[The year 2009 marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin and the 150th anniversary of the publication of “On The Origin of Species.” The University of Cincinnati is marking these anniversaries with a year-long celebration of Darwin’s life and work. This series on the life of Charles Darwin is part of the celebration.]
On June 10, 1834, the survey brig H.M.S. Beagle emerged from the mouth of the Cockburn Channel on the western end of the Strait of Magellan and entered the sparkling blue waters of the Pacific Ocean. For 25 year-old Charles Darwin, the ship’s naturalist, the “rounding of the horn” would be both a present and a future boon. Since joining the crew of the Beagle at the end of 1831, Darwin had dreamed of completing a circumnavigation. Three years of documenting the geology, fossil history, and biodiversity of South America made him eager to experience the flora and fauna of the Pacific islands and Australia. As history would ultimately show, Darwin’s upcoming visit to the Galapagos archipelago would be a turning point in his view of adaptation and the origin of species.Once in the Pacific, the Beagle sailed the west coast of Chile stopping at Valdivia, Concepción, and Valparaiso. While Darwin was wondering through the coastal forests near Valdivia, a large earthquake struck the Chilean coast. While Valdivia itself was only superficially damaged, Concepción, 200 miles further north, was almost completely destroyed. For Darwin, the effect of the earthquake was a geologic revelation. For more than a year, Darwin had been studying Charles Lyell’s recently published Principles of Geology. In this work, Lyell argued that everyday processes, operating over very long periods of time were sufficient to explain Earth’s geologic features. This view was contrary to the more widely held position that catastrophic events, like cataclysmic earthquakes and great floods, were responsible for the orientation and composition of rock strata. Surveying the damage around Concepción, Darwin found much evidence of small-scale geologic effects, but no evidence of substantial changes. Lyell was right.
Leaving Concepción, the Beagle made a brief stop at Lima, Peru and then proceeded westward across the Pacific toward the Galapagos archipelago, which it reached on September 15, 1835. Once ashore, Darwin was immediately struck by the desolate nature of the island’s landscape. The volcanic “soil” was shallow, dark, rough, and hot. Trees, where present, were scrawny, stunted and almost lifeless. Yet in this unforgiving environment, crabs, lizards, birds, and giant tortoises lived and sometimes thrived. Darwin, now an experienced naturalist, observed that many of the bird species, while unique to individual islands, were also quite similar to species found on the mainland. Colonists also claimed that they could tell which island a tortoise came from based solely on the shape of its shell. Darwin noted these local variations in appearance; but it wouldn’t be until he returned to England that he would recognize them as the product of descent (with modification) from a common ancestor.
Leaving the Galapagos behind on October 20, 1835, the Beagle made stops at Tahiti, Australia, and South Africa, as it slowly plied the seas back to England. Along the way Darwin recorded his impressions of coral colonies, a platypus, Maori tribesmen, and kangaroos. In Cape Town he dined with legendary astronomer Sir John Herschel, who, it turns out, was also an amateur geologist. From the Cape, the Beagle sailed steadily northward, stopping for supplies when necessary, but never staying too long in any port. On October 2, 1836, after almost five years of voyaging, Darwin finally returned to English soil. The journey had been at times lonely and difficult, but for Charles Darwin it was a voyage that would shape the rest of his life.
There are several outstanding biographies of Charles Darwin readily available to the public. The definitive biography is a two volume work by E. Janet Browne titled Charles Darwin: Voyaging and Charles Darwin: The Power of Place. Darwin: the Life of a Tormented Evolutionist by Adrian Desmond and James Moore is also highly regarded. For a shorter biography of Darwin try The Reluctant Mr. Darwin by David Quammen.