DANA AND DARWIN 



Museum of Yale University, and in other great museums 

 of natural history, may quicken the desire to hear the 

 words of a wise interpreter. 



Dana and Darwin 



The relations of Dana's researches to Darwin's are thus 

 indicated : 



" Our cruise led us partly along the course followed by 

 Mr. Charles Darwin during the years 1831 to 1836, in the 

 voyage of the Beagle, under Captain Fitzroy ; and, where 

 it diverged from his route, it took us over scenes, similar 

 to his, of coral and volcanic islands. Soon after reaching 

 Sydney, Australia, in 1839, a brief statement of Mr. Dar- 

 win's theory with respect to the origin of the atoll and 

 barrier forms of reefs was found in the papers. The para- 

 graph threw a flood of light over the subject, and called 

 forth feelings of peculiar satisfaction, and of gratefulness 

 to Mr. Darwin, which still come up afresh whenever the 

 subject of coral islands is mentioned. The Gambier 

 Islands, in the Paumotus, which gave him the key to the 

 theory, I had not seen ; but on reaching the Feejees, six 

 months later, in 1840, I found there similar facts on a still 

 grander scale and of more diversified character, so that I 

 was afterward enabled to speak of his theory as established 

 with more positiveness than he himself, in his philosophic 

 caution, had been ready to adopt. His work on Coral 

 Reefs appeared in 1842, when my report on the subject 

 was already in manuscript. It showed that the conclu- 

 sions on other points, which we had independently 

 reached, were for the most part the same. The principal 

 points of difference relate to the reason for the absence 

 of corals from some coasts, and the evidence therefrom as 

 to changes of level, and the distribution of the oceanic 

 regions of elevation and subsidence topics which a wide 

 range of travel over the Pacific brought directly and con- 

 stantly to my attention." 



Darwin's gratified reception of Dana's Geology of the 

 Expedition is thus mentioned in his memoirs, under the 

 date of December 4, 1849: 

 X 4 209 



