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whom I am going to tell you presently, is one of the best 

 seers that ever lived, partly because he had learned so well 

 what to look for, and partly because nothing escaped his 

 eyes. Before he himself travelled, he read a great many 

 books of travel, and he seemed to remember at the right 

 time just what it was useful for him to remember. But 

 before that, he had trained himself, with the aid of the mi- 

 croscope, to observe little things; and people have not yet 

 got over their astonishment at learning how many important 

 things he thus saw which they had never seen, or had seen 

 without thinking them of any consequence. And now all 

 the world looks at things differently from what it used to 

 before he showed it how. How he saw things you will 

 partly see by reading the following pages, taken from his 

 account of the voyage of the Beagle. 



Charles Darwin (whose full name is Charles Robert Dar- 

 win) was born at Shrewsbury, a famous town in Shropshire, 

 England, February 12, 1809. His father was Dr. Robert 

 Waring Darwin ; his grandfather Dr. Erasmus Darwin, also 

 a distinguished naturalist. His mother's father was Josiah 

 Wedgwood, the celebrated manufacturer of pottery, some 

 of which goes by his name. Mr. Darwin was educated, first 

 at Shrewsbury, then at the University of Edinburgh, and 

 finally at Christ's College, Cambridge. The end of his 

 schooling was in 1831. Then Captain Fitzroy invited him 

 to join the Beagle as naturalist, and he sailed from Devon- 

 port, England, December 27, 1831, not to return till October 



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