Ch. II.] VOYAGE. 27 



soon as the news spread, which it did quickly, as the captain 

 sont for the first lieutenant to assuage his anger by abusing me, 

 I was doeply gratified by receiving an invitation from all the 

 gun-room officers to mess with them. But after a few hours 

 Uoy showed liis usual magnanimity by sending an officer 

 to me with an apology and a request that I would continue to 

 live with him. 



His character was in several respects one of the most noble 

 which I have over known. 



The voyage of the Beagle has been by far the most important 

 event in my life, and has determined my whole career ; yet it 

 depended on so 6mall a circumstance as my uncle offering to 

 drive me thirty miles to Shrewsbury, which few uncles would 

 have done, and on such a trifle as the shape of my nose. I 

 have always felt that I owe to the voyage the first real training 

 or education of my mind ; I was led to attend closely to 

 several branches of natural history, and thus my powers of 

 observation were improved, though they were always fairly 

 deveh 



The investigation of the geology of all the places visited was 

 far nioro important, as reasoning here comes into play. On 

 first examining a now district, nothing can appear more hope- 

 less than the chaos of rocks ; but by recording the stratification 

 and naturo of the rocks and fossils at many points, always 

 reasoning and predicting what will be found elsewhere, light 

 soon begins to dawn on the district, and tho structuro of the 

 wholo becomes more or less intelligible. I had brought with 

 me the first volume of Lycll's Principles of Geology, which I 

 studied attentively ; and the book was of the highest service to 

 me in many ways. The very first place which I examined, 

 namely, St. Jago, in the Cape de Verde islands, showed me 

 rly the wonderful superiority of Lyell's manner of treating 

 geology, compared with that of any other author whose works 

 1 had with me or ever afterwards read. 



Another of my occupations was collecting animals of all 

 classes, briefly describing and roughly dissecting many of the 

 marine ones ; but from not being able to draw, and from not 

 having sufficient anatomical knowledge, a great pile of MS. 

 which I made during the voyage has proved almost useless, 

 I thus lost much time, with the exception of that spent in 

 acquiring some knowledge of the Crustaceans, as this was of 

 service when in after years I undertook a monograph of the 

 Cirripe.lia. 



Daring some part of the day I wrote my Journal, and took 

 much pains in describing carefully and vividly all that I had 



