10 



PREFACE 



I owe to the high talents and disinterested zeal of the above 

 distinguished authors, could not have been undertaken, had it not 

 been for the liberality of the Lords Commissioners of Her Maj- 

 esty's Treasury, who, through the representation of the Right 

 Honourable the Chancellor of the Exchequer, have been pleased 

 to grant a sum of one thousand pounds towards defraying part 

 of the expenses of publication. 



I have myself published separate volumes on the ' Structure 

 and Distribution of Coral Reefs;' on the 'Volcanic Islands 

 visited during the Voyage of the Beagle;' and on the 'Geology 

 of South America.' The sixth volume of the ' Geological Trans- 

 actions ' contains two papers of mine on the Erratic Boulders 

 and Volcanic Phenomena of South America. Messrs. Water- 

 house, Walker, Newman, and White, have published several able 

 papers on the Insects which were collected, and I trust that many 

 others will hereafter follow. The plants from the southern parts 

 of America will be given by Dr. J. Hooker, in his great work on 

 the Botany of the Southern Hemisphere. The Flora of the 

 Galapagos Archipelago is the subject of a separate memoir by 

 him, in the 'Linnean Transactions.' The Reverend Professor 

 Henslow has published a list of the plants collected by me at the 

 Keeling Islands; and the Reverend J. M. Berkeley has described 

 my cryptogamic plants. 



I shall have the pleasure of acknowledging the great assistance 

 which I have received from several other naturalists, in the 

 course of this and my other works ; but I must be here allowed 

 to return my most sincere thanks to the Reverend Professor 

 Henslow, who, when I was an undergraduate at Cambridge, was 

 one chief means of giving me a taste for Natural History, — 

 who, during my absence, took charge of the collections I sent 

 home, and by his correspondence directed my endeavours, — and 

 who, since my return, has constantly rendered me every assist- 

 ance which the kindest friend could offer. 



Down, Bromley, Kent, 

 June, 1845. 



