198 THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE 



held that the contemporary state of the earth's crust 

 was owing to a series of catastrophes, stupendous 

 exhibitions of natural force to which recent history 

 offered no parallel. Also enlightened as to the sig- 

 nificance of organic remains in stratified rock, Lyell 

 in 1830 felt the need of further knowledge in refer- 

 ence to the relation of the plants and animals rep- 

 resented in the fossils to the fauna and flora now 

 existing. 



It is to Lyell's disciple, Charles Darwin, however, 

 that we turn for our main illustration of the value 

 of travel for comprehensive scientific generalization. 

 Born, like another great liberator, on February 12, 

 1809, Darwin was only twenty-two years old when 

 he received appointment as naturalist on H.M.S. 

 Beagle, about to sail from Devonport on a voyage 

 around the world. The main purpose of the expedi- 

 tion, under command of the youthful Captain Fitz- 

 roy, three or four years older than Darwin, was to 

 make a survey of certain coasts in South America 

 and the Pacific Islands, and to carry a line of chron- 

 ometrical measurements about the globe. Looking 

 back in 1876 on this memorable expedition, the 

 naturalist wrote, "The voyage of the Beagle has 

 been by far the most important event in my life, 

 and has determined my whole career." In spite of 

 the years he had spent at school and college he re- 

 garded this experience as the first real training or 

 education of his mind. 



Darwin had studied medicine at Edinburgh, but 

 found surgery distasteful. He moved to Cambridge, 

 with the idea of becoming a clergyman of the Estab- 

 lished Church. As a boy he had attended with his 



