The Voyage of the Beagle - FULL
Audio Book - Part 1 of 2 - by
Charles Darwin
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Darwin was invited by FitzRoy to contribute the natural history section to the captain's account of the
Beagle's voyage, and using his field notes and the journal which he had been sending home for his family to read, completed this section by September
1837. FitzRoy had to edit the notes of the previous captain of the Beagle, as well as write his own account of the voyage and the previous expeditions of two ships. The account was completed and published in May 1838 as the Narrative of the Surveying Voyages of
His Majesty's Ships Adventure and Beagle in four volumes.
Volume one covers the first voyage under
Commander Phillip Parker King, volume two is FitzRoy's account of the second voyage.
Darwin's Journal and Remarks, 1832—1835 forms the third volume, and the fourth volume was a lengthy appendix. FitzRoy's account includes Remarks with reference to the
Deluge in which he recanted his earlier interest in the geological writings of
Charles Lyell and his remarks to Darwin during the expedition that sedimentary features they saw "could never have been effected by a forty days' flood", asserting his renewed commitment to a literal reading of the
Bible.[1] He had married on the ship's return, and his wife was very religious.[2]
Darwin's contribution proved remarkably popular and the publisher,
Henry Colburn of
London, took it upon himself to reissue Darwin's text in August with a new title page as
Journal of Researches into the
Geology and
Natural History of the various countries visited by
H.M.S. Beagle apparently without seeking Darwin's permission or paying him a fee.
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The book went through many editions, and was subsequently published under several different titles. The best known was the second edition of 1845 which incorporated extensive revisions made in the light of interpretation of the field collections and developing ideas on evolution. This edition was commissioned by the publisher
John Murray, who actually paid Darwin a fee
.
In the first edition, Darwin remarks in regard to the similarity of
Galápagos wildlife to that on the
South American continent, "The circumstance would be explained, according to the views of some authors, by saying that the creative power had acted according to the same law over a wide area". (This was written in a reference to Charles Lyell's ideas of "centres of creation".) Darwin notes the gradations in size of the beaks of species of finches, suspects that species "are confined to different islands", "But there is not space in this work, to enter into this curious subject."
Later editions hint at his new ideas on evolution:
Considering the small size of these islands, we feel the more astonished at the number of their aboriginal beings, and at their confined range
... within a period geologically recent the unbroken ocean was here spread out. Hence, both in space and time, we seem to be brought somewhat near to that great fact -- that mystery of mysteries -- the first appearance of new beings on this earth." Speaking of the finches with their gradations in size of beaks, he writes "one might really fancy that from an original paucity of birds in this archipelago, one species had been taken and modified for different ends."
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Audio is courtesy of Librivox and is in the public domain
- published: 22 Jan 2013
- views: 4408