438 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1909. 
was. It was only later that he learned that even then his going was 
not a certainty, for Captain Fitzroy, after seeing him, was in doubt as 
to whether he should accept him, for a reason not easy to guess—be- 
cause of the shape of his nose! Fitzroy was an enthusiastic disciple 
of Lavater, whose doctrine of physiognomy was then widespread. 
He believed that the shape of Darwin’s nose proclaimed a lack of 
energy, and he was doubtful about taking anyone deficient in that 
quality on such a journey. Happily, Darwin’s friends were able to 
reassure Fitzroy on this point, and he must often enough afterwards 
have had opportunity to convince himself of Darwin’s energy. 
Thus it was apparently by mere chance that Darwin got the oppor- 
tunity to develop actually into the great naturalist we now know that 
he must have been potentially. But I do not believe that this is a 
correct judgment. His inward impulse would certainly have forced 
a way after he had been led to perceive, through Humboldt and 
Herschel, what the way for him was to be. And even at that time 
no serious obstacle would be likely to stand in the path of a young 
Englishman of fortune who wished to explore foreign lands and seas. 
But undoubtedly this manner of traveling for five years through the 
seas and countries of different zones was particularly advantageous. 
And Darwin used his opportunities to the full. On board ship he 
studied the best books, especially Lyell’s “ Principles of Geology,” 
but he also collected certain kinds of natural objects, and investigated 
all that came in his way, keeping a detailed journal of everything 
that struck him as worthy of note in what he observed. Thus he 
became a well-informed and many-sided naturalist. But he valued 
much more highly than any other result of the voyage the habits of 
energetic industry and concentrated attention to whatever he had in 
hand that he then acquired. And thus he became the great naturalist 
for which nature had designed him. | 
Darwin published his journal later; it fills a closely printed volume 
of 500 pages. Like all his books, it is characterized by a simplicity 
and straightforwardness of expression; there is absolutely no striving 
after sensational effect, but an innate enthusiasm and truth pervades 
it, and I have always found it most enjoyable reading. Other people 
must have found it so, too, for by 1884 16,000 copies of the English 
edition had been sold. I can not here give even a brief account of 
the voyage of the Beagle; I can only say that its work lay chiefly on 
the southern coast line of America, and the journey included the east 
coast of Bahia to Tierra del Fuego, and the inhospitable Falkland 
Islands, and the western coast to Ecuador and Peru. 
This occupied several years, and thus the young explorer had a 
chance to make himself thoroughly acquainted with a great part of 
the South American continent, for while the ship lay at anchor 
taking soundings in some bay or other, Darwin ranged over the 
