Charles Darwin Charles Darwin
On December 27, 1831, Charles Darwin set sail from Devenport, England aboard HMS (His Magesty's Ship) Beagle. During that time Darwin studied the plants, animals, landforms, and fossils of the many countries and islands he visited during the five-year voyage. He dissected animals and plants, kept a journal, sent fossils and specimens back to England, and wrote letters to friends and colleagues describing his observations.
DARWIN, CHARLES ROBERT was born into a welathy family at Shrewsbury on the 12th of February 1809. He was the younger of the two sons and the fourth child of Dr Robert Waring Darwin, son of Dr Erasmus Darwin. His mother, a daughter of Josiah Wedgwood (1730—1795), died when Charles Darwin was eight’ years old. He was an average student who loved to hunt and collect plants and animals. He spent two years in medical school at Edinburgh but he did not enjot the experience of seeing and hearing his first operation. He then trained as a clergyman at Cambridge University for three years. He was mostly bored by his studies but while at college he became friends with some of the most respected scientists of the time.
Through a college contact he accepted an unpaid post as naturalist aboard the HMS Beagle which sailed around the world for 5 years from 1831 to 1836. Darwin took along Lyell's just published Principles of Geology which challenged belief that the earth was created only 6,000 years ago. He was impressed by Lyell's idea that the rocks on Earth were millions of years old. He gradually began to think that if the characteristics of plants and animals could change over time then the Earth itself could change the way it also looked.
Darwin got off the ship wherever possible and he collected specimens and took notes on virtually every fossil and living organism he encountered. These observations sowed the seeds of his theory of evolution. Darwin was amazed by the variety of organisms he encountered during his voyage. Everywhere he looked, he saw new and oddly shaped trees, exotically colored flowers and birds, and beetles and other insects. Darwin quickly realized that the diversity of living organisms was only part of the mystery of life.
VOYAGE
OF THE BEAGLE
Darwin writes in his journal:
December 27, 1831, Devenport, England #1
Heavy winds blew our ship back to port two
times. Under the command Captain Fitz Roy the Beagle
finally set sil on December 27, 1831. The object of the
expedition was to complete the survey of Patagonia and Tierra del
Fuego, commenced under Captain King in 1826 to 1830 -- to survey
the shores of Chile, Peru, and of some islands in the Pacific --
and to carry a chain of chronometrical measurements round the
World.
January 16, 1832 Porto Praya #2
Porto Praya is a desolate place. Volcanic fires of past ages and
the scorching heat have made the soil unfit for
vegetation. A single green leaf is hard to find, but
flocks of sheep and cows survive there. It rains very seldom but
when it does it rains in torrents, and immediately small plants
grow out of every crack and crevice.
July 5th, 1832, Rio de
Janerio, Brazil #3
One dark night we were surrounded by numerous seals and penguins,
which made strange noises. On a second night we witnessed a
splendid scene of natural fireworks; the mast-head and
yard-arm-ends shone with St. Elmo's light; and the form of the
vane could almost be traced as if it had been rubbed with
phosphorus.
July 24, 1833, Maldonado,
Uruguay #4
About fifty years ago, under the old Spanish government, a small
colony was\par established here; and it is still the most
southern position (lat. 41°) on this eastern coast America,
inhabited by civilized people.
August 24, 1833, Buenos
Aires, Argentina #5
I discovered fossil armadillos, giant ground sloths, peculiar
horses, and creatures that reminded me of the hippopotamus. They look like their modern relatives except
that they were a lot larger. The bones were found
embedded on the beach, within the space of about 200 yards
square. I saw so many fossils that I am convinced that
there are more extinct species than living species. I
also realize that living species have ancestors
January 9, 1834, Port St.
Julian, Argentina #6
The whole southern part of the continent, a distance of 1200
miles had been uplifted. Here I observed beds of fossil ocean
organisms (sea shells) thousands of feet above sea level.
December 17, 1834, Tierra
del Fuego, Argentina #7
A group of Fuegians partly concealed by trees, were perched on a
wild point overhanging the sea; and as we passed by, they sprang
up and waving their tattered cloaks sent forth a loud and
sonorous shout. The savages followed the ship, and just before
dark we saw their fire, and again heard their wild cry.
January 15, 1835, Bay of
S.Carlos, Chile #8
On the night of the 19th the volcano of Orsono was in
action. Large masses of molten lava could be seen being
cast out of the crater.
February 20, 1835 Valdivia,
Chile #9
I was on shore and lying down when an earthquake came on suddenly
and lasted two minutes. It lifted beds of marine
mussels twenty feet above the high water mark.
March 4, 1835, Concepci'on,
Chile #10
The mayor of the Concepci'on told me the terrible news of the
great earthquake of the 20th: -- "That not a house in
Concepcion or Talcahuano (the port) was standing; that seventy
villages were destroyed; and that a great wave had almost washed
away the ruins of Talcahuano."
September 15, 1835, Galapagos Islands, Ecuador #11
The Galapagos Islands are a cluster of 18 rugged volcanic
islands. We explored the islands for five weeks and we
landed on six of the islands. The climate was far from
being excessively hot, due to the low temperature of the
surrounding water, brought by the great southern Polar
current. These islands are inhabited by large numbers
of bizzare and often beautiful plant and animal
species. Of the 26 species of land birds, 23 are found
nowhere else in the world. Of the 436 species of plants, 223 are
found nowhere else.
I have observed species of birds, lizards, and tortoises and have
found that the different species are only found on certain
islands. I think that an ancestral stock had migrated to
the islands where they underwent profound changes under the
different conditions of the individual islands. Apparently a
single ancestral group could give rise to several different
varieties or species.
Finches
I observed finches that were probably descended from one type of
ancestor and then, due to isolation and through chance, different
climates and natural forces such as food availability and type,
they evolved into thirteen different types of finches identified
by the different beak shapes and sizes. Some of the finches were
found in the treetops and others lived in the lower shrubs of a
neighboring islans. Some finchs had heavy, short beaks
used for pecking trees, while others had small, thin beaks used
for capturing insects.
During a drought season when no new seeds were produced for an
island's finches to eat, the finches were forced to hunt for
remaining seeds on the ground. Soon all the visible seeds had
been devoured. It so happened that those with slightly
thicker bills than average could turn over stones a little bit
better than the rest to find the remaining seeds and so they
managed to survive the famine. The others perished. When
the drought ended and the birds again had young, this new
generation had slightly thicker bills. Survival of the
fittest.
Lizards
The rocks on the coast abounded with great black lizards, between
three and four feet long; and on the hills, an ugly
yellowish-brown species was equally common. We saw many of this
latter kind, some clumsily running out of the way, and others
shuffling into their burrows.
Tortoises
I observed several types of land tortoises on the
islands. Tortoises with short necks were living in
damp areas with lots of plant life that grew short to the ground.
Longer-necked tortoises were living in dry areas with
cacti. I wonder whether the length of their necks made it
possible for the tortoises to live in different environments.
November 15, 1835, Tahiti
Island, French Polynesia #12
The luxuriant vegetation of the lower part could not yet be seen,
and as the clouds rolled past, the wildest and most precipitous
mountain peaks showed themselves towards the centre of the
island. As soon as we anchored we were surrounded by canoes.
January 12, 1836, Sydney,
Australia #13
Having entered the harbor, it appears fine and spacious, with
cliff-formed shores of horizontally stratified sandstone. The
nearly level country is covered with thin scrubby trees.
Proceeding further inland, the country improves: beautiful
villas and nice cottages are here and there scattered along the
beach. In the distance stone houses, two and three stories
high, and windmills standing on the edge of a bank, pointed out
to us the neighborhood of the capital of Australia. I
saw the ostrich, rhea, emu, and wonder why these large flightless
birds are found only in Australia. Organisms on one
continent are different from those on another continent.
April 1, 1836 Cocos
Islands #14
We arrived in view of the Keeling or Cocos Islands, situated in
the Indian Ocean, and about six hundred miles distant from the
coast of Sumatra. This is one of the lagoon-islands of coral
formation, similar to those in the Low Archipelago which we
passed near.
May 19, 1836, Port Louis,
Mauritius #15
This island, the forbidding aspect of which has been so often
described, rises abruptly like a huge black castle from the
ocean. Near the town, as if to complete nature's defence, small
forts and guns fill up every gap in the rugged rocks. The town
runs up a flat and narrow valley; the houses look respectable,
and are interspersed with a very few green trees.
July 19, 1836,
Ascension #16
On the 19th of July we reached Ascension. Those who have beheld a
volcanic island, situated under an arid climate, will at once be
able to picture to themselves the appearance of Ascencion. They
will imagine smooth conical hills of a bright red colour, with
their summits generally truncated, rising separately out of a
level surface of black rugged lava. A principal mound in the
center of the island, seems the father of the lesser cones. It is
called Green Hill its name being taken from the faintest tinge of
that color, which at this time of the year is barely perceptible
from the anchorage. To complete the desolate scene, the black
rocks on the coast are lashed by a wild and turbulent sea.
October 2, 1836, Falmouth,
England #17
On the 2nd of October we made the shore, of England; and at
Falmouth I left the Beagle, having lived on board the good little
vessel nearly five years.
BACK HOME
On Darwin's return to England in 1836 he was convinced of the
idea that all organisms, including humans, are modified
descendents of previously existing forms of
life. Darwin thoughts developed in two
stages: the realization that organisms are not fixed and
unchangeable and to provide an explanation of the process of
evolutionary change.
In 1838 Darwin read "An essay on the principle of population, as it affects the future improvement of society" by a mathematician named Malthus. Malthus claimed that sometime in the future human population growth would exceed resources and there would be intense competition causing war, misery and famine. From this Darwin concluded that competition exists among all living things and a "struggle for existence" might be the means by which well adapted individuals survive and the ill adjusted are eliminated.
Darwin married his cousin Emma Wedgwood in 1839 and continued to study and publish on a variety of scientific subjects achieving a great reputation as a naturalist and traveller.
His eight years grueling work on barnacles, published 1851-4 established Darwin's
reputation as an authority on taxonomy as well as geology and the
distribution of flora and fauna as in his earlier works.
Darwin spent the next 20 years formulating his theory while also
working on a number of other scientific
projects. Darwin became interested in the
domestication of plants and animals and how breeders artificially
select different varieties of dogs, horses, fowl and crop and
ornamental plants from one species.
In
1858, while Darwin was working on his manuscript outlining his
theory of evolution, he received a manuscript for review by a
young English naturalist named Wallace. The title
was "On the tendencies of varieties to depart
indefinitely from the original type". To Darwin's surprise
Wallace had independently come up with the same theory of natural
selection! Wallace was a naturalist working mostly in
the Malay Archipelago. He had also read Essay on the
principle of population by Malthus and it came into his mind
during a malarial fever. He wrote..."suddenly there
flashed upon me the idea of survival of the fittest"
Darwin wanted to let Wallace publish first but Lyell convinced him that they should jointly present their work. Papers by both Darwin and Wallace were read before the Linnaean Society of London on July 1, 1858. Lyell urged Darwin to publish his full theory of evolution as soon as possible. "On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life" was published and sold out on Nov. 24, 1859. The complete text of Darwin's "Origin of Species" is available on the web here.
Both Darwin and Wallace share credit for the theory of natural selection, however there is much more to the theory of evolution than this. Over more than 20 years Darwin amassed massive amounts of meticulously documented evidence to support his theory of "descent with modification" which can be summarized as follows:
In his final book published the year before his death, The formation of vegetable mould through the action of worms (1881) Darwin again made an important contribution which, as was characteristic of Darwin, revealed the amazing complexity and importance of a natural process of gradual accumulation, which no one seemed to have grasped before, and that had all along been under our feet.
Charles Darwin was a mild, kind,
pleasant man, unassuming and sincerely modest. He suffered from
an unexplained illness much of his adult life (perhaps picked up
during the Beagle voyage). He nevertheless remained driven and
ambitious to explore nature and examine it candidly and to remain
part of the elite scientific world he respected and admired.
Darwin died in 1882 and he is buried in Westminster Abbey.