivan's navigational skill: it is exactly correct, within a few seconds of a degree.

Bearing in mind the struggle they had with the 'foul wind' and the swell as they came nearer to the open waters close to the southern tip of the island, good time was made, and by the evening of 8 December they reached the island of San Pedro at the southeastern extremity of Chiloe; the Beagle was there to meet them. Darwin continues that 'while doubling the point of the harbor [sic]1 - probably Punta Plutipoye - he and a couple of other officers landed 'to take a round of angles', or make a series of survey observations. A 'fox' watched them for awhile; it sat on the point and was so absorbed in watching the surveyors' activities that it allowed Darwin to

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walk up behind it. He killed the creature with his geological hammer. George Waterhouse who later studied the mammals that Darwin collected on the Beagle voyage identified the rather small, dark brown, almost black, animal as Canis fulcipes. Modern scientific thought places the organism in the genus Dusicyon along with a number of other South American canids, including the extinct Falklands fox or wolf {Dusicyon australis), all of which had a reputation for tameness and inquisitiveness.9

On 8 December a party led by FitzRoy attempted to climb to the summit of the Island of San Pedro, which the Captain thought was the highest point in the Chiloe group. (It was not: the peak is 536 m in altitude; there are a couple of points in the centre of the main island that are 777 m high.) But the climb was doomed, as Darwin recalled:

In vain we tried to gain the summit: the wood is so intricate that a person who has never seen it will not be able to imagine such a confused mass of dead & dying trunks. I am sure oftentimes for a quarter of an hour our feet never touched the ground, being generally from 10 to 20 feet above it; other times, like foxes, one after another we crept on our hands & knees under the rotten trunks.10

Smaller creatures than the fox also interested Darwin on the islet of San Pedro; he seems to have used his sweep-net, and searched dead wood for insects, and obtained a goodly number of flies, beetles and others. A specimen of Elater luteipennis 'from a considerable height' on San Pedro is preserved in the Natural History Museum in London.11

Thereafter the crew of the Beagle left Chilotan waters, and cruised for five weeks among the islets of the Chonos Archipelago, south of Chiloe, but on 15 January 1835 they steered for the south-west point of the island. They attempted on the 16th to survey part of the western coast, but the weather became very bad and they 'ran to an anchorage', losing one of the ship's anchors. Darwin undertook a little geology onshore that evening. The bad weather continued: 'the rain in this country never seems tired of pouring down', he complained. The next couple of days they 'made a good run', tracking parallel to the outer coast of the island, noting that in its forested nature and whitish cliffs it was similar to the inner coast, and by noon on 18 January were close to San Carlos (Ancud). On the 19th Darwin asked to be put ashore and examined the geology of the Peninsula Lacui, to the north-west of the port. That night the Osorno Volcano on the mainland was active again:

... at 12 o'clock [midnight] the Sentry observed something like a large star, from which state it gradually increased in size till three o'clock,

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Figure 10.3 Temperate forest, Chiloe

when most of the officers were on deck watching it. It was a very magnificent sight; by the aid of a glass, in the midst of the great red glare of light, dark objects in a constant succession might be seen to be thrown up & fall down. The light was sufficient to cast on the water a long bright shadow. By the morning the Volcano seemed to have regained its composure.12

The Captain wanted to take a few more observations along the western coast of the island, and it was agreed that Darwin and Midshipman King should ride south to Castro, and then across the island to the west coast. It is not clear whether Covington accompanied them. There is no mention of this trip in Covington's diary, so perhaps not.13 In any event, horses and a guide were hired, and they set out on the morning of 22 January. Darwin mentions that they were accompanied for part of the way by a woman and two boys, commenting that wayfarers on Chiloe always seemed friendly, and he enjoyed the privilege 'so rare in S. America' of travelling without firearms. As it was high summer, the road, made of logs laid transversely or

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parallel to the road's direction, was reasonably good. The weather was beautiful and Darwin clearly enjoyed the ride through thick forest, the flowers of many of the trees giving the air a fragrance. He also noted the 'high enjoyment' of bivouacking with 'the sight of a multitude of stars which brightened the darkness of the forest'.

They started very early the next morning and arrived at the old town of Castro at 2.00 p.m.; the old Governor having died since their previous visit, one Don Pedro held the position. He was most hospitable, procuring fresh horses and offering to accompany the visitors himself. On they went to the south (24 January). At the tiny settlement of Vilepilli [now Vilopulli], Don Pedro's opposite number, the Commandante, could not understand why a group of Englishmen should wish to go to such an out-of-the-way place as Cucao on the west coast: 'But where are you really going' he asked, 'What is the good of deceiving me?' Both local dignitaries accompanied them along a poor road to the west of Chonchi, meeting a small herd of cattle which had just been collected at a 'rodeo', and onward through wooded country, here and there a fragment of cleared ground planted with corn and potatoes. When they arrived at Vilinco, marked today on maps as Huillinco, the Commandante, in a peremptory manner, ordered a group of six local Indian men to take them by a periagua, a 'strange rough boat', along the lake, about 18 km long and 1 km wide, that runs east-west across part of the island. Charles Darwin 'did not think that six uglier little men were ever in a boat together', but they rowed cheerfully enough, even with a good deal of strange crying out, at the rate of about three miles an hour. The group arrived at Capella de Cucao after nightfall; they camped comfortably enough in the crude hovel used by the priest on his intermittent visits to the neighbourhood.

Darwin noted that the population of Cucao was 'about thirty or forty Indians, scattered along four or five miles of shore, & with out a single Spanish resident'. To this day it remains a humble settlement, but is the access point for the Chiloe National Park, so it has certain minimal tourist facilities. Until recently there was just a ferry linking the poor road east to Chonchi and Castro with the track northwards towards the Park, but this has recently (5 July 1999) been replaced by a massive concrete bridge, surely constructed for political rather than economic reasons. There is still a strong Amerindian element in the population; on horseback with their ponchos flapping in the breeze these folk constitute a picturesque element in the landscape.

Although they were impoverished, exchanging the products of sealing for products from the outside world, and abused by their rulers, Darwin and his friends got along very well with Indians, once they had them on their own. They gave cigars, mate and sugar, the last of which was a great curiosity.

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The following day (25 January), Darwin and King were determined to continue back to the north of the island along the west coast, but they were told that it was 'quite impracticable' (there were still - in 2000 - no roads through this thickly forested country), and they were only able to get to 'P. Huantamo' (correctly, Punta Huentemo). The road lay along a very broad beach, on which, even after some days of fine weather, 'a terrible surf was breaking'. Darwin's accounts mention 'difficulty in reaching the point', 'intolerably bad paths', 'a perfect quagmire', 'a sea . . . eternally roaring' and a 'coast. . . exceedingly rugged and broken'. They could go no further by that route. Of the place where they turned back Darwin wrote:

The point itself is a bold rocky hill. It is covered by a plant allied, I believe to the bromelias, with little recurved hooks on the leaves, & which the inhabitants call Chepones.14 In scrambling through..., our hands were very much scratched . .. This plant bears a fruit, in shape like an artichoke, in which a number of seed-vessels are packed together; which contain a pleasant sweet pulp,... here much esteemed.15

Elsewhere Darwin saw the Chilotans making chichi, a drink a little like cider, from this fruit.

The return to the ship, along the route they had come, was uneventful. They crossed the lake in the periagua, and then collected their horses, reaching Castro after dark on the 26th and dining with the Commandante. Darwin noted that several days of continuous fine weather were being utilized by the Chilotans to clear patches of forest by burning: 'in every direction volumes of smoke were curling upwards', he noted, marvelling that seldom did the fires get out of control to make fire-damage extensive. Leaving Castro in the very early morning of the 27th they paused for a moment on the steep brow of a hill to consider

an extensive view of the great forest, over the horizon of trees the Volcanoes of Corcovado and the great flat-topped one to the north, stood out in proud pre-eminence... I hope it will be long before I forget this farewell view of the magnificent Cordillera fronting Chiloe.16

One more night spent 'bivouacked under a cloudless sky' followed, and on the morning of 28 January the group arrived back in San Carlos. Not a moment too soon, for that evening the rain started, once again, in earnest. The next couple of days saw mixed weather; Darwin went on short geological excursions, sometimes with a guide, sometimes without. For 10.00 a.m. on the morning of 4 February, the log records, 'His Majesty's Surveying Sloop Beagle weighed anchor and made all sail.' On leaving Chiloe Darwin noted that he had now 'well seen' the island, having both circumnavigated

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it, and crossed it in two directions. He might have added that he had seen it in all its moods, winter and summer, under bright sunlight and under heavy, continuing rain. It was one of the most thorough island surveys that he undertook during the Beagle voyage.

Let us now consider the fruits of this survey, and the results of his many-faceted observations.

One of the most important accomplishments might at first appear of little significance. We have seen that the young naturalist was frequently collecting and studying marine creatures: an interest developed while a student at Edinburgh, wandering along the shores of the Firth of Forth. Along the shores of Chiloe, as well as sea-anemones, sea-cucumbers and sea-slugs, shells and fish, he collected specimens of acorn barnacles. His zoological notes record: 'Great Balanius (for dissection) Chiloe. Are esteemed very good eating, grow to 5 or 6 times the size of the specimen; sometimes at the lowest spring tides can be seen, generally grow in deeper water.'17 These massive barnacles, often 20 cm across, something of a speciality on Chiloe and elsewhere in southern Chile, are locally considered excellent eating, and can be seen by the crate-load in local fish-markets. Barnacles were the focus of Darwin's scientific studies for over eight years after his return, investigations that had their origins during the Beagle years. This species is mentioned in his great work on the group, A Monograph on the Sub-class Cirripedia (Ray Society, 1851-54), that established his scientific credentials, besides giving him insights into the general nature of species. In this work he gives a very detailed description, although the illustration is poor and rather small; he uses the name Balanus psittacus:

This, which is the largest known species of the genus ranges from Peru (Arica being the most northern spot, whence I have seen specimens), along the coast of Chile, where it is abundant at a few fathoms' depth, at least as far as southern Chiloe . . . [T]his Balanus, when cooked, is universally esteemed as a delicious article of food.18

Darwin carefully notes the habitat of the barnacle; as we have seen from an early stage of the voyage he was considering the relationship between organisms and their environment, and with other species. He did this with terrestrial species of invertebrate too. He noted, during the 1834 visit that a type of dung beetle was exceedingly abundant, boring deep holes beneath every heap of horse dung and, he wrote, 'once I saw sheep's'. They formed large 'earth-balls', from which the larvae eventually ate their way out. He identified these as Geotrupes. The actual specimens seem to have been lost. Darwin noted that it was a curious instance of a change in habitat, as before

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the arrival of stock there had been no large quadrupeds on Chiloe. Perhaps before the arrival of larger animals these creatures acted as scavengers to humans, he postulated later.19

Darwin collected dozens of insects on Chiloe and the nearby islets: by sweeping with a net in vegetation, by investigating carrion, dung and fungi, pulling apart tufts of moss growing on trees and turning over stones in streams. Many of these specimens were beetles - his life-long enthusiasm -including Chrasognathus grantii that squeaked or 'clacked', but there were other much smaller creatures that attracted his attention: he collected both fleas and lice from human subjects and prepared the following note on lice (written in July 1834, in the hand of Covington):

Pediculi V. - account Chiloe

These disgusting vermin are very abundant in Chiloe: Several people have assured me that they are quite different from the Lice in England: They are said to be larger and softer (hence they will not crack under the nail) they infest the body even more than the head, - I should suppose they originally come from the Indians, whose race is so predominant with these Islanders. I have little doubt this is the kind so common amongst the Patagonians of Gregory Bay; they are said to be there very large . . . Mr Martial, a surgeon of an English Whaler assures me that the Lice of the Sandwich Islanders are blacker and different from these, or any lice which he ever saw. Several of the natives lived for months ... in the ship, no efforts could free their bodies from these parasites but he assures me as a certain fact, known to every one on board, that their Lice if they strayed to the bodies of the English in 3 or 4 days died, and were found adhering to the linen ... So that the sailors, who constantly slept close to the Sandwichers were constantly infested by their vermin. - If these facts were verified their interest would be great. - Man springing from one stock according his varieties having different species of parasites.20

Interestingly, in the version of this account in the Zoological Diary, the following words are added and then crossed out: 'It leads one into many speculations.' The speculations continued, for Darwin included a paraphrase of this material in The Descent of Man (1871), in his discussion of the relationships between the different races of humans. This is one of the earliest examples of a Darwin note that touches on human evolution. As always he was comparing his findings with those of others and aspects of one island (and mainland) with those of another.

Darwin was extremely observant of the avifauna of Chiloe. Here is his account from the Birds volume of The Zoology of the Voyage of the

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Beagle21 of one of the most spectacular: the grey or brown petrel (Procellaria cinera; Darwin uses Puffinus cinerus):

It generally frequents the retired inland sounds in very large flocks; although occasionally two or three may be seen out at sea. I do not think I saw ever so many birds of any other sort together, as I once saw of these petrels, behind [i.e. to the east of] the island of Chiloe. Hundreds of thousands flew in an irregular line, for several hours in one direction. When part of the flock settled on the water, the surface was blackened; and a cackling noise proceeded from them, as of human beings talking in the distance. At this time, the water was covered by clouds of small Crustacea. The inhabitants of Chiloe told me that this petrel was very irregular in its movements; sometimes they appeared in vast numbers, and on the next day there was not one to be seen . . . Their flight was direct and vigorous and they seldom glided with extended wings in graceful curves, like most other members of this family. They are very wary, and seldom approach within gun-shot of a boat or ship: a disposition strikingly different from that of most of the other species.22

He went on to note that inside the stomach of one he (or probably Covington) managed to shoot were 'seven prawn-like crabs' and in another 'the beak of a small cuttlefish'. This account is interesting for the amount of information it contains on the behaviour of the species - flight, social behaviour, voice, wariness are all recorded. Darwin compares the behaviour with that of other species. The account is also to some extent ecological, for the food and habitat are noted. Not only was he an excellent observer, distinguishing carefully his own observations from those of others, but he observed in a rather different way from many naturalists of his day who were mainly concerned with the appearance of an organism.

He applied the same approach to small forest species, and he noted a number on Chiloe. Here is his account, from the notes in his Zoological Diary of the Chucao tapaculo (Scelorcbilus rubecula, or Pteropteros rube-cula in Darwin's day):

[this bird is] . . . called by the Chilotans Cheucau. - It is common in Chiloe, extends at least as far as 47°S, but further North than 37°, where the woody country ceases it can not been seen. This bird frequents the most gloomy & retired spots in the humid forests. At some times although its cry may be heard it cannot with the greatest attention be seen; but generally by standing motionless in the wood, it will appear within a few feet in the most familiar manner. It busily hops, its

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tail vertically cocked upwards amidst the impervious mass of rotting canes and branches. The gizzard is muscular, it contained hard seeds, bits of plants and vegetable fibres, mixed with bits of stones, in a specimen killed further to the south, there were also some scanty remains of insects. It is said to build nests in low bushes or amongst sticks close to the ground. This bird is known and held in superstitious dread by the natives on account of the strange & varied cry [sic] it utters: the most used is the loud singular and repeated whistle. There are altogether three distinct [cries]; one is called the chiduco & is an omen of good, another huitreu which is unfavourable. These names are given in imitation of the sounds; by which the natives are governed! - The Chilotans have chosen a most comical little bird for their prophet.23

The account is anthropomorphic, attributing human characteristics to birds: - they are 'busy' or 'comical'. (He also described the caracara as 'bold' in relation to mankind, but displaying 'cowardice to other animals'.) But the level of detail on behaviour, ecology and the local folklore relating to the bird is excellent. Darwin was once again ahead of his time in his emphasis on behaviour.

By the time that Darwin visited Chiloe he had had considerable experience of other localities in South America and of other island environments. When he first stepped ashore at San Carlos (Ancud) he immediately compared the forests with those of Tierra del Fuego to which he felt, from a distance, the vegetation bore 'a very close resemblance'. He went on, however: 'The woods are incomparably more beautiful' than those of Tierra del Fuego; in contrast to the 'dusky uniformity' of the southern island 'we have the variety of Tropical scenery'. He noted in his diary:

... excepting in Brazil I have never seen such an abundance of elegant forms. Chiloe, situated on the West coast, enjoys a very uniform temperature, & an atmosphere saturated with moisture; the soil resulting from volcanic ashes appears very fertile; hence arises the teeming luxuriance of the forests.24

Here he is making a three-fold comparison amongst the tropical rainforests of eastern Brazil, the damp, cool, temperate forests of southern Chile and the much less complex woodland of the southern tip. The use of the term 'biodiversity' lay a century and a half in the future, but Darwin clearly understood the relationship amongst the variety of species present, structural complexity, climate and soil.

He also has an eye for detail: he mentioned the flowering trees which so 'perfumed the air', the bromeliads, the bamboo-like grasses that make the

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forests so difficult to cut through in places, the Winter's bark (Drimys winteri), the southern beech (Nothofagus nitida), which he thought were stunted and close to their northern limit. The species he describes, and his account of the fern-drooped, tangled, dripping forest strike a chord with the modern traveller who has encountered one of the areas of original forest of Chiloe, such as those in the Chiloe National Park, near Cucao on the west coast. The dead trunks, he thought, gave the forests a 'solemnity'; a common feature of 'old growth' forests is the occurrence of dead and near-dead timber. Here is his diary account of another plant that can still be seen growing prolifically along Chiloe's coasts:

I noticed . . . growing on the cliffs of soft sandstone some very fine plants of the Pangi, which somewhat resembles the rhubarb on a gigantic scale. The inhabitants eat the stalks, which are sub-acid, & with the root tan leather & prepare a black dye. (The stalks are called Nalca, so indeed is the plant sometimes.) The leaf is much indented in its margin is nearly circular; the diameter of one was nearly 8 feet [approx 2.4 m] (giving a circumference of 24 feet! [7.3 m]): the stalk rather more than a yard [0.9 m] high: each plant throws out from four to six of these enormous leaves & a group of them thus has a very fine appearance.25

Throughout his wanderings Darwin was always careful to record details of the human communities he visited; a particular focus was the manner in which humanity impacted on the landscape. His notes on the Chilotans are perceptive: he records their languages, economy (including their simple agriculture), diet, religion and even politics. He described the 'few scattered green patches' that have been cleared close to the settlements, and the long roads, often built of planks through the dark forests between the tiny towns and villages. He noted that a recent census had recorded the population of Chiloe and adjacent islands as 42,000; in 1999 it was given as 130,688. Potatoes, pigs and fish were the food staples. Cattle, sheep, goats and a few fowls were also kept, as indeed they still were in 2000. He describes how he saw potatoes growing wild, two or three feet high, in the sandy soil. Corn and capsicum (peppers) are also mentioned. Apples were also important, and he notes a distinctive method of cultivation:

Apple Trees

In Chiloe the inhabitants have a mode of propagating trees so that in three years it is possible to have an orchard of large fruit-bearing trees. At the lower part of every branch, there are small (2 or 3 l/10th of an inch) conical, brown, wrinkled projecting points; these are roots, as may be seen when any mud [?] has fallen on the tree. - A branch of a

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tree as thick as a man's thigh is chosen & is cut off just below a group of points, this is done very early in the spring: the extremities of all the sub-branches being lopped off. The ensuing summer it throws out very long shoots, & sometimes bears a few apples (I saw one which had most unusually produced as many as 23), the 2nd summer the former shoots throw out others: in the third summer it bears a good deal of fruit &c is (as I have seen) a well wooded tree. Are the incipient roots present in trees in any part of England? I have noticed that the Applies [sic] not one in a hundred will have any seeds in its core.26

Besides the economic interest of this passage, it marks one of the first detailed references in Darwin's notes to the propagation of cultivated plants. Later he became extremely interested in the matter of the inheritance of the characteristics of domestic plants and animals, and the topic represented one of the ways in which he approached evolution: there was a similarity in which humans selected particular strains in such organisms, and the natural selection that powered evolution. His book Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication appeared in 1868. While on the Beagle Darwin did not develop the connection between the importance of vegetative propagation and the absence of seeds (seeds being the result of sexual reproduction and therefore essential for variation from generation to generation, the seed receiving genetic material from the two parents), but his interest in the topic, in view of the later significance of it in his work, is of note.

The modern visitor to Chiloe is certain to enjoy seafood. Various types of shellfish are harvested, and fish-farming (especially of salmon) is practised in an efficient, scientific manner in some of the inlets. Some deeper sea fishing is undertaken, and there is a large fish-processing works at Quellon. The tradition is a long one. On 1 December 1834 Darwin was on the islet of Lemuy, off the east coast of the main island, and noted: 'The people here live chiefly on shell-fish and potatoes; at certain seasons they catch also, in "corales" or hedges under water, many fish which are left as the tide falls, dry on the mud-banks.'

Another feature of the island that is apparent to the modern visitor is the high proportion of the inhabitants with Amerindian blood. Darwin, on each of his visits, commented on relations between the 'Indians' and the 'Spaniards'. He stated that although the social position of the latter was higher, sometimes much higher, there was sometimes not a great deal to choose between the two groups in terms of poverty: most of the inhabitants were miserably poor (although, he stated, they had plenty to eat) and there was a good deal of discontent. In several places he tried to analyse the reasons for this.

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There were many that regretted the ascendancy of the 'Patriot government' and the overthrow of the Spanish colonial administration. The revolutionaries' success had come in 1818, but it was some years after this that the new government's authority had extended to the very south of Chile: the effects of the transition were strongly in the mind of the people. Indeed, folk at some of the remote settlements at which the Beagle (or her boats) put ashore genuinely wondered whether the visit might represent the advance guard of some Spaniard-led taskforce attempting to regain control. Darwin summarized the situation at the time of his first visit, in July 1834:

Many of the old men whom I talked with had good cause to regret former times; they had been veterans in the Spanish armies, & with the fall of the Spanish flag of course they have lost the half-pay to which during their whole lives they had been looking forward. Seventeen of the inhabitants were executed, when the first Governor arrived from the Patriots, for having faithfully served their king. These things rankle long in the minds of men, who live the uniform & retired life, such as the inhabitants of Chiloe.27

Another factor contributing to the poverty was the low level of technology and infrastructure; the main roads were constructed from trunks of trees and the people seemed to have only the simplest of hand-tools, a few horses and the most primitive of boats.

There also seem to have been the most absurd impositions and restrictions on the development of land:

[There are] . . . restrictions of the government, which makes it necessary before buying ever such a small piece to pay two shillings to the Surveyor for measuring each quadra (150 square yards) & whatever price he fixes for the value of the land. After his valuation, the land must be put up for auction & if no one bids more, the purchaser can have it at that rate.

Darwin goes on to comment that these 'enactions must be a serious' check to the clearance of the forest and other development, and that this was one reason why the inhabitants were 'extremely poor'. There were also cases of families clearing and developing land only to have it seized by the government.28

Hand-in-hand with this was the extreme scarcity of capital. Indeed, there was very little currency or coin in circulation. Many of the inhabitants made use of barter; anything to be bought had to be acquired through a series of intermediate barter transactions. It was noted that when a naval vessel such as the Beagle hove to in San Carlos the people were delighted; they wel-

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corned the ship with 'unaffected joy'. The money that they had earned from cutting wood and providing other services and provisions when the ship had visited the port on an earlier voyage 'had enabled them to buy sheep and .. . they had ever since been much better off. Darwin frequently notes that his group when exploring the island had been able to purchase food and other supplies in exchange for a twist or two of tobacco, a few trinkets or a trifling sum. No efficient system of marketing seemed to exist, and indeed the agriculture, such as it was, was of the subsistence type. One informant put it as follows:

... no one can be considered to possess a regular income. Each person raises enough for the consumption of his own family & a little more such as hams & potatoes, which are . . . exchanged for such articles of clothing as they cannot themselves manufacture.29

Darwin was always interested in the various races of people that he met on his voyage, and has a good deal to say on the Indians he encountered, the various groups that existed in the southern part of South America and the language groups of the people. As was his wont, he compared the language spoken by the Chiloe people with those who lived further south; a local guide at one point 'pertinaciously' told him, he noted, 'the Indian name for every little point, rivulet & creek. In the same manner as in T. del Fuego, the Indian language appears singularly well adapted for attaching names to the most minute divisions of land.'

There had been a good deal of intermarriage between persons of Spanish origin and the indigenous people. Darwin noted, not without the tiniest hint of satisfaction, that often persons largely of Indian blood, and retaining their Indian surname, and those who traced their ancestry to the Spanish aristocracy were equally poor. He was also interested in the religion of those with whom he came in contact. At the time Darwin was an orthodox but (despite the fact that a career as a priest had been mooted) not over-enthusiastic member of the Church of England. Yet he usually describes the religious views of those with whom he came into contact without bigotry. He observed the attractive little wooden churches that were to be seen in the settlements and noted that almost all of the inhabitants were Christians, but a few traces of earlier beliefs persisted. Darwin wrote, tantalizingly: 'They [the Chilotans], however, to this day hold superstitious communication in caves with the devil; particulars of the ceremony are not known, because formerly every one convicted of this offence were [sic] sent to the inquisition at Lima.'30

Geology, as on any island that Darwin visited, was a subject for close observation. Time and again he notes that he paused to examine a bed of oysters

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high on a hillside, an exposure of 'primitive micaceous slate', a place where lignite was being worked, or a sandstone cliff. As a result, his notes on the geology of the island are extensive, and formed the basis for a lengthy description in his Geological Observations on South America. Just a few glimpses will be included here, in order to illustrate both his eye for detail and his ability to discern the broad pattern of relationships. He describes the complex network of concretionary markings and veins in a tuff deposit in the northern part of the island:

The following diagram is an accurate representation of a horizontal space of tuff, about four feet [1.3 m] long by two and a half [0.75 m] in width; the double lines represent the fissures partially filled with oxide of iron and agate; the curvilinear lines show the course of the innumerable, concentric, concretionary zones of different shades of colour and of coarseness in the particles of tuff.31

Yet on the basis of his scattered observations he attempts an overview of the geology of the island:

This fine island is about a hundred miles [160 km] in length. The entire southern part, and the whole western coast, consists of mica-schist, which likewise is seen in the ravines of the interior. The central mountains rise to a height of 3,000 feet [915 m; in fact the highest spot height on modern maps appears to be 777 m], and are said to be partly formed of granite and greenstone: there are two small volcanic districts. The eastern coast, and large parts of the northern extremity are composed of gravel, the boulder formation, and underlying horizontal strata. The latter are well displayed for twenty miles [32 km] north and South of Castro; they vary in character from common sandstone to fine-grained, laminated mudstones . . . some of the beds might be called volcanic grit-stones.32

One of the preoccupations of Darwin for much of the voyage was with changes in sea level. The modern geographer, noting the long inlets to which the name ria is sometimes given, alternating with extended promontories or peninsulas, and the scatter of offshore islets sees evidence of a 'drowned' coastline - of a landscape once dissected by river action that has been partially submerged by a rise in sea level. Curiously, although Darwin encountered this type of environment in many parts of the world - southern Chile, Tierra del Fuego, New Zealand, south-west Australia, Tasmania, the Falkland Islands - this interpretation did not occur to him. He frequently emphasized uplift of coastal areas. The second chapter of his book on the

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geology of South America is entitled: 'On the Elevation of the Western Coast of South America'. Today the complex interplay of the rise in sea levels following glaciation and both upward and downward tectonic movements, both long- and short-term, has been subjected to detailed consideration. For Darwin it was the rise in the land relative to the sea that was of paramount importance. His review of the evidence from Chiloe is lengthy. Here is a fragment; the comparative approach and the careful distinction between his own observation and those (and the deductions) of others is typical.

The Island of Chiloe

The evidence of recent elevation is here more satisfactory [than localities further south]. The bay of San Carlos is in most parts bounded by precipitous cliffs from ten to forty feet [3-13 m] in height, their bases being separated from the present line of tidal action by a talus, a few feet in height, covered with vegetation. In one sheltered creek (west of P. Arena), instead of loose talus there was a bare sloping bank of tertiary mudstone, perforated, above the line of the highest tides, by numerous shells of a Pholas33 now common in the harbour. The upper extremities of these shells, standing upright in their holes with grass growing out of them, were abraded about a quarter of an inch, to the same level as the surrounding worn strata. In other parts I observed ... a great beach, formed of comminuted shells, twenty feet above the present shore. In other parts again there were small caves worn into the foot of the low cliffs, and protected from the waves by the talus with its vegetation; one such cave which I examined had its mouth about twenty feet [6 m], and its bottom, which was filled with sand containing the fragments of shells and legs of crabs, from eight to ten feet [2.5-3 m] above the high-water mark. From these several facts, and from the appearance of the upraised shells, I inferred that the elevation had been quite recent; and on enquiring from Mr Williams, the Portmaster, he told me he was convinced that the land had risen, or the sea fallen, four feet [1.2 m] over the last four years. During this period there had been one severe earthquake, but no particular change of level was then observed; from the habits of the people who keep boats in the protected creeks, it is absolutely impossible that a rise of four feet could have taken place suddenly and been unperceived. Mr Williams believes that the change has been quite gradual.34

Darwin went on to acknowledge that without further fairly rapid elevation, the talus at the foot of the cliffs would quite rapidly be eroded away, and

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mentioned that there was evidence that 'one such talus, with a footpath on it was already sensibly decreasing in width'.35

Since fairly early in the voyage, Darwin had been turning over in his mind the ideas of the gradualist or uniformitarian ideas of Lyell36 and contrasting them with the catastrophist notions at that time more fashionable. About three weeks after the final departure from Chiloe, on 20 February 1835, he experienced a spectacular earthquake while at Valdivia, and a few days after that saw for himself the devastation it had wrought on the town of Concepcion. Darwin thought that he had evidence of a rise in the land relative to the sea (in Chiloe and elsewhere), but he was uncertain whether it was slow or more rapid, associated with earthquakes.

Objectively, Chiloe was one of the most important islands that Darwin visited. By the time that he arrived there he had found his 'sea legs'. He knew what to look for; he had over two years of field experience; he was able to delegate some of the routine collecting work to Covington; he was observing well and his note-taking was excellent. He seems to have had a sufficiently good relationship with FitzRoy and his other shipmates to be able to get them to set him down and pick him up where he wanted. He spent in total several weeks on and near to Chiloe, more than on almost any other island groups. He was able, while at Chiloe, to pursue almost every one of the intellectual themes on which he had been working up to that point in the voyage.

Darwin's interest in marine and sea-shore life resulted in him collecting some giant barnacles that were to lead to a ten-year study. He had looked at birds (and other organisms) from the point of view of their relationship with their habitat and their behaviour, and from his geological observations was beginning to place them in the context of the geology of South America as a whole, particularly in relation to the matter of changes in sea level. He had made the acquaintance of a human community very different from his own and considered it against the backdrop of its environment, commenting on the structure of its society. He had made observations on domestic animals and plants. Almost every one of the important books he wrote in later life had some antecedent in the observations he made on Chiloe. Above all, perhaps, he had visited sufficient other islands - Cape Verde, Tierra del Fuego, the Falklands and the Chiloe's nearby islets - as well as mainland environments in several parts of South America for his comparison skills to become well honed. Perhaps he knew this. When he left he felt he had 'well seen' Chiloe; while he constantly grumbled about the poor weather - 'the gloom & ceaseless rain of winter' - he acknowledged that when the weather was fine and clear it was a

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Chiloe: A Fine Island

'charming island'; and while he hints at the dark side of the Chiloe people's nature and deplored their poverty, he found something 'very attractive in the simplicity &c humble politeness of all the cottagers'. In his geological summary he uses the term 'fine island'.

Notes

1. Log of Beagle; PRO ADM 51/3054-5.

2. Syms Covington's Diary; Mitchell Library, Sydney, NSW, MS No. 2009/108/ item 5.

3. Diary, 24 November 1834, p. 250.

4. Neither do D. Y. Levy and E. C. Le-Fort, in Darwin en Chile (Santiago: Editorial Universaria, 1998), attempt to suggest a possible location.

5. Osorno is in fact 2652 m (8,700 ft) in altitude (41°5'S, 72°30'W). Corovado (43°7'S, 72°45'W) is 2,300 m. The third volcano might have been Calbuco (42°2'S, 72°40'W ), which is 2,003 m (just under 6,600 ft) in altitude.

6. Diary, 1 December 1834, p. 255.

7. Almost certainly the flightless steamer-duck, Tachyeres pteneres.

8. Diary, 3 December 1834, pp. 255-6.

9. See Chapter 9, on the Falkland Islands. The tameness no doubt contributed to the extinction.

10. Diary, 8 December 1834, p. 257.

11. K. G. V. Smith, 'Darwin's Insects', Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), 14.1 (1987): 85.

12. Diary, 19 January 1835, p. 264.

13. This should not be considered conclusive. Sometimes Syms made no entry in his diary for long periods.

14. Identified by Levy and Le-Fort in Darwin en Chile as chupones (Greigia spha-celata)

15. Diary, 25 January 1835, p. 269.

16. Voyage, p. 284.

17. Zoological Diary, DAR 29.1: Shells in Spirits of Wine; specimen note 1174.

18. C. Darwin, A Monograph on the Sub-class Cirripedia, Vol. 2, Part 1, Balanidae, (London: Ray Society, 1854), pp. 208-9.

19. DAR 31.1/364. See also Smith, 'Darwin's Insects', pp. 80-1.

20. Insects in Spirits of Wine, DAR 29, quoted ibid., p. 43.

21. Zoology of the Voyage, Part 3, pp. 137-8.

22. Some authorities (e.g. G. S. Tuck, A Field Guide to the Seabirds of Britain and the World (London: Collins, 1978), describe this species as frequently following ships. The species is widely distributed in southern oceans and seems to vary in appearance.

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23. DAR 29.2/56, ornithology notes on Chiloe, specimen 2127.

24. Diary, 29 June 1834, pp. 231-2.

25. The species has been identified as Gunnera tinctoria (Levy and Le-Fort, Darwin en Chile). Plants very similar to Darwin's description abounded in sandy soils close to the sea, north of Cucao in February 2000. Gunnera is represented by several species in Chile, and is also found in New Zealand.

26. DAR 31.1/266-7, July 1834.

27. Diary, 13 July 1834, p. 234.

28. This information Darwin gleaned from a Mr Douglas, long resident on the island, an experienced surveyor and temporarily employed by the Beagle as a pilot and guide.

29. The informant was Mr Douglas (see note above). Diary, 27-28 November 1834, p. 253.

30. Colonial Chile was part of the viceroyalty of Peru.

31. Geology of the Voyage, Part 3, p. 123.

32. Ibid., p. 120.

33. Pholadidae, the piddock family, rock-boring molluscs.

34. Geology of the Voyage, Part 3, pp. 27-8.

35. My own careful study of the shore along parts of the coast west of Ancud in February 2000 (although limited in time and in the length of coast covered) revealed no such talus accumulation at the foot of cliffs, nor any upraised mollusc boreholes, although Darwin's general account of the cliffed shoreline was very accurate. A long period of still-stand since the 'elevatory movement' and human pressure may have removed the evidence to which Darwin referred.

36. Darwin had by this time all three volumes of Principles of Geology.

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11. The Chonos Archipelago: A Multitude of Islets

From Chiloe the ship ran south, and on the 13 December 1834 'ran into an opening' in the southern part of the Chonos group of islands. It was just as well, for a furious storm of Tierra del Fuegan dimensions blew up; massive clouds piled up, the mountains appeared as 'dim shadows'; the water was white with flying spray. Nevertheless, the ship's boats were sent off to undertake surveys of parts of the archipelago. Nearby, a group of American seamen, who, feeling they were badly treated by their captain, had 'jumped ship' to land up on this desolate piece of the Chilean coast, were seen waving a shirt, and were taken on board. Their gratitude was immense as they had been living on seal-meat and shellfish for fifteen months! One had perished.

On 29 December the ship came to anchor at Yuche Island, a tiny speck of land to the north of the Peninsula of Tres Montes; 'to our great surprise,' wrote Darwin, 'we found the island well stocked with fine wild goats'. Eight were soon shot, providing fresh meat for two days. Darwin speculated that they had been introduced by a Spanish missionary expedition. That was not his only speculation:

On the Island ... a small thickly wooded Isd in the Chonos Archipelago there were many wild goats. - It is probable they have been turned out a century since. Their colour was pretty uniform, being a dark reddish brown. - Many had a white mark on the forehead & a few had one on the lower jaw. All appeared to have a singular outline of forehead. - For this reason I thought [that] the skulls of these animals perhaps are retrograding into their original form.1

Here can be seen, as well as Darwin's detailed observation, his understanding of the idea of an island population having distinct properties (as

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Darwin's Other Islands

opposed to individuals), and of inheritance. These ideas were developed in his Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, 1868, and indeed the study of domestic creatures was one of his entry-points into evolutionary ideas. There were other signs of human presence, perhaps left by sealers, the remnants of a shed, trees cut down and the remains of a fire. Perhaps it was earlier sealers that abandoned the goats?

On the other hand, he wrote, 'the entire absence of all Indians amongst these islands is a complete puzzle'. Darwin thought that the islands had originally been inhabited (partly because of the abundance of seals), but the people had been exterminated.

The Beagle ran on to the northward, and on 7 January made rendezvous with those of the crew who had been surveying this part of the Chonos group at Low Harbour, a narrow inlet between Isla Gran Guaiteca and Isla Marta (43°49'S; 74°02'W). The Beagle encountered a group of Chilotans who had crossed the sound from Caylen (Quellon on modern Chilean maps) in a periagua or open boat, a distance of some 62 miles (100 km), seeking food: wild potatoes, fish, mussels and oysters abounded there.

From here the ship struck north-west and called at Isla Guafo (Darwin, perhaps influenced by the Spanish pronunciation of the 'G', gives Huafo) for him to examine the sediments and collect a large number of fossils.

The vegetation of these islands - there are dozens of them scattered along the Chilean coast - was thorny, extremely tangled and almost impossible to penetrate, so Darwin was restricted in the amount of geology he was able to do. However, he did collect from a small number of points, and Lieutenant Stokes (in charge of a surveying party in one of the ship's boats) collected from a number of intermediate points. Between Cape Tres Montes and the northern Chonos Islands (some 200 miles, 320 km), Darwin noted:

The predominant rock is mica-slate, with thick folia of quartz, very frequently alternating with and passing into a chloritic, or into a black, glossy, often striated, slightly anthracitic schist, which soils paper. Thin layers of feldspar . . . are sometimes included . . . Great veins of quartz are numerous in the mica-schists . . . The cleavage of the homogeneous schists, the foliation of those composed of more or less distinct minerals in layers, and the planes of alteration of the different varieties or so-called stratification, are all parallel, and preserve over this 200 miles of coast a remarkable degree of uniformity of direction. At the northern end of the group, at Low's harbour, the well-defined folia of mica-schist everywhere ranged within eight

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The Chonos Archipelago: A Multitude of Islets

degrees ... of N 43° W and S 43° E; and even the point of dip varied little, being always directed to the West and generally at an angle of forty degrees.2

In some cases the foliation was almost vertical. Having moved amongst the islands of the Chonos Archipelago, Chiloe, Chiloe's nearby islets and several points on the adjacent mainland, Darwin appreciated that the rocks of the entire region, along a belt several hundred miles in length, were part of the Andean system. He noted the strong parallelism in the lines of cleavage and foliation, the structural arrangement of intruded granites, and the strike or 'the axis of elevation' or the general grain of the country. He concluded his chapter on cleavage and foliation in The Geology of South America:

The planes of cleavage and foliation are intimately connected with the planes of different tension, to which the area was long subjected, after the main fissures of axes of upheavement had been formed, but before the final consolidation of the mass and the total cessation of all molecular movement.3

While the 'core' of many of the islands was of these crystalline rocks, there were areas of Tertiary sedimentary deposits, including boulder-beds, and softish grey and brown, fusible, often laminated sandstones, containing a few pebbles, and fragments of black lignite. Darwin thought it was because of these more fertile pockets that the vegetation was particularly luxuriant.

The woods came down to the sea-beach, just in the manner of an evergreen shrubbery over a gravel walk . . .

In the central parts of the Chonos Archipelago (lat. 45°), the forest has very much the same character with that along the whole west coast, for 600 miles southward to Cape Horn. The arborescent grass of Chiloe is not found here; while the beech [Nothofagus] of Tierra del Fuego grows to a good size, and forms a considerable proportion of the wood; not however, in the same exclusive manner as it does father southward. Cryptogamic plants here find a most congenial climate. In the Strait of Magellan ... the country appears too cold and wet to allow their arriving at perfection; but in these islands the number of species and great abundance of mosses, lichens, and small ferns is quite extraordinary. In Tierra del Fuego trees grow only on hill-sides; every level piece of land being covered by a thick layer of peat. Here, within the Chonos Archipelago, the nature of the climate approaches that of Tierra del Fuego rather than that of northern

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Chiloe; for every patch of level ground is covered by two species of plants (Astelia pumila and Donatia magellanica), which by their decay compose a thick bed of elastic peat.

I believe that in Chiloe (lat 41° to 42°), although there is much swampy ground, no well characterised peat exists: but in the Chonos Islands, three degrees farther southward ... it is abundant.4

Here Darwin is making a threefold comparison, showing the gradual change in conditions as one moves northward, from one island group to another, along the coast of South America, emphasizing the subtle interplay amongst climate, soil and vegetation. He records that he was again active 'sweeping with his insect net' and obtained a 'considerable number' of beetles, flies and other minute forms from the tangled vegetation.

Amongst the larger creatures he noted the coypu (Myocastor coypus) which Darwin described as like a beaver, but with a round tail, and a small sea otter, which was very numerous, feeding on fish, small red crabs (which occurred sometimes in swarms, colouring the water), cuttlefish and shellfish. He noted that the red crabs were also eaten by the seals, cormorants and other seabirds. If he had arranged the same information in the form of a diagram he could have constructed a food-web: even so he shows a striking appreciation of the nature of the animal community as a whole.

Darwin tended to describe the avifauna of Chiloe and Chonos together, noticing the occurrence of 'cheucau' or 'chucao' (modern scientific name Scelorchilus rubecula) and the 'guid-guid', barking bird or 'huet-huet' (Pteroptocbos tarnii). Darwin describes the calls and behaviour of each in great detail. Of the former he said:

It frequents the most gloomy and retired spots within the dim forests. Sometimes, although its cry may be heard close at hand, let a person watch ever so attentively he will not see the cheucau; at other times let him stand motionless and the red-breasted little bird will approach within a few feet in the most familiar manner.5

Darwin described them as 'allied to' and replacing the turco and tapacolo of central Chile.6 The concept of 'vicarious species', the replacement of one species by another in different parts of a geographical range, later became an important concept in biogeography.

We noted, in Chapter 10, that Darwin was impressed by the very large specimens of barnacles he encountered at Chiloe. In fact the first specimen he ever dissected, when he embarked on his detailed study of the barnacle group, was of the smallest species. Amongst the islands of the Chonos Archipelago he collected specimens of Cryptophialus minutus. In the very

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detailed description of the species in his book on the Balanidae, as well as commenting that it is 'the smallest known cirripede', he notes:

This cirripede inhabits, in vast numbers, the shells of the living Concholepas Peruviana, among the Chonos islands; the whole outside of the shell being sometimes completely drilled by its cavities, as happens in the case of Alcippe with the shells of Buccinum.7

Always he adopts the comparative approach; note that careful emphasis is placed on the relationship of the organism with other species. He adds a personal footnote:

I am greatly indebted to Dr Hooker, for having, several years ago, when I examined my first cirripede, aided me in many ways, and showed me how to dissect the more difficult parts, and for having made several very correct drawings, which, with some subsequent alterations are now engraved.8

From the point of view of Darwin's island studies, one of his most interesting observations on the Chonos Islands was described:

I caught in a trap a singular little mouse (Mus brachiotis); it appeared common on several of the islets, but the Chilotans at Low's Harbour said it was not found in all. What a succession of chances, or what changes of level must have been brought into play, thus to spread these small animals throughout this broken archipelago!9

In the Voyage of the Beagle he adds a footnote:

It is said that some rapacious birds bring their prey alive to their nests. If so, in the course of centuries, every now and then, one might escape from the young birds. Some such agency is necessary, to account for the distribution of the small gnawing animals on islands not very near each other.10

It must be remembered that these remarks were penned after the voyage, for they might be said to at least imply an evolutionary outlook. All the members of the biota of a small island (or their ancestral forms) are assumed to have made the journey thither by some mechanism such as a land-bridge (changes in sea level making a direct land connection) or carriage by some bird of prey, or we might add, rafting on a mat of vegetation. A 'creationist' would be less concerned by these island-to-island differences, arguing, perhaps, that a Creator was free to create whatever assemblage of organisms on an island he pleased. After the voyage George Waterhouse examined the creatures, describing Mus brachiotis as having soft, very long and dense fur,

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and very small ears. He seems to have compared the Low's Harbour specimen with another from a different islet, 150 miles to the south. He recorded minor differences, but did not think it was a separate species.11

Darwin, despite the bad weather and long periods spent on board with little to do, was fortunate in being able to spend several months zig-zagging up the western South American coast, visiting island after island, sometimes doubling back so that he could re-examine sites previously visited. He had his shipmates collect specimens from islets he was unable to visit; he talked extensively to local people. He compared, in a way that few in his day had the opportunity of doing, the rocks, soils, plants, animals and people in Tierra del Fuego, Chiloe, many small islands in the Chonos group and peninsulas on the South American mainland. From this he was able to tease out generalizations about the distribution of organisms and the relationship between organisms and their environment in a quite remarkable way. His observations on animal behaviour continued, and he was able by this stage to gain something of the whole picture of the geology of South America.

Darwin's peregrinations on the mainland of South America in Chile and Peru, including for example his observations in those regions on changes in sea level, are outside the scope of this book. We have already accompanied him on his visit to the Galapagos, and so we must now set out with him to explore the islands of the Pacific. He was certainly looking forward to this part of the voyage. On New Year's Day 1835, after many months of poor, gloomy weather around the southern tip of South America, he wrote:

The new year is ushered in with the Ceremonies proper to it in these regions: - she lays out no false hopes; a heavy NW gale with steady rain bespeaks the rising year. Thank God we shall not here see the end of it; but rather in the Pacific, where a blue sky does tell one, there is a heaven, something beyond the clouds above our heads.12

And so it was to be. Notes

1. Zoological Diary, DAR 29.1/18, Specimen Notes 2494.

2. Geology of the Voyage, Part 3, pp. 156-7.

3. Ibid., p. 168.

4. Voyage, pp. 272-3.

5. Ibid., p. 275.

6. Probably the moustached turca (Pteroptochos megapodicus) and the white-throated tapaculo (Scelorchilus albicollis).

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7. C. Darwin, A Monograph on the Sub-class Cirripedia, Vol. 2, Part 1, Balanidae (London: Ray Society, 1854).

8. Ibid.

9. Voyage, p. 275.

10. Ibid.

11. C. R. Darwin, Zoology of the Voyage, Part 2, Mammalia (London: Smith, Elder &Co, 1839), pp. 50-1.

12. Diary, 1 January 1835, p. 261.

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12. Across the Wide Pacific: To Tahiti and Beyond

On 20 October 1835, after a very rapid survey of the two westernmost islets of the Galapagos Archipelago, the Beagle's 'head was put towards Otaheite' and commenced the long passage of 3,200 miles (about 5,120 km). On this leg of the voyage the ship, under the influence of the steady trade winds, averaged about 150 or 160 miles a day. For several weeks the sun shone brightly from a cloudless sky.

Around 9 November, a change was in the air. First, increasing numbers of seabirds were seen, especially of two species of terns;1 later the first island of Polynesia was sighted - Dog or Doubtful island2 - Darwin described it as 'an outlier on the East side of the low Isds'. He had been doing his homework, however, and described it as not quite typical of the low islands, described by Captain Beechey, a copy of whose book FitzRoy had aboard.3 It was slightly higher than was usual with the 'low islands', but bright green in appearance, had a level surface and was surrounded by sand beaches, with some detached rocks. The tiny island nevertheless impressed Darwin: 'The insignificant patch of land bears no proportion [to] &c seems an intruder on the domain of the wide all-powerful ocean', he wrote. At the same time the weather was deteriorating; the sky was gloomy, and there were 'thunder, lightning, squalls and heavy rain'. The temperature in the poop cabin remained about 80-83° Fahrenheit (27-28° Celsius), and as it was very humid, the atmosphere was oppressive. As the air was 'thick and misty' it was felt advisable, as the ship approached the islands of the 'Low or Dangerous Archipelago'4 to heave to at night.

On 13 November, four days later, the ship was passing through the main part of the Archipelago, and Darwin noted that at daylight, and again at noon, they had recorded two islands that were not on the charts.5 Although in his diary he describes these islands as of 'uninteresting appearance', he

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Across the Wide Pacific: To Tahiti and Beyond

seems in fact to have been rather excited about his first prospect of coral atolls. Despite his professed hatred of ships and the sea, and frequent seasickness, he seems to have brought himself to climb to the mast-head to view the islands. His description is quite detailed:

... a long and brilliantly white beach is capped by a low bright line of green vegetation. This stripe on both hands, rapidly appears to narrow & sinks beneath the horizon. The width of dry land is very trifling; from the Mast-head it was possible to see at Noon Island across the smooth lagoon to the opposite side. This great lake of water was about 10 miles wide.6

This sighting strengthened Darwin's fascination with coral atolls: a fascination that, as we shall see, had already existed for some months and ultimately resulted in the publication of Part 1 of the Geology of the Voyage: The Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs, which represented one of his first flirtations with the notion of gradualism.

The Beagle had not yet crossed what is now known as the International Date Line (Longitude 180°, East and West), but Tahiti seems to have taken its time from the West rather than the East and Darwin's diary entries show some signs of confusion. In an entry under the heading 'Sunday 15th [November 1835]' he wrote: 'This was our Sunday but their Monday.' The next entry he headed 'Tuesday November 17th', and then deleted the date. He then wrote: 'This day is reckoned in the log book as Tuesday 17 instead of Monday 16th, owing to our so far successful chase of the sun.'

Darwin liked Tahiti and the Tahitians from the start - when the Beagle was surrounded by canoes as she came to anchor in Matavai Bay. He refers to 'the delights of the first impression provided by a new country', and of 'charming Tahiti', and the 'merry faces of the people', as well as 'an intelligence that shows they are advancing in civilisation'. The men were the fittest Darwin ever beheld - they were tall and athletic, with well-proportioned limbs, and their dusky skins were 'pleasing'; most of them were tattooed, the decorations, he recorded, 'so gracefully follow the body that they have a graceful & pleasing effect'.

The land appeared productive; the low ground close to the shore - alluvial land at the foot of the mountains - was covered by a 'beautiful orchard of Tropical plants ... bananas, orange, cocoa-nut & breadfruits'.7 There were also yams, sugar cane, guavas and pineapples. The winding paths leading to the scattered houses were a source of delight. FitzRoy, too, was also impressed by much of what he saw, especially by the bright sunshine, which he felt 'heightened the vivid and ever-varying tints of a rich verdure'.

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Figure 12.2 Map of Tuauru Valley, Tahiti

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Darwin's Other Islands

Figure 12.3 Breadfruit still flourish in the gardens of Tahiti

Not all was perfect, however. Both Darwin and FitzRoy felt that the women were less attractive than the men; some of the houses were not as clean as they might have been; and they deplored the ragged and sometimes dirty European-style clothes worn in place of the traditional costume. Both have something to say in their accounts of the voyage about Tahitian society and customs: houses, artefacts, canoes, food, clothes and personal adornment, and the children's songs are mentioned. They give no great detail, however, but one gets the impression that they thought that society had declined since the days of Captain Cook and before. There had been a good deal of European contact: both Darwin and FitzRoy describe the way in which Tahitian men swarmed aboard the Beagle, wanting to trade artefacts, shells - almost anything - for dollars. Beside a number of missionary families - of whom more anon - there were a number of other foreigners living in Tahiti, traders, opportunists and charlatans, whose intentions were not so honourable. FitzRoy describes a somewhat strained encounter with a personage who claimed to have a French title, to have been educated at Oxford and Cambridge, to have served with an English regiment and to have some sort of official position; he was accompanied by a 'motley group' of tattooed Maoris and 'ill-looking American seamen'. In his house was a

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Across the Wide Pacific: To Tahiti and Beyond

Figure 12.4 Coast of Tahiti from Point Venus

pile of muskets with long bayonets. He seems to have been little more than a pirate, and anything but the philanthropist he claimed to be. FitzRoy gave him short shrift.

Captain FitzRoy was in fact extremely busy during much of the ten-day visit. The ship was anchored at Matavai, and on 17 November he set up his instruments at Point Venus, where Captain Cook had observed the transit of Venus in 1769, and took his navigational and magnetic measurements, with the assistance of some of his officers, but with the hindrance of some of the local people who crowded round him to watch.8 The Captain also had some extremely ticklish negotiations to conduct with the ruler of Tahiti, Queen Pomare. About two years previously, a British-owned ship had been plundered by the inhabitants of the Low Islands, under the dominion of the Queen of Tahiti, allegedly instigated by some laws passed by her. The British government demanded compensation, which had not been paid. Negotiations were lengthy and complex, but eventually a deal was agreed, documents were signed and FitzRoy offered to entertain the Queen aboard his ship. He seems to have given her advice on a number of matters connected with dealing with foreigners, and to have attempted to sort out a number of other petty squabbles. He was also anxious to see and to be able to report

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upon, the activities of the missionaries and the state of the people of Tahiti. Darwin accompanied him to some of the negotiations with Queen Pomare and her chiefs and on some but not all of his other peregrinations and duties. On 17 November, while FitzRoy and some of his officers were making their navigational measurements, Darwin 'ascended the slope of the nearest part of the mountains to an elevation of between two & three thousand feet'. Assuming his estimate of altitude was approximately correct, this might place him at the summit close to Fare Topato, which has an altitude of about 2,800 feet (872 m). This point is about 6 km from the Beagle's anchorage at Matavai Bay and due south; the round trip of about seven miles (12 km), even with some stiff climbing, should have been possible in a day. Darwin examined the geology of the area and noted the changing vegetation as he climbed. He was most impressed with the view from the highest point:

From this point, there was a good view of the distant island of Eimeo [now Moorea] . . . On the lofty & broken pinnacles white massive clouds were piled, which formed an island in the blue sky, as Eimeo itself in the blue ocean. The island is completely circled by a reef, with the exception of one small gateway. At this distance a narrow but well defined line of brilliant white, where the waves first encountered the wall of coral, was alone visible. Within this line was included the smooth glassy water of the lagoon, out of which the mountains rose abruptly. The effect was very pleasing & might aptly be compared to a framed engraving, where the frame represents the breakers, the marginal paper the lagoon, & the drawing the Island itself.9

As we shall see, this made an important and lasting impression on him.10

Darwin rose early the following morning, packed some food and clothes into a bag, and with his servant Covington and a couple of Tahitian guides began a three-day expedition to the interior of the island. His route lay almost due south. 'The line of march was the valley of Tia-auru [now Tuauru], in which the river that enters the sea by point Venus flows.' The valley was a steep ravine, and led to the foot of Mount Orohena (2,741 m; Darwin estimated 7,000 feet - an underestimate). He noted the wall-like precipices of basaltic lava, the lush vegetation of palms, tree-ferns and lilies. He admired the several waterfalls they passed.11 They seemed to have lived off the land, getting fish from the streams, harvesting wild fruits and roots, and roasting them over a fire, wrapped in banana leaves, using traditional Polynesian methods. They slept in a bivouac thatched with banana leaves, which despite overnight rain, kept them dry. Darwin doesn't seem to have collected very extensively. The very few small insects he collected on Tahiti

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have been lost. He got on well with the Tahitians that accompanied him, and was impressed by their piety: they offered morning prayers each day in an entirely natural, unselfconscious way. With an early start he returned to the shore at noon on 19 November, to find that the Beagle, in order to more easily obtain supplies of good water had moved to Papawa (Papoa) a few miles to the west, 'to which place I immediately walked', he wrote.

Many of his remarks on the Tahitian people are from the standpoint of their relationship with the European missionaries. Darwin met missionaries at a number of places in his journeyings - there had been the fiasco of Tierra del Fuego, in Tahiti and later New Zealand - and on the whole had a good opinion of them. Indeed, in a letter written jointly with Captain FitzRoy to a South African publication in June 1836, containing extracts from Darwin's diary, they strongly defend the work of missionaries in Tahiti and elsewhere. This was in response to the hostile feeling against missionaries that they sensed during their brief visit to Cape Town (31 May-18 June 1836). The first missionary that Darwin met in Tahiti, on his first day on the island, was a Mr Wilson, who he described as giving 'a friendly reception' and being 'goodnatured' and a person of 'unpretending excellent merit', although not one's imagined missionary - more like a 'quiet trader'. The missionaries' discouragement of drink, especially spirits, met with Darwin's approval. The Tahitians' commitment to regular prayer we have already noted. Some writers had stated that the Tahitians were a gloomy race, the melancholy brought on by the excessive religiosity of the missions, but Darwin saw no evidence of this, describing the happy, easy, friendly way with which the local people got along with the missionaries. Church attendance was regular and indeed sometimes enthusiastic. (Darwin noted that the occasional inattention he observed was no more and no less than might be seen in an English congregation.) Much had been written about the promiscuity of the Tahitian women, but Darwin felt that descriptions had perhaps been exaggerated.

Here is a typical extract from his account of the missionaries:

Capt. FitzRoy took a party there [Papiete, on Sunday, 22 November] in the morning to hear divine service in the Tahitian language & afterwards in our own. Mr Pritchard, the leading Missionary in the Island, performed service. (Mr Pritchard was regularly educated in the mission college; he appears a sensible agreeable gentleman & a good man.). .. The third Missionary whom we have seen is Mr Nott, who has resided 40 years on the Island ... & has now finished his great task of translating the whole bible. He bears universally a high & respectable character. The characters of this class of men have been so

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frequently attacked, that I have mentioned my opinion of the three who reside in this vicinity.12

He described the human sacrifices, 'the bloody wars where the conquerors spared neither women nor children' and the infanticides that had allegedly formerly occurred. He went on to declare that 'dishonesty, intemperance & licentiousness have been greatly reduced by the Introduction of Christianity'. In view of the fact that the young Darwin, when he stepped aboard the Beagle, had considered himself a possible candidate for ordination to the Church of England priesthood, this viewpoint is not altogether surprising. He was not uncritical, however, feeling that the Sabbatarian views of the missionaries were rather extreme, and considering the ban on flute-playing and dancing 'foolish'.

Darwin makes a few passing remarks about the geology and geo-morphology of Tahiti in his diary, speculating as to the origins of the island, following his first excursion:

The form of the land is rather singular & may be understood by explaining its hypothetical origin. I believe a group of the interior mountains stood as a smaller island in the sea & around their steep flanks streams of Lava &c beds of sediment were accumulated in a conical mass under water. This after having been raised was cut by numerous profound ravines, which all diverge from a common centre; the intervening ridges thus belonging to one slope & being flat-topped.13

Much of this was well founded, although he was less certain in print about the rise in the level of the land. He also noted the many waterfalls and cascades in the steep-sided ravines. He mentions too an exposure of columnar lava and the decomposition of the rock. Further material appears in his Geological Diary,14 and in a few brief paragraphs in his book on Volcanic Islands.15 In these he describes the variation in the types of basalt: some rich in augite and olivine, some vesicular, some amygdaloidal, others 'compact and earthy'. He stresses that the rocks were in many places 'much decomposed' and 'decayed'; this made for some difficulty in distinguishing the layers. He thought that it was due to the collapse in the structure of basalts with vesicles (originally bubbles in the fluid lava) under the weight of overlying materials. Strangely he does not relate the rate of decomposition to the effects of the hot, wet, tropical climate. He is much less certain in Volcanic Islands about the possibility of a geologically recent rise in the land, mentioning the discovery of coral remains high in the mountains by others, but adding pointedly that 'these remains' had not 'been specifically

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examined'. In the companion Coral Reefs volume he states that he looked 'in vain' at many places along the coast for upraised shells and corals without success, and also states that he enquired of local chiefs whether there was any tradition of recent uplift, and 'they were unanimous in giving me an answer in the negative'.

Darwin's notes on Tahitian geology16 provide some of the clearest indications, up to this point, of an adoption of a Lyellian, gradualist or uniformitarian standpoint. He seems convinced that the island's landscape has developed over long periods of time, through the action of processes of weathering and stream erosion that are still in operation. The following extracts are typical:

All the Lavas . . . have undergone decomposition to a remarkable degree. Hence we have a very great thickness of Wacke . .. The characteristic feature of this scenery is the depth, narrowness & extreme steepness of the sides of the valleys or rather mountain gorges ... I looked at this scenery with great interest. I believed I saw the effect of running water, continued through so long a succession of ages, as to suffice to wear away several thousand ft in thickness of solid strata.

On about Monday, 23 November Darwin went out in a canoe to see something of the coral reefs.17 The canoes, because of their extreme narrowness, were 'comical little boats'. They would have been very unstable were it not for 'a floating log of very light wood joined to the canoe by two long transverse poles'. His study seems to have been a careful one, and he probably spent some hours afloat. 'We paddled for some time about the reef admiring the pretty branching Corals.' His interest in corals and coral reefs was profound: 'It is my opinion that besides the avowed ignorance concerning these tiny architects of each individual species, little is yet known, in spite of much which has been written, of the structure & origin of Coral Islands and reefs.'18

Darwin may also have examined the reef and the inner lagoon by wading, or perhaps using a 'jumping pole'; some additional material, including crude cross-sections and sketches, appears in his Geological Notes. He also had access to the hydrographic survey data gathered by the Beagle. Although he does not make as much of the Tahiti experience in the later Coral Reefs book as one might have expected, he is clearly combining material from a range of sources in the following note:

A depth of 25 to 35 fathoms, which is the limit of the growing corals, is reached from 100 to 150 fathoms from the edge of the reef. The slope then steepens rapidly to 160 and 180 fathoms, which depth is

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reached at a distance of 225 to 250 fathoms from the edge of the reef; to 100 fathoms the slope is 45°, thence to about 2,000 it is about 30°, and then it eases off. From 35 to 150 fathoms sponges, akyonarians, corals and other invertebrates were obtained; beyond the latter coral-sand with volcanic minerals and pelagic shells. Inside the lagoons the reefs were fringed with living corals, sloped downwards and outwards for a few feet, then plunged at once to depths of 10 and 16 fathoms. The deposit in the lagoons was in some places coral-sand, in others a volcanic mud.19

The very steep offshore profile, the barrier reef with the lagoon within it and the general appearance of the island all convinced Darwin that Tahiti and Eimeo 'must have recently subsided'.

Darwin collected some shells on Tahiti and he procured about a dozen fish specimens. Some of them were caught while he was out in the canoe examining the coral reef and some may have been caught by Covington, or he may have bought them from Tahitians with whom he came into contact, or possibly from his shipmates. The fish represented nine species (there were one or two duplicates) and some were new to science, although Darwin did not know this until Leonard Jenyns described them in Part 4 of the Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle. No other vertebrates appear to have been collected. A very few insects seem to have been taken using a sweep-net: all have been lost. His attention seems to have been directed primarily towards the coral formations, and to some extent to the human community.

But he could not avoid noticing the plants, and he describes the vegetation he encountered on his expeditions in some detail, mentioning the 'great beds of Feye or mountain banana, covered in ripe fruit... twenty to twenty-five feet high', coconut palms (Cocos nucifera), tree ferns and wild arum. He also encountered 'an extensive brake of wild sugar cane'. He ate a 'liliaceous plant called Ti', and a number of other species. He also noted by the banks of a stream 'dark green knotted stem of Ava, so famous in former days for its powerful intoxicating effects'. Its use had been strongly discouraged by the missionaries, and by the time of Darwin's visit it only grew in mountain recesses. He tried a piece, finding that it had an acrid and unpleasant taste.20 He described the way in which the vegetation clung to tiny inaccessible ledges in ravines.

There are two aspects of the ecology of Tahiti upon which Darwin comments in his diary. First, he notes the distinctive altitudinal zonation in plant communities as he climbed into the hills on his second day ashore. Close to the sea there was a 'narrow girt of inhabited land', and above this he recorded:

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The vegetation is singular, consisting almost exclusively of small dwarf fern, mingled higher up with coarse grass. The appearance was not very dissimilar from that of some of the hills in North Wales; & this so close above the orchard of Tropical plants on the coast was very surprising. At the highest point which I reached trees again appeared . . . tree ferns having replaced the Cocoa Nut.21

Later he commented on the cool dampness of the forest environment. Darwin may have been partly influenced by his reading of Humboldt, who described altitudinal zonation in South America, but of course had himself seen this phenomenon there. He was later to comment on zonation on other islands, for example on the Island of Ascension.

Second, Darwin comments on the much lower plant biodiversity (he did not, of course use this term) of the Tahitian forests compared to that of continental forests. Again and again we note that Darwin is not confused by the luxuriance of the forest on tropical islands; he realized that any species present on such an island must have made a journey thither. It has already been stressed that the notion of long-distance dispersal is the handmaiden of the theory of evolution (see also pp. 18-19). Darwin compared the forests of Tahiti to those of South America: 'It must not... be supposed that these woods at all equalled the forests of Brazil. In an island, the vast number of productions which characterise a continent cannot be expected to occur.'22

Darwin had not adopted the evolutionary approach as he thrashed through the tree ferns and climbers in the Tahiti forests, but in understanding the way in which organisms were linked with their environments and commenting on the poverty of island biota he was beginning to arrange his observations around theoretical constructs that were compatible with it.

The Beagle left Tahiti, blown by a strong sea breeze, at sunset on 26 November 1835. She later experienced several days of light winds, passing through what are now known as the Cook Islands at daylight on 3 December. Darwin recorded that the ship 'passed near to the island of Whytootacke'. FitzRoy, in his account, refers to 'Whylootacke (or Waiutaki)' while the island today is known as Aitutaki. FitzRoy continues, probably supplementing his observations with information gained on Tahiti and elsewhere: 'a small group of islets encircled by a coral reef, from four to eight miles in diameter. The principal one is 360 feet high, and nearly four miles long. There was a native missionary on it, educated at Otaheite.'23 These facts are entirely accurate. The main island has a core of volcanic rocks; the remaining islets making up the atoll surrounding the lagoon (over a dozen) are of coral.

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Darwin was very interested, and gives further details:

We saw here a union of the two prevailing kinds of structure ... A hilly irregular mass was surrounded by a well defined circle of reefs, which in great part have been converted into narrow strips of land, which as Cook calls them are half drowned, consisting merely of sand & Corall [sic] rocks heaped up on the dead part of the former reef. The inhabitants made a smoke to attract our attention.24

Again it seems likely that Darwin climbed to the mast-head. The careful description, including the use of the term 'half drowned' is interesting, for he had been doing a good deal of thinking about coral reefs and atolls while the ship was heading south-westwards from Tahiti.

Before we try to penetrate Darwin's thought processes, at this point, as he sat in the poop cabin of the Beagle poring over his books and notes, we should perhaps backtrack a little and consider what he had been thinking about some months before. In a letter dated 29 April 1836 to his sister Caroline he said: 'the subject of Coral formation has for the past half year been a point of particular interest to me'. This would take the date of his first deliberations on the subject of coral to late October 1835. In his Autobiography, written many years later, he stated that 'the whole theory [of coral reef formation] was thought out on the west coast of S. America before I had seen a coral reef. Moreover, in one of his 'little note books', containing entries probably written in Chile in 1835, there are some fragmentary speculations:

[I]n Pacific a Coral bed forming as land sunk would abound with those genera which live near the surface (mixed with those of deep water) . . .

Is there a large proportion of those coralls [sic] which live only near the surface. If so we must believe the land sinking.

The Test of depression in strata is where great thickness has shallow coralls growing in situ: this could only happen where bottom of the ocean was subsiding.

Finally, there is a letter (dated 25 June 1835) from R.E. Alison,25 who had assisted Darwin with some of his studies on the Chilean coast saying how much he was looking forward to Darwin's reports on the Pacific islands for 'it will be curious if you find sinking of land there, & rising here . . .'. Darwin, in the Falklands, in Chiloe and on the mainland of South America had looked for, and often felt he had found, evidence of changing levels of

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land and sea, and it seems that even before he had seen a coral island he was speculating on the possibility of subsidence of the Pacific islands in some way compensating for a rise in the level of South America.

As we have seen, Darwin took a particular interest in the island of Eimeo (Moorea) which he had seen from above Point Venus, with its rocky interior, surrounding lagoon and barrier of coral beyond, and he made extensive observations of the reefs around Tahiti. He was trying to find confirmation in the field of a theory he had already constructed - another type of comparison, in a way.

Among Darwin's Beagle Geological Notes in the Cambridge University Library is a 23-page manuscript, apparently rather hastily written in his own hand. Entitled 'Coral Islands', it is likely that it was written between 3 and 21 December 1835 on board ship during the crossing from Tahiti to New Zealand. It is in this document that we see his first coherent expression of his theory that fringing reefs (in which coral reefs are closely attached to the shore), barrier reefs (where there is a peripheral moat-like lagoon) and true atolls (Darwin sometimes called these 'lagoon islands', circular or horse-shoe-shaped groups of islets with a central lagoon) are members of a series, one form developing into another as the result of subsidence. Indeed, this represents Darwin's first substantial embrace of the notion of gradualism in his own work. This idea he had partly acquired, of course, from his reading of Lyell's Principles of Geology. It emphasized gradual change rather than catastrophism. In the 'Coral Islands' document Darwin briefly repeats his description of Eimeo:

The mountains rise out of a glassy lake, which is separated on all sides, by a narrow defined line of breakers, from the open sea. Remove the central group of mountains, & there remains a Lagoon Isd. I ground this opinion from the following facts. There is a general similarity in the two cases in the form &c size of their reefs; their structure appears identical, we have scarcely fathomable water in each case, at a very short distance on the outer margin; within is a shallow basin more or less filled by knolls of growing coral or converted into dry land. In the Lagoon Isds there are some which do not deserve this title for they consist solely of a circular reef of which scarcely a point projects above water; while others have a more or less complete, but narrow ring of land.26

The small-scale features of reefs are also closely described in the document; from his fieldwork in Tahiti, he recalls how the outer 'mound' or 'breakwater' of living coral slopes inwards, towards the smooth waters of the lagoon: 'The sea, breaking violently on the outer margin, continuously

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pumps over in sheets the water of its waves. Hence the surface is worn smooth & gently declines toward the lagoon.'27

Elsewhere in the account he noted that the coral growth was most rapid and prolific on the outer edge of the reef; this was the home of certain specific types of coral. He accurately suggested that this might be due either to 'the motion of the water or the quantity of insolved air'. He summarizes: '[I]n certain parts of the Pacifick [sic], a series of subsidences have taken place; of which no one exceeded in depth the number of ft at which . . . polypi [sic] will flourish: tk. [where] the successive steps were sufficiently long to allow their growth.'28 He concluded, once again by speculating that the rise in the level of South America was compensated for by depression in the Pacific.

Darwin and FitzRoy did not land on the island of Aitutaki, but the Beagle seems to have sailed quite close to it, and the Captain, having taken a sounding or two, noted that no bottom was found at 270 fathoms (1620 feet, about 490 m). Darwin used the term 'drowned' for the coral island group (attributing the term to Captain Cook), and described the archipelago as the union of 'two prevailing kinds of structure'; by this he presumably meant a volcanic island with a fringing reef attached and a barrier reef.

He was writing in this way exactly at the time that that he was also drafting his first account of the gradual evolution of coral reefs from fringing reefs, to barrier reefs, to atolls as the result of subsidence. He must have experienced the simple thrill of ideas coming together as he sailed away from this tiny group of islets, watching the smoke of the fire lit by the inhabitants curl into the sky.

Figure 12.5 Darwin's theory of coral reefs: the transformation of a fringing reef into a barrier reef and ultimately an atoll, through the subsidence of an island or a rise in sea level

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The only other source of interest on the crossing to New Zealand was on 11 December (at exactly 180° East and West and 28° South) when a small group of white terns (Gygis alba, perhaps) was sighted. FitzRoy argued in his account that this provided an indication of how far birds might wander from land, but in fact at that point the ship was not so very far from the Kermadec Islands (178°30'West, 30° South; a group of islands now administered by New Zealand).

Just over a week later the ship was within sight of the hills of New Zealand's North Island, but because of contrary winds it was another two days (21 December 1835) before HMS Beagle stood into the Bay of Islands.

Notes

1. Captain FitzRoy, in his Narrative, p. 506, refers to a 'black tern', possibly the sooty tern (Sterna fuscata) - one of the few species of tern often seen far from land - and tropic birds (genus Phaethon).

2. FitzRoy refers to Honden Island: Narrative, pp. 507-8.

3. F. W. Beechey, Narrative of a Voyage to the Pacific and Beering's Strait... 1825, 26, 27, 28 (London, 1831).

4. Now called the Tuamotu Archipelago.

5. FitzRoy, probably after discussing the matter with people in Tahiti, refers to the 'native names' of Tairo and Cavahi (Taiaro and Kauehi appear on modern maps). He continues that the ship passed 'between the Elizabeth and Wittgenstein or Faarava groups'. Modern maps include 'Fakarava'.

6. Diary, 13 November 1835, p. 344.

7. These plants, along with avocados, are still grown in every garden.

8. Alas, there are now few reminders of Captain Cook's visit at Point Venus, and none at all of that of Darwin and FitzRoy. The site has a somewhat unkempt appearance.

9. Diary, 17 November 1835, p. 348.

10. Because of the development and suburbanization of much of the coastal zone of northern Tahiti access to this point is now difficult.

11 . The route is clearly identifiable today, and despite some rather flimsily built housing development along the northernmost three or four kilometres of the valley, much of Darwin's description remains appropriate.

12. Diary, 22 November 1835, pp. 354-5.

13. Ibid., 17 November 1835, p. 347.

14. DAR 37.2/798-800.

15. Geology of the Voyage, Part 2, pp. 256-8.

16. DAR 37.2/798-80.

17. It would not have been Sunday, 22 November, as the Tahitians were prohibited

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by the missionaries from launching their craft on the Sabbath, and the 25th and 26th, and possibly also the 24th, were taken up with negotiations with Queen Pomare, and other official duties, at which Darwin seems to have been present.

18. Diary, 22-25 November 1835, p. 357.

19. Geology of the Voyage, Part 1, p. 185, note.

20. The drinking of kava and the enjoyment of its intoxicating effects is still practised on Pacific islands, and indeed represents a part of the Polynesian lifestyle. Darwin's missionaries were not successful. The drink is made from the root, and so Darwin, by chewing a portion of the above-ground leaves or stems, would not get the effect.

21. Diary, 17 November 1835, pp. 347-8.

22. Ibid., 17 November 1835, p. 348.

23. Narrative, p. 557.

24. Diary, 3 December 1835, pp. 358-9.

25. Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 452.

26. Coral Islands, DAR 40/5. The document is transcribed by D. R. Stoddart in Atoll Research Bulletin, 88 (1962).

27. Ibid., DAR 40/12.

28. Ibid., DAR 40/15.

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13. New Zealand: Maoris and Missionaries

The log of HM Surveying Sloop Beagle shows that she was within sight of the New Zealand coast in the early afternoon of 19 December 1835; the sky was blue, with a few white clouds, but there was a force 4 westerly breeze and progress was slow for the next couple of days. At one stage the ship was blown back eastwards many miles; later the vessel was becalmed at the mouth of the Bay of Islands. By late morning on 21 December, however, the Beagle was 'standing up the Bay of Islands', and came to anchor around 2.15 p.m. There were three whaling-ships in the bay, and a single Maori canoe came alongside. A little later, Darwin, along with FitzRoy, explored the small group of houses, which Darwin felt 'hardly deserves the title of a village', as he describes Pahia. He was struck by the English atmosphere: honeysuckle, stocks and sweetbriar grew outside the missionaries' whitewashed cottages. They also visited Mr James Busby, the British Resident who lived in the then recently constructed, small but elegant 'Residency' nearby.1

The following day, Darwin attempted to explore more of the district on foot: 'I soon found that the country is very impracticable: the hills are thickly covered with tall fern, together with low bush ... I then tried the sea beach, but proceeding towards either hand, my walk was soon stopped by creeks & deep streams.'2 He had come up against the Waitangi River to the north and the Haumi River to the south. However, later in the day he and FitzRoy, together with one of the missionaries, explored Koroareka (Russell). Darwin formed a poor view of the place, inhabited as it was by the crews of whaling ships, and the human flotsam and jetsam of the Pacific: words such as 'worthless character', 'whole population addicted to drunkenness', 'runaway convicts', 'all kinds of vice', 'filth' and 'disgusting' occur throughout his account. FitzRoy, Darwin and some of the officers on the

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Beagle contributed towards the building of a church: 'the missionaries', thought Darwin, had 'fixed on this spot, to attack vice in her very Citadel'. The wood-built church, Christ Church, still exists: it is the oldest church in New Zealand. Darwin was invited by one of the missionaries to visit Waimate, a missionary settlement about fifteen miles (24 km) inland. Two days before Christmas he set off with a Maori guide. James Busby gave them a lift by boat to 'a pretty waterfall' - Haruru Falls - and from there they proceeded on foot.

At Waimate, Darwin took tea with a missionary family and met 'a large party of children collected together [in preparation for] for Christmas day ... I never saw ... a more merry group', said Darwin, and he noted an atmosphere of 'cordiality and happiness' amongst all at the mission. He stayed overnight at the mission and rambled about the farm and garden, noting that some of the Maori children were playing cricket and that the landscape had been modified. He approved of the way in which fields of corn had been planted, the gardens were full of familiar English plants and farms, barns and a watermill constructed. He visited some nearby kauri forest, and was impressed by the enormous trees.

Darwin returned to the Beagle on Christmas Eve, having borrowed a horse, and attended a Christmas Day service in Paihia. Part of the service was in Maori and part in English, which he thought a 'clumsy method'. In view of what happened at Christmas time earlier in the voyage, it is likely that many of the crew indulged in some fairly drunken behaviour, and that Darwin kept his head well down! Syms Covington records that the festive season was passed 'pretty merrily'.

On 26 December, however, the young naturalist was back at work, and, with Busby and Lieutenant Sulivan, who accompanied Darwin on geological excursions at many ports of call, he was rowed in an open boat 'some miles up the river Cowa-Cowa [Kawakawa]', towards some limestone caves at Waiomio.

[At] Waiomio . . . there are some singular masses of limestone resembling in their forms ruined castles. These rocks have long served as burial places, & hence are sacred. One of the young [Maori] men cried out 'Let us be brave', & ran on ahead; but when within a hundred yards, the whole party stopped short; they allowed us however, with perfect indifference to examine the place.3

It seems that Darwin, Busby and Sulivan did not actually enter the caverns. Twelve years later, on 13 November 1847, Darwin wrote to Sir George Grey, Governor of New Zealand, about the caves: 'I was prevented from entering them by their having been used as places of Burial.'4

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Figure 13.1 Map of the Bay of Islands area, North Island, New Zealand, showing places mentioned in the text and Darwin's route to Waimate Mission

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Figure 13.2 Haruru Falls (Darwin was unable to take his boat upstream beyond this 'pretty waterfall*, walking inland from this point to Waimate Mission)

Figure 13.3 Kauri trees, North Island, New Zealand

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New Zealand: Maoris and Missionaries

The next day, being Sunday, divine service was again held aboard the Beagle, and probably Darwin attended. He seems to have spent the afternoon writing letters, for one of the whaling ships was about to leave for England. The only letter surviving from this batch seems to be one to his sister Caroline, in which he describes writing it on a 'rainy Sunday evening'; it is full of grumbles about seasickness and hankerings for the end of the voyage.5

The log shows that the crew was busy preparing for the next stage of the voyage; substantial quantities of pork, vegetables and water were taken on board, and running repairs undertaken. No extensive hydrographic survey was done, but instruments were set up on one of the small islands, and the usual magnetic and other observations made - another link in Captain FitzRoy's 'chain of meridians' around the world. FitzRoy also attempted to sort out a number of petty quarrels between the residents, and amongst the crew of the whaling-ship Rose from Halifax, Nova Scotia. He made various enquiries on social conditions at the Bay, giving evidence to a parliamentary committee on his return to England.

Darwin, meanwhile was diligently collecting specimens along the shores of the Bay, labelling, preserving and describing them in his notes in the evenings. He collected a large number of insects by means of his sweep-net, and by examining decaying wood, dung and carrion: several dozen flies, plant bugs and beetles were taken, including a ladybird and a tiger beetle, the latter being present 'in extraordinary numbers in all parts of the country'.6 Several species of fish and around fifteen shells were collected, along with a green gecko, which, ever observant of habitat and behaviour, Darwin recorded as living in trees and making a laughing noise.7 There were also others aboard the Beagle who were collecting natural history specimens. Covington records that a very large shark, 35 feet (10 m) long was taken, and FitzRoy had the jaws cleaned and mounted.8 They stood five feet (1.5 m) high!

Darwin also collected about fifteen geological specimens while in New Zealand and wrote up a detailed memorandum on the geology of the area. He described the rock-types he encountered in some detail - Permo-Triassic argillaceous (clay) and volcanic rocks near the anchorage, the pink Tertiary limestones in which the caves were formed - in some cases dating them remarkably accurately.

But it was the recent volcanic rocks that captured his attention: along much of the road to Waimate, he recorded in his geological notes that there were rocks that

. . . were certainly volcanic. There was much grey Basalt, but seldom containing many crystals, sometimes slightly vesicular and amygda-loidal, its structure frequently columnar. The other most abundant

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kind is a kind of greenstone (?) with crystals of glassy Feldspar. At a small village . . . the whole surface was covered with shaggy &c highly vesicular Lavas. In a neighbouring broken down hill, the form of a crater could be traced. I heard of another whose figure is perfect. Near Waimate, two or three truncated conical hills are said to be surrounded by deep circular cavities, & clearly have at one time existed as active Volcanoes . . . [but] there is no sign of any recent action.9

In a later passage he combines his own observations with information he obtained from talking to the local missionaries, and from books and charts that he had aboard the Beagle:

Crystalline or Volcanic rocks in the neighbourhood of the Bay of Islands would appear to be the most prevalent kinds. In the Southern & main part of the island the land becomes very mountainous ... In the interior it is confidently asserted there is an active volcano. It is certain that in this part Earthquakes are commonly experienced. Mr Williams described to me a large Volcano which he had seen in full activity, as comprising a small Island in the Bay of Plenty on the East coast. Also another Island covered with rugged & nearly naked streams of lava. On the mainland there are many springs of hot waters . . . These Volcanic districts in the Northern Island of New Zealand may from its position & direction of its coast, be with propriety described as the SE termination of the great band of Volcanic action which contains the parallel lines of New Caledonia, New Hebrides, New Ireland & New Guinea.10

Darwin is not only combining information from a range of sources but he is also carefully integrating material on rock-types, land-forms, hot springs, active volcanoes and gross structure. In his book Volcanic Islands, and to some extent in Coral Reefs, he developed his ideas on what later came to be known as 'island arcs' in more detail.

As we have already noted, as the voyage wore on Darwin was becoming increasingly under the influence of LyelPs gradualist or uniformitarian ideas. He was on the look-out for evidence of erosion, transport and deposition actually in progress in the environments he studied. He noted benches being cut by the waves on some of the islets of the Bay, volcanic rocks being weathered to clay, limestone being dissolved away to produce strange forms and pebbles of 'clay-slate' in the beds of streams. He must have seen the erosive effects of Haruru Falls. The following extract is typical of the way in which he was coming to understand a changing, dynamic world:

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The Northern stripe [sic] of land [of North Island] is hilly but can scarcely be considered mountainous; its outline is smooth, &C undulating & its surface waterworn. Large masses of strata appear to have been removed & in several places I noticed huge rounded boulders, but as they consisted of rocks similar to what are found in all parts, they may not have travelled far.11

Another example of the way in which Darwin described the changing world, as we have already noted, was the manner in which he emphasized changes in sea level. This is a theme that runs through the entire corpus of his geological annotations from Chiloe, the Falklands and later from Australia and Mauritius. The notion was fundamental to his coral atoll theory, the first written draft of which he had just completed (see Chapter 12). He noticed, in a number of places around the Bay, mounds of sea-shells. Although the local people attributed these to the Maoris, Darwin linked them to a former higher level of the sea. The missionary Mr Williams described to him, in considerable detail, river terraces in the Thames Valley, on the west coast, south of the Bay of Islands, which led him later to write: 'I cannot doubt... that the land has been there elevated.' There is some evidence that this part of northern New Zealand was elevated slightly in the Holocene period (i.e. since the Ice Age), but probably not on the scale envisaged by Darwin. Nevertheless, the preoccupation with this subject was important as he collected further evidence for sea level change later in the voyage, in relation to the development of his ideas on the formation of coral reefs. Interestingly, he did not see the Bay of Islands as a drowned river-cut valley any more than he had seen the inlets of the Falklands or southern South America, or would later see King George's Sound, Western Australia, as having formed in this way.

Nevertheless, some of his observations were remarkably prescient. At many of the islands and island groups he visited Darwin noted the organisms that were absent and emphasized the poverty of island biota. He noted the poverty of the vertebrate fauna of New Zealand as follows, in an entry in his diary on Christmas Eve 1835:

[I]t is a very remarkable fact that so large an island, extending over nearly a thousand miles of latitude, and in many parts one hundred and fifty broad, with varied stations, a fine climate and land of all heights from 14,000 feet downwards, should not possess one indigenous animal [i.e. mammal] with the exception of a small rat.12

Darwin took special notice of the kauri trees and New Zealand flax, commenting on the use made of both these native species of plants. But

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although he approved of the transformation of the landscape in Europe's image, and the introduction of English crops and ornamental plants (he listed barley, wheat, potatoes, clover, gorse, vegetables, oaks), he noted with disapproval the effects of the introduction of some other alien species:

It is moreover said that the introduction of the common Norway kind [of rat, i.e. Rattus norvegicus] has entirely annihilated the New Zealand species in the short space of two years, from the Northern extremity of the island. In many cases I noticed several sorts of weeds, which like the rats, I was forced to own as my own countrymen. A leek, however, which has overrun whole districts and will be very troublesome, was imported lately ... by a French vessel. The common dock is widely disseminated and will for ever remain a proof of the rascality of an Englishman who sold the seeds for those of the tobacco plant.13

The term 'introduction' is benign enough, but note also 'annihilated' and 'overrun'. The metaphors of struggle, competition and conflict recur throughout Darwin's work. He thought of the development of coral reefs as a struggle between land and sea, and the notion of competition is deeply implanted in his theory of evolution through natural selection. In the Origin of Species he uses the New Zealand example, stating that far more European plants had become naturalized in New Zealand than vice versa. 'Under this point of view, the productions of Great Britain may be said to be higher than those of New Zealand', he argued. This is a somewhat Eurocentric and imperialist view, perhaps, with which modern thought would not concur. Nevertheless, it provides an example of how an 'island experience' influenced Darwin's thinking, even if some of his deductions were flawed.

Not a great many observations on animal behaviour were made in New Zealand (there being few behaving animals for him to observe), but studies of the behaviour and customs of the people perhaps made up for this. The daughter of a chief had died at a village he passed though on the way to the Waiomio caves and Darwin describes the funeral customs in some detail. His notes on tattooing by the Maoris perhaps show the influence of his abortive time at Edinburgh Medical School, years before: 'The complicated but symmetrical figures, covering the whole face, puzzle & mislead the unaccustomed eye; it is moreover probable that the deep incisions, by destroying the play of the superficial muscles, would give an air of rigid inflexibility.'14

The custom of rubbing or 'pressing' noses was described in particular detail:

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The women on our first approach began uttering something in a most dolorous and plaintive voice, they then squatted down & held up their faces; my companions standing over them placed the bridges of their own noses at right angles to theirs, & commenced pressing; this lasted rather longer than a cordial shake of the hand would with us; as we vary the force of the grasp of the hand in shaking, so do they in pressing. During the process they utter comfortable little grunts, very much in the same manner as two pigs do when rubbing against each other.15

Darwin compared, objectively, the Maori custom with the Western handshake and, in a less complimentary way, the vocalizations with those of pigs. Beyond that there was little attempt at analysis and interpretation. In his later work, particularly in The Descent of Man and The Expression of Emotions in Animals and Man, he emphasizes comparisons between the behaviour of humans and animals more strongly.

Very early in his visit, in his diary entry for 22 December 1835, he appreciated that the Maoris and Tahitians belonged to the 'same family of mankind'. Two days later he attempted to place the various island societies that he had encountered in relationship to one another on a ladder or 'scale': 'If the state in which the Fuegians live should be fixed on as zero in the scale of government, I am afraid New Zealand would rank but a few degrees higher, while Tahiti, even as first discovered would occupy a respectable position.16

The ideas of a family relationship between races and of a ladder of civilization recur throughout his writings. A few weeks later he was to write about the Australian Aborigines and the Cocos Malays in the same way. They were perhaps ill-formed, naive ideas, but concepts that were later developed in the Descent of Man.

The idea that there existed a close relationship between organisms and their environment was fundamental to Darwin's work. Humans were no exception. The Maori people both manipulated their environment and were influenced by it. Darwin had heard it asserted that the extensive open country was once covered by forest but had been cleared by the Maoris with the help of fire. 'The natives', he stated, 'had an evident motive for thus clearing the country', as tracts of fern flourished where the fire had been and this was a 'staple ... article of food'. Moreover, in many of the cleared areas digging revealed large lumps of resin, such as flowed from the kauri trees. He also noted that pas (fortified hillforts) were an important element in the landscape:

The summits were cut into steps or successive terraces & they had frequently been protected by trenches ... That the Pas had formerly been

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used was evident from the piles of shells & the pits in which I was informed, sweet potatoes were buried as reserved provisions.17

Darwin did not particularly like New Zealand; he saw Maori society as being in decline. He described the Maoris as living in 'hovels'. Adjectives such as 'desolate', 'impracticable', 'filthy', 'worthless' and 'disgusting' are scattered through his descriptions, and it seems that the inhabitants of Kororareka were a tough, lawless lot. Yet he very strongly approved of what the missionaries were doing, writing of the 'excellence of the Christian religion' and saying that they (the missionaries) were 'improving the moral character' of the Maoris. The natives he met at Waimate he described as 'respectable', 'honest', 'clean, tidy and healthy' and 'very merry and good humoured'.

As an upper-middle-class Englishman, educated at Shrewsbury School, Edinburgh Medical School and Cambridge, Darwin was proud of his nation. He fully supported Britain's imperial stance, although his Whig credentials were strong and he disapproved deeply of exploitation or cruelty. He seems to have treated all of those with whom he came into contact with dignity and respect, although he observed them through the lens of his own background and upbringing. He gained much from his week's visit to New Zealand; his observations of volcanic features, the perception of New Zealand as having an 'island-like' biota but with a geology that in some respects had characteristics of larger land-masses was important. He was able to apply Lyellian, gradualist ideas to another environment and examine the customs of another non-European culture. All these were of lasting importance. As the vessel 'stood out of the Bay of Islands' at noon on 30 December 1835, tacking rather laboriously for a few hours before rounding Cape Pocock (Cape Wikiki) at 5.30 p.m. en route for Port Jackson, Darwin, although pleased that he was now on the homeward run, would probably have been reasonably satisfied with the brief but intensive programme of work he had completed.

Notes

1. A fuller account of Darwin's visit to New Zealand is given in P. H. Armstrong, 'Charles Darwin's Visit to the Bay of Islands, December 1835', Auckland-Waikato Historical Journal, 60 (1992): 10-24; and P. H. Armstrong, 'Darwin's Perception of the Bay of Islands, New Zealand, 1835', New Zealand Geographer, 49.1 (1993): 26-9.

2. Diary, 22 December 1835, p. 360.

3. Ibid., 26 December 1835, p. 374.

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4. Correspondence, Vol. 4, p. 95.

5. Ibid., Vol. l,p. 471.

6. K. G. V. Smith, 'Darwin's Insects', Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), 14.1 (1987): 96.

7. Zoology of the Voyage, Part 5, p. 27.

8. Covington's Diary, Mitchell Library, Sydney, NSW.

9. DAR 37.2/803-04.

10. DAR 37.2/809-10.

11. DAR 37.2/809.

12. Diary, 24 December 1835, p. 372.

13. Ibid.

14. Ibid., 22 December 1835, p. 363.

15. Ibid., 23 December 1835, p. 367.

16. Ibid., 22 December 1835, p. 364.

17. Ibid., 22 December 1835, p. 360-1.

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The passage from the Bay of Islands to Port Jackson, or Sydney, had been a difficult one. It had taken twelve days. On one occasion there had been a force 8 gale. Covington wrote that 'it blew very heavy' and that the long passage was occasioned 'by head winds and calms', noting that the voyage was 'very often made in 5 days by traders'.

However, by the morning of 12 January 1836 things were improving: just after midnight the log records that the ship 'Made all sail on the port tack' and by 4.00 a.m. the Sydney Light, about eight miles distant, was visible. At 7.30 a.m. sails were trimmed and shortened for 'running for and into Port Jackson'. It was fine: a few clouds scattered over the summer sky, with a force 2 southerly breeze, but it was not until 1.30 p.m. that HMS Beagle came into Sydney Harbour and was moored '30 fathoms each way' (i.e. with cables going in two directions). HMS Zebra was at anchor close by, and it seems that she and the Beagle exchanged some equipment. Most of the next few days were spent in taking on stores, both food (bread, raisins, sugar, chocolate, tea, flour, beef, vegetables) and naval supplies (rope, canvas, tar, paint, turpentine, tallow, linseed oil, timber), as well as coal for cooking and some small items of equipment. The crew were 'employed variously about ship's duties', and Captain FitzRoy and Lieutenant Sulivan took navigational and astronomical measurements at a point not far from the present site of the steps of Sydney Opera House. FitzRoy had reports to write for the Admiralty and courtesy calls to make on local notables such as the surveyor-general, Major T. L. Mitchell. There were occasional excitements. On 15 January it is recorded that a nearby vessel was observed on fire and boats were sent to render assistance. On 26 January the ship was dressed with flags 'in commemoration of the settlement being founded' 48 years previously -the precursor to the modern Australia Day.

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Darwin left the ship on 16 January, returning on the 27th, socializing a little in Sydney and visiting the King family home at Dunheved, inland from Sydney. (Philip Gidley King was a midshipman aboard the Beagle. He had been a good friend of Darwin, but left the ship at this point.) Darwin hired a couple of horses and a guide to take him inland. It was extremely hot and dry. The roads, he thought, were excellent, and there was a good deal of traffic, but he noted that there were more 'pot-houses' (pubs) than in England. He lunched at one in Parramatta. He continued on to Emu Ferry, where he spent the night 'at a very comfortable inn' which has been identified as the Governor Bourke Inn.1 As usual, Darwin observed all aspects of his surroundings closely, noting the distinctiveness of many aspects of the Australian environment:

This line of road is the most frequented & longest been inhabited in the Colony. The whole land is enclosed with high railings; for the farmers have not been able to rear hedges. There are many substantial houses & good cottages scattered about; but although [there are] considerable pieces of land under cultivation, the greater part yet remains as when first discovered. Making allowances for the cleared parts, the country here precisely resembles all that which I saw during the ten succeeding days. The extreme uniformity in the character of the Vegetation is the most remarkable feature in the landscape of all parts of New S. Wales. Everywhere we have open woodland, the ground being partially covered with a most thin pasture. The trees nearly all belong to one family; the foliage is scanty & of a rather peculiar light green tint; it is not periodically shed; the surface of the leaves are placed in a vertical, instead of as in Europe a nearly horizontal position. This fact & their scantiness makes the woods light & shadowless; although under the scorching sun of summer, this is loss of comfort, it is of importance to the farmer, as it allows grass to grow where it otherwise could not.2

Anyone familiar with the Australian bush immediately feels that Darwin has captured the essential nature of eucalypt woodland extremely well. He went on to report that the trees stood 'tolerably straight' and 'well apart'. He described the way in which the bark was annually shed and often hung in long shreds, swinging in the wind, giving the landscape an 'untidy' and 'desolate' appearance, and one of 'arid sterility'. T cannot imagine a more complete contrast in every respect than the forest of . . . Chiloe, with the woods of Australia', he wrote.

One sunset he fell in with a group of about 20 Aborigines:

. . . each carrying in their accustomed manner a bundle of Spears &c other weapons. By giving a leading young man a shilling they were

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easily detained & threw their spears for my amusement. They were all partly clothed &c several could speak a little English; their countenances were good humoured & pleasant & they seemed far from the degraded beings as usually represented. In their own arts they are admirable; a cap being fixed at 30 yards distance, they transfixed it with a spear, delivered by the throwing stick . . .3

Traditional Aboriginal society was already in decline: Darwin noted the effects of the availability of liquor, the introduction of diseases (especially measles) and the high infant mortality, together with the fact that groups battled with each other, and he expressed little surprise that numbers were decreasing. Despite the above fair-minded account, he thought that they stood a 'few degrees higher in civilisation . . . than the Fuegians'. Here he displays his classic comparative approach and the concept of a 'scale' of human societies (see pp. 76 and 163).

On 17 January the little party started from the inn very early, crossing the Nepean River in a small ferry-boat, and began the ascent of the Blue Mountains, the road always bordered by the 'scrubby wood of small trees of the never-failing Eucalyptus family'. At lunch-time he recorded: 'we baited our horses at a little Inn called the Weatherboard'. While the horses were resting, Darwin followed a little valley with its tiny rill to the north and came upon a stupendous vista, which he wrote about lyrically and at considerable length. The extract below is abbreviated.

[A]n immense gulf is suddenly & without any preparation seen through the trees which border the pathway at a depth of perhaps 1500 feet. Walking a few yards farther, one stands on the brink of a vast precipice, & below is the grand bay or gulf, for I know not what other name to give it, thickly covered with forest. The point of view is situated as it were at the head of the bay, for the line of cliff diverges away on each side, showing headland behind headland as on a bold sea coast. These cliffs are composed of a horizontal whitish Sandstone; & so absolutely vertical that ... a person standing on the edge & throwing a stone can see it strike the trees in the abyss. In front . . . about five miles distant another line of cliff extends, having the appearance of completely encircling the valley; hence the name of Bay is justified as applied to this grand amphitheatrical depression. If we imagined that a winding harbor [sic] . . . surrounded by bold cliff shores were laid dry, & that forest sprung up on the sandy bottom we should have the appearance & structure . . . here exhibited. The . . . view was . . . extremely magnificent.4

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The locality is now known as Wentworth Falls. Darwin went on his way towards Blackheath and spent the night at the Scotch Thistle Inn. This has since been destroyed, but an inn on the same site is known as Gardner's Inn, in memory of the innkeeper who welcomed Darwin and his little party. He told travellers he was an old soldier: in fact he was a former convict. Darwin thought that the inn was similar to some of those of North Wales, perhaps those in which he had stayed in the summer of 1831 with Professor Sedgwick, just before he embarked.

Very early on the morning of 18 January they covered the few miles to Govett's Leap, a view that Darwin considered 'similar . . . perhaps even more stupendous' than that at Wentworth Falls. Early in the day 'the gulf was filled with a thin blue haze . . . which added to the apparent depth'.

In his geological notes Darwin wrote: 'The Geologist is immediately astonished at the enormous amount of matter, which the horizontal stratification on each side of the grand valley seems to prove to have been removed.'5 He described the little trickle of the 'insignificant rivulet' or 'chain of pools' in the upper valleys. Although the idea that the valleys had been cut 'like other valleys by aqueous erosion' seems briefly to have run through his mind, the notion that they had been cut by the sea, when it 'stood higher' some time in the geological past seems to have stuck in his mind. He stresses this notion of an uplifted sea-coast in his book Geological Observations on Volcanic Islands, in which he uses the same terminology as in his earlier notes on the gorge-like valleys. He describes them as resembling 'a bold sea-coast', and wrote of the 'bay-like recesses' as having a similarity to the 'numerous fine harbours ... on the present coast of New South Wales'. The idea that such gargantuan valleys could have been cut by stream action was 'preposterous'. He was almost obsessed with this notion (now considered erroneous), and wrote many times of it to his friend James Dwight Dana, who visited the valleys a few years later.6 The sea level change theme runs through his writings on the Falklands, the Bay of Islands and elsewhere. It was not always a correct evaluation.

The travellers continued northwestwards, through the granite country of the Vale of Clwydd, spending the next night at Wallerawang, a large sheep property now partly submerged beneath an artificial lake. Darwin had an introduction to the 'superintendent', who was hospitable. On 19 January they went kangaroo-hunting. There was poor sport and Darwin bemoaned the fact the greyhounds (and of course firearms) had led to the destruction of wildlife: 'now the Emu is banished to a long distance, & the Kangaroo is become scarce', he wrote, foreseeing the time when they would be exterminated - 'the doom is fixed'. However: 'The Grey hounds pursued a Kangaroo Rat [Potorous tridactylus, a potoroo] into a hollow tree out of

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which we dragged it; it is an animal as big as a rabbit, but with the figure of a Kangaroo.'7

They continued towards Bathurst on the 19th. Darwin noticed the almost ubiquitous effects of fire. Birds were not very abundant, but he saw large flocks of white cockatoos (probably sulphur-crested Cacatua galerita) and 'a few most beautiful parrots' (perhaps crimson rosella Platycercus elegans, eastern rosella Platycercus eximus and king parrot Alisterus scapu-laris)} There were crows 'like our jackdaws' and 'another bird something like a magpie'. He saw Casuarinas, thinking it odd that they were called oaks (she-oaks) as they did not resemble English oaks at all! In the pleasant evening he took a stroll along a chain of ponds, where he had the good fortune to see several of the famous platypus or Ornithorhyncus paradox-icus (now O. anatinus). In the same diary entry he recorded:

I had been lying on a sunny bank & was reflecting on the strange character of the animals of this country compared to the rest of the World. An unbeliever in everything beyond his own reason might exclaim, 'Surely two distinct Creators must have been at work; their object is the same & certainly the end in each case is complete'. Whilst thus thinking, I observed the conical pitfall of a Lion-Ant: a fly fell in &c immediately disappeared; then came a large but unwary Ant. His struggles to escape being very violent, the little jets of sand described by Kirby (Vol. 1. p. 425) were promptly directed against him. - His fate, however, was better than that of the fly's. Without doubt the predaecious Larva belongs to the same genus but to a different species from the Europaean kind. Now what would the Disbeliever say to this? Would any two workmen ever hit on so beautiful, so simple, &c yet so artificial a contrivance? It cannot be thought so. The one hand has surely worked throughout the universe. A Geologist perhaps would suggest that the periods of Creation have been distinct & remote the one from the other; that the Creator rested from his labor [sic].9

It could be argued that the use of the words 'Creator' and 'Creation' (and the use of capitals), the idea of more than one episode of creation and the sentence: 'The one hand has surely worked throughout the universe', signify a Creationist, deistic approach, reflecting Genesis 1; the final words, 'the Creator rested in his labor', echoing the words of Genesis 2:2-3. But Darwin uses capitals for many nouns in his diary. On the other hand two Australian authors10 hint at the possibility that much of this was a religious disguise, as the diary was partly written for his family (especially his sisters) and Darwin wanted to conceal from them the fact that he had abandoned

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his religious outlook and adopted an evolutionary point of view. However, the evidence for this is not strong; as we have seen, he was writing from a strongly Christian viewpoint just a few weeks earlier, in Tahiti and New Zealand (see pp. 145 and 165).

Although here and there in the notes from the Beagle period there are vague hints that the idea of mutability of species went though his mind, all the evidence suggests that it was not until after his return to England, in about March 1837, that his full 'conversion' to the evolutionary outlook occurred.11 At the time of his embarkation on the Beagle he probably accepted much of the Genesis creation narrative as an accurate account of life's origins. These conventional notions were to some extent reinforced in his undergraduate days by his reading of William Paley's (1802) Natural Theology, which argued that the complexity of the living world and level of adaptation of organisms to their environment and way of life provide evidence for the existence of the deity: design implies a designer.

The 'sunny bank' was possibly that of Cox's River, between Blackheath and Bathurst, New South Wales.12 Darwin had travelled for several days through an open forest of eucalypts, acacias and casuarinas, often burned. He had been hunting for emu and kangaroo and seen flocks of cockatoos and parrots. He had encountered groups of hunting Aborigines. He was very conscious of travelling through a very different environment from any that he had seen before.

But there was more to it than that. A few hours before he encountered the antlion he had dragged from a hollow tree a kangaroo-rat, 'as big as a rabbit, but with the figure of a Kangaroo'; he had had seen several platypi playing in a chain of ponds that represented the dry summer remnants of a river; they 'might easily have been mistaken for many water rats', although when his companion shot one he could see that they were quite different -'a most extraordinary animal'; there were birds 'something like the [European] magpie' but although black and white were very different in structure. He heard tell of 'tigers and hyaenas' called such 'simply because they are Carnivorous' although very different from animals with these names elsewhere. The Australian trees were completely different from the oaks of the East Anglian and Shropshire countryside (but they were nevertheless trees). And the antlion (the larval form of an insect related to the lacewings, family Myrmeleontidae) was remarkably similar in its appearance and behaviour to that described by William Kirby from Europe, and yet also subtly different. In the margin beside the sentence: 'Without doubt this .. . Larva belongs to the same genus but to a different species from the Europaean kind' are written the words, 'NB The pitfall was not above half the size of the one described by Kirby.'

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Darwin was noticing an environment that was different, with different organisms, isolated from the rest of the world, and yet there were creatures that, even if they belonged to different species, genera or families, resembled those with which he was familiar. Of the 'two distinct Creators', one of Australia, one of the rest of the world, he mused, 'their object has been the same &c certainly in each case the end is complete'. Today we might argue that the platypus and the water-rat, the Australian magpie and its European analogue, the two species of antlion, the marsupial carnivores and their placental mammal equivalents filled similar ecological niches and had been subjected to similar selection or adaptation pressures. Darwin was not able to go as far at the time, but he was on his way. He was not an evolutionist when he lay on the grassy bank in New South Wales that hot summer day in early 1836, but he was already beginning to think ecologically, in terms of whole environments, and to wonder about the manner in which individual organisms related to their surroundings. The she-oaks and the gum-trees with their vertical leaves, the climate, the occurrence of fire, the soils, the Aborigines, the parrots and cockatoos, the emus, kangaroo and kangaroo-rat were components of an integrated system, just as the components of the kelp-bed in the Falklands (pp. 97-8) were intimately connected with each other. However, while the kelp-bed was almost indistinguishable in the Falklands, Tierra del Fuego and (as he later found) the islands round the southern tip of Chile, the Australian environment was very distinctive.

While resting with Darwin on the bank, we might also briefly re-examine the antlion incident. (It must have been written up some days after the event, when he had access to Kirby's four-volume work aboard the Beagle.) Although the note is brief, it is very perceptive: there is excellent detail; the behaviour of the larva in directing 'little jets of sand' against the prey is mentioned; it shows the comparative approach; some quantitative comment on the size of the 'conical pitfall' is implied. Alas, we cannot be absolutely certain of the exact species that Darwin found - there are dozens of species in Australia. Despite having collected hundred of insect specimens in Australia, he does not seem to have taken the antlion specimen.13

Darwin's little group continued, arriving at Bathurst after a 'long day's ride'. Again he passed though vast areas that were aflame, with 'volumes of smoke sweeping across the road'. It was hot, dry and dusty; the rivers were reduced to chains of ponds. The town had a 'not very inviting appearance'. There was a 'hideous little red-brick church': it still stands, although the more recent addition of a tower improves its appearance somewhat. His Little Notebook contains the scribbled note that on riding about Bathurst he 'saw nothing'. There was a small detachment of British soldiers in the town,

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and Darwin met, and seems to have stayed with, a Captain Chetwoode. The Captain's attempts at gardening were 'quite heart-breaking' as the 'siroccolike' wind damaged the 'young apples, peaches and grapes'. In former years there had been 'plenty of quail to shoot', but like the kangaroo and emu they had declined. Finally: 'The Officers all seemed very weary of this place & I am not surprised.'14

Darwin returned to Sydney, using a different route for the first part of the journey. At noon on the 22 January he 'baited at a farm house (there being no inns)'. The owner was a very recent arrival in the colony of New South Wales 'and appeared to be going on very well'. For a long period Darwin had lived in an almost exclusively masculine society - the seamen on the Beagle, soldiers, pioneers - and he must have yearned for a little female company.15 He noted that the owner of the farm 'had two pretty daughters, who, I suspect will not remain long on his hands'. He endured a day's illness (perhaps he had been overexerting himself) at the Weatherboard Inn, as the weather closed in and it rained heavily, 'dropping from the eaves'; there was a 'thin mist; the air was cold and comfortless'.

He resumed his journey on the 26th, spending the night with the King family at Dunheved. The next day he rode to Paramatta with Captain King (the former Captain of the Beagle and father of Midshipman King, Darwin's shipmate).

Close to the town, his brother in law Mr MacArthur lives & we went there to lunch. The house would be considered a very superior one, even in England. There was a large party, I think about 18 in the Dining room. It sounded strange in my ears, to hear very nice looking young ladies exclaim, 'Oh we are Australians & know nothing about England.'16

The reaction of other English visitors to Australia, before and since, has been similar. Again, however, Darwin seems to have appreciated the female company. He was not the only one: two of his shipmates from the Beagle eventually married the MacArthur daughters.17

It would have been a short ride back to Sydney. In his last two days there, Darwin visited Conrad Martens, the man who had been the official artist on the first part of the Beagle's voyage but who had left the ship in South America. There seems to have been a certain amount of socializing while the ship was in port: the officers of the Beagle, Captain King and the colony's surveyor-general, Colonel Mitchell, seem to have mingled. Possibly Darwin attended some of this. He probably did some shopping, and seems even to have had a little time for insect-collecting: several dozen specimens were taken. He wrote some letters and wrote up his diary, giving his considered

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views on New South Wales. He was worried by the fact that the convicts (and former convicts) were everywhere: it must be dreadful, he thought, to be waited on at table by convict servants. 'The whole community', he wrote, 'is rancourously divided on every subject.' Comments such as: 'Children acquire ... vile expressions'; 'There is much jealousy', occur throughout his notes. 'I am disappointed in the state of Society', he concluded, but

On the other hand, the capital of a person will without trouble produce him treble interest as compared to England. The luxuries of life are in abundance & very little dearer, as most articles of food are cheaper than in England. The climate is splendid & healthy, but to my mind its charms are lost by the uninviting aspect of the country.18

There is some contradiction here; in a letter to his sister Susan he asked her to tell his father that he had had to draw a bill for £100, as Sydney was 'a villainously dear place'!19 This typifies his ambivalence. 'This is a wonderful Colony', he wrote to his sister. The wool industry was thriving and the colony expanding economically; it 'ranked high amongst the 100 wonders of the World' and showed 'the Giant force of the parent country'. And yet

On the whole I do not like new South Wales: it is without doubt an admirable place to accumulate pounds and shillings; but Heaven forbid that ever I should live where every other man is sure to be somewhere between a petty rogue and a bloodthirsty villain.20

At 10.30 a.m. on 30 January the anchor was weighed, and the ship 'made all sail to the top gallant sails', tacking 'as requisite, working out of Port Jackson'. By 7.00 p.m. they were abeam of Point Perpendicular.

They were bound for Hobart Town, in Tasmania (see Chapter 15), but before we follow Darwin to the 'Apple Isle', let us briefly compare his experiences in New South Wales with those at his second landfall on the Australian mainland.

HMS Beagle, at 1.00 p.m. on 6 March, was 'standing up K[ing] George's Sound'. After tacking slowly for a few hours she 'came into the narrows and furled sails' at 5.30 p.m. At dawn the following morning she went through the narrows and anchored in three fathoms in Princess Royal Harbour. One of the ship's boats was put out. As was usually done when the Beagle arrived at a new port, Captain FitzRoy, accompanied by the 'ship's philosopher', paid a courtesy call on the local dignitary. In this case it was Sir Richard Spencer, a retired naval officer, the government Resident, who lived with his family in a 'small but comfortable farmhouse', what is now called the Old Farm at Strawberry Hill, Albany. Sir Richard had lived there only since

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Figure 14.1 Map of King George's Sound, Western Australia

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1833, but there was a thriving garden with oranges, asparagus, gooseberries and raspberries. They discussed the Beagle's hydrographic survey, and FitzRoy agreed to let Sir Richard have details of the navigational and astronomical observations they made at the Sound.21

Many of Darwin's impressions of King George's Sound echo his experiences in New South Wales, but he seemed to have an even lower opinion of the place. The passage below is from The Voyage of the Beagle, based on his diary entries.

The Beagle sailed from Tasmania [on 7 February 1836], and on the 6th of the ensuing month, reached King George's Sound, situated close to the S.W. corner of Australia. We staid [sic] there eight days; and we did not during our voyage pass a more dull and uninteresting time. The country, viewed from an eminence, appears a woody plain, with here and there rounded and partly bare hills of granite protruding. One day I went out with a party in hopes of seeing a kangaroo hunt, and walked over a good many miles of country. Everywhere we found the soil sandy and very poor; it supported either a low brushwood and wiry grass, or a forest of stunted trees. The scenery resembled the high sandstone platform of the Blue Mountains; the Casuarina (a tree somewhat resembling a Scotch Fir [Pinus sylvestris]) is, however, here in rather greater number, and the Eucalyptus rather less . . . The general bright green colour of the brushwood and other plants, viewed from a distance, seemed to promise fertility. A single walk, however, was enough to dispel such an illusion; and he who thinks with me will never wish to walk again in so uninviting a country.22

Even the plants were less appealing than those that he had seen elsewhere:

In the open parts there are many grass trees [Xanthorrhoea sp. and Kingia australis], a plant which, in appearance, has some affinity with a palm; but, instead of being surmounted by a crown of noble fronds, it can boast merely of a tuft of very coarse grass-like leaves.

Although he gives a succinct description of the West Australian environment, negative adjectives predominate through the whole passage - dull, uninteresting, poor, stunted, uninviting, coarse - to name a few.

The two aspects of life around the Sound that were of greatest interest were the geology and an Aboriginal corroboree.

Darwin started his geological observations and speculations before the Beagle came to anchor:

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Figure 14.2 Dykes intruding into granite, shore of King George's Sound

Figure 14.3 Grass-tree (Kingia), King George's Sound

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[0]n entering the sound in the Vessel, I saw that peculiar form of bare smooth conical hills appearing to be composed of great folding layers, which is found in Brazile [sic] &c in the Mountains of Venezuela. I at once suspected that the observation of Humboldt of the frequency of this form in the hills of gneiss-granite, would be verified in this part of Australia.23

His prediction was correct: the rounded and conical domes that surround King George's Sound are indeed of granite. He studied the granite carefully, describing it as 'a handsome stone composed of very large crystals of feldspar, little quartz, black mica, which latter [is] infrequently replaced by hornblende'. Elsewhere he records the way in which the whole district is traversed by dykes: 'Near the settlement in Princess Royal Harbor, there is [a] . . . system of six or eight dykes; these are a foot wide . . . They occur within a space of a hundred yards & run from N by E-S by W.'24

It is humbling and instructive to walk around the Sound today and identify almost exactly the route that Darwin took on some of his geological walks; to see the mineralogy of the granite just as he described it, the rounded domes with their exfoliating layers, the abundance of intruded dykes. Some of these dykes and veins he thought were of approximately the same age as the granite, some much younger. His observations were superb and would have confirmed in his mind the fact that he lived in a dynamic, changing world.

He noticed that the depressions between the granite hills were for the most part lined with sandy sedimentary deposits. Sometimes the sediments lapped up the sides of the hills, occasionally as in the steep cliffs of Bald Head, giving marked land-forms. Darwin visited the headland with FitzRoy, and described the calcareous sands, with their fossil shells and plants, in great detail in his notes, believing them - probably correctly - to have accumulated as sand-dunes. He also, as in many of the localities he visited, thought that the land had formerly 'stood lower in relation to the sea':

As the land rose, during the periods of its elevation, sand dunes would accumulate lower and lower on the flanks of the hills; in them bushes would grow and land shells abound. By degrees, the sand becoming solidified, the shells would be imbedded and the bushes would perish; their decayed roots and branches would then become so many casts occupied by calcareous matter.25

The process of accumulation of the sands might well be broadly correct (although modern thought differs in some detail on the mechanism of origin of the calcareous plant fossils). However, although there has been some

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oscillation in levels of land and sea over the past few thousand years, along the coast of south-west Australia the most important movement has been a rise in sea level since the Ice Age and the resultant drowning of pre-existing valleys to form Princess Royal Harbour and King George's Sound. As in the Falklands, Tasmania and South America, Darwin did not appreciate this. The account of the Aboriginal corroboree is worth giving almost in full:

A large tribe of natives, called the White Cockatoo men, happened to pay the settlement a visit while we were there. These men, as well as those of the tribe belonging to King George's Sound . . . were persuaded to hold a 'corrobery' or great dancing party. As soon as it grew dark, small fires were lighted, and the men commenced . . . painting themselves white in spots and lines. As soon as all was ready, large fires were kept blazing, round which the women and children were collected as spectators; the Cockatoo and King George's Men formed two distinct parties, and generally danced in answer to each other. The dancing consisted in their running either sideways or in Indian file into an open space, and stamping on the ground with great force as they marched together. Their heavy footsteps were accompanied by a kind of grunt, by beating their spears together, and by . . . extending their arms and wriggling their bodies. It was a most rude and barbarous scene, and to our ideas without any sort of meaning; but we observed that the black women and children watched it with the greatest pleasure. Perhaps these dances originally represented actions, such as wars and victories; there was one called the Emu dance, in which each man extended his arm in a bent manner, like the neck of that bird. In another dance, one man imitated the movements of a kangaroo grazing in the woods, whilst a second crawled up, and pretended to spear him. . . . [T]he air resounded with their wild cries. Every one appeared in high spirits, and the group of nearly naked figures, viewed in the light of the blazing fires, all moving in hideous harmony, formed a perfect display of a festival amongst the lowest barbarians. In Tierra del Fuego, we have beheld many curious scenes in savage life, but never, I think, one where the natives were in such high spirits and so perfectly at their ease. After the dancing was over, the whole party formed a great circle on the ground and the boiled rice and sugar was distributed, to the delight of all.26

Darwin is applying his 'scale' or ladder of human society here: 'rude and barbarous scene', 'lowest barbarians', and in his comparison with the Fuegians. Anything but politically correct to the modern view, but Darwin was seeing the world through the lens of his time and background. Humans

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> .' 'Crin^^ ."•{&.*£ . '&t £rt»J«

Figure 14.4 Aborigines, King George's Sound

Source: Durmont Durville, Voyage pittoresque autour du monde (Paris, 1835)

and their behaviour were observed as carefully as animals, and were seen to be a component of the environment, along with the animals, plants and landscapes.

Although he collected insects, fish, shells, a mouse and a frog at King George's Sound, along with a number of rock specimens, Darwin seems to have seen few birds or mammals. The landscape he thought was dull; the vegetation, as in New South Wales, was for the most part monotonous. He thought the tiny young colony of about 30 or 40 cottages scattered along the coast of the Sound rather pathetic. Yet he was surprisingly prescient in many ways: he certainly thought that this part of Western Australia had good prospects. He was uncannily accurate when he wrote: 'I understand . . . that thirty miles inland there is excellent land for all purposes: this is already granted into allotments & will soon be under cultivation. The settlement of King George's Sound will ultimately be the Sea port of this inland district.'27

There was much in Australia that Darwin did not like; and yet. . ., and yet. . ., there was much of interest to him. Australian threads weave their way though much of his later work - in Volcanic Islands and Coral Reefs, in Origin of Species, Emotions, Descent of Man and much else. The isolated Great South Land, with its distinctive land-forms, plants, animals and people, left a lasting impression on him. On 'gladly' leaving28 Australia, on

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14 March 1836, he wrote: 'Farewell Australia! you are a rising child and doubtless some day will reign a great princess in the South: but you are too great and ambitious for affection, yet not great enough for respect. I leave your shores without sorrow or regret.'29

Notes

1. F. W. Nicholas and J. M. Nicholas, Charles Darwin in Australia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), p. 25.1 have given details of Darwin's visit to Sydney in P. H. Armstrong, 'HMS Beagle in Sydney, January 1836', History (February 1995): 15-17.

2. Diary, 16 January 1836, p. 377.

3. Ibid., p. 378.

4. Ibid., 17 January 1836, p. 380.

5. DAR31.8.

6. P. H. Armstrong, 'The Contrasting Views of Charles Robert Darwin and James Dwight Dana: An Early Problem in Australian Geology'', Journal of Australian Studies, 39 (1993): 55-64. In Darwin's defence it might be added that he did not have the opportunity of seeing these valleys in flood, during a wet season.

7. Diary, 18 January 1836, p. 382.

8. The suggestions of Nicholas and Nicholas, Darwin in Australia.

9. Diary, 19 January 1836, p. 383.

10. Nicholas and Nicholas, Darwin in Australia.

11. F. J. Sulloway, 'Darwin's Conversion: The Beagle Voyage and Its Aftermath', Journal of the History of Biology, 15 (1982): 327-98.

12. Nicholas and Nicholas, Darwin in Australia.

13. K. G. V. Smith, 'Darwin's Insects', Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), 14.1 (1987).

14. Diary, 20 January 1836, p. 385.

15. His ex-girlfriend, Fanny Owen, had married someone else a few months after Charles' departure. There was no one waiting for him.

16. Diary, 27 January 1836, p. 386.

17. John Wickham married Annie in 1842; Philip King married Elizabeth in 1843.

18. Diary, 28-29 January 1836, pp. 386-7.

19. Letter to Susan Darwin, 28 January 1836, DAR 223, Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 483.

20. Letter to J. S. Henslow, 28-29 January 1836, original in Botanic Gardens, Kew, Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 485.

21. P. H. Armstrong, Charles Darwin in Western Australia: A Young Scientist's Perception of an Environment (Nedlands: University of Western Australia Press, 1985).

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22. Voyage, pp. 432-3.

23. DAR 38.1/864-5.

24. DAR 38.1/866.

25. DAR 38.1/875.

26. Voyage, pp. 433-4.

27. Diary, 6 March 1836, p. 392.

28. The Beagle log shows that they went aground as they left the Sound, but managed to refloat an hour or two later without difficulty.

29. Voyage, p. 434.

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15. Tasmania: A Geological Laboratory

Tasmania, or Van Diemen's Land - as it was still often called at the time of Charles Darwin's visit - is an 'an island off an island', and it is interesting to reflect upon the comparisons he made between Tasmania and the mainland of Australia.

The crossing from Sydney took six days. The weather was bad some of the time: it was 'very cold and squally' and when the vessel entered Storm Bay, the weather 'justified this awful name'. Nevertheless, Darwin was on deck, making observations on the rock-formations as the Beagle sailed up the Derwent Estuary late on 6 February 1836. His first impression was that Hobart was 'inferior' to Sydney, for 'the latter might be called a city, this only a town'. Admittedly, around the cove were some 'fine warehouses' (they still stand), but the 'small fort' (Battery Point) did not impress him: 'Coming from the [former] Spanish settlements [of South America], where such magnificent care has generally been paid to the fortifications, the means of defence of these colonies appeared very contemptible.'1

Possibly we hear the echo of the voices of some of the officers of the Beagle speaking here.2 There were fewer large houses than in Sydney. Despite these initial impressions, Darwin seems to have preferred Hobart to Sydney, stating that he would certainly select Tasmania in preference to New South Wales should he be compelled to emigrate. The shops, he said, 'appeared good' and there was a good water supply - 'a thing much wanted in Sydney'. Some of the farms were 'very nice', others 'very tempting'. The village of New Norfolk, which he visited on his last day (16 February), he recorded as having 1,822 inhabitants, and he described it as 'flourishing'. He thought the colony well governed and speculated that there might be less crime than in England.

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The lower parts of the surrounding hills had been cleared and agriculture flourished. There were 'bright yellow fields of corn and dark green ones of potatoes' (it was late summer). The upper slopes of Mount Wellington were covered with 'a light wood', but the lower slopes which contemporary paintings and engravings3 show to have been criss-crossed with a network of field-boundaries, probably reminded him of parts of the English and Welsh countryside with which he was familiar. The climate was more moist, Darwin noted, and he thought the soils more fertile than those of New South Wales. 'The cultivated fields look well', he summarized, 'and the gardens abound with thriving vegetables and fruit trees', in marked contrast to the pathetic attempts at gardening by the soldiers of the garrison at Bathurst.

The greatest difference, however, was in 'society', which he felt was infinitely to be preferred to that of Sydney: he thought the difference might be due to the lack of wealthy former convicts! Darwin, through his position as an honorary member of the crew of one of His Majesty's ships, had an immediate entree into the highest levels of Tasmanian society. He seems to have enjoyed himself. He dined one day with the Attorney-General's family and had a splendid musical evening. He also spent a good deal of time with the surveyor-general, George Frankland, and had dinner at his house another night, indeed possibly several nights,4 besides going on a number of field-trips with him. He heard tell of (but did not himself attend) a fancy-dress ball, at which 113 persons were present 'in costumes'.

He also seems to have been quite impressed with the level of engineering and scientific expertise in the small community. Of one of his geological field excursions he later wrote:

I took a long walk on the side of the bay opposite to the town: I crossed in a steam-boat, two of which are constantly plying backwards and forwards. The machinery of one of these vessels was entirely manufactured in this colony, which, from its very foundation, then numbered only three and thirty years!s

More controversial, perhaps, is his comment that the island enjoyed 'the great advantage of being free from a native population'. Darwin had had ample opportunity - in New Zealand, New South Wales, on Chiloe island, Tahiti and in Tierra del Fuego - of seeing that contact between Europeans and indigenous people usually resulted in the degradation of the latter, the deterioration of their social structures and conflict with the newcomers. He considered that the removal of the remnants of the Tasmanian native population to an isolated location was probably in their best interests. There had been terrible conflict with the settlers -

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robberies, burnings and murders. Darwin understood very clearly, however, where the blame lay: 'I fear there is no doubt that this train of evil and its consequences, originated in the infamous conduct of some of our own countrymen.'6 Darwin had no personal experience of the Tasmanian Aborigines, but seems to have made careful enquiries about their fate, both while on the island and subsequently. In the Voyage of the Beagle he describes the pathetic way in which an attempt was made to round up the remaining individuals:

The plan adopted was nearly similar to that of the great hunting-matches of India: a line was formed reaching across the island, with the intention of driving the natives into a cul-de-sac on Tasman's peninsula. The attempt failed; the natives, having tied up their dogs, stole one night through the lines.7

Eventually, however, most of them did surrender, and through the good offices of a Mr Robinson, 'an active and benevolent man', at considerable danger to himself, were taken to an island in the Bass Strait 'where food and clothes were provided them'. Darwin predicted the extinction of the race, and he was more or less right. The last full-blood died in 1876, although several thousand persons who claim part of their descent through Tasmanian Aborigines still constitute a vocal group in Tasmanian affairs. Darwin compared the situation with that on mainland Australia, where many Aborigines had little contact with whites and where families 'swarm with children', although he had noted some signs of decline.

As usual Darwin collected a large number of specimens from the island of Tasmania: about 50 rocks (more than at most places he visited), several reptiles, dozens of insects (especially his beloved beetles) and a number of shells. He also took some flatworms, or planaria, which he encountered in some rotting wood with which the countryside abounded. Darwin did a number of experiments with these aboard the Beagle, although the creatures perished 'through neglect' before the work could be completed.8 Amongst the shells he collected, as he clambered over the rocks along the shoreline of the Derwent Estuary, were barnacles, the group of which Darwin made a special study in his later life.

Darwin's observations on the natural vegetation of Tasmania are mainly based on his ascent of Mount Wellington, behind Hobart. Darwin estimated its height at 3,100 feet (945 m); modern maps show it at 1,271 m. He described the mountain as high but without picturesque beauty. He attempted to climb Mount Wellington on 10 February, but, as he put it: 'I failed in a first attempt, from the thickness of the wood.' He tried again the following day, this time taking a guide with him. Darwin continued:

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Our guide, however, was a stupid fellow, and conducted us to the southern and damp side of the mountain, where the vegetation was very luxuriant; and where the labour of the ascent, from the number of rotten trunks, was almost as great as on a mountain in Tierra del Fuego or in Chiloe. It cost us five and a half hours of hard climbing before we reached the summit.9 In many parts the Eucalypti grew to a great size, and composed a noble forest. In some of the dampest ravines, tree-ferns flourished in an extraordinary manner; I saw one which was at least twenty feet [6.1 m] to the base of the fronds, and was in girth exactly six feet [1.8m]. The fronds forming the most elegant of parasols, produced a gloomy shade, like that of the first hour of the night.10

The damp forest, with its ferns and tangled undergrowth, was in marked contrast to the plant community at the summit of Mount Wellington, which was described as 'broad and flat, and is composed of huge angular masses of naked greenstone [dolerite]'.

We can be almost certain that in both the forest and in the 'alpine'11 environment (and also in farmland and garden habitats) Darwin was collecting hard; he was probably using his sweep-net, as well as examining, as he often did, the dead timber and carrion he encountered. There were small pools of water on the summit and it may be that a 'Larva, beneath stones, freshwater' was found there.12 It seems that he collected over a hundred insect specimens (possibly several hundred) in Tasmania, but many have been lost. Amongst the most interesting insects that he collected were a number of dung-beetles:

In Van Diemen's Land ... I found four species of Onthophagus, two of Aphodius, and one of a third genus, very abundant under the dung of cows; yet these latter animals had been then introduced only thirty-three years. Previously to that time, the Kangaroo and some other small animals were the only quadrupeds; and their dung is of a very different quality from that of their successors introduced by man. In England the greater number of stercovorus [dung-eating] beetles are confined in their appetites; that is they do not depend indifferently on any quadruped for the means of their subsistence. The change, therefore, in habits, which must have taken place in Van Diemen's Land, is the more remarkable.13

Subsequent research has confirmed the remarkable nature of this change in habits (and habitat) in Tasmania. Apparently, on the mainland of Australia, most of the species of beetle found by Darwin are similarly confined to the dung of native Australian animals. These annotations confirm Darwin's extraordinary powers of observation and deduction. He was extremely

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interested in dung-beetles and studied them in Chiloe, St Helena and elsewhere, pondering over the close association between two such different organisms, large mammals and a type of beetle (see pp. 118-19).

Covington seems to have assisted in a good deal of the collecting (the Insect Notes for Sydney include his name adjacent to the entries). His own diary shows that he accompanied Darwin up Mount Wellington on 11 February. However, apart from the occasional use of 'we' or 'us' in his writings on the locality, Darwin makes no mention of his companion. This occurs elsewhere, so perhaps we have a social- or class-divide here: Darwin was the 'master' and Covington the 'servant', and the relationship was a business one and not often acknowledged in any other way.14

Despite his descriptions of the forest and alpine communities, and the mentions of the 'noble' eucalypts and the tall ferns, Darwin does not seem to have collected many plant specimens in Tasmania. Nevertheless, he did take note in his geological diary of the evidence for the former existence of what seemed to have been a plant community rather different from the existing one. In a pale yellow limestone deposit 'within the outskirts of Hobart Town'15 he found 'distinct impressions of various leaves, which are said to differ from those now existing. Very many Shells have also been found.' It is not clear who it was said that they were of extinct forms -George Frankland, perhaps, who also gave him rock specimens from parts of Tasmania that Darwin was not able to visit. (Darwin was normally very careful to acknowledge where opinions of observations were those of others.) The suggestion, apparently accepted by Darwin at the time, appears to have been well founded. In the short published version of his account of the geology of Van Diemen's Land he wrote, after consulting an English botanist who knew the flora of Tasmania well:

Mr Robert Brown had the kindness to look at my specimens, and he informed me that there are four of five kinds, none of which he recognises as belonging to existing species. The most remarkable leaf is palmate, like that of a fan-palm, and no plant having leaves of this structure has hitherto been discovered in Van Diemen's Land. The other leaves do not resemble the most usual form of the Eucalyptus (of which tribe the existing forests are chiefly composed) nor do they resemble that class of exceptions to the common form of the leaves of the Eucalyptus which occur in this island.16

He went on to describe this fossil assemblage as a 'remnant of a lost vegetation'. Here was evidence that the vegetation of the island had changed over time.

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On 15 February 1836, his penultimate day in Tasmania, he wrote to his friend, cousin and fellow beetle-collector from Cambridge days, William Fox. Despite a successful couple of days of fieldwork with George Frankland, and having apparently dined with him earlier in the evening, he lamented:

I have had little opportunity for some time past of doing anything in Natural History. I draw up very imperfect sketches of the Geology of all the places, to which we pay flying visits; but they cannot be of much use. Leaving [South] America, all connected & therefore interesting, series of observations have come to an end.17

This letter was written after the three years or so of work in South America and the visits to the Galapagos, Tahiti, New Zealand and New South Wales but before those to the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, Mauritius, South Africa, Ascension, St Helena and the Azores. It was indeed penned before he had written up his Tasmanian material. It shows the somewhat weary young naturalist (he had been on the move for just over four years) reasonably satisfied with what he had achieved in South America, where he had been on a number of long journeys, observing and collecting, and so seen many different parts of the continent and a wide variety of environments. Perhaps he already appreciated that he had sufficient material for his book on the Geology of South America, although he seems to have felt somewhat dissatisfied with his brief week or two-week stays in the places he had subsequently visited. The observations had been superficial and appeared disconnected. Patterns and relationships were unclear.

Darwin need not have worried. His comparative approach would see him through. He had seen coral reefs in Tahiti, and prepared a first draft of his coral reefs hypothesis, but he had not yet visited Cocos, a description of which formed the prime case-study (Chapter 1) in his Coral Reefs book. He had visited St Jago and the Galapagos but not yet St Helena and Ascension, accounts of which performed a similar role (Chapters 3 and 4) in the Volcanic Islands volume. It was the visits to these places which could be said to provide the 'keystones' of his important later published theories and descriptions. Darwin had excellent powers of observation and deduction. He could use information from several different sources to build a theory or an integrated account, showing the relationships between different aspects. He also had the most superb luck! He visited the right places, and indeed it could be said he visited them in the right order. He saw St Jago, where the geology was well-exposed and straightforward, before he tried to unravel the more complex geologies of other islands (or the Andes!). He saw what he thought was evidence for changes in sea level in many localities,

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swam amongst the corals of Tahiti and developed the first outline of the reefs theory, which he was able to confirm at Cocos a few weeks later. The 'habit of comparison' allowed him to interpret what he saw in a coherent, structured way. Nonetheless, he was presented, in the amazing panorama of islands (and other places) which the Beagle put before him, with the raw materials of that comparison.

Even as he was penning the somewhat self-critical letter to William Fox, he was probably thinking about writing up his account of the geology of Tasmania, which despite being confined to a restricted area provides a number of instances of Darwin's integrative powers, illustrates his scientific preoccupations at the time and in some ways was over a century ahead of its time. Alas, although certain fragments appeared in Geological Observations on Volcanic Islands, the full manuscript was not published until 1971.18

Darwin immediately grasped, on the basis of just a few days of fieldwork, the broad structure of the geology of the Hobart region: 'In the neighbourhood of Hobart town, two distinct formations occur, both accompanied by rocks of igneous origin.'19 He goes on to describe the rocks of the younger series in fine detail:

I will begin by the most modern of the two. In this formation the prevalent rock is white, fine-grained Sandstone, composed of minute grains of Quartz with a little white cementing matter. Within the town it is associated, with reddish laminated Aluminous Sandstones, other ferruginous ones & some Clay Slates. On a hill close behind the town, there are strata of a very impure Coal, carbonaceous Shale, & white Sandstone banded with the finest lines, stained black by a similar substance. Here such layers are penetrated by a great mass or dyke (a hundred yards wide) of a decomposing Greenstone: on one side the strata dip away at an angle of 60° or 70°, & fragments of Porcelain rock & indurated sandstone, lying on the lines of junction, point out the effect of the igneous mass - on the other side, the confusion is even greater; layers of impure Coal being now nearly vertical.

Darwin deduces the geological history from the appearance of the rocks and their orientation. A sequence of sedimentary rocks has been intruded by a dyke, the hot magma cooking up the shaley, clay-rich rocks into a porcelain-like substance, modifying the sandstone and contorting the originally more or less horizontally bedded rocks so that they dip at a high angle or are near vertical.

The account continues with more details of the mineralogy and petrology of the formation; again and again the relationships between the rocks are emphasized: 'parts [of a sandstone layer] passed into a Conglomerate,

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from containing so many pebbles of the underlying Greenstone & a white flinty rock bearing peculiar Organic impressions, &c Sandstone, all of which belong to the older formation'.20 Darwin astutely recognized that where rocks contain fragments of other rocks, those included must be older. He continued:

We now come to the older formation of rocks, from the degradation of which the first series have been formed. The upper strata, to the thickness of several hundred feet consist of Sandstone; this rock is subject to some variation, but generally is of a yellowish or red colour, hard siliceous, & contains rounded grains of Quartz; I have seen some white & some quite red . . . Beneath this older sandstone we have a very singular assemblage of rocks; they may be described as graduating between compact hard Clay-Slates, white Cherty or Flinty rocks ... & Limestones . . . Perhaps the most abundant varieties might be named whitish flinty Slates. These rocks abound with impressions of Organic remains - the most abundant are those of the smaller stony Corals . . . there are likewise the casts of numerous Terebratula.21

Typically, Darwin gives excellent detail, and he describes fossils in the context of the strata in which they are found, rather than as mere curiosities. He understood that fossils could be used for correlating strata in different places. He also understood the relationship between the sedimentary strata and the intruded greenstone (dolerite):

Yet in this immediate neighbourhood I believe the lower strata of the second series generally rest on a coarse greenstone which, when in a fluid state, has burst through them. I think this from the entire absence of pebbles of Greenstone in strata which are only a few feet distant from this rock; & from its close juxtaposition of masses of the stratified stones.22

South of Hobart, on the western side of the Derwent estuary, Darwin (probably on 9 February) encountered basaltic lavas, and other types of volcanic rocks.

Following the Basaltic beach for a few hundred yards, there is a cliff, composed of a very compact mass of highly vesicular stone mingled with some compact kinds, parts have been broken & apparently reunited by heat, others clearly by the agency of water, as shown by containing two or three rounded pebbles. The cells of the Vesicular lava are generally linear, the lines being not infrequently parts of curves ... I can feel no doubt that this little projecting cliff, although

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at present showing no trace of a Crater was the point, from which the Basalt flowed. In close proximity, we have the older greenstone bearing almost the appearance of a Syenite, & through this rock the former Volcano must have burst its way.23

Darwin thus recognized that in the geological past there had been an active volcano a little to the south of where Hobart now stands. Interestingly, he makes a comparison with the geology of another large island that he had examined just a few weeks earlier: 'From first examining the country, from the preponderance of Trappean and ancient Volcanic rock I was struck with the resemblance of it to New Zealand.'

Other comparisons abound in Darwin's account of the geology of Tasmania; he compares his 'upper formation' with the sandstones of New South Wales, hinting at the suggestion that they might be approximately coeval and that there might be comparisons to be made in the granitic rocks of the two colonies. More recent geologists have seen these comparisons as 'perspicacious'. He recorded the similarity between a 'white soft alumino-sandstone' found south of the town with 'the substance of Huepilacuy at Chiloe'. A very much more speculative note, in another notebook, compared pebbles and rocks of the Hobart area with those from the sea floor off Tierra del Fuego, hinting that both may have been ice-rafted.

Darwin, therefore, using the disposition of rocks in the field, their appearances, the manner in which igneous rocks related to sedimentary strata, the inclusion of fragments of one rock-type in another (and the absence of such inclusions) and the presence of fossils was able to reconstruct the sequence of rocks in an area. He made generalizations based on his comparisons - both local and more widely drawn.

There are a host of other themes discussed in Darwin's geological memoranda on Hobart Town that might be discussed, were space to permit. We will note just two more. Darwin observed the relationship between the topography and the geomorphology, the land-forms; of the ascent of Mount Wellington he noted:

Passing over the low ground at its foot composed of the first series, we reach in the ascent the anomalous flinty and slaty rocks, then come to the Sandstones; these strata extend to a height perhaps of 1,200 ft, above which there is nothing but Greenstone. As the Strata on the sides are not very much disturbed, perhaps this height nearly expresses the thickness of this formation. All the Greenstone which crowns the mountain is of a very uniform character ... it strongly affects the Magnetic needle; one side of the mountain shows a large columnar structure; generally there is grand accumulation of immense loose fragments.24

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An enquirer who has attempted to retrace Darwin's steps in Tasmania immediately has an affinity with this: the initial gentler incline, the wall of sandstone, the massive screes, the 'organ pipes' feature of columnar doler-ite. The vista from the summit was also accurately described: 'The summit of Mount Wellington is broad, level & of considerable extent; looking W & NW, numberless Mountains of the same form & height, are seen; these in parts are said to unite into an elevated central plateau.'25 Here Darwin anticipates the theories of geomorphologists of well over a century later. J.L. Davies in 1959 recognized a 'higher plateau surface' - an 'erosion surface' cut in the geological past and subsequently uplifted and dissected. Darwin was also interested in features lower down in the landscape:

I now come to a subject which I have so frequently discussed in my Geological Memoranda, viz recent movements in the level of the land. On both sides of the Bay, & along nearly the whole line of coast, broken shells are found on the land to the height of 30 & 40 ft in quantities which make it rather difficult to believe they have all been carried there by the Aborigines. Amongst these shells are found many rounded pebbles and individuals two [sic] small to be brought for the purposes of eating; the coast moreover in a few places, by its outline, obscurely shows a small vertical retreat.26

Darwin was convinced, in his published account, 'that we must attribute the presence of the greater number [of shell deposits] to a small elevation of the land'. He was sure that the sea had formerly 'stood higher' (as he had been in Chiloe, the Falklands, New Zealand and New South Wales and many places in South America); the long narrow inlet of the Derwent and Storm Bay, now thought to be drowned valleys, did not strike him as evidence of submergence. Nevertheless, he was also self-critical:

On the shore of Ralph Bay (opening into Storm Bay) I observed a continuous beach about fifteen feet above high-water mark, clothed in vegetation, and by digging into it, pebbles encrusted with Serpulae were found: along the banks, also of the river Derwent, I found a bed of broken sea shells above the surface of the river, and at a point where the water is now too fresh for sea shells to live; but in both of these cases, it is just possible, that before certain spits of mud in Storm Bay were accumulated, the tides might have risen to the height where we now find shells.27

In a footnote to these observations in Geological Observations on Volcanic Islands (from which the above note, based on his Hobart Town geological notes, was taken) he compares the situation with that on another island:

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It would appear that some changes are now in progress in Ralph Bay, for I was assured by an intelligent farmer that oysters were formerly abundant in it, but that about the year 1834 they had, without any apparent cause, disappeared ... At Chiloe, in South America, I heard of a similar loss, sustained by the inhabitants, in the disappearance from one part of the coast of an edible species of Ascidia.28

Darwin seems to have been firmly under the spell of Lyell, understanding that changes can occur relatively gradually in the environment, and indeed are continuing today.

In the end it does not matter a great deal whether the small beach features he observed were raised beaches based on a former higher sea level (and modern thought is doubtful about this), or whether the piles of shells were Aboriginal middens (and recent opinion is that this is the case).29 Right or wrong, what is of particular interest is that in Tasmania, as at locales on the mainland of Australia (see Chapter 14), in February and March 1836, Charles Darwin was thinking a great deal about changes in the relative level of the land and sea. Indeed, this had been something of a preoccupation since his wanderings on the coasts of South America. Just a few weeks before he had seen the coral reefs of Tahiti (Chapter 12), and then, probably during the voyage between there and New Zealand, had written out the first draft of his coral atoll theory. All these ideas were to come together and to receive confirmation at the Cocos (Keeling) Islands in early April 1836. It is to this brief but important sojourn on the beautiful coral atoll in the Indian Ocean that we now turn.

Notes

1. Diary, 6 February 1836, p. 389.

2. The matter of Hobart's defences was an item of discussion in the colony for some decades. An article published over 20 years later pleaded for the building 'of more defensive batteries and the training of a militia'. A. F. Smith, 'Hobart Town Considered with Regard to Its Defence', Papers & Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania, 3.2 (1859): 213-20.

3. For example, Hobart Town on the River Derwent, Tasmania, W. J. Huggins, 1830. Hand-coloured engraving, Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales.

4. He noted in his diary: 'I passed at his house the most agreeable evenings since leaving England.' One of the nights that he dined with the Franklands was 12 February, Darwin's 27th birthday. Possibly they made a bit of a fuss of him, although he does not record this: he was frequently rather reticent about such personal matters in his letters and diaries.

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5. Diary, 7-10 February 1836, p. 390.

6. Voyage, p. 430.

7. Ibid. In his diary entry for 6 February (p. 389) he seems to be under the impression that the Aborigines were interned on the Tasman Peninsula (it was in fact the convicts); his later enquiries allowed him to correct this in the Voyage.

8. He described their reaction to light (they 'disliked' it and immediately crawled beneath fragments of wood). He also bisected one individual and observed the organism's ability to regenerate from a fragment. But a over a month later, as the Beagle entered the tropics 'they gradually sickened and died'.

9. It can now be ascended in a few minutes in a car by a good motor road.

10. Voyage, p. 432.

11. Darwin uses this word in his 'Insect Notes', K. G. V. Smith, 'Darwin's Insects', Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), 14.1 (1987): 99.

12. Alas, Darwin's 'Insect Notes' from Australia are somewhat confused. It is unclear whether some specimens were collected in New South Wales, Tasmania or at King George's Sound. There are crossings-out, and the order does not seem to coincide with the order in which the Beagle visited these places. Smith, 'Darwin's Insects'.

13. Ibid., p. 97.

14. Nevertheless there is good evidence that Darwin was quite fond of Covington, who remained in his employ after return to England. Covington was given letters of recommendation from Darwin when he emigrated permanently to Australia, and they corresponded until the former's death in 1861.

15. M. R. Banks located this quarry on land that is now a reserve bounded by Arthur, Browne, Lochner and Hamilton Streets, in Hobart. M. R. Banks, 'A Darwin Manuscript on Hobart Town', Papers & Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania, 103 (1971): 5-19.

16. Volcanic Islands, Chapter 7.

17. Letter to W. Fox, 15 February 1836, Christ's College, Fox 48; Correspondence, Vol. 1, pp. 491-2.

18. Banks, 'A Darwin Manuscript'. Original at DAR 38.1/837-57.

19. DAR 38.1/837.

20. DAR 38.1/839.

21. DAR 38.1/841-2. Terebratula is a genus of brachiopod, a type of shelled creature abundant in ancient seas.

22. DAR 38.1/846.

23. DAR 38.1/840.

24. DAR 38.1/847-8.

25. DAR 38.1/849.

26. DAR 38.1/854-5.

27. Geology of the Voyage of the Beagle, Part 2, Volcanic Islands, p. 141.

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28. Ibid, footnote to p. 141. Ascidia = sea-squirt.

29. J. L. Davies, 'Sea Level Change and Shoreline Development in Southeastern Tasmania', Papers & Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania, 93 (1959): 89-95; S. Brown, Aboriginal Archaeological Resources in South East Tasmania (Tasmania: National Parks and Wildlife Service of Tasmania, 1986); J. L. Davies, Macquarie University, personal communication.

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16. 'i am glad that we have visited these Islands': The Cocos (Keeling) Atoll

Captain FitzRoy's instructions, issued by their Lordships of the Admiralty at the start of the voyage, included the suggestion that the ship might call at the Keeling Islands (as they were then usually called) and 'accurately fix their position', if the Torres Strait route to the north of Australia were taken between the Pacific and Indian Oceans. (This was the route recommended for the southern hemisphere winter.) As we have seen, however, the Beagle left Port Jackson in late January, at the height of the southern summer, and so it was possible for FitzRoy to take the ship by the southern route, via Hobart Town and King George's Sound. The Captain's letter to the Admiralty, written from Port Jackson on 29 January 1836, reads: 'The Beagle . . . will sail tomorrow for Van Diemen's Land. Thence she will proceed towards England, touching at King George's Sound, the Mauritius, Cape of Good Hope and St Helena.'1 It seems that the decision to visit the Cocos (Keeling) archipelago2 was taken very late in the day. One is tempted to wonder whether some special pleading from the young naturalist influenced the Captain. It was fortunate indeed for Darwin that Cocos was included on the itinerary.

The last few days of the passage, from King George's Sound around Cape Leuwin and northwards, were 'tempestuous'. Much rain fell and the weather became 'thick and oppressive'. At the end of the sector, the officers of the Beagle 'were in much doubt whether [the islands] . . . lay eastward or westward of us'. On 31 March 1836, however, 'just as the sun was setting', the ship's crew saw a number of gannets flying to the west and FitzRoy 'steered directly after them'. FitzRoy's account of his first sight of the island group, at about 8.45 a.m., on 1 April, is worth quoting in full:

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7 am glad that we have visited these Islands': The Cocos (Keeling) Atoll

A long but broken line of cocoa-palm trees, and a heavy surf breaking on a low white beach, nowhere rising many feet above the foaming water, was all we could discern till within five miles of the larger Keeling (there are two distinct groups), and then we made out a number of low islets, nowhere more than thirty feet above the sea, covered with palm-trees, encircling a large shallow lagoon.3

Although the weather was fine (the log shows the symbols 'b' and 'be', for 'blue sky' and 'blue sky with passing clouds'), the winds were fickle; progress was slow, and sails had to be trimmed from time to time. At 2.00 p.m. a signal gun was fired for a pilot, and at 3.00 p.m. a ship's boat was sent ahead. An hour later, the log records, the 'pilot came on board'. Darwin recorded that 'Mr Liesk, an English resident, came off in his boat'. The latter assisted in bringing the ship to a safe anchorage in just under five fathoms (about 9 m) at 5.20 p.m.

The following morning the ship 'swept in' on the powerful current that exists between Direction and Horsburgh Islands. The anchor was cast in '3 to 5 fathoms' (6-9 m) in the lagoon just off Direction Island. It was 'still morning' when Darwin 'went on shore on Direction Island'. He obviously wasted little time; he seems to have walked around most of the island, looking at the beaches, botanizing and collecting for most of the day.

During the course of the next couple of days, Darwin, sometimes accompanied by FitzRoy, explored Home Island and West Island; they wandered round the Malay kampong (there were about 130 Malays employed by Clunies Ross, the self-styled ruler of the islands). One evening they dined with Mr Liesk, and perhaps Mrs Ross.

On 6 April Darwin accompanied FitzRoy and a small group of seamen in one of the ship's boats to the extreme south of the lagoon. He wrote: 'The channel was exceedingly intricate, winding through fields of delicately branching corals.' They saw several turtles and the Malays hunting them. In an unpublished account of the coral features of the islands he wrote:

The upper parts of the Lagoon are much filled up with Coral. Extensive flats are nearly awash at low water, & only here & there a circular hole of 12 fathoms is left, & these are clearly being filled up. The more common depth is about 6 fathoms, so that this is a shallow lagoon. The commonest species are the (Seriatopora, crown coral, a yellow sort) . . . Fungia, Escara, Chama, Meandrina in great loose balls. Astrea (the bulwark species) infrequent, as are the two other kinds which are found outside. These Corals are brittle & soft, & on standing on them a person breaks through to some depth.4

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Emden

HORSBURGH^ ISLAND

DIRECTION

ISLAND

12°05'S

'\Turks Reef

\Rumah Baru

-12°10'S

Quarantine,, Station

PRISON ISLAND Cemetery

HOME ISLAND

Oceania House

^PULUCEPLOK

"PULU '/PANDAN

WEST ISLAND.

5 km

MAJOR ISLANDS OF THE SOUTHERN COCOSATOLL

'SOUTH ISLAND

Figure 16.1 Map showing the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, Indian Ocean (partly after Australian National Mapping)

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7 am glad that we have visited these Islands': The Cocos (Keeling) Atoll

Figure 16.2 Exposed coast, West Island, Cocos; fragments of coral rock are visible in the foreground

The boat eventually reached South Island (Pulu Atas). Darwin mentions 'hillocks of blown sand about 14 ft' and crossing the 'narrow islet' to find a 'great surf breaking on the windward coast'. The contrast between the tranquil waters of the lagoon and the pounding waves of the Indian Ocean, just a short walk apart, through the coconut thicket and scrub was immense.

I can hardly explain the cause, but there is to my mind much grandeur in the view of the outer shores of these lagoon Islands. There is a simplicity in the barrier-like beach, the margin of green bushes and tall Cocoa nuts, the solid flat of Coral rock, strewed with occasional great fragments, & the line of furious breakers, all rounding away towards either hand.5

It is possible to identify the spot with some precision. The modern visitor is similarly impressed not only by the intrinsic beauty and grandeur of the scene but also by the possibility that Darwin stood here on this lonely tropical beach pondering his coral atoll theory, which was by this time well formed in his mind.

Even when FitzRoy, Darwin and their crew returned to the boat and cast off again into the lagoon, they did not hurry back to the Beagle:

We did not return on board till late in the evening, for we staid a long time in the lagoon, examining fields of coral and the gigantic shells of Chama, into which, if a man were to put his hand, he would not, as long as the animal lived, be able to withdraw it.6

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Few of the very large clams (Tridacna gigas) survive in the lagoon today, but smaller individuals are to be found and a number of old, very large shells (up to 1 m) can be seen leaning against walls and fences around the settlement in Home Island.

The log indicates that the next few days were spent preparing for the next sector of the voyage: 'Received Wood per boat', 'Employed cleaning lower decks'. Repairs to sails and rigging were carried out, and food supplies (turtle, poultry, vegetables and coconuts) were carried aboard. Manuscript charts now held at the Hydrographic Office in Taunton (Somerset, England) show that the ship's boats criss-crossed the northern part of the lagoon taking soundings. Darwin confirms this, writing: 'the winds being very strong rendered the most important part [of the survey], the deep sea sounding, scarcely practicable. I visited Horsburgh & West Island.' The log confirms that high winds, force 6 and 7, and once force 8, were experienced on 6, 7 and 8 April. The exacting work of measuring depths of water on the outside of the atoll would have been impossible and, adjacent to a coral shore, extremely dangerous. Probably, as Darwin explored the atoll in those days - we know he visited at least five islets - collecting plants, shells, insects, fish, coral and rock specimens (about sixteen in all), and taking particular note of the form of the atoll as a whole, he would have been put down by one of the survey boats in the morning and collected later in the day. Sometimes Covington accompanied him.

Both Darwin and FitzRoy seem to have had quite a lot to do with Mr Liesk (Clunies Ross's second-in-command), obtaining a good deal of information about the islands. On one occasion Captain FitzRoy baptized several of the Ross and Liesk children.7

Darwin liked the Cocos Islands, their beauty and variety contrasting with the grey-green monotony of the Australian bush. In fact he was quite lyrical about them. He describes sitting beneath the palms, drinking the 'cool pleasant fluid' of the coconuts: 'thus to see a field of glittering sand . . . around the border of which the Cocoa nut trees extend their tall waving fronds, formed a singular & very pretty view.'8

Here is Darwin's account of his initial impressions:

The reef is broken on the Northern side & there lies the entrance to the anchorage. The general appearance of the land at a distance is precisely similar to what I have mentioned at the Low Isds of the Pacifick. On entering the Lagoon the scene is very curious and rather pretty, its beauty is, however, solely derived from the brilliancy of the surrounding colors. The shoal, clear & still water of the lagoon, resting in its greater part on white sand, is, when illuminated by a vertical sun, of

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7 am glad that we have visited these Islands': The Cocos (Keeling) Atoll

a most vivid green. This brilliant expanse, which is several miles wide, is on all sides divided from the dark heaving water of the ocean by a line of breakers, or from the blue vault of Heaven by the strips of land, crowned at an equal height by the tops of Cocoa nut trees. As in the sky here & there a white cloud affords a pleasing contrast, so in the lagoon dark bands of living Coral are seen through the emerald green water ... [I]t is impossible not to admire the elegant manner in which the young & full grown Cocoa-nut trees, without destroying each others symmetry, mingle together into one wood: the beach of glittering white Calcareous sand, forms a border to these fairy spots.9

But despite the feeling of tranquillity conveyed by such passages, the notions of struggle and conflict also run through much of what Darwin wrote on the Cocos Islands. The metaphors of struggle and conflict were of course fundamental to his later notion of natural selection, and it is interesting to see them being employed at this early stage - we noted their use in the context of the competition between indigenous and introduced species in New Zealand (see Chapter 13). Here is part of his diary entry for his first day ashore, on Direction Island, where he had seen the powerful waves smashing on the reef - 'the violence of the open ocean' - yet noted that the islands were entirely composed of coral:

The aspect and constitution of these Islets at once calls up the idea that the land &c the ocean are here struggling for the mastery: although terra firma has obtained a footing, the denizens of the other think their claim at least equal. In every part one meets Hermit-crabs of more than one species.10

A line or two later he refers to the partly terrestrial hermit-crabs 'carrying on their backs the houses they have stolen from the neighbouring beach'. The notion of competition between land and sea recurs many times. A couple of days later: 'The ocean throwing its waters over the broad reef appears an invincible, all-powerful enemy, yet we see it resisted & even conquered by means [i.e. the growth of fragile corals] which would have been judged most weak & inefficient.'y A note on a specimen of the beach-margin plant Pemphis acidula reads: 'No sooner has a new reef become sufficiently elevated by the accumulation of sand upon its surface, but that this plant is sure to be the first that takes possession of the soil.'

The figurative use of such belligerent words and phrases 'struggling for . . . mastery', 'obtained a footing', 'claim', 'stolen', 'invincible all-powerful enemy', 'take possession', 'resisted' and 'conquered' so frequently within a short space is hardly coincidental. The metaphor of conflict is applied partly

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to the struggle between the inanimate forces of land and ocean, but organisms (corals, hermit-crabs, plants) are also involved. Later, the idea of competition became a vital component of evolutionary theory.

There were other relationships in nature that were more harmonious. Darwin was struck by the tripartite ecological link between molluscs, hermit-crabs and sea-anemones: 'Actinia The specimen which I found was adhering to old shells which were inhabited by Hermit crabs; they lay beneath the large stones on the outer reef . . .'12

In his diary he expanded. He had been assured, and his own observations confirmed 'that there are certain kinds of these hermits which always use certain kinds of old shells'. He noted how well some of the hermit-crabs were adapted to their curious way of life: 'The large claw or pincers of some of them are most beautifully adapted when drawn back, to form an operculum [a closing door-like structure] to the shell, which is nearly as perfect as the proper one which the molluscous animal formerly possessed.'13

There were other links between organisms. In dissecting one species of coral, he found delicate branching filaments which he thought might be a 'minute parasitical plant or animal'. There were also many adaptations of creatures to their environments. He noted how different species of corals inhabited different environments; there were delicate, slender filamentous branching forms in the quiet waters of the lagoon and robust platy corals on the outer reef:

The second species of Millepora grows in vertical plates, which frequently intersect each other & so form a coarse honeycombed mass. In such masses the outer parts alone of the plates are alive. This coral flourishes in the outer part of the reef where the sea violently breaks.14

Organisms such as corals were important in building up the reefs, but there were also creatures involved in breaking them down. Darwin collected a common fish, later named as Scarus chlorodon by Leonard Jenyns in The Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle volume on fish, which fed exclusively on coral. Darwin opened the intestines of several of these 'parrot-fishes' (the modern scientific name of one that he collected is Scarus prasiognathos), and found them distended with 'yellow calcareous sandy mud'.15 There were two species of these fish, both with strong bony jaws, both 'coloured a splendid bluish-green', one living in the lagoon, the other among the corals of the outer breakers. He also thought that holuthurians (sea-cucumbers) sometimes fed on corals, and that these, together with the numerous burrowing shells and the 'nereidous worms which perforated every piece of dead coral', were the agents that produced the 'fine white mud' that lay on the bottom of parts of the lagoon. Darwin captured, in his accounts of the 'exquisite

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'I am glad that we have visited these Islands': The Cocos (Keeling) Atoll

adaptation' of organisms to their environment, the notion of a 'dialogue' between the physical surroundings and organisms, and the way in which the various parts integrated to form a functioning whole. He did this for the coral reef and lagoon of the Cocos atoll, just as he did for the kelp-beds of the Falklands (see Chapter 9) and to some extent the forests of Chiloe and the Australian bush.

The animals that Darwin encountered on remote islands were very much alive. He mentions, again and again, the tameness of birds and sometimes other 'beings' in such places. He saw an animal's behaviour as part of its adaptation to environment, his observations on a creature's behaviour often being extremely detailed. Here he writes of the coconut-crab of the Cocos Islands:

These monstrous crabs inhabit the low strips of dry coral land; they live entirely on the fruit of the cocoa nut tree, Mr Liesk informs me he has often seen them tearing, fibre by fibre, with their strong forceps, the husks of the nut. This process they always perform at the extremity, where their three eyes are situated. By constant hammering the shell in that soft part is broken & then by the aid of their narrow posterior pincers the food is extracted I think this is as curious a piece of adaptation and instinct as I ever heard of. The crabs are diurnal in their habits; they live in burrows which frequently lie at the foot of the trees. Within the cavity they collect a pile, sometimes as much as a large bag full of the picked fibre & on this they rest. At night they are said to travel to the sea; there also their young are hatched, & during the early part of their life they remain & probably feed on the beach. Their flesh is very good food: in the tail of a large one there is a lump of fat which when melted down gives a bottle full of oil. They are exceedingly strong. The back is coloured dull brick red: the under side of the body & legs is blue, but the upper side of the legs clouded with dull red. In the 'Voyage par un Officier du Roi' to the Isle of France [Mauritius] there is an account of a crab which lives on Cocoa Nuts in a small island North of Madagascar: probably it is the same animal, but the account is very imperfect. . . .

Mr Liesk informs me that the crabs with swimming plates to posterior claw employ this tool in excavating burrows in the fine sand and mud & that he has repeatedly watched the process.16

In this account of the robber-, or coconut-crab (modern scientific name, Birgus latro) Darwin is showing excellent powers of observation and attention to detail. He enriches his account with material from another observer and from a book he had available to him on the Beagle. There are traces of his usual comparative approach. Of special interest is that as much

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attention is given to the behaviour of the organism as to its appearance: feeding and burrowing are described in detail, along with the lining of the burrows with fibre; breeding and daily rhythms are touched upon. The account relates the creature to its habitat - coconut palm-groves, growing in a sandy soil, close to a beach. The structure of the organism is related to its behaviour. Darwin's account, as with some of those of organisms, strikingly integrates the morphology of the animal, its habitat and behaviour.

Darwin also performed experiments on the behaviour, or at least irritability, of animals. We noted this in the case of the octopus at St Jago in the Cape Verde Islands, and the flat-worms he found in Tasmania. Here Darwin is describing a 'purplish red' sea-anemone:

The animal has the remarkable power when irritated of emitting from its mouth . . . bunches of viscous threads. These threads are colored 'Peach & Aurora Red', they can be drawn out when in contact with any object to the length of some inches, & are emitted with considerable force. The pores near the part most irritated only affected this substance.17

He added the note: 'I know not their nature or use.' They were in fact cnid-oblasts, the stinging structures containing toxin used for defence and the capture of food by coelenterates. The threads spring out when a bristle-like trigger or cnidril is touched - hence their release when irritated by Darwin. Work of this kind prepared the ground for later work on behaviour and instinct.

Darwin describes the tangled 'vigorous' vegetation of the islands, dominated by coconut palms, describing it as being 'as thick as a jungle'. Nothing but the tropical climate, he argued, could produce this from such a poor, loose, dry stony soil. But the young observer was not deceived. The number of species was low:

Besides the Cocoa nut which is so numerous as to first appear the only tree, there are five or six other kinds. One called the Cabbage tree, grows in great bulk in proportion to its height & has an irregular figure . . . Besides these trees the number of native plants is exceedingly limited: I suppose it does not exceed a dozen.18

The 'Cabbage tree' was Scaevola sericea (Scaevola Koenigii in Henslow's account of Darwin's Cocos collection of plants). It remains one of the most conspicuous plants on the island, forming a continuous but loose bright green shrubby barrier along the shores of much of the islands. Darwin's guess at the species diversity was an underestimate: a recent list of the flora of the islands included about 70 native species (plus a number that have

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T am glad that we have visited these Islands': The Cocos (Keeling) Atoll

been introduced since his visit). Some are scarce or confined to small areas; others are mainly found on North Keeling (some kilometres to the north). Darwin clearly understood the poverty of island floras in general; he had detected it elsewhere, at St Paul's Rocks and the Abrolhos, for example. He continued: 'There are no true land birds, a snipe & land-rail are the only waders, the rest are all birds of the sea. Insects are very few in number: I must except some spiders & a small ant, which swarms in countless numbers at every spot and place.'19 The 'snipe' was in fact probably a turn-stone, Arenaria interpres. The land-rail, later identified as Rallus philippen-sis andrewii, is an endemic subspecies, now confined to North Keeling. A fragment of paper kept with Darwin's zoological notes lists the '12 specimens' - flies, ants, a couple of moths and a beetle. In the Voyage he amends the total to thirteen species. He records a single species of lizard. In his writings on the land plants and animals of the archipelago, words, such as 'few', 'only', 'scanty' and 'paucity' occur. As always, he compared: 'Although the productions of the land are thus scanty, if we look at the surrounding sea, the number of organic beings is indeed infinite.' This comparison between the poverty of species of the terrestrial ecosystem and the richness of communities in the nearby ocean was one he had previously made in both the Falklands and Tahiti.

Darwin seems to have made more extensive collections of the plants and animals of Cocos than at many other islands. He even caught a rat in a trap baited with cheese! A fragmentary note exists describing it as being 'smaller & brighter colour, rather yellower... perhaps tail rather longer' than others he caught on the voyage. Although it would be interesting if he had noted this difference while actually on the island, it is possible that he wrote this fragment after the voyage, perhaps around the time he discussed the differences between the rodents he collected on the voyage with George Waterhouse, who wrote up the mammals' volume of The Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle. The original rats are alleged to have come ashore with the wreck of a ship from Mauritius.

There is evidence that Darwin gave thought to the matter of the means of dispersal of the islands' biota while actually on the islands. He gave Professor Henslow the plants he collected on Cocos (about 20 species), and they were eventually described in a paper in the Annals of Natural History.20 In this article Henslow noted: 'Mr Darwin heard of the trunks of trees, of many seeds, and of old cocoa-nuts being washed on the shore from time to time.' Indeed, as he walked along the outer shores of Direction, Home, South or Horsburgh Islands, he could hardly have missed the scattered organic flotsam to be found there. He certainly found some seeds there. In modifying his diary account for publication, he noted that the

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islands had 'quite the character of a refuge for the destitute'. This implies not only the poverty of the biota in terms of numbers of species but also the notion of a long and difficult journey for those that became successfully established. A key passage is: 'As the islands consist entirely of coral, and must at one time have existed as mere water-washed reefs, all their productions must have been transported here by the waves of the sea.'21

There thus seems to be an understanding of the significance of the relationship between long-distance dispersal and evolution: if all life on earth evolved from a single entity, or a limited number of simple forms, the biotas of remote islands must have arisen by dispersal from elsewhere. It was probably written some months after Darwin's return to England and his 'conversion' to an evolutionary outlook in the spring of 1837, although it has to be admitted we can see traces of the same idea in his diary entry for Tahiti (p. 149).

There is one other incident that impinges on the concept of long-distance dispersal. In his writing on the coral features of the Cocos Darwin records 'small pumice pebbles on beach from Sumatra, like the seeds'. Masses of vesicle-filled volcanic material are still frequently found on the shores of Cocos, having floated there from some volcanic eruption in Indonesia. (I picked up several on the outer shore of Home Island in 1987.) In the little red notebook Darwin used to record the numbers of his geological specimens is to be found: '3581 A piece of a well rounded boulder of compact greenstone [dolerite] found in the coral breccia of the Northern Isd: in possession of Capt. Ross.' The 'Northern Island' would be North Keeling, seen from the deck of the Beagle by Darwin but not landed on. The diary is silent on this strange lump of igneous rock, brought back to Home Island by Ross. (As Captain Ross was not present during the Beagle's visit one must assume that the 'piece' was handed over to Darwin by Mrs Ross or by Mr Liesk.) In the Voyage, it is described as being 'rather larger than a man's head', and, on the basis of comparison with observations of similar phenomena described by other authors, Darwin ventured the suggestion that it had arrived amongst the roots of a tree, once cast up on the lonely islet. This provided further evidence for long-distance dispersal.

In his later work, for example in the Descent of Man and The Expression of Emotions in Animals and Man, Darwin compared the behaviour of animals with that of humans. Although such direct comparisons are rare in his writings from the Beagle period, as well as taking a profound interest in animal behaviour, he made quite detailed observations about the customs and activities of the human groups with which he came into contact. There had been a community of Malay people on the islands since the 1820s, and Darwin describes their appearance, origins and customs in some detail.

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'I am glad that we have visited these Islands': The Cocos (Keeling) Atoll

The natives come from the different islands of the East Indian Archipelago, but all speak the same language; we saw the inhabitants of Borneo, Celebes, Java & Sumatra. In color [sic] of the skin they resemble the Tahitians, nor widely differ from them in form of features; some of the women, however, showed a good deal of Chinese character.22

The history and origins of the Cocos Malay community (which still thrives) is one of some complexity. Many of the original group arrived at the islands as members of the entourage of early settlers - Captain Clunies Ross and a somewhat despotic individual called Alexander Hare. There seems to have been some African blood, at least one person from Papua and indeed some intermingling of European blood, for Hare is reported to have fathered children with a Malay woman.

Darwin and FitzRoy describe a number of aspects of daily life in the Malay kampong: the making and use of water-craft, the catching of turtles as food, the gathering of nuts (the coconut was the economic life-blood of the community), the cultivation of smallholdings (sugar cane, maize, pumpkins and bananas are mentioned), the collection of wild fruits and fishing. Both Darwin and FitzRoy agreed that while not in what might be considered genuine slavery, the Malay people at Cocos had few rights. Darwin, in particular, was most uneasy about the situation. Indeed, it remained with little change until the government of the Commonwealth of Australia took over the management of the islands in 1978, imposing something akin to contemporary standards of democracy.

There was one incident in particular that stuck firmly in Darwin's mind. After having dinner with Mr (and presumably also Mrs) Liesk on Home Island on the evening of 3 April, Darwin and FitzRoy remained ashore for a while and watched what Darwin described as:

a strange half superstitious scene, acted by the Malay women. They dress a large wooden spoon in garments - carry it to the grave of a dead man - &c then at the full moon they pretend it becomes inspired & will dance & jump about. After the proper preparations the spoon held by two women becomes convulsed & danced in good time to the song of the surrounding children Sc women. It was a most foolish spectacle, but Mr Liesk maintained that many of the Malays believed in its spiritual movements. The dance did not begin till the moon had risen & it was well worth remaining to behold her bright globe so quietly through the long arms of the Cocoa nuts.23

The ceremony was almost certainly a funereal ritual, and according to Ms Pauline Bunce, a long-time resident of the islands, several of the

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elements described in the account are recognizable in the death rituals that were still being practised by the Malay people on Home Island in the 1980s. The 'spoon' was perhaps a messan, a wooden spade- or spoon-shaped headpiece, pairs of which are placed on male graves - the 'spoon' is described as being carried 'to the grave of a dead man'. (Female graves have a rather differently shaped head-piece.) Darwin mentioned the 'spoon' - today's versions are typically a little less than a metre in length - being dressed in garments: today (or least until recently, according to informants in the Malay community), the messan is wrapped in a white cloth. Singing, particularly by the older women, was said to be repeated during the several days of the mourning period. The rising full moon in Darwin's description may also be significant) as there is said to be a strong lunar element in the Cocos Malays' pattern of activities.

FitzRoy noted that the Malay people were 'Mahometans', that one of their number 'officiated as priest [imam]', and that they had an 'extreme dislike of pigs'. Today there are three mosques on Home Island, but despite the strength of Islam, fragments of an older animist or spiritualist tradition remain. The spirits of the departed are said to make their presence felt on the living in certain ways; for instance, some show a fear of landing on North Keeling, believing it to be the haunt of evil spirits: young women especially will not go there, some saying that children born to them may be deformed. Although information is fragmentary, these ideas are at least compatible with Darwin's report that the 'spoon' became 'inspired' (based on Mr Liesk's assertion that 'many of the Malays believed in its spiritual movements').

We have noted that one of the influences on Charles Darwin during the voyage was his reading of Lyell's Principles of Geology. In this work Lyell expressed the notion that the low circular or horseshoe-shaped archipelagoes of the Indo-Pacific were formed by the growth of coral upwards from the rim of a volcanic crater. The idea did not appeal to Darwin. As he wrote to his sister, 'The notion of a lagoon island, 30 miles in diameter being based on a submarine crater of equal dimensions, has always seemed a monstrous hypothesis.'24 He came to see that 'the three great classes of coral reefs' -fringing reefs, barrier reefs and atolls - were members of a single sequence, and that as a submarine mountain subsided, or sea levels rose, the coral grew upwards, converting one form into another. As we have noted, Darwin became preoccupied with the idea of sea level change in South America, and found (or thought he found) evidence to support the idea in the Falklands, Chiloe, New Zealand, Tasmania and on the Australian mainland, developing his ideas into a full-scale theory following a glimpse of Pacific atolls and extensive fieldwork in Tahiti.

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'I am glad that we have visited these Islands': The Cocos (Keeling) Atoll

Although he had glimpsed atolls from the mast-head, as the Beagle bowled her way across the Pacific, Darwin had not actually set foot on one (although he had seen reefs of other types in Tahiti) until Cocos. It provided an environment for him to test his ideas. His developing ideas can be traced to some extent in what may be called the Cocos Coral Manuscript.25 This begins with a neat cross-section (cross-sections and transect diagrams are common in Darwin's geological notes - an approach he learned from Professor Sedgwick in North Wales in the summer of 1831), but the connected style of the first few pages degenerates into a series of pencil jottings. It was probably begun early in the stay on the islands, but added to and scribbled upon later on in, and indeed possibly after, the voyage. It provided some of the material for the elegant case-study on the 'Keeling Islands', published as Chapter 1 of The Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs. But he used other sources, including some of the descriptions of individual coral species from the Zoological Notes. Darwin probably obtained hydro-graphic information from FitzRoy and some of the other officers. This chapter is a well-integrated account that shows the relationships amongst the form and growth of coral species, the physical environment and the microtopography of the reefs. Thus he describes the zonation in coral types from the outer barrier, where the waves break through the inshore zone, and in the quiet waters of the lagoon. He describes the environment associated with each coral (or coral community), and the form of the reef associated with each, and he displays an awareness of ecological relationships:

[T]he reef-building polypifers [corals] not being tidal animals, require to be constantly submerged or washed by the breakers ... an exposure to the rays of the sun for a very short time invariably causes their destruction. Hence it is only possible under the most favourable circumstances, afforded by an unusually low tide and smooth water, to reach the outer margin, where the coral is alive. I succeeded only twice in gaining this part, and found it almost entirely composed of a living Porites, which forms great irregularly rounded masses ... from four to eight feet broad, and little less in thickness. These mounds are separated from each other by narrow channels, about six feet deep, most of which intersect the line of the reef at right angles. On the furthest mound, which I was able to reach with the aid of a leaping-pole, and over which the sea broke with some violence ... the polypifers in the uppermost cells were all dead, but between three and four inches lower down on its side they were living, and formed a projecting border round the upper and dead surface. The coral thus being checked in its upward growth, extends laterally, and hence most of the

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masses, especially those a little further inwards, had broad flat, dead summits. On the other hand I could see, during the recoil of the breakers, that a few yards further seaward, the whole convex surface of the Porites was alive . . .26

There was a different assemblage of corals inshore, 'in the protected hollows in the back part of the reef, as Darwin put it, coinciding with that zone's different microtopography. He continues:

The lagoon is inhabited by a quite distinct set of corals, generally brittle and thinly branched; but a Porites, apparently of the same species with that on the outside is found there, although it does not seem to thrive, and certainly does not attain the thousandth part of the bulk of the masses opposed to the breakers.

The ideas of organisms' adaptation to environment, and the dialogue between living things and their surrounds, each affecting the other, comes through very well. Darwin also shows that there are important links between the growth of corals and the broader geomorphology of the island group:

It is [the] reef which essentially forms the atoll. In Keeling atoll the ring encloses the lagoon at all sides except at the northern end, where there are two open spaces, through one of which ships can enter. The reef varies in width from 250 to 500 yards: its surface is level, or very slightly inclined inwards . . . and at high tide the sea breaks entirely over it: the water at low tide thrown by breakers on the reef is carried by the many narrow and shoal gullies on its surface into the lagoon: a return stream sets out of the lagoon though the main entrance. The most frequent coral in the hollows of the reef is Pocillopora verrucosa, which grows in short sinuous plates, and ... is a beautiful pale lake-red ... As soon as an islet is formed, and the waves prevented from breaking entirely over the reef, the channels and hollows become filled up with fragments cemented together by calcareous matter; and the surface is cemented together into a smooth hard floor. The flat surface varies in width from 100 to . . . 300 yards, and is strewed with fragments of coral torn up during gales . . .

The islets on the reef are . . . first formed between 200 and 300 yards from its outer edge, through the accumulation of a pile of fragments, thrown together by some unusually strong gale. Their ordinary width is under a quarter of a mile and their length varies from a few yards to several miles . . . The highest part of the islets (excepting hillocks of blown sand, some of which are 30 feet high) is close to the outer

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7 am glad that we have visited these Islands': The Cocos (Keeling) Atoll

beach and averages six to ten feet above high water mark. From the outer beach the surface slopes gently to the shores of the [inner] lagoon; and this slope no doubt is due to the breakers, the further they have rolled over the reef, having less power to throw up fragments.

Darwin completed his description with a brief account of the inner lagoon, stating that it was shallower than that of other comparable atolls, varying in depth, with coral, both dead and alive, and considerable sedimentation. He also briefly described the offshore part of the atoll, noting that the seabed fell away very steeply from the shore. No bottom was found 2,200 yards (about 2 km) from the breakers with a line 7,200 feet in length.

These passages, partly written after the voyage but incorporating much material written down while actually visiting the archipelago, show that not only was Darwin accurately observing the form of the atoll (and the relationships amongst its components, living and non-living), but that he was attempting to analyse the processes that contributed to its formation.

As we have already noted, Darwin saw the formation of the islands in terms of a struggle between land and sea. Several times he wrote of 'land & water . . . opposed', 'antagonist powers' and of the 'struggle between the two nicely balanced powers of land and water'. There was a battle between coral growth and the power of the waves, between erosion and accumulation. But there was also a struggle between the upward growth of corals and the tendency of the atoll to subside. Darwin was convinced that the island group was subsiding, indeed quite rapidly. In a number of places he felt that there had been 'a slight encroachment of water on the land'.

I noticed in several places [within the lagoon] . . . old cocoa-nut trees falling with their roots undermined, and the rotten stumps of others on the beach, where the inhabitants assured us the cocoa-nut could not now grow. Capt. FitzRoy pointed out to me, near the settlement, the foundation posts of a shed, now washed by every tide, but which the inhabitants stated, had seven years before stood above high water mark . .. From these considerations I inferred that probably the atoll had lately subsided by a small amount; and this inference was strengthened by the circumstance, that in 1834, two years before our visit, the island had been shaken by a severe earthquake, and by two slighter ones during the ten previous years.27

A modern observer is perhaps less convinced. There are still coconut trees being eroded at their roots in various places around the lagoon, but also new seedlings growing; there are signs of local small-scale erosion and of deposition. Certainly over the long term the island may have subsided,

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but probably not quite as quickly as Darwin seems to be implying. He attempted again and again in his work to detect broad patterns; a note on the reverse of p. 6 of the Cocos Coral Manuscript (possibly written much later) reads: 'Cocos Isd connected to volcanic force of Sumatra, that rises this falls.' We shall return to this idea later.

Darwin was obviously not aware of the significance of the general postglacial rise in sea level of about 120 m (approx. 390 feet) (quite distinct from any local isostatic changes). He made errors (certainly some of his conclusions would be seen as errors by modern scientists), such as in the rate of subsidence. But he was increasingly a Lyellian, believing that the world as one saw it now was the product of gradual changes - processes - of the type to be seen today.28 The coral atoll theory, largely confirmed by his visit to the islands of the Cocos (Keeling) group, was his first major theoretical flirtation with gradualism - the conceptual framework that provided the basis for his work on evolution through natural selection, some of his ideas on children's psychological development, the fractionation of igneous rocks and much else. He noted evidence of the poverty of island biotas and thus the importance of long-distance dispersal, the handmaid of evolution. He adopted the integrated approach to 'whole environments' that he has previously implied elsewhere (e.g. in the Falklands). Enjoying the tameness of some of the Cocos creatures, such as seabirds and crabs, he extended his range of examples of insights into animal behaviour in relation to environment. He had applied his notion of 'struggle' in a range of different circumstances. He had collected a number of fish, insects and shells, and had seen a quite distinctive human community in the Cocos Malays. It is not surprising, therefore, that appreciating perhaps the power of his own 'eye of reason' he wrote in his diary entry for 12 April 1836, after the Beagle had 'stood out of the lagoon':

I am glad we have visited these Islands; such formations surely rank high amongst the wonderful objects of the world. It is not a wonder which at first strikes the eye of the body, but rather after reflection, the eye of reason. We feel surprised when travellers relate accounts of vast piles 6c [the] extent of some ancient ruins, but how insignificant are the greatest of these, when compared to the matter here accumulated by various small animals.29

Notes

1. ADM1/1820 Cap ¥56. In his letter from Hobart Town (ADM1/1820 F58, 12 February 1836) FitzRoy said he was 'perhaps' going 'to the Keeling Islands'. Darwin's letter to his sister from Hobart does not anticipate the visit.

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'I am glad that we have visited these Islands': The Cocos (Keeling) Atoll

2. The clumsy 'bracket' name is the official one recognized by the Commonwealth of Australia.

3. Narrative.

4. DAR41/9.

5. Diary, 6 April 1836, p. 399.

6. Voyage, p. 443.

7. In the Church of England, as in a number of Christian denominations, any baptized Christian may baptize when the occasion requires it.

8. Diary, 7-11 April 1836, p. 399.

9. Ibid., 1 April 1836, pp. 394-5.

10. Ibid., 2 April 1836, p. 396.

11. Ibid., 6 April 1836, p. 399.

12. DAR 31.2/361.

13. Diary, 2 April 1836, p. 396.

14. DAR 31.2/358. Darwin called the species Millepora complanata. Its modern name is M. platyphylla.

15. The flesh of some species in this genus are on occasion very poisonous; there is evidence that Darwin ate some - if so he was in real danger.

16. DAR 31.2/362.

17. DAR 31.2/358.

18. Diary, 2 April 1836, p. 396.

19. Ibid.

20. J. S. Henslow, 'Florula Keelingensis: An Account of the Native Plants of the Keeling Islands', Annals of Natural History, 1 (1838): 337-47.

21. Voyage, p. 437.

22. Diary, 3 April 1836, p. 397.

23. Ibid., 2 April 1836, p. 398.

24. Letter to Caroline Darwin, 29 April 1836, Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 495.

25. DAR 41.

26. The Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs, pp. 7-9ff. Darwin obviously spent much time on the coral reefs; he noted that it was possible to wade from island to island across the reefs. One still can. I was advised, when planning to do this, that if small sharks approached, I should 'kick them in the head'. The advice was sound.

27. Ibid., pp. 24-5.

28. Although he disagreed completely with Lyell's theory that coral atolls formed on the rim of a submerged volcanic crater.

29. Diary, 12 April 1836, pp. 399-400.

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17. Mauritian Interlude

On leaving the Cocos Islands Darwin declaimed: 'I am glad that we visited these islands.' His enthusiasm had been because the visit allowed him to confirm, to his own satisfaction at least, the correctness of his coral island theory. He had actually been able to explore from land and sea, a 'lagoon island', or atoll, to see how different coral environments were arranged in relation to each other, how a rise in sea level might have been related to the islands' form and the nature of the biota of a remote island.

Just over two weeks later, on the morning of Friday, 29 April 1836, the Beagle rounded the 'northern extremity' of the island of Mauritius (Cape Malheureux), and in the days that followed, Darwin was able not only to fit the forms of another set of coral shorelines into his model but also to combine this with observations on another volcanic island. Mauritius was therefore one of the few islands that he visited that contributed to the development of his ideas on both volcanic and coral phenomena.

The ship passed close to 'several small islands' - Flat Island, Gunners Quoin and Round Island - that Darwin was later to describe as volcanic. It was 'shortly after midday' that the vessel 'came to anchor at Port Louis'. Darwin does not seem to have explored much of the island that day. Another ship was about to leave for England, and he seems to have spent most of the afternoon writing a long letter to his sister Caroline. But he spent much of the following day 'walking about the town and visiting various people'. He admired the clean and well-laid-out character of the town - he notes a population of 20,000 - and seems also to have done some shopping.

On 1 May he took a 'quiet' walk - an appropriate activity for the Sabbath, perhaps - along the coast north of the port. He carefully recorded the coral formations and noted the 'field of black smooth lava'. On the next day, he climbed La Pouce, 'a mountain so called from a thumb-like projec-

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Mauritian Interlude

tion, which rises close behind the town to a height of 2,600 feet'. (Darwin's estimate was very close - modern maps give the height as 811 m [2,660 ft].) He would have followed the track up the steep-sided Pouce Valley, close to the stream, about three miles (5 km) to the south-east. From the summit he enjoyed excellent views over the dissected volcanic terrain to the north and west, and over the cultivated landscape, with its green sugar-cane fields and scattered white farmhouses, to the south.

Darwin's diary for 3 May records that in the evening Captain Lloyd, the surveyor-general, 'so well known from his survey across the Isthmus of Panama', invited him together with Lt Stokes to his country house, 'situated on the edge of Wilheim Plain, about six miles from the port'.1

This central part of the island is about 800-1,250 feet (250-350 m) above sea level and the air was described by Darwin as 'pleasantly cool and fresh' compared to that at the crowded port. He continued that there were 'on every side' many 'delightful walks'. Close by there was a 'grand ravine', about 500 feet (150 m) deep, which had 'worn through the slightly inclined streams of lava that have flowed from the central platform'.2

The area is in fact dissected by a network of streams which cut deeply into the plateau: the Grand River, the River Profonde and the Moka River, which flow in ravines in places several hundred metres deep, and it can be assumed that for much of 4 May Darwin wandered rather gently close to the surveyor-general's residence, without exerting himself very greatly.

On the 5th, however, fieldwork was resumed and Captain Lloyd took them to the Riviere Noire, close to the southwestern tip of the island, so that Darwin could 'examine some rocks of elevated coral'. They passed through gardens and fields of sugar cane 'growing amidst huge blocks of lava'. The hedges were of mimosa, and avenues of mango trees approached some of the houses. These, against the backdrop of the steep grey-peaked hills, were 'exceedingly picturesque'. Darwin and Stokes were constantly tempted to say to one another 'how pleasant it would be to spend one's life in such quiet abodes', but their host had a surprise for his visitors:

Capt. Lloyd possessed an elephant; he sent it half way on the road, that we might enjoy a ride in true Indian fashion. I should think, as is commonly said to be the case, that the motion must be fatiguing for a long journey. The circumstance which surprised me most was the perfectly noiseless step: the whole ride on so wonderful an animal was extremely interesting. This elephant is the only one at present on the island: but it is said that others will be sent for.3

Darwin returned to the port on 6 May and seems to have remained in or near to Port Louis for the remainder of his sojourn. He almost certainly

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went for one or two more walks along the coast to examine the shoreline and coral formations, but on his own admission he did not stretch himself. He dined out every evening, commenting: 'since leaving England I have not spent so idle and dissipated a time'. It would have been delightful 'if it had been possible to have banished remembrance of England'. After almost exactly four and a half years at sea, and now in his late twenties, Darwin was getting very homesick.

He does not mention the weather he experienced during his stay, apart from comparing the cool air of the plateau with the heat of the coast. Syms Covington, however, mentions 'frequent squalls or showers of rain occasioned by the mountains back of the Town which break the clouds in their passage'. Covington seems to have quite liked Port Louis: he mentions a 'small Race ground (at back of Town)'. Such a ground still exists. He continues:

The Port is very snug with a Fort on each side of the entrance4 which entrance is about a quarter of a mile wide - very good anchorage. Moorings for 3 Men or War, viz. Line of Battle ship, Frigate & sloop . . . Fort Adelaide now building is said will be bomb proof when finished. Will contain all the English on the Island, with provisions for 7 years, commands the Town and & Harbour . . . The Town is laid out like Spanish in South America ... Houses are nearly all built of wood. There are stationed here about 2,000 Soldiers.5

Although Covington often accompanied Darwin on his excursions, he may not have done so on this occasion, spending more time in the town than his master. Covington's diary records 'Paul &c Verginias [sic] grave 7 miles from the town', perhaps representing a personal pilgrimage.6

As Covington often helped Darwin with his collecting, his absence may explain the poverty of the collections from the island, for apart from rock specimens, collections from Mauritius are much less extensive than elsewhere. For example, although fish were collected at the two previous landfalls (King George's Sound and Cocos), and opportunities for fishing must have existed, they seems to have been missed. Nor do there seem to be any plant specimens (although again an important collection was made at Cocos). However, Darwin's Insect Notes provide an entry for specimen 3,635: 'Water beetles, Mountain stream Mauritius. May'. This appears to relate to a specimen now in Cambridge, of Limnoxenus. It may have been collected in the stream at the foot of the steep ravine close to where he was staying during 3-6 May. There is also a cicada (Stagia dartvini) in the Natural History Museum in London that may have been collected by Darwin in Mauritius. This meagre haul is surprising, considering Darwin's interest in insects.7 But his collection of vertebrates was hardly more numerous. He

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seems only to have collected a specimen of a frog, identified by Thomas Bell as Rana mascariensis and figured in Part 5 of The Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle. Darwin found this 'pretty species ... on swamps near the sea'. Always interested in the behaviour and locomotion of organisms, he remarked on 'the extraordinary height of its leaps'. He could not have known it at the time of the frog's collection, but Bell wrote: 'It [the frog] has also been found in the Seychelles, Madagascar and Island of Bourbon [Rodriguez].' Darwin later seems to have deduced from this that it was introduced, for in his Natural Selection, his 'Big Species Book', written between 1856 and 1858, and of which the Origin of Species was a condensed version, he wrote:

It would be superfluous to give the cases amongst my notes of the enormous increase of Birds, fish, frogs, snails & insects, when turned out into new countries; the one island of Mauritius would afford striking instances of all these classes except fishes.8

Darwin is referring to the spectacular rate of increase in the numbers of organisms, in the absence of regulatory pressures, in new environments. He also later used the Mauritius frog example (accepting it was introduced) in the Origin of Species itself, in rather a different way, emphasiszing the original absence of indigenous species of amphibians on remote islands and comparing the Mauritian situation with that of other islands and some of which he had visited.

The general absence of frogs, toads and newts on so many oceanic islands cannot be accounted for by their physical conditions; indeed it seems that islands are peculiarly well fitted for these animals; for frogs have been introduced into Madeira, the Azores and Mauritius, and have multiplied so as to become a nuisance.9

He went on to point out that these animals and their spawn are destroyed by salt water, and thus their transport by sea would be very rare. Evolutionary theory, emphasizing that life begets life, and that living things can only reach remote islands by long-distance dispersal, thus explains their absence. 'But why, on the theory of creation, they should not have been created there would be very difficult to explain.'

There is little evidence of these ideas having gone through Darwin's mind at the time. On Cocos he does seem to have speculated about the battles of life, about adaptation, the depauperate nature of the biota and dispersal. Perhaps he was just fortunate that one of the very few organisms he collected in Mauritius during his 'dissipated' time there was a frog that later studies showed was introduced. But Darwin was not just a superb observer

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and a brilliant theorizer; he had on occasions the most extraordinary luck! For example, he was perhaps similarly fortunate in seeing, as he thought, evidence for sea level change in Australia, a perfect atoll - the product of submergence - at Cocos and coral reefs of a different character again on Mauritius. And he saw them in a sequence that followed his drafting of his 'coral island theory' in December 1835, after his sojourn in Tahiti. He saw the right things, and he saw them in the right order.

Darwin, in his notes of the geology of Mauritius, compared his observations on the coral formations with those he had made at Cocos and Tahiti. The volcanic rocks - the basalts and lavas - he compared with those of St Jago and the Galapagos, comparisons that he developed even more strongly (combining them with annotations from St Helena, Ascension and the Azores) in his books on coral reefs and volcanic islands and in some of his scientific papers. He compared his own observations with those of others, for he makes extensive use of two volumes that were at his disposal on the Beagle: the Zoologie volume of LCD. Freycinet's Voyage autour du monde . .. 1817-1820 and Voyage a I'isle de France . . . par un officier de rot.

Extracts from Darwin's opening remarks in his notes on the geology of Mauritius show how in his few days of fieldwork he had come to grips with the combined volcanic and coral structure of the island:

Before describing the few facts I have collected concerning the coral reefs which encircle this island, it will be necessary to give a slight sketch of its geological structure. M. Lesson in the Zoologie of the voyage of the Coquille, states that the whole central plain of the island appears once to have been the bottom of a great crater. The detached hills that encircle it have a usual elevation of between 2 & 3,000 ft above the level of the sea. On the NW & W sides of this island, I observed a . . . dip pointing from a common centre. These hills are composed of lavas, which are Basalts & black trachytes: the solid strata alternate with firmly cemented fragmentary rocks . . . the ancillary hills, the picturesque and jagged forms of which are so well known from the descriptions of so many voyagers, stand detached from each other ... [A] multitude of . . . streams of lava flowed from the central platform after the crater had been breached . . . within . . . the crater, there are hills, which . . . formerly existed as smaller orifices.10

Around this volcanic core there was a rim of coral. Whereas at Cocos Darwin saw evidence of a rise in the level of the sea relative to the island (although coral growth had more or less kept pace with it), at Mauritius he suspected the opposite was the case:

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On the NW, W &c SW of the islands coral rock such as [is] now forming the reefs is commonly found in masses elevated considerably above the reach of the highest tides ... To the northward of Port Louis the surface of the country to a height of 30 or 40 ft, & to a considerable distance inland is created by a bed of partially cemented fragments of stony branching corals .. . the rock is composed of precisely the same materials such as now are lying on the beach.11

He gives much more detail from his own observations, on the coral deposits, the present coral reef that surrounds the islands some distance from the shore and material that he derived from the earlier travellers, summarizing as follows: 'I have attempted to prove in detail that the land, within the Recent period, but at a date probably some centuries past, has been elevated.' He carefully noted the differences in the corals that grew on the landward and seaward side of the reef and also, perhaps from soundings done from the Beagle herself, noted the depth beyond the reef at which coral occurred:

[T]o the depth of 8 fathoms I sounded repeated[ly] with a lead, the face of which was formed like a saucer . . . The arming [presumably with a wax-like substance] invariably came up deeply cut by the . . . corals . . . marked with the impressions of Astreas . . . From 8-15 fathoms occasionally there was a little sand.

He continued sounding outwards from the coast until no coral material or impressions appeared. He concluded: 'I feel little doubt that those corals which are efficient in forming a reef do not abound at a greater depth than 15 fathoms.' Coral, although certainly able to grow away from the modern shore, could not flourish below a certain depth: shallow seas were essential for its growth.

He also noted that 'a violent agitation of the waters of the sea is favourable to the production of coral', seeing that coral growth was poorer on sheltered shores, and finally he recorded that, as at Cocos, the sea-bed fell away steeply outside the coral zone. Any 'theory of coral reefs' had to accommodate all these factors.

There is some coral growth below about 30 m from the surface, but Darwin's concept was entirely appropriate. Coral flourishes in warm, clear, shallow seas where there is abundant oxygenation.

Mauritius gave Darwin an example of a coral-fringed island that appeared to be rising, in contrast to those of the Pacific and Cocos which he thought were sinking. In linking observations on coral-reef ecology, Darwin was able to show why corals grew where they did. As a volcanic

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island subsided with a coral reef around it, the turbulent, shallow waters provided exactly the right environment for corals to flourish, and upward growth was able to keep pace with subsidence, converting a fringing reef to a barrier reef and finally a 'lagoon island' or atoll. Where an island was rising, one might expect to find coral rock and structures inland. The first draft of the coral atoll theory had been prepared after fieldwork in Tahiti; some confirmation was found in evidence he thought he had seen (some of it now thought to be questionable) in New Zealand and Australia of sea level change. Cocos and Mauritius, following close upon one another, provided a bonus.

Darwin in his geological work always displayed a remarkable 'eye for detail'; he carefully records the dip of the volcanic strata, the variation in the forms of the living coral, the depths at which it grew offshore. Despite his self-confessed lack of attention to natural history, he seems to have collected tiny insects from streams and noticed the gait of a small frog. He was also able to describe, succinctly and accurately, a whole landscape and to convey his delight in what he saw as a picturesque scene. Here he is describing his first view of the island from the sea to the north:

From this point of view the aspect of the island equalled the expectations raised by the many descriptions of its beautiful scenery. The sloping plain of the Pamplemouses, scattered over with houses, &c coloured bright green from the large fields of sugar cane, composed the foreground. The brilliancy of the green was . . . remarkable . . . Towards the centre of the island groups of wooded mountains arose out of the highly cultivated plain, their summits, as so commonly happens with ancient volcanic rocks, being jagged by the sharpest points. Masses of white clouds were collected around these pinnacles as if merely for the effect of pleasing the stranger's eye. The whole island, with its sloping border & central mountains was adorned with an air of perfect elegance: the scenery, if I may use such an expression, appeared to the senses harmonious.12

Today, the population of the island is close to a million and pressure on the land and resources is severe. But the modern tourist flying in to enjoy the beaches finds much that was familiar to Darwin.

At many of the places he visited Darwin made notes on the local economy. He was impressed by the expansion of sugar cultivation, which he felt was partly due to efficient administration and the development of a transport infrastructure. He had been told that less than half the suitable land was cultivated; if such were the case, he argued, bearing in mind the 'present

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great export of sugar', at some time in the future 'this island when thickly peopled will be of great value'. Since the island had come under British rule, sugar exports had increased 75-fold, he enthusiastically recorded. Of the macadamized roads he wrote: 'One great cause of this prosperity is due to the excellent roads and means of communication.' There was surely a note of triumphalism in the young Englishman's reporting the good state of the roads in Mauritius compared with the allegedly 'miserable' condition on the nearby French island of Bourbon, but in foreseeing the spectacular rise in the population of the island, the expansion of the area under cultivation and the export of sugar he was being both perceptive and prescient.

The races of humanity, and relations between them, were always of importance to Darwin. The variety of races present in the streets of Port Louis was of special interest: 'Convicts from India are banished here for life . . . there are about 800 who are employed in public works. Before seeing these people I had no idea that the inhabitants of India were such noble looking men.'13

He was perhaps relying on his Edinburgh medical training when he described the 'emaciated body and strange drowsy expression' of an Indian opium-addict.14

Despite Darwin's regret that he had 'dissipated' his time in Mauritius, at least as far as his work on coral coastlines is concerned, the Mauritius sojourn provides an excellent example of his comparative and integrative approach. He compared the volcanic rocks and land-forms with those of other islands he had visited. He compared his own observations (made mainly on the north and west of the island) with those of earlier French writers (who had visited other parts); he combined his knowledge of Cocos, Tahiti and Mauritius. He integrated his observations on coral-reef ecology and the conditions under which coral grew with offshore soundings and land-based observations on coral-rock and land-forms. He had the most amazing good fortune, but fortune favours the brave - especially the intellectually brave.

Notes

1. Diary, 3 May 1836, p. 403.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid., 6 May 1836, p. 404.

4. Maps show Fort George to the north of the harbour and Fort William to the south.

5. Covington's diary is in the Mitchell Library, Sydney, NSW. Although Covington

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is occasionally in error on his observations, his account here seems remarkably accurate. Fort Adelaide (The Citadel) is on a hill, about 80 m (or 250 ft) high, about 1 km south-east of the harbour, and does indeed dominate the town and port. It was completed in 1838. The grid-iron pattern, like some of the South American cities Darwin and Covington had visited, stands out clearly, and since the island had changed hands from France to Britain in 1814, it was indeed well garrisoned.

6. J. H. Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, Paul and Virginia (1771).

7. K. G. V. Smith, 'Darwin's Insects', Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), 14.1 (1987): 101.

8. R. C. Stauffer (ed.), Charles Darwin's Natural Selection, Being the Second Part of His Big Species Book (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975), p. 178.

9. Origin of Species, Chapter 10.

10. DAR 38.1/881-90.

11. Ibid.

12. Diary, 29 April 1836, p. 401.

13. Ibid., 30 April 1836, p. 401.

14. Ibid., p. 402.

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18. A Rock and a Cinder: St Helena and Ascension

Darwin records a conversation with the ship's purser, John Edward Dring.1 The folk of St Helena, Mr Dring declaimed, have a saying: 'We know we live on a rock, but the poor people of Ascension live on a cinder.' After visiting the two remote islets of the southern Atlantic Ocean, Darwin felt: 'The distinction is in truth very just.'

Both small islands are in the tropical South Atlantic, both are volcanic in origin and associated with what is now referred to as the Mid-Atlantic Ridge; both have long been British possessions. They are about 750 miles (1,200 km) apart. Darwin visited each of them - for just under a week in each case - with just a few days between the two visits in mid-July 1836. It was natural that Darwin should compare them closely and appropriate that they should be considered together in this account.

Darwin begins his diary accounts of the two visits in a similar way:

July 8th. In the morning arrived at St Helena. This island, the forbidding aspect of which has so often been described, rises like a huge castle from the ocean. A great wall, built of successive streams of black lava, forms around its whole circuit, a bold coast . . . [TJhere is one striking view; an irregular castle perched on the summit of a lofty hill . . . boldly projects against the sky.2

July 19th. Reached the anchorage in the afternoon, & received some letters . . . Those who have beheld a volcanic Island, situated within an arid climate, will be able at once to picture to themselves the aspect of Ascension. They will imagine smooth conical hills of a bright red colour, rising out of a level surface of black horrid lava . . .To complete this turbulent scene, the black rocks of the coast are lashed by a wild sea.3

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Darwin compares both islands with well-defended castles, extending the idea from the form to the function of the two islands, sometimes almost mingling the two. After the description of the isle of St Helena as 'like a huge castle', he continues: 'Near to the town, as if in aid of the natural defences, small forts &C guns are everywhere built up & mingled with the ragged rocks.' And later: 'There are alarm houses & alarm guns on every peak .. . [and] forts and picket houses on the line leading down to Prosperous Bay.'

Ascension Island was until 1922 administered by the Admiralty. The population consisted almost entirely of marines: 'there is not a private person on the island', Darwin wrote, 'The whole Isd may be compared to [a] huge Ship.' It was not much more than 'a mere fortress in the ocean'. Both islands were significant victualling stations for the Royal Navy, but the main reason for the extensive fortification of the islands in the early nineteenth century was that St Helena was used as a place of detention for Napoleon after his defeat at Waterloo in 1815. Ascension Island was garrisoned to discourage any attempt to rescue him.

Napoleon died in 1821 and was buried on St Helena.4 (Darwin wrote that for the period 9-13 July he 'obtained lodgings in a cottage within a stone's throw of Napoleon's tomb'.) Much of the military infrastructure remained, although in decline. Darwin deplored the extent to which the house in which the exiled former emperor had lived had been vandalized. 'With respect to the house in which Napoleon died, its state is scandalous, to see the filthy & deserted rooms, scored with the names of visitors, to my mind was like beholding some ancient ruin wantonly disfigured.'5

Darwin was accompanied during his stay on St Helena by Covington (who adds that wine was sold and that there was a billiard table available at Napoleon's house).6 They went out for long walks every day with an elderly man, a former slave, who had worked as a goatherd: 'a civil, quiet old man . . . respectably dressed'.

Darwin's four days on St Helena were spent on detailed geological studies, not all of which can be reviewed here. He was impressed by the Welsh character of the landscape; he may have been influenced in this remark by recalling the broken landscape of parts of North Wales that he had traversed with Sedgwick in the early summer 1831, where volcanic rocks appear. He illustrated his accounts by several cross-sections based on traverses, e.g. from Flagstaff Hill to the Barn - the technique he had learned from Sedgwick. He noted that there were several sets of volcanic lavas which differed quite markedly in their character, mineralogy and the direction of dip. By noting that some layers of lava appeared to be eroded and were covered in a layer 'one inch in thickness of a reddish earthy matter', he speculated that considerable intervals of time had elapsed between the

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different volcanic events. He found, as he had found in so many places before, evidence of uplift, both in the topography, and in the deposits. He noted the swarms of intruded dykes, and suggested that this implied considerable stretching of the earth's surface at certain points. He saw also the strong relationship between the geology and topography: resistant rocks, such as some steeply inclined lava series, and the dykes often protruded as eminences. He saw evidence of extensive erosion: some of the volcanic forms were 'broken down'. He refers to 'a remnant of a great crater', describing how a 'wall or parapet' was very similar to those he had seen surmounting several of the craters in the Galapagos Islands; he adds, perhaps wistfully recalling the island he was not able to visit, a reference from Humboldt to a similar feature on Tenerife.7

In his chapter on the geology of St Helena, in Part 2 of the Geology of the Voyage of the Beagle, Darwin is at his comparative best:

There is much resemblance in structure and in geological history between St Helena, St Jago and Mauritius. All three islands are bounded (at least in the parts I was able to examine) by a ring of basaltic mountains, now much broken, but evidently once continuous. These mountains had, or apparently once had, their escarpments steep towards the interior of the island, and their strata dip outwards ... I feel however that . . . their average inclination is greater than that which they could have acquired, considering their thickness and compactness, by flowing down a sloping surface. At St Helena, and at St Jago, the basaltic strata rest on older and probably submarine beds of different composition. At all three islands, deluges of more recent lavas have flowed from the centre of the island, towards and between the basaltic mountains; and at St Helena, the central platform has been filled up by them. All three islands have been raised in mass . . . In these three islands, but especially at St Jago and Mauritius, when standing on the summit of one of the old basaltic mountains, one looks in vain towards the centre of the island - the point at which the strata beneath one's feet and of the mountains on each side rudely converge - for a source whence these strata could have been erupted; but one sees only a vast hollow platform stretched beneath, or piles of matter of more recent origin.8

Darwin's explanation was that uplift, volcanic eruptions and denudation continue contemporaneously. 'The conjecture is', wrote Darwin, 'that during the slow elevation of a volcanic district or island, in the centre of which one or more orifices continue open to relieve subterranean forces, the borders are upraised more than the central area.' He referred to these structures as

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'craters of elevation'. This was, of course, only written after the voyage, but time and again one can see in his contemporary notes that Darwin was comparing the geological features of the various islands he visited.

In the same chapter Darwin offers a brief comparison with the geology of Ascension:

The contrast in the superficial state of St Helena, compared with the nearest island, namely, Ascension, is very striking. At Ascension, the surface of the lava-streams are glossy, as if just poured forth, their boundaries are well defined, and they can be traced to perfect craters whence they erupted; in the course of many long walks I did not observe a single dike [sic] . . . On the other hand, at St Helena, the course of no stream of lava can be traced, either by the state of its boundaries or superfices ... but the surface of some of the highest hills are interlaced by worn-down dikes.9

The implication of all this was that Ascension was a much more recently formed volcanic island than St Helena. (The latter, he thought at the time, 'had existed as an island from a very remote period'.) The impression was strengthened in many of the details of Ascension Island recorded in Darwin's notes, or his chapter on the island in his Volcanic Islands.10 He described the 'singularly convoluted forms' of the surface of lava-flows and the 'conical red-coloured hills, scattered over the northern and western borders of the island'. Standing on the central mountain he counted 'between twenty and thirty of these cones of eruption'. He noted that they all sloped towards the south-east, the ejected fragments and ashes being blown by the trade wind. A further indication of the potency and violence of volcanic eruptions were the volcanic bombs, varying in size from that of an apple to that of a man's body, which occurred in great numbers, some of them at a distance from points of eruption: these had a coarsely cellular or 'scoriacious' interior, surrounded by a layer of compact lava and in turn by a cracked outer crust. These were formed by masses of viscous material being expelled with considerable force during an eruption.

On Ascension Island Darwin distinguished the landscape and geology of the northern area of red volcanic cones and recent lava flows from that of the central and south-east portion where the exposed rock was trachyte 'of a pale colour, generally compact, and of a feldspathic nature'. He refers to this as the 'fundamental' or underlying rock, almost everywhere else being covered by the more recent basaltic lavas and ashes. He noted that these rocks are in places strongly laminated, with the crystals within them arranged in layers, perhaps caused by the material having moved while still fluid. He found layering of a different kind in a series of tuffs, which he

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thought at the time were formed underwater; and he reported investigations by another geologist which appeared to confirm this with the finding of organic material. It seemed that there had been a lake of some kind on the now dry island. After discussing this, Darwin ends his account of Ascension in the Voyage of the Beagle as follows:

Anyhow, we may feel sure, that at some former epoch, the climate and productions of Ascension were very different from what they are now. Where on the surface of the earth can we find a spot on which close investigation will not discover signs of that endless cycle of change, to which this earth has been, is, and will be subjected?11

The finding of the layers of fossils on East Falkland led Darwin to conclude that those bleak islands had once been teeming with life beneath a warm shallow sea. The discovery of apparently water-laid tuffaceous deposits on Ascension suggested that the now desert-like landscape had formerly experienced a rainy period. Darwin was becoming more and more influenced by Lyell.

On both St Helena and Ascension Darwin observed the plants and animals, considering the relative importance of indigenous and imported species. In his letter to Professor Henslow, dated 9 July 1836, when he had hardly been 24 hours on the island of St Helena, he described the island as 'this little centre of a distinct creation', implying that he appreciated that there was a distinctiveness about the native flora and fauna. Towards the end of his visit, or shortly after it, he wrote in his diary: 'St Helena, situated so remote from any continent, in the midst of a great ocean, & possessing an unique Flora, this little world within itself, excites our curiosity. Birds & insects, as might be expected, are very few in number.'12 Darwin clearly understood the poverty of the biota, its distinctiveness and the main reason for these -the isolation. He had seen the same phenomenon at many places before -New Zealand, Cocos and the Falklands among them. He knew by now what to look for and how to evaluate what he saw.

He noted in his diary (he must have obtained the data from some other source) that there were 52 indigenous species of plants and 424 imported species on St Helena. He noted also that the island was formerly forest-covered, deploring the destruction that was caused by the clearance. It was only on the very highest and steepest mountains that the native flora survived.13

At the time of Darwin's visit, the lava fields near the coast were 'entirely destitute of vegetation'. In the central uplands, however, he noted: 'it is surprising to behold a vegetation possessing a decided English character':

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yellow gorse covered the sloping banks, the hills were crowned with irregular plantations of Scotch firs; weeping willows lined the rivulets, and hedges were formed by brambles, some of which were in fruit. Plants were not only introduced from Britain: some from Australia were also succeeding. Darwin believed that all the bird species were introduced. 'Partridges & pheasant are tolerably abundant.' He did not see, or perhaps failed to recognize, the St Helena wire bird (Aegilitis sanctae-helenae).14

The metaphors of struggle and conflict are found widely in Darwin's writings; we have already noticed their use in context of the struggles between land and sea, and between coral growth and the erosive power of the waves in the Cocos Islands, and in the 'invasion' of New Zealand by European plants and animals. After a discussion of the English character of the flora of St Helena he elaborates:

These numerous species, which have so recently been introduced, can hardly have failed to have destroyed some of the native kinds ... It is not improbable that even at the present day similar changes may be in progress. Many English plants appear to flourish here better than in their native country.15

Here we see very similar ideas to those he expressed about the invasion of New Zealand by exotic, mainly English plants (Chapter 13, p. 162). The notion of competition between organisms was later to be of immense importance to Darwin as he developed his ideas on natural selection.

Another species that Darwin found on St Helena, and indeed collected by him (although the specimens have been lost), had him speculating how far whole assemblages of ecologically related organisms could be introduced, or alternatively how the relationships between organisms might change. He found dung-beetles beneath dung (presumably that of cattle and sheep) in the higher hills. In his Insect Notes he commented that this was the 'most extraordinary instance yet met with of transported, or change in habits of stercovorous16 insects'. There were two species, one of which seemed to be new. In a lengthy footnote in The Voyage of the Beagle he compared the habits of the dung-beetles in St Helena, Chiloe and Tasmania, into all of which sheep and cattle had been introduced recently. He wondered if the beetles had been introduced with the stock, or whether they had simply adapted:

When the island was discovered it certainly possessed no quadruped, excepting perhaps a mouse: it becomes therefore, a difficult point to ascertain, whether these stercovorous insects have since been imported by accident, or if aborigines, on what food they formerly subsisted.17

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The same phenomena of the relative paucity of the island's biota and of the importance of introduced species were noticed on Ascension Island a few days later.

Near the coast nothing grows; a little inland an occasional green Castor oil plant & a few grasshoppers, - true friends of the desert, may be met with. On the central elevated parts, some grass is scattered over the surface, much resembling the worse parts of the Welsh mountains ... Of native animals, rats, mice, land-crabs are abundant: of Birds the guineas-fowl imported from the C. Verd's, swarm in great numbers. The Isd is entirely destitute of trees, in which & in every other respect it is far inferior to St Helena.

Darwin obtained two specimens of the Ascension Island mouse, which was later determined to be of the same species as that found in England, and two specimens of a rat. The two rat specimens differed markedly: one was black, although it had 'an obscure purple-brown hue on the upper parts of the body', the sides and under parts were grey. The other was very distinctively marked. George Waterhouse, who examined the specimens after Darwin's return to England, provided the following description:

Hairs along the centre of the back chiefly black, and but obscurely annulated [i.e. marked with rings], near the apex, with deep yellow; toward sides of the body, and over the haunches, the hairs are more distinctly annulated, and on the sides of the body they are of a pale yellow at the apex; on the under parts the hairs are grey, tipped with dirty yellowish white; the feet are the same deep purplish-brown hue as in the specimen first described.18

The two varieties were clearly different, and Darwin, in comparing them, wondered why this was so and what was the relationship between them. His speculations are extremely interesting and worth quoting in full:

The specimen, which has a black and glossy fur, frequents the short grass near the summit of the island, where the common mouse likewise occurs. It is often seen running about by day, and was found in numbers, when the island was first colonized by the English, a few years since. The other, and browner coloured variety, lives in the outhouses near the sea-beach, and feeds chiefly on the offal of turtles, slaughtered for the daily food of the inhabitants. If the settlement were destroyed, I feel no doubt that the latter variety would be compelled to migrate from the coast. Did it originally descend from the summit? and in the case just supposed, would it retreat there? and if so, would

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its black colour return? It must, however, be observed, that the two localities are separated from each other by a space, some miles in width, of bare lava and ashes. Does the summit of Ascension, an island so immensely remote from any continent, and the summit itself surrounded by a broad fringe of desert volcanic soil, possess a small quadruped peculiar to itself? Or, more probably, has this new species been brought by some ship, from some unknown quarter of the world? Or, I am again tempted to ask, as in the case of the Galapagos rat, has the common English species been changed, by its new habitation, into a strongly marked variety?19

Waterhouse, after carefully studying the specimens, was able to tell Darwin that he was at least partly right. The rats were, Waterhouse thought (although he was not completely certain), of the same species - that of the 'English' black rat (the species now known as Rattus rattus) - which used to be common on board ships and in ports. And although they are not well organized, Darwin's observations and speculations (which may have been written up after the Ascension visit) show the way in which his mind was working.

1. He appreciated the importance of the isolation of populations, both on the broad scale and at a more local level. He realized that both the wide ocean and a barren, infertile area might be barriers to movement.

2. He understood the importance of long-distance dispersal.

3. He speculated on the possibility of one form changing over time into another, and finally. . .

4. He appreciated that the trigger for this change might be the colonization of a new environment.

All these components later appeared in his evolution through natural selection hypothesis. Thus the comparison of a couple of dead rats from Ascension Island may have had a greater impact than has been recognized. The importance that Darwin attached to the behaviour of animals, as well as their appearance, has been mentioned before. Although from his descriptions we can picture the brown rats and the mice scurrying about amongst the sparse vegetation of the upper slopes of Ascension's peak and the dung-beetles burrowing beneath the piles of dung on St Helena, there were few opportunities for extensive studies of behaviour on these islands. There was, however, one incident that recalls his comments on the tameness of birds on remote islands elsewhere, a product of their long isolation from humans (see pp. 46, 99 and 203). From the Beagle, whilst at sea, he had noticed parts of the island had a mottled white appearance. Later he was

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able to discover that this was due 'to the number of seafowl, which sleep in such full confidence, as even in midday to allow a man to walk up to them & seize them'.

Darwin contrasts the character of the human occupance of St Helena with that of Ascension. While run by the East India Company there was some prosperity. The presence of 'Boney' and his entourage and guards had likewise created employment. Although there were 'a few cultivated fields', 'numerous cottages & small white houses', stock - goats, sheep, cattle, horses - and he felt that Longwood (viewed from a distance) appeared like a respectable English gentleman's country seat, there was, however, evidence that the island had fallen on hard times. Many of the public servants had left and the people were 'extremely poor', wages being low. For the most part, people lived on rice and salt beef and 'as these articles must be purchased, the low wages will tell heavily'. He also deplored the fact that the people had been stopped from burning plants that occurred along the coast to produce soda for sale, for fear that partridges would have nowhere to nest! (He thought this was very English!) Darwin foresaw that following the emancipation of slaves, 'their numbers will quickly increase [they already amounted to some 5,000]: if so what is to become of the little state of St Helena?' Darwin was extremely prescient. In the 180 years following his visit numbers have increased enormously, and so too have unemployment and poverty.

Darwin, as he climbed Green Hill on Ascension,20 so called because the moisture on the mountain allowed vegetation to grow, and indeed gardens to be cultivated, noticed the presence of cisterns for water and also the milestones; every part of the establishment was well managed, especially the springs. He admired the industry that had created all this, but regretted that so much effort was 'wasted towards so poor & trifling an end'. He approved of the growing 'little Englands' of the Australian colonies and South Africa, and indeed much of Britain's imperial thrust, but he deplored waste, extreme poverty and the abuse and exploitation of one race by another. The visits to the two islands of St Helena and Ascension were scientifically of great value to him; but he also saw much about which he was uneasy.

Notes

1. Mr Dring was appointed acting purser following the death at sea of Mr George Rowlett in June 1834, 'of a complaint under which he had been labouring for years' (see p. 107).

2. Diary, 8 July 1836, pp. 409-10.

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3. Ibid., 19 July 1836, p. 413.

4. His body was transported back to France in 1840 and he was reburied in Paris.

5. Diary, 9-13 July 1836, p. 410.

6. On Ascension, Darwin probably made day excursions, sleeping on board ship.

7. Geology of the Voyage, Part 2, Volcanic Islands, p. 83.

8. Ibid., p. 95.

9. Ibid., pp. 92-3.

10. Ibid., Chapter 3, pp. 34-72.

11. Voyage, p. 476.

12. Diary, 13 July 1836, p. 412. The annotation fits well with similar comments made on Tahiti and Cocos. In fact several dozen insects were collected by Darwin (or by his servant Covington) at St Helena; they included beetles, flies and ichneumons.

13. Later, discussing his experience with colleagues, he found that there had formerly existed 'eight species of land-shells' found nowhere else, along with several species of sea-shells.

14. P. Gosse, St Helena: 1502-1938 (London: Cassell & Co, 1938; repr. Oswestry: Anthony Nelson, 1990), p. 309.

15. Diary, 9-13 July 1836, p. 411.

16. Darwin's apparently made-up word for dung-feeding.

17. Voyage, p. 471, footnote.

18. Zoology of the Voyage, Part 2, p. 36.

19. Ibid., pp. 36-7.

20. Darwin gives the height, in his diary, as 2,840 ft; he presumably obtained this figure from the naval surveyors on the Beagle, although he did carry an anaeroid; it is uncannily exact. Modern maps give the summit as 859 m (about 2,840 ft).

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19. The Last Island: Terceira, Azores

Darwin seems to have been looking forward to his visit to the Azores. In a hastily scribbled letter to his sister Susan, from Bahia, Brazil, which the Beagle revisited on her homeward run, completing the entire 'chain of meridians around the world', dated 4 August 1836, he wrote:

We go from here to the C. de Verds [Cape Verde Islands]. That is if the winds or the Equatorial calms will allow us. I have some faint hopes, that a steady foul wind might Induce the Captain to proceed direct to the Azores. For which most untoward event I heartily pray.1

It seems that he hoped that FitzRoy would sail directly to the Azores, rather than deflect to the east to the Cape Verde Islands (in the event he did not). Darwin eagerly anticipated the visit to the Azores as they would be the last port of call before England. He had by then lived for over four and a half years on the Beagle, and elsewhere in the same letter he exclaimed: T loathe, I abhor the sea, &c all ships which sail on it.'

Despite this modest eagerness of his anticipation, Darwin dismisses the sojourn in the Azores in his Voyage of the Beagle with the simple statement that after a visit to the Cape Verde archipelago '[W]e proceeded to the Azores, where we staid [sic] six days.' Although he found several things of great interest on Terceira (the only island of the group on which he landed), his writings show a certain lack of enthusiasm. He made no study of the marine biota off the island, and his observations on some aspects of natural history, compared to the detail he lavished on some of the other islands he visited are sparse. He collected few specimens - not even a single fish. The city of Angra he noted was 'tidy', but he wrote that 'its glory has departed'; the town of Praia was 'forlorn'; the burned-up, late-summer stubble had an

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'unpleasant' appearance; the central uplands of the island were 'desolate'. He was anxious to be home.

FitzRoy did not usually enter the noon position of the Beagle into the log himself; it was generally inked in by his clerk or one of the others aboard the ship, but the commander carefully checked the entries and countersigned the completed pages with something of a flourish.2 It can be assumed that he carefully checked the entries for noon, 18 September 1836; his ship was approaching the last landfall before returning to England from a voyage that had been outstandingly successful in many respects. He would not have wanted anything to go amiss at this late hour. The entry reads:

Distance Lat. Long. Bearing and Distance

DR Obs DR Chon. 115 37.57 38.03 27.33 27.39 Angra N29E 41 miles

The vessel had thus traversed 115 nautical miles since noon the previous day, and the position of the ship had been determined at 37°57'N, 27°33'W by dead reckoning (i.e. based on the estimated distance travelled, and the course steered since the previous observation), but 38°03'N, 27°39'W by instrument readings (sextant and chronometer). This placed the ship at a point from which the little port of Angra on the island of Terceira was 41 miles distant, on a bearing a little east of north.

The wind was from the south-east, force 2. It was fine: white clouds drifted across a blue sky. At 2.00 p.m. the sails were trimmed; further adjustments were made an hour later and again at 4.10 p.m. By 7.10 p.m. the wind had strengthened to force 4 and shifted towards the south-west, requiring the sails to be shortened and the topsails to be double-reefed, as the ship hauled to the wind on the starboard tack; further adjustments were made during the night.

At 4.00 a.m. on 19 September land could just be made out towards the nor' nor' west, and as daylight grew brighter the form of the island could be seen more clearly: the easternmost point lay north-east by north; the wind strengthened once again and the ship 'made all sail to Royals'.

At 6.00 a.m. the sun was rising, and as the ship tacked, the town of Angra could be seen some six or seven miles distant. Darwin was on deck at an early hour, for in his diary he recorded: 'In the morning we were off the East end of the island of Terceira.' He observed the land carefully, noting that it was 'moderately lofty 8c has a rounded outline with detached conical hills of volcanic origin'. At 9.00 a.m. one of the ship's boats was lowered and sent to the town, while the Beagle worked slowly towards the tiny, rather exposed, harbour just to the east of Monte Brasil, a large volcanic cone. At noon she came to rest in 35 fathoms. During the

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_^ Darwin's approximate rou18 22Sept. 1836

Figure 19.1 Map of Terceira, with Darwin's probable routes

afternoon many of the crew were employed blacking the rigging, painting and mending hammocks.

That evening, Darwin records, 'a party went on shore'. He and his companions spent some time looking round the streets of the attractive but rather sleepy town of Angra, examining some of the churches, glancing up at the defensive works at the foot of Monte Brasil, and exploring the tightly packed streets that tumbled down to the harbour. Possibly Darwin and one or two of the officers of the ship called on the British Consul (FitzRoy often made a point of paying courtesy calls on local dignitaries at ports of call). The young naturalist recorded in his diary: 'The next day [20 September3] the Consul kindly lent me his horse & furnished me with guides to proceed to the spot in the centre of the island, which was described as an active crater.' The weather was unsettled: overcast and showery, with a strong wind from the south-west, but he was not discouraged, setting out fairly early, northwards from the town.

Ascending in deep lanes bordered on either side by high stone walls, for the first three miles we passed many houses &c gardens. We then entered a very irregular plain country, consisting of more recent streams of hummocky basaltic lava. The rocks are covered in some

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parts by a thick brushwood about three feet high, & in others by heath, fern & short pasture: a few broken down old stone walls completed the resemblance to the mountains of Wales.4

He was making his way to the Furnas do Enxofre, the fumaroles, or steam-vents, that were his destination (described later), probably stopping occasionally to collect rock specimens. The now-seasoned explorer recorded in some detail the rocks, land-forms, and some of the birds he saw. As always, he took great interest in the human inhabitants, writing that 'it was pleasant to meet such a number of the peasantry' and describing their physical appearance, clothing, implements and way of life in some detail. He enjoyed his day's ride, but 'did not see much worth seeing'.

The two other excursions made by Darwin (on the 21 and 22 September) were a geological excursion to Monte Brasil and a long ride around parts of the north of the island, visiting some of the little villages on the route to Praia (Darwin spells it Praya) - a forlorn little place - although he admitted that the north-east of the island was 'particularly well cultivated' and recorded that it produced 'a fine crop of wheat'. There is a hint of tiredness and eagerness to be away in the final words of the latter outing:

When we descended from the clouds to the city, I heard the good news that [navigational and magnetic] observations had been obtained, & that we should go to sea the same evening. The anchorage is exposed to the whole swell of the southern ocean, & hence during the present boisterous time of year is very disagreeable & far from safe.5

The Beagle, with a force 5 sou'wester blowing in the sails 'made sail on the starboard tack'. At 6.40 p.m. the vessel hove to, and the boat was taken up. By 7.00 p.m. the sails were filled again as the ship set course for the island of Sao Miguel (St Michael's, Darwin called it) some 80 nautical miles (150 km) to the south-east.

Despite the slightly negative feel of some of Darwin's comments on Terceira, some of his observations, particularly on the geology, are as detailed and perceptive as those made elsewhere:

The island of Terceira appears to consist of an elevated central part which slopes down on all sides to the sea. Both on the flanks and on the summit there are numerous volcanic summits. The streams of lava which have proceeded from these can in some cases be traced. And the surface, especially in parts of the elevated, central land, is covered by hummocks & irregular depressions. These more modern streams, when I saw them [chiefly] consist of a blackish lava. Specimens (3,212, 13, 14) show their nature. Besides these streams, there are irregular

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ridges & large hills chiefly composed of true white or pale grey trachyte full of broken crystals of glassy felspar [sic], brown lines &C minute black points precisely similar to the trachyte of Ascension.6

As usual, Darwin sees the big picture, as well as the tiny detail, and as always is comparing the features of one island with another. He thought the degree of volcanic activity about equal to that of the Galapagos and Cape Verde 'with respect to age, of... crater degradation'. The black lavas 'with crystals of glassy feldspar' he thought were similar to some on St James Island (Santiago) in the Galapagos.

Here is his account of the costume of some of the country people: 'The men & boys are all dressed in a plain jacket & trowsers [sic], without shoes or stockings; their heads are barely covered by a little blue cap with two ears & a border of red; this they lift in the most courteous manner to each passing stranger.'7 He compared the way of life of the people of Terceira with that of the inhabitants of Chiloe that he had visited over a year previously. He compared the landscape of Terceira with that of Sao Miguel (see p. 244).

Although, therefore, Darwin has a number of observations on the countryside, towns and people of the Azores, and more brief annotations on some of the birds, insects and plants, it is the geological notes that are most important. He comments principally on three aspects:

1. The structure and petrology of Monte Brasil (Mount Brazil in Darwin's accounts), the steep volcanic cone (and crater) that almost overhangs the harbour at Angra.

2. The general nature of the volcanic landscapes of the island.

3. The fumaroles, or steam-vents, at Furnas do Enxofre, in the centre of the island, and the effects of the emerging steam on the surrounding rocks.

Darwin wrote at some length on these matters in his geological diary, polishing his prose for his Volcanic Islands;

The town of Angra is overlooked by a crateriform hill (Mount Brasil), entirely built of thin strata of fine-grained, harsh, buff-coloured tuff. The upper beds are seen to overlap the basaltic streams, on which the town stands. The hill is almost identical in structure and composition with numerous crater-formed hills in the Galapagos Archipelago.8

The descriptions of the form of the cone and its crater (in the centre of which, within living memory, crops were grown; traces could be seen in the 1990s) and the descriptions of the rocks that comprise the old volcano are entirely accurate. The grey-brown tuffs, strongly layered, with fragments up to a centimetre or two in diameter are still widely exposed on the

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Figure 19.2 Volcanic landscape, Terceira

flanks of the cone. In his original notes Darwin added further details, including the erosion of part of the volcanic cone by the sea, and recorded that the 'extremities of the [volcanic tuff] beds overlie the termination of the coast basaltic streams', deducing that they are therefore 'very modern'. Darwin was always interested in structural geology and in what the relationships between rock masses could tell about the geological history of the region. His analysis of the history of Monte Brasil: the outpouring of lavas, the development of the volcanic cone on top of them, and its later erosion by marine attack recalls his first attempts to reconstruct the history of a volcanic landscape on his first island, St Jago, four and a half years before.

Darwin's mention of erosion by the sea is of interest. He had spent long hours during the voyage reading Lyell's Principles of Geology, copies of all three volumes of which he had by him for some time. By September 1836 he had absorbed Lyell's uniformitarian or gradualist ideas and applied them in many settings. Darwin observed the very steep seaward face of Monte Brasil, commenting that the sea had 'destroyed' part of the hill. He continued: 'A little further to the Eastward [from Mount Brasil] there is [sic] outlying islands & some rocks which appear of a similar nature, but only a small segment now remains.'9 He was referring to the Uheus das Cabras, two steep islets, all that remains of a volcanic cone after marine attack, 5 km

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due east of Monte Brasil. Darwin would have passed close to them on his ride to Praia, and the Beagle sailed not far from them on entering and leaving port. Elsewhere, describing the narrow valley in the centre of the island where he observed the steam-vents, he wrote that he thought the depression was due to 'the washing away & ordinary degradation of the rocks' as much as subsidence. Darwin, now well-equipped with Lyellian ideas, was ready to accept the gradual and the mundane as well as the sudden and spectacular.

The steam-vents, or fumaroles, in the centre of the island that he visited the day after his arrival provided the geological site of greatest interest. His three accounts of this site (in his geological diary, his general diary and his (much later) account in Chapter 2 of Volcanic Islands) provide examples of his careful observation, using a range of senses (touch, smell and even taste as well as sight), his comparative approach and his attempts at explanation and search for pattern. He was also always careful to separate his own observations from what was reported to him by others. Here is the description from Volcanic Islands, which combines material from his two accounts written at (or very close to) the time of his visit.

In the central part of the island there is a spot, where steam is constantly issuing in jets from the bottom of a small ravine-like hollow, which has no exit, and which abuts against a range of trachytic mountains. The steam is emitted from several irregular fissures; it is scentless, soon blackens iron, and is much too high a temperature to be endured by hand. The manner in which the solid trachyte is changed on the borders of these orifices is curious: first the base becomes earthy, with red freckles evidently due to the oxidation of the particles of iron; then it becomes soft; and lastly even the crystals of glassy feldspar yield to the dissolving agent. After the mass is converted into clay, the oxide of iron seems to be removed from some parts, which are left perfectly white, whilst in other neighbouring parts, which are of the brightest red colour, it seems to be deposited in greater quantity; some other masses are marbled with the two distinct colours. Portions of the white clay, now that they are dry, cannot be distinguished by the eye from the finest prepared chalk; and when placed between the teeth they feel equally soft grains; the inhabitants use this substance for white-washing the houses ... In some half-decayed specimens, I found small, globular aggregations of yellow hyalite, resembling gum-arabic, which no doubt had been deposited by the steam.

As there is no escape for the rain-water, which trickled down the sides of the ravine-like hollow, whence the steam issues, it must all percolate

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downwards through fissures in the bottom. Some of the inhabitants informed me that it was on record that flames (some luminous appearance?) had originally proceeded from the cracks and that the flames had been succeeded by the steam; but I was not able to determine how long this was ago, or anything certain on the subject. When viewing the spot I imagined that the injection of a large mass of rock, like the core of phonolite at Fernando Noronha, in a semi-fluid state, by arching the surface might have caused a wedge-shaped hollow with cracks at the bottom, and that rain-water percolating to the neighbourhood of the heated mass, would, during many succeeding years be driven back in the form of steam.10

One of the things that a modern visitor notices about the site is the presence of crystals of elemental sulphur and a faint sulphurous smell. Darwin does not mention these (unless the 'globular aggregations of yellow hyalite' refers to sulphur), although in one of his draft accounts he postulates that the steam contains some 'muriatic [i.e. hydrochloric acid] gas'. In his geological diary he speculates on the possibility that the water passes into a 'subterranean cavity'. This was quite well grounded as there are caverns in the area, a little over a kilometre to the east, at Algar do Carvao.

Darwin had visited a number of volcanic islands on the voyage, and in North Island, New Zealand, on the Galapagos, Ascension and the Cape Verdes he had seen volcanic cones similar to those of Terceira. But in few places had he seen such clear evidence of activity close to the surface, and this impressed him (although he had seen an eruption from afar while in Chiloe, and felt an earthquake in South America). He wrote: 'Throughout the island, the powers below have been unusually active duing the last year; several small earthquakes have been caused & during a few days a jet of steam issued from a bold precipice overhanging the sea not far from the town of Angra.'11 And: 'Many years since a large city here [Praia] was overwhelmed by a large earthquake. It is asserted that the land subsided, & a wall of a convent now bathed by the sea is shewn as proof: the fact is probable, but the proof not convincing.'

Darwin clearly interpreted what he was told with care, but in the vague descriptions of flames at the steam-vent site (above) there may linger folk-memories of volcanic eruptions and spectacular 'quakes' in the past. There was in fact an eruption in 1761; other disturbances are recorded in 1614, 1800 and 1814. The occasional damaged house seen on the island today confirms that earthquakes still occur.12

Although the spectacular and bizarre always had a fascination for Darwin, he was nevertheless punctilious in also recording the common and the

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routine, carefully observing Terceira's volcanic cones and the rocks that comprised them. His careful documentation of the mineralogy of the trachytes of the island we have already noted. Of the island's uplands he wrote: 'On every side, besides the ridges of more ancient lavas, there were cones of various dimensions, which yet partly retained their crater-formed summits, & where broken down, showed a pile of cinders like those of an ironfoundry.'13

As the result of his interest in the structural relations amongst the main series of rocks, and his comparative method, he sought to find similarities in these three-dimensional patterns on different islands, and he believed by the end of the voyage he had found them. He maintained that the typical structure of volcanic islands was a lower, older trachytic core, overlain by more recent basalt flows. Here is his introduction to the section on Terceira in Volcanic Islands:

The central parts of the island consist of irregularly rounded mountains of no great elevation, composed of trachyte, which closely resembles in general character the trachyte of Ascension . .. This formation is in many parts overlaid, in the usual order of superposition, by streams of basaltic lava, which near the coast comprise nearly the whole surface.14

While still aboard the Beagle he wrote in his notes of the Terceira trachytes: 'These lavas appeared the most ancient; & their circumstances present the old case of the Trachytic nucleus enveloped by more recent streams of a basaltic nature.'15

His comparative method has led Darwin to discern a pattern: volcanic islands have an older core of trachyte, with a more recent layer of basaltic lavas above. At least in the case of Terceira these conclusions seem to have been soundly based. One recent study of the island's geological history identifies:

1. (Oldest) a pre-trachyte basaltic and andesitic complex, subdivisible into several phases.

2. The trachytic eruptions.

3. The quaternary basalts.

4. Historic eruptions.16

There seems to be more variety in the mineralogy of the Terceiran basalts than Darwin recognized, but bearing in mind the limited training that he had and his very simple field equipment (a geological hammer, a clinometer, a hand-lens and a blow-pipe), his rock identification was generally sound.

When summarizing, in Volcanic Islands, his conclusions from all the volcanic islands he visited, Darwin does more than suggest the simple

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model of their structure. He offers an explanation of the variety of rocks on volcanic islands. His idea was that in certain circumstances, in a crystallizing mass of molten rock, the heavier minerals would separate out:

The sinking of crystals through a viscid substance like molten rock, as is unequivocally shown to have been the case in the experiments of M. Dree, is worthy of further consideration, as throwing light on the separation of the trachytic and basaltic series of lavas.17

Once again, although his views are something of a simplification, Darwin shows himself far ahead of his time. The process now identified as being responsible for the derivation of a variety of rock-types from a single melt is fractional crystallization: the settling out of minerals in a particular order from a melt results in the formation of a residual melt of very different composition from the original magma. One common fractionation path does in fact link basalt and trachyte. According to modern petrological theory, gravitational settling may not be the whole explanation, but in his speculation about the derivation of trachyte and basalt from the same parent melt, and that crystallization was part of the story, Darwin was substantially correct, although the extent to which he developed these ideas during the voyage rather than later is not clear.

Interestingly, this is a gradualist, almost Lyellian model: gradual change through time allows one entity to 'evolve' into another, just as fringing-reefs passed into barrier-reefs and ultimately into atolls, so a route from an original molten magma, through trachytic material to basalt, can be discerned.18

Important though Darwin's observations and speculations on the geology of Terceira may have been, he also commented on other aspects of the island's environment. Among these were a few, rather casual comments on the plants and animals. We have already noted how he compared certain aspects of the landscape and vegetation with that of Wales; the reticulate pattern of small fields and scattered villages in the north of the island evoked comparable feelings: 'The square, open fields & small villages with white washed churches gave to the view, as seen from the heights, an aspect resembling the less picturesque parts of central England.'19 Some of countryside he passed through between Shrewsbury and Cambridge, perhaps, but it was not just the landscapes that provided reminders of home: 'I saw moreover, some old English friends amongst the insects, & of birds, the starling, water wagtail,20 chaffinch and blackbird.'

Darwin's familiarity with the island's biota is perhaps further demonstrated by the fact that he took almost no natural history specimens (apart from a few rocks). Perhaps the 'old English friends' among the insects were

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so familiar that he felt they were not worthy of special note. Today the visitor from the British Isles notices several butterfly species (browns, whites) and bumblebees familiar from gardens at home, and it may have been these that he saw.

There were some things that Darwin liked about Terceira, and the familiarity of the green landscapes, along with the commonplace organisms that lived there, was among them. The island reminded him of home in many ways, yet it was not home, and after a few days he was glad to leave.

Darwin made a number of passing references to the inhabitants of the island, but his remarks are somewhat unsystematic. He comments favourably on the cleanliness, courtesy and industriousness of the 'fine peasantry', the little fields divided by stone walls, the vineyards, the harvesting of wheat and Indian corn, the picturesque white-painted villages. He also notes their poverty: there was 'not want of food but of all luxuries', as in Chiloe. He comments on the attractive narrow streets of Angra, with the creaking oxcarts making their way along them. The 'many fine churches' that Darwin noted are still an important feature of the townscape.

By September 1836 Darwin was quite knowledgeable about fortifications and military architecture. He had shared his quarters with experienced military and naval officers. (He had, indeed, come close to a firefight in South America.) He had commented approvingly in some of his writings on the defences of some South American cities, comparing them unfavourably with those elsewhere, for example with those of Hobart Town (Chapter 15). At Angra he mentioned the 'strong castle', the squat, square form of Sao Sebastiao Castle, overlooking the harbour. The other part of the impressive system of fortifications he saw lies to the south-west of the old core of the city, at the foot of Monte Brasil. These works have been described as one of the most important sets of fortifications in Europe dating from the sixteenth and seventeen centuries. A massive set of walls and bulwarks faces the north and east. Bastions, arrowhead-shaped in plan, confront the intruder from the direction of the city. An impressive gate in worked stone provides access to the Sao Joao Baptista Castle within.

In evaluating these, as with the cultural landscape and the people, Darwin sees them from the point of view of an educated, upper-middle-class Englishman. In some ways his comments on Terceira are less penetrating than observations made elsewhere (except maybe, for those on geology). He was back within the European realm, and was eager to be on his way to his family anxiously awaiting him in Shrewsbury. Terceira was the last island of the voyage upon which Darwin set foot, although he glimpsed Sao Miguel from the deck of the ship a day or so later. He compared the landscape with that of Terceira:

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The Isd of St Michael's is considerably larger & three times as populous & enjoys a much more extensive trade than Terceira ... St Michael's has much the same open, semi-green, cultivated patchwork appearance as Terceira. The town is scattered; the houses & churches there & throughout the island are white washed & from a distance look neat & pretty. The land behind the town is less elevated than on Terceira, but yet rises considerably; it is thickly studded or rather made up of small mammiformed hills, each of which has sometime been an active volcano.21

A whale-boat was sent ashore to enquire for letters (there was none) and to make navigational and magnetic measurements. At 4.00 p.m. on 23 September, getting a good offing from the land, the Beagle 'steered, thanks to God, a direct course for England'.

Notes

1. Letter to Susan Darwin, 4 August 1836, DAR 223, Correspondence, Vol. 1, p. 503.

2. ADM 51/3055.

3. Diary, p. 21. Darwin's diary dates seem in error at this point. His dates for the Azores visit differ by a day or two from those in the official log, for the same events. I have used the log dates for preference. The itinerary for the visit and the discrepancy in dates is discussed further in P. H. Armstrong, 'Charles Darwin's Last Island: Terceira, Azores, 1836', Geowest, 27 (University of Western Australia, 1992).

4. Diary, p. 421.

5. Ibid., p. 424.

6. DAR 38.2/957. First page of notes headed: 1836 Terceira Azores (DAR 38.2/957-60).

7. Diary, pp. 422-3.

8. Geology of the Voyage, Part 2, p. 24.

9. DAR 38.2/958.

10. Geology of the Voyage, Part 2, pp. 24-5.

11. DAR 38.2/959.

12. There have also been several new islands formed by volcanic activity within the last two centuries. One appeared just off Ponta Ferraria, west of Sao Miguel in 1811. It reached 125 m (410 feet) in height but then was eroded away, completing its entire life-cycle in 119 days (18 June-15 October). Its history was documented by Captain Tilliard of HMS Sabrina (Philosophical Transactions, 1812). In 1867 another volcano rose from the sea twelve miles (19 km) northwest of Terceira. It too soon became inactive and was removed by the sea.

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The effects of the 1980 earthquake can be seen in the odd damaged building, both in the city of Angra and in the countryside.

13. There is a comparison to be made with some of his descriptions of the Galapagos (Chapter 3).

14. Geology of the Voyage, Part 2, p. 24 (my emphasis).

15. DAR 38.2/959 (my emphasis).

16. Comite national frangais de geologie, Geologie de pays europeens (Espagne, Grece, Italia, Portugal, Yugoslavie) (Paris: Dunod, 1980).

17. Geology of the Voyage, Part 2, p. 118.

18. Compare the coral atoll observations in Chapters 12 and 16. The notion of a 'gradualist' approach in Darwin's ideas on igneous rocks is discussed in P. N. Pearson, 'Charles Darwin on the Origin and Diversity of Igneous Rocks', Earth Science History, 15.1 (1996): 49-67.

19. Diary, p. 424.

20. The identity of this 'water-wagtail' is unclear. The taxonomy of the genus Motacilla is somewhat complex, with considerable variability within what are sometimes regarded as species, sometimes as races. The term 'water-wagtail' is avoided by modern ornithologists and is not found in current field-guides. Older books use it for the pied wagtail (Motacilla flava). The name 'yellow water-wagtail' is known from The Ornithology of Francis Willurghby (1678) for the yellow wagtail (M. alba). The most conspicuous wagtail at the time of my visit in 1992 was the grey wagtail (M. cinerea), somewhat similar to the above. Darwin would probably have been familiar with all these species.

21. Diary, pp. 424-5.

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20. Conclusion:

Islands, Inspiration and Ideas

It can be argued that there is nothing so very distinctive about island environments. They possess rock-types that can, at least on occasion, be found on the world's continents; they possess plants and animals that interact with one another in communities or ecosystems, just as do those of the forests, grasslands, coasts and lakes found on the continental masses. Many scientists say that exactly the same techniques should be used to study remote islands as are used to study other environments. Some islands are inhabited, indeed have a very high density of population, and have been much modified by human occupance; others are uninhabited and are relatively pristine.

The other point of view is that although islands vary - a distinction between continental islands and oceanic islands is perhaps the most fundamental (see pp. 17-18) - they do differ, at least in degree, from environments that are parts of the major continents. They also differ from each other, each island being unique.

Over the last century or so, scientists have invested much effort in attempting to understand the geology, geography, biology and ecology of islands. Today they recognize that where islands resemble one another, despite striking differences, they display the following characteristics:

1. Relatively small size (though there are obvious exceptions).

2. Isolation. An island is defined as a piece of land surrounded by water, and so any island is isolated from other environments, if only by a narrow channel.

3. Relatively low species diversity. Isolation, and in some cases extreme isolation, may mean that fewer species of plants and animals have been able to establish themselves than on mainland environments. (Assuming the hypothesis of independent creation is rejected.)

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Conclusion: Islands, Inspiration and Ideas

4. Clearly defined boundaries.

5. A degree of endemism. Isolation means that at least some of an island's biota may be unique. Gene-flow between the island ecosystem and an outside source of variability may be impossible, or almost so.

6. Small populations: the relatively small physical size of many islands means that they have a small and relatively easily ascertainable population size in the case of larger organisms.

7. Relatively simple networks of ecological relationships. The often low species diversity, small size and small populations of islands, together with their distinctive boundaries, many mean that islands are easier to study. It is easier to discern 'what is going on' on a tiny islet than on a great continent.

8. Comparability. Although each island represents a unique combination of physical factors and biological species, the fact that there are so many islands means that comparisons can be made. And, as Darwin knew well, 'the habit of comparison leads to generalization'.

Darwin had a brilliant, creative mind. He had been trained in certain critical skills and he had the most incredible good fortune to visit a great range of these natural island laboratories. Let us now attempt to summarize how his variety of island experiences contributed to his intellectual development.

In some cases it is possible to trace the development of an idea or group of ideas through the course of the voyage. An example is provided by the 'theory of coral reefs' or 'coral atoll theory'. Put simply, this is the notion that fringing coral reefs, barrier-reefs and atolls are members of a series, and that the main vehicle driving the transformation is a rise in sea level or a subsiding land level. Charles Lyell, in Principles of Geology, expressed the view that circular coral atolls were the result of the growth of coral around the lip of a volcanic crater. Darwin, at a fairly early stage, thought this was a 'monstrous' idea! Coral growth had interested him ever since while a student in Edinburgh he had seen a few tiny coralline forms along the Scottish coast. How much bigger and better were the corals growing in the sea at his feet as he sat on the shore of Quail Island at St Jago in the Cape Verdes a few weeks into the voyage! There, limestones on the shore behind him told the story of uplift. This site seems in some ways to have been that of his awakening: the point where he began to appreciate in a vivid way that he lived in a dynamic, changing world. Not many weeks later he scrambled ashore the little islets of the Abrolhos, apparently composed entirely of coral, noticing the huge brain-corals in the sea nearby. Although Darwin

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did not set foot again on a true coral island for over two years, there is evidence that associated ideas ran through his mind; in the Falklands, on Chiloe and around a good deal of South America (especially Chile) he searched for evidence of change in the relative level of land and sea. Sometimes he felt he had found it.

Darwin's letters and notebooks show that his interest in a theory of coral islands was reawakened shortly before he left the west coast of South America. Glimpses of distant atolls followed as he crossed the Pacific. From a high point in Tahiti he was able to view the Isle of Eimeo (Moorea), seeing a barrier-reef in all its glory. During the same visit, from an outrigger canoe, he was able to examine the detailed form of coral reefs: he appreciated that different parts of the reef were associated with different species of corals, and that corals only thrived in shallow, disturbed water. FitzRoy's hydro-graphic surveys showed that offshore from Tahiti and Aituaki the sea-bed shelved steeply; the coral formations were the caps of isolated submarine mountains. As the Beagle sailed between Tahiti and New Zealand, the first full draft of the 'coral atoll theory' was prepared. Cocos, visited after Australia, provided a case-study. It was the first true atoll upon which he had set foot, and although he probably overestimated the rate of change in sea level, the study of the archipelago provided striking confirmation of his theory. Soundings offshore showed that here again the bed sloped away steeply, and a glimpse of the tiny atoll of North Keeling provided yet another example. In Darwin's day the nature and importance of a postglacial rise in sea level was not understood. He reasoned that if some parts of the ocean were sinking, other areas must be rising, and that the Pacific coast of South America might be such an area, along with other parts of the Pacific and perhaps other oceans. For we must always remember the 'Eight Stones' incident: just a few days into the voyage, following New Year 1832, the Beagle's crew had searched in vain for this group of tiny islets (perhaps they were volcanic and had disappeared, maybe subsiding back into the sea from whence they had came).

There were clear links between the development of the coral atoll theory and Darwin's work on volcanic islands. While atolls had developed through gradual change as the result of subsidence, time and again he stated that he felt that some volcanic islands were rising; he thought that rises in one part of the ocean floor were compensated for by subsidence elsewhere. Certainly he felt he had seen evidence of rise at St Jago: there limestones containing the remains of marine organisms that were still around were uplifted above sea level. On Mauritius, surrounded by coral reefs, but with a volcanic island core, he had found coral material upraised above the level of the beach.

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Table 1 Darwin's theory of coral reefs, showing the relationship between places visited on the voyage, the ideas and the relevant documents

Date

Place

Component

Documents

Pre-April 1835

April 1835

13 November 1835

15-26 November 1835

December 1835 (possibly early January 1836)

5-17 February 1836

6-14 March 1836

1-12 April 1836

29 April 1836

29 April-9 May 1836

31 May 1837

1842

South America

Low Archipelago

Tahiti

On board HMS Beagle

Hobart Town King George Sound Cocos Islands

Mauritius Mauritius

Geological Society of London

London

Evidence for change in levels of land and sea accumulated

First glimmerings of coral island theory

First glimpse of atoll

Observations on barrier-reefs

First written draft of theory

Observations on sea level change

Only visit to atoll. Detailed observations on living corals

Satisfaction with theory expressed

Observations on fringing-reefs. Evidence of elevation

First formal presentation of theory Publication of full statement

Miscellaneous notes and letters

Entries in 'little notebooks'

Diary entry

Diary entries, Geological Notes

'Coral Islands', DAR 40.1-22

Geological Diary, DAR 38.1

Diary entries, Zoological Diary, DAR 31.2

Letter to Caroline, DAR 223

Entry in 'Little Notebook', Geological Diary, DAR 38.1

'On Certain Areas of Elevation and Subsidence . . .' Proceedings 2 (1838): 552-4

Geology of the Voyage of HMS Beagle, Part 1, The Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs

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Work along the coasts of Australia, especially Tasmania (which of course he visited after St Jago, the Galapagos and Tahiti, but before Cocos and Mauritius), further convinced him that there too changes in level were occurring. Not all of his suggestions were well founded - he does not seem to have grasped that the inlets of Sydney Harbour, the Derwent Estuary and King George's Sound were formed by a rise in sea level relative to the land, preferring to emphasize their emergence: along large parts of the coast of southern Australia, he felt, the sea had formerly 'stood higher'.

The theory of coral atolls, originally sketched out while aboard the Beagle, was put before the Geological Society of London on 31 May 1837 and published the following year.1 The ideas were much expanded in the Coral Reefs volume of the Geology of the Voyage of the Beagle. Thus in notebook, draft, letter and publication the development of the idea, in fits and starts, perhaps, and, by way of the occasional tangled diversion, the accumulation and development of ideas can be traced.

Another theme connected with the development of volcanic islands may be introduced at this point. On several islands - Ascension, Tahiti and Terceira amongst them - he noticed that trachytic lavas (relatively acid, containing quartz and feldspar minerals) and basaltic lava (more basic, and richer in 'mafic' - manganese and iron - minerals) occurred in relatively close juxtaposition to one another. Several times during his study of the volcanic geology of the islands he expressed the view that the older series of lavas were the trachytic, and the basaltic eruptions had come later. Partly during the voyage, and partly afterwards, he identified a mechanism that he thought might explain this. As a magma cooled, some crystals would separate out first and sink, leaving a fluid with a rather different chemical composition. On James Island, in the Galapagos, he felt he had seen rocks where this had occurred: 'In [the] higher central part the rock generally is much more compact with scarcely any crystals.'2 The trachytic fluid would be higher in the magma chamber as the result of this process - one that is now known as 'fractional crystallization' and so would be extruded first. He also noted, for example at King George's Sound, that granite country (granite being an acid rock, rich in quartz) was sometimes run through by greenstone (i.e. dolerite, more basic) dykes. Could the granite have been emplaced first and then the material of a different chemical composition but derived from the same original source have been emplaced later? he wondered. Different types of material might, therefore, over time be derived from the same 'ancestral' fluid.3 The isomorphism of this idea with the coral atoll theory and the later notion of evolution through natural selection will not have escaped the reader.

At times during his voyage we see traces of catastrophist ideas, as, for example, in the strange notion that the stone-runs of East Falkland were

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formed by earthquakes. Sometimes even creationist ideas emerge: for example, in his reference to St Helena as a 'centre of creation', and perhaps in some of his annotations on the antlion incident in New South Wales. But well before the end of the voyage, having had all three volumes of the Principles of Geology4 by his side for several years, he was a convinced Lyellian (although, as we have noted above on the crater-lip idea on the origin of atolls, he was not uncritical). LyelPs thrust was that the features of the earth's surface were best understood in terms of the cumulative effects of long-continued processes of gradual change and cyclicity, and again and again in Darwin's notes on his island visits we can see him recording the processes of coastal or stream erosion, or of deposition. The descriptions of erosion of deep ravines on Tahiti are particularly clear.

There were links between Darwin's various intellectual enterprises: his appreciation of the dialogue between an organism and its environment linked to his enthusiasm for the study of the habits and behaviour of animals (see below). It could be argued that his study of coral islands, volcanic islands and search for evidence of changes in sea level were but different aspects of a single theme. Part of Darwin's brilliance was his ability to see relationships between tiny fragments of information and slot them into some grand plan, 'bold theory', or use them in a search for a 'vera causa'. But he could also reuse and translocate material from one intellectual enterprise to another. In the final few paragraphs of his coral island presentation to the Geological Society, we see not only the degree to which he had assimilated much of Lyell's view of the world but the way in which he spun together a number of ideas, on coral and volcanic islands, on subsidence and uplift and on change in general. The paper was reported as follows:

Mr Darwin then pointed out the above areas [of subsidence and uplift] in the Pacific and Indian Oceans, and deduced the following principal results. (1) That linear spaces of great extent are undergoing movements of an astonishing uniformity, and that bands of elevation and subsidence alternate. (2) From an extended examination, that the points of eruption all fall on the areas of elevation. The author insisted on the importance of this law, as thus affording some means of speculating, wherever volcanic rocks occur, on the changes of level even during ancient geological periods. (3) That certain coral formations acting as monuments over subsided land, the geographical distribution of organic beings (as consequent on geological changes laid down by Mr Lyell) is elucidated by the discovery of former centres whence the germs could be disseminated. (4) That some degree of light might be thus thrown on the question, whether groups of living beings peculiar

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to small spots are the remnants of a former large population or a new one springing into existence. Lastly, when beholding more than one hemisphere, divided into symmetrical areas, which within a limited period of time have undergone known movements, we obtain some insight into the system by which the crust of the globe is modified during endless cycles of change.5

This represents Darwin's first public (and published) hint of his belief in evolution, dating as it does from about two and a half months after his 'conversion' in March 1837. There is no evidence that anyone took up the matter at the time.

Parts of the above would now be rejected. We now know that the structure of the ocean floor is very different from that of the continents. Yet in the idea of areas of uplift and areas of downward movement can we not perceive the precursors to the modern notion of 'island arcs'? Darwin drew attention to the alignment of chains of islands, earthquake zones and volcanoes, in the Azores and in the Pacific. Perhaps he was not so far from the truth after all.

Interestingly, from quite an early stage in his wanderings from island to island, we can see how Darwin noticed the low numbers of species of animals and plants found on remote islands: another idea associated with the evolutionary perspective. Of St Paul's he noted 'not a single plant, not even a lichen grows on the islet', and he listed a fly, a moth, a tick and some spiders as completing the terrestrial fauna. Of his meagre collection of plants from the Abrolhos, a few weeks later, he recorded: 'small though my collection is, I believe it contains nearly every species . . .' That he should remark on the biological poverty of the bleak Falklands should not be a surprise, but in Tahiti and on Cocos Darwin was not seduced by the lushness of the tropical vegetation; he compared the species diversity of Tahitian forests unfavourably with that of the forests of South America; of Cocos he further wrote: 'insects are very few in number'. The poverty of the vertebrate fauna of New Zealand made a particularly strong impression. This theme of islands as supporting a depauperate biota runs through much of his note-taking from the Beagle period. Ocean islands were a 'refuge for the destitute'; they had arisen out of the sea and all their tenants had arrived from elsewhere. Sometimes he speculated on the route: migrating birds and storms might constitute the link between South America and the Falklands; perhaps carriage by a bird of prey provided a mechanism for the occurrence of a species of mouse on a rocky islet in the Chonos group. Flotation as a mechanism was mentioned, and he had encountered insects at sea that had obviously travelled long distances, for example, in the cricket blown aboard

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the Beagle north-west of St Jago that must have come from the African coast, away to the east. Possibly Darwin did not see the full significance of these observations while aboard, and indeed he uses the phrase 'centre of creation' for St Helena. But following his adoption of an evolutionary outlook, these facts could be conveniently slotted in.

Later in life, Darwin, in correspondence with his friend Dr Joseph Hooker, agreed that the study of plant distributions would become a 'splendid' subject. And there were two chapters in the Origin of Species6 that had the title of 'Geographical Distributions'. He saw that the matter was vital to his species theory; geographical affinities sometimes provided evidence for patterns of common descent. He perceived the importance of endemism and uniqueness in isolated island environments. On the small scale, although he apparently never set foot on West Falkland there were others on the ship who did, and specimens of the Falkland fox or warrah (see Figure 9.13) were collected from both East and West Falkland. Darwin noted the differences in form and in fur colour between the two populations.

Indeed, after discussing facts such as these in the Origin of Species he went on:

All the foregoing remarks on the inhabitants of oceanic islands, -namely the scarcity of kinds - the richness in endemic forms in particular classes or sections of classes - the absence of certain whole orders, as of batrachians [frogs and toads] and of terrestrial mammals, notwithstanding the presence of aerial bats, the singular proportions of certain orders of plants seem to me to accord ... with the view of occasional means of transport having been largely efficient in the long course of time . . .

He continued a page later: 'The most striking and important fact for us in regard to the inhabitants of islands is their affinity to those of the nearest mainland without being actually the same species.'7 As we have seen, the notion of long-distance dispersal, linked as it is with the idea that like begets like, is intimately associated with that of evolution.

On a much larger scale Darwin was particularly impressed, especially perhaps in the dry eucalypt forests of New South Wales, by the individuality of the plants, mammals, birds and insects of the island continent. He seems to have noted how organisms with which he was familiar in Europe were represented by organisms that were in some ways superficially similar but really very different. He also noted the occurrence of similar organisms in Tierra del Fuego, Chiloe, Tasmania and New Zealand - now seen as part of the evidence for the former closer juxtaposition between South America and Australasia, and of a connection through the Gondwana supercontinent.

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Another idea that runs through much of Darwin's island writings and later became of importance is the idea of 'struggle' and competition. There was a struggle between land and sea on coral islands. Introduced species competed successfully with the native denizens of New Zealand and elsewhere. In Tierra del Fuego the idea is carried a little further and applied to a human population. Darwin noted that conflict sometimes seemed to be related to food supply: '[T]he cause of their warfare would appear to be the means of subsistence', he recorded. He noted, however, that the population seemed to remain stable. He found streamers of thousands of sea-slug eggs along Falklands beaches - 'a wonderful instance of fecundity' - yet the species was not common. On the same island both the introduced rabbit and wild horse numbers seemed to be held in some invisible check. All the ingredients were there: it only required the injection of Malthus's ideas of checks to population growth, following Darwin's reading of the Essay on Population after his return to England (in about September 1838), for the jigsaw to be put together into the theory of natural selection.

Running through much of the corpus of Darwin's writing from the Beagle days onwards is the idea of the existence of a dialogue between an organism and its environment. Reading William Paley's Natural Theology as an undergraduate had taught Darwin to look for the intricacy with which a plant or a creature was 'exquisitely' adapted to its surroundings and way of life; later he described how natural selection was the result of the pressure of the environment on a population. Whilst aboard the Beagle, Darwin often thought in terms of whole environments, complexes of nature, a much greater idea than that of a single organism 'locking in' to its home. Probably the best description of this from his island experiences is the description of the kelp-beds: the seaweeds, the invertebrates that lived upon them, the fish and the seabirds feeding upon the fish were seen as constituting an integrated whole. There are traces of the same ideas in some of his descriptions of coral-reef environments. Similarly, in Tierra del Fuego the Nothofagus (southern beech) trees, the fungus that habitually grew on them, the insects living on the fungi and the Fuegan people that also lived partly on the fungus were all components of an entity that had a certain unity. On a smaller scale he recorded the subtle links between dung-beetles and the vertebrate mammals that provided the dung (in St Helena, Tasmania, Chiloe), and that between the hermit-crab, its 'stolen' mollusc shell and the anemone atop it. Often, too, he compared and contrasted whole environments: the relatively species-poor forests of tropical islands compared less than favourably with those of the Brazil mainland and with the nearby coral reefs. The bleak, bare Falklands heathland contrasted both with the productiveness of nearby kelp-beds and the rich fauna that existed in the warm, shallow sea of millions of years earlier.

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Darwin's remarkably detailed observations of animal behaviour often fitted into this integrated, ecological framework. Again and again he described a bird, a mammal, a reptile or an insect (even, occasionally a fish) in terms of its food, its habitat and its mode of locomotion. The vocalizations of birds and other vertebrates were often documented in detail. The nests of termites, wild wasps and bees and birds were described, and sometimes collected. The antlion seen excavating its trap and capturing its prey on the sunny bank in New South Wales is compared with the description of a European relative. The appearance and structure of an organism, its behaviour, its food supplies, habits and habitat were seen as interrelated. It is true that Darwin's descriptions tend to be anthropomorphic: creatures are 'cunning', 'crafty', 'timid' or 'bold', but there is sometimes an attempt at analysis, as for example when he suggests that behaviour of a Falklands car-acara, as well as its appearance, suggests a relationship with hawks. Few had suggested that animal behaviour might be used as an aid to taxonomy in his day. He sometimes adopted an experimental approach, applying touch or light to organisms such as flatworms (planaria) and sea-anemones. The octopus at St Jago was placed on substrata of differing colour and even subjected to electric shocks. Psychology and ethology were at that time in their infancy and these approaches show an inventive mind. These insights were developed in articles in Mind, in later life, and in his Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals.

One of Darwin's entry points to evolutionary ideas was from the study of domestic animals and plants; just as over time artificial selection pressures could have an effect on a population in the farmyard or garden, so the pressures exerted by the natural environment could ultimately cause modification. The first chapter of the Origin of Species was entitled 'Variation under Domestication', and ten years later (1868) a full monograph with the title The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication drew a number of related ideas together. On Chiloe Darwin showed a special interest in the way in which apples were vegetatively propagated. He noted that 'not one in a hundred' of the apples from these trees possessed seeds: he hints at the connection between vegetative (i.e. non-sexual) reproduction and the absence of seeds here, without speculating to any extent on the consequences. He had several opportunities of seeing how when a domestic animal was turned out on a remote island it sometimes, as he put it, had 'retrograded' into an 'original form'. He noted the vast, aggressive wild bulls on East Falkland, 'like ancient sculptures', and the behaviour of feral horses on the same island. On a tiny islet in the Chonos Archipelago there were many wild goats, probably 'turned out a century since'. 'Their colour was pretty uniform', he continued in his diary,

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'being a dark reddish brown. Many had a white mark on the forehead & a few had one on the lower jaw. All appeared to have a singular outline of forehead.' Here was a small, isolated, island population that had inherited the characteristics of the founder population. In each case Darwin was just a short step from an expression of evolutionary ideas, but while aboard the Beagle he did not quite get there.

Perhaps a little surprising, in view of the reticence with which Darwin applied his evolutionary ideas to the human species in the years after the publication of the Origin of Species in 1859, is the fact that it was human 'races' that he came closest to discussing in terms of something very approximately akin to an evolutionary, or at any rate a hierarchical, model. It will be recalled that while in New Zealand he attempted to place the various island societies that he had encountered in relationship to one another on a ladder or 'scale': the Fuegians he 'fixed on as zero in the scale of government'. The Maoris, he felt 'would rank but a few degrees higher', while Tahiti, even as first discovered, 'would occupy a respectable position'. After he met the Australian Aborigines, he placed them on a low point on the ladder; the Cocos Malays, in some respects, he compared to the Tahitians. Some of the Indians he saw in Mauritius he thought were of 'noble' appearance. (It was taken as read that European civilization was at the top of the ladder.) On Chiloe Island he came up against the strange suggestion that the different races of men had different parasites, and that lice adapted to one race would not live well on another. He thus seems to have acknowledged that although the different groups or 'varieties' of humans had sprung 'from one stock' (the phrase he used) they had 'different species of parasites'. The implication was that all humans had a common origin (elsewhere he referred to them of being of the same family) but that there were important biological differences between them.

Sometimes, in his notes, Darwin depicts humans, as well as plants and animals, as adapted to their environment and way of life. In Tahiti he described the enomous appetites of his guides:

I never saw any man eat anything nearly so much in quantity. They did not, however, overeat... their activity was anything but impaired. I should suppose such capacious stomachs must in large part be the result of their diet consisting of fruits &C vegetables which do not contain in a given bulk much nutriment.8

Perhaps it was the result of medical training, but Darwin always saw human communities against the backdrop of their home and environment. The Malays of Cocos, Tahitians, Maori, Fuegians, Chilotan Indians and Australian Aborigines were sometimes seen almost as parts of an island's

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landscape. On Terceira and in Tasmania, on Mauritius and St Helena he displays an understanding of the dialogue that existed between human communities and their surroundings. A landscape might be underlain by rocks, clothed in vegetation, but many landscapes were cultural landscapes, and the result of human choices and manipulation. Geographically, as well as biologically, therefore humans were intimately linked to nature.

As all the world knows, Charles Darwin did not publish his evolutionary hypothesis following his acceptance of it, after discussion of some of his findings with the leading 'men of science' in London and Cambridge in the spring of 1837. Rough drafts were prepared in the 1840s (the 'Sketch' of 1842 and the 'Essay' of 1844).9 Later the 'Big Species Book' was compiled, but summarized in a 'digest' as the Origin of Species, following the news that Alfred Russel Wallace was experimenting with similar ideas in 1858. Whether this delay was due to the religious susceptibilities of his wife Emma (his cousin, whom he married in 1839) or his perceived need to accumulate overwhelming evidence, has been much discussed. The intervening years were spent on a study of barnacles, an impressive series of volumes on this little-studied group of organisms. The publication of these studies had the effect of firmly establishing his scientific credentials. We have seen that to a very real extent he was launched on this important venture by finding enormous barnacles along the coast of the Island of Chiloe. In yet another way an island incident later proved to be of considerable importance to his intellectual development.

Darwin was by no means always right. His missing of vital differences between the tortoise shells from the various Galapagos Islands, his overestimating the rate of submergence of atolls, his misunderstanding of the nature of rias (long narrow marine inlets) as drowned valleys were errors. Sometimes in these pages I have stressed the extent that he was ahead of his day in what he thought or wrote during or following a visit to a particular island; sometimes I have hinted at error. But I have deliberately avoided doing this excessively. Whether he was right on a particular matter is not of the utmost importance (scientific opinion continually changes, anyway). What is more significant is the way in which his recording of a particular incident or fact, or development of some facet of a theory, fitted into the development of his intellectual outlook as a whole. The Beagle voyage can be seen as an incomplete enterprise. Throughout it, as he moved from island to island, he was arranging his material around ideas that were to be important later. It was in the decades that followed his climbing into the stagecoach at Falmouth on the wet and windy night of 2 October 1836 that the pieces were tied together cohesively. Those 40 (or so) islands were

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constantly being compared during the voyage and subsequently, and new links being exposed. The various threads from the wealth of experience were through his whole life being woven into different fabrics.

The Galapagos Islands were important, but they were not all-important.

Notes

1. C. R. Darwin, 'On Certain Areas of Elevation and Subsidence in the Pacific and Indian Oceans, as Deduced from the Study of Coral Formations', Proceedings of the Geological Society of London, 2 (1838): 552-4.

2. DAR 37.2/770.

3. P. N. Pearson, 'Charles Darwin on the Origin and Diversity of Igneous Rocks', Earth Science History, 15.1 (1996): 49-67.

4. Volume 1 he had had with him from the start of the voyage (presented to him by FitzRoy), whereas the other volumes were forwarded to him in South America.

5. Presented at the meeting of31 May 1837. Proceedings of the Geological Society of London, 2 (1838): 552-4.

6. Origin of Species, Chapters 11 and 12.

7. Ibid., Chapter 12.

8. Diary, 18 November 1835, p. 352.

9. These manuscripts were republished in G. de Beer (ed.), Evolution through Natural Selection (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1958).

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Citation: John van Wyhe, ed. 2002-. The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online. (http://darwin-online.org.uk/)