126 HISTORY OF BOTANY 



to read a book on geology or in any way to study the 

 science so long as he lived." This, remember, was the 

 decision of the future author of the Structure and Distribu- 

 tion of Coral Reefs and of the Geological Observations on 

 Volcanic Islands. 



Finding himself not likely to become a successful 

 medical man, Darwin exchanged Edinburgh for Cambridge, 

 where he entered Christ's College with the view of reading 

 for holy orders, but he had no better words to say for 

 Cambridge than he had for Modern Athens. " During 

 the three years which I spent at Cambridge," he says, 

 " my time was wasted, as far as academic studies were 

 concerned, as completely as at Edinburgh and as at 

 school." If he passed the door of the geology lecture 

 room with a cold shudder, he found his way into the 

 botanical one and there he made the acquaintance of 

 Henslow, " a man of rare character and singularly ex- 

 tensive acquirement in all branches of natural history." 

 The acquaintance grew into friendship which lasted till 

 Henslow's death in 1861. Henslow overcame Darwin's 

 prejudice against geology and succeeded in introducing 

 him to Sedgwick, at that time professor of geology at 

 Cambridge, and Darwin had to forswear his vow never 

 to study the science, for he not only accompanied the 

 professor on his geological excursions but set himself to 

 master Lyell's Principles of Geology, a work to which in 

 after years he professed himself as fundamentally indebted. 



Henslow is, however, responsible for more than 

 merely turning Darwin's thoughts to botany and geology ; 

 he showed himself possessed of a far-seeing vision that 

 was the means of dedicating to science the man who was 

 destined to become perhaps the greatest of her priests. 

 For it was due to Henslow that Darwin, when scarcely 

 out of his teens, was appointed naturalist on the Beagle 

 for a five years' surveying voyage round the world. "So," 

 again to quote Huxley, " a fourth educational experiment 

 was to be tried ; this time Nature took him in hand 



