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A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World
The Voyage of the Beagle
By Charles Darwin, M.A., F.R.S.

Journal of Researches into the Natural History and Geology of the countries visited during the voyage round the world of H.M.S. Beagle under the command of Captain Fitz Roy, R.N.

With illustrations by R. T. Pritchett of places visited and objects described.

First Edition May 1860 Second Edition May 1870 Third Edition February 1872 Fourth Edition July 1874 Fifth Edition March 1876 Sixth Edition January 1879 Seventh Edition May 1882 Eighth Edition February 1884 Ninth Edition August 1886 Tenth Edition January 1888 Eleventh Edition January 1890 Reprinted June 1913

TO CHARLES LYELL, ESQ., F.R.S.
This second edition is dedicated with grateful pleasure,
as an acknowledgment that the chief part of whatever scientific
merit this journal and the other works of the author may possess,
has been derived from studying the well-known and admirable
PRINCIPLES OF GEOLOGY.

Text and illustrations derived from the John Murray edition of 1913 titled
A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World

Table of Contents

• INDEX
• PREFATORY NOTICE TO THE ILLUSTRATED EDITION.
• AUTHOR'S PREFACE.

1. ST. JAGO—CAPE DE VERD ISLANDS

   Porto Praya — Ribeira Grande — Atmospheric Dust with Infusoria — Habits of a Sea-slug and Cuttle-fish — St. Paul's Rocks, non-volcanic — Singular Incrustations — Insects the first Colonists of Islands — Fernando Noronha — Bahia — Burnished Rocks — Habits of a Diodon — Pelagic Confervæ and Infusoria — Causes of discoloured Sea.

2. RIO DE JANEIRO.

   Rio de Janeiro — Excursion north of Cape Frio — Great Evaporation — Slavery — Botofogo Bay — Terrestrial Planariae — Clouds on the Corcovado — Heavy Rain — Musical Frogs — Phosphorescent insects — Elater, springing powers of — Blue Haze — Noise made by a Butterfly — Entomology — Ants — Wasp killing a Spider — Parasitical Spider — Artifices of an Epeira — Gregarious Spider — Spider with an unsymmetrical web.

3. MALDONADO

   Monte Video — Maldonado — Excursion to R. Polanco — Lazo and Bolas — Partridges — Absence of trees — Deer — Capybara, or River Hog — Tucutuco — Molothrus, cuckoo-like habits — Tyrant-flycatcher — Mocking-bird — Carrion Hawks — Tubes formed by lightning — House struck.

4. RIO NEGRO TO BAHIA BLANCA.

   Rio Negro — Estancias attacked by the Indians — Salt-Lakes — Flamingoes — R. Negro to R. Colorado — Sacred Tree — Patagonian Hare — Indian Families — General Rosas — Proceed to Bahia Blanca — Sand Dunes — Negro Lieutenant — Bahia Blanca — Saline incrustations — Punta Alta — Zorillo.

5. BAHIA BLANCA.

   Bahia Blanca — Geology — Numerous gigantic extinct Quadrupeds — Recent Extinction — Longevity of Species — Large Animals do not require a luxuriant vegetation — Southern Africa — Siberian Fossils — Two Species of Ostrich — Habits of Oven-bird — Armadilloes — Venomous Snake, Toad, Lizard — Hybernation of Animals — Habits of Sea-Pen — Indian Wars and Massacres — Arrowhead — Antiquarian Relic.

6. BAHIA BLANCA TO BUENOS AYRES.

   Set out for Buenos Ayres — Rio Sauce — Sierra Ventana — Third Posta — Driving Horses — Bolas — Partridges and Foxes — Features of the country — Long-legged Plover — Teru-tero — Hail-storm — Natural enclosures in the Sierra Tapalguen — Flesh of Puma — Meat Diet — Guardia del Monte — Effects of cattle on the Vegetation — Cardoon — Buenos Ayres — Corral where cattle are slaughtered.

7. BUENOS AYRES TO ST. FÉ.

   Excursion to St. Fé — Thistle Beds — Habits of the Bizcacha — Little Owl — Saline streams — Level plains — Mastodon — St. Fé — Change in landscape — Geology — Tooth of extinct Horse — Relation of the Fossil and recent Quadrupeds of North and South America — Effects of a great drought — Parana — Habits of the Jaguar — Scissor-beak — Kingfisher, Parrot, and Scissor-tail — Revolution — Buenos Ayres — State of Government.

8. BANDA ORIENTAL AND PATAGONIA.

   Excursion to Colonia del Sacramiento — Value of an Estancia — Cattle, how counted — Singular breed of Oxen — Perforated pebbles — Shepherd-dogs — Horses broken-in, Gauchos riding — Character of Inhabitants — Rio Plata — Flocks of Butterflies — Aeronaut Spiders — Phosphorescence of the Sea — Port Desire — Guanaco — Port St. Julian — Geology of Patagonia — Fossil gigantic Animal — Types of Organisation constant — Change in the Zoology of America — Causes of Extinction.

9. SANTA CRUZ, PATAGONIA, AND THE FALKLAND ISLANDS.

   Santa Cruz — Expedition up the River — Indians — Immense streams of basaltic lava — Fragments not transported by the river — Excavation of the valley — Condor, habits of — Cordillera — Erratic boulders of great size — Indian relics — Return to the ship — Falkland Islands — Wild horses, cattle, rabbits — Wolf-like fox — Fire made of bones — Manner of hunting wild cattle — Geology — Streams of stones — Scenes of violence — Penguin — Geese — Eggs of Doris — Compound animals.

10. TIERRA DEL FUEGO.

    Tierra del Fuego, first arrival — Good Success Bay — An account of the Fuegians on board — Interview with the savages — Scenery of the forests — Cape Horn — Wigwam Cove — Miserable condition of the savages — Famines — Cannibals — Matricide — Religious feelings — Great Gale — Beagle Channel — Ponsonby Sound — Build wigwams and settle the Fuegians — Bifurcation of the Beagle Channel — Glaciers — Return to the Ship — Second visit in the Ship to the Settlement — Equality of condition amongst the natives.

11. STRAIT OF MAGELLAN.—CLIMATE OF THE SOUTHERN COASTS.

    Strait of Magellan — Port Famine — Ascent of Mount Tarn — Forests — Edible fungus — Zoology — Great Seaweed — Leave Tierra del Fuego — Climate — Fruit-trees and productions of the southern coasts — Height of snow-line on the Cordillera — Descent of glaciers to the sea — Icebergs formed — Transportal of boulders — Climate and productions of the Antarctic Islands — Preservation of frozen carcasses — Recapitulation.

12. CENTRAL CHILE

    Valparaiso — Excursion to the foot of the Andes — Structure of the land — Ascend the Bell of Quillota — Shattered masses of greenstone — Immense valleys — Mines — State of miners — Santiago — Hot-baths of Cauquenes — Gold-mines — Grinding-mills — Perforated stones — Habits of the Puma — El Turco and Tapacolo — Humming-birds.

13. CHILOE AND CHONOS ISLANDS

    Chiloe — General aspect — Boat excursion — Native Indians — Castro — Tame fox — Ascend San Pedro — Chonos Archipelago — Peninsula of Tres Montes — Granitic range — Boat-wrecked sailors — Low's Harbour — Wild potato — Formation of peat — Myopotamus, otter and mice — Cheucau and Barking-bird — Opetiorhynchus — Singular character of ornithology — Petrels.

14. CHILOE AND CONCEPCION: GREAT EARTHQUAKE

    San Carlos, Chiloe — Osorno in eruption, contemporaneously with Aconcagua and Coseguina — Ride to Cucao — Impenetrable forests — Valdivia — Indians — Earthquake — Concepcion — Great earthquake — Rocks fissured — Appearance of the former towns — The sea black and boiling — Direction of the vibrations — Stones twisted round — Great Wave — Permanent Elevation of the land — Area of volcanic phenomena — The connection between the elevatory and eruptive forces — Cause of earthquakes — Slow elevation of mountain-chains.

15. PASSAGE OF THE CORDILLERA

    Valparaiso — Portillo Pass — Sagacity of mules — Mountain-torrents — Mines, how discovered — Proofs of the gradual elevation of the Cordillera — Effect of snow on rocks — Geological structure of the two main ranges, their distinct origin and upheaval — Great subsidence — Red snow — Winds — Pinnacles of snow — Dry and clear atmosphere — Electricity — Pampas — Zoology of the opposite sides of the Andes — Locusts — Great Bugs — Mendoza — Uspallata Pass — Silicified trees buried as they grew — Incas Bridge — Badness of the passes exaggerated — Cumbre — Casuchas — Valparaiso.

16. NORTHERN CHILE AND PERU.

    Coast-road to Coquimbo — Great loads carried by the miners — Coquimbo — Earthquake — Step-formed terraces — Absence of recent deposits — Contemporaneousness of the Tertiary formations — Excursion up the valley — Road to Guasco — Deserts — Valley of Copiapó — Rain and Earthquakes — Hydrophobia — The Despoblado — Indian ruins — Probable change of climate — River-bed arched by an earthquake — Cold gales of wind — Noises from a hill — Iquique — Salt alluvium — Nitrate of soda — Lima — Unhealthy country — Ruins of Callao, overthrown by an earthquake — Recent subsidence — Elevated shells on San Lorenzo, their decomposition — Plain with embedded shells and fragments of pottery — Antiquity of the Indian Race.

17. GALAPAGOS ARCHIPELAGO

    Galapagos Archipelago — The whole group volcanic — Number of craters — Leafless bushes — Colony at Charles Island — James Island — Salt-lake in crater — Natural history of the group — Ornithology, curious finches — Reptiles — Great tortoises, habits of — Marine lizard, feeds on seaweed — Terrestrial lizard, burrowing habits, herbivorous — Importance of reptiles in the Archipelago — Fish, shells, insects — Botany — American type of organisation — Differences in the species or races on different islands — Tameness of the birds — Fear of man an acquired instinct.

18. TAHITI AND NEW ZEALAND

    Pass through the Low Archipelago — Tahiti — Aspect — Vegetation on the mountains — View of Eimeo — Excursion into the interior — Profound ravines — Succession of waterfalls — Number of wild useful plants — Temperance of the inhabitants — Their moral state — Parliament convened — New Zealand — Bay of Islands — Hippahs — Excursion to Waimate — Missionary establishment — English weeds now run wild — Waiomio — Funeral of a New Zealand woman — Sail for Australia.

19. AUSTRALIA

    Sydney — Excursion to Bathurst — Aspect of the woods — Party of natives — Gradual extinction of the aborigines — Infection generated by associated men in health — Blue Mountains — View of the grand gulf-like valleys — Their origin and formation — Bathurst, general civility of the lower orders — State of Society — Van Diemen's Land — Hobart Town — Aborigines all banished — Mount Wellington — King George's Sound — Cheerless aspect of the country — Bald Head, calcareous casts of branches of trees — Party of natives — Leave Australia.

20. KEELING ISLAND:—CORAL FORMATIONS

    Keeling Island — Singular appearance — Scanty Flora — Transport of seeds — Birds and insects — Ebbing and flowing springs — Fields of dead coral — Stones transported in the roots of trees — Great crab — Stinging corals — Coral-eating fish — Coral formations — Lagoon islands or atolls — Depth at which reef-building corals can live — Vast areas interspersed with low coral islands — Subsidence of their foundations — Barrier-reefs — Fringing-reefs — Conversion of fringing-reefs into barrier-reefs, and into atolls — Evidence of changes in level — Breaches in barrier-reefs — Maldiva atolls, their peculiar structure — Dead and submerged reefs — Areas of subsidence and elevation — Distribution of volcanoes — Subsidence slow and vast in amount.

21. MAURITIUS TO ENGLAND

    Mauritius, beautiful appearance of — Great crateriform ring of mountains — Hindoos — St. Helena — History of the changes in the vegetation — Cause of the extinction of land-shells — Ascension — Variation in the imported rats — Volcanic bombs — Beds of infusoria — Bahia, Brazil — Splendour of tropical scenery — Pernambuco — Singular reefs — Slavery — Return to England — Retrospect on our voyage.

• INDEX

List of Illustrations

• H.M.S. Beagle in Straits of Magellan. Mt. Sarmiento in the distance.
• H.M.S. Beagle under full sail, view from astern.
• H.M.S. Beagle: Middle section fore and aft, upper deck, 1832.
• Fernando Noronha.
• Incrustation of shelly sand.
• Diodon Maculatus (Distended and Contracted).
• Pelagic Confervæ.
• Catamaran (Bahia).
• Botofogo Bay, Rio Janeiro.
• Vampire Bat (Desmodus D'Orbigny).
• Virgin Forest.
• Cabbage Palm.
• Mandioca or Cassava.
• Rio Janeiro.
• Darwin's Papilio Feronia, 1833, now called Ageronia feronia, 1889.
• Hydrochærus capybara or Water-hog.
• Recado or Surcingle of Gaucho.
• Halt at a Pulperia on the Pampas.
• El Carmen, or Patagones, Rio Negro.
• Brazilian whips.
• Brazilian hobbles and spurs.
• Bringing in a prisoner.
• Irregular troops.
• Skinning uji or water serpents.
• Rhea Darwinii (Avestruz Petise).
• Landing at Buenos Ayres.
• Maté pots and bambillio.
• Giant thistle of pampas.
• Cynara Cardunculus or Cardoon.
• Evening camp, Buenos Ayres.
• Rozario.
• Parana River.
• Toxodon Platensis. (Found at Saladillo.)
• Fossil tooth of horse. (From Bahia Blanca.)
• Mylodon.
• Head of Scissor-beak.
• Rhynchops Nigra, or Scissor-beak.
• Buenos Ayres bullock-waggons.
• Fuegians and wigwams.
• Opuntia Darwinii.
• Raised beaches, Patagonia.
• Ladies' combs, banda oriental.
• Condor (Sarcorhamphus gryphus).
• Basaltic Glen, Santa Cruz.
• Berkeley Sound, Falkland Islands.
• York Minster (Bearing S. 66° east.)
• Cape Horn.
• Cape Horn (another view).
• Bad weather, Magellan Straits.
• Fuegian basket and bone weapons.
• False Horn, Cape Horn.
• Wollaston Island, Tierra del Fuego.
• Patagonians from Cape Gregory.
• Port Famine, Magellan.
• Patagonian Bolas.
• Patagonian Spurs and Pipe.
• Cyttaria Darwinii.
• Eyre Sound.
• Glacier in Gulf of Penas.
• Flora of Magellan.
• Macrocystis Pyrifera, or Magellan Kelp.
• Trochilus Forficatus.
• Hacienda, condor, cactus, etc.
• Chilian miner.
• Cactus (Cereus Peruviana).
• Cordilleras from Santiago de Chile.
• Chilian spurs, stirrup, etc.
• Old Church, Castro, Chiloe.
• Inside Chonos Archipelago.
• Gunnera Scabra, Chiloe.
• Antuco Volcano, near Talcahuano.
• Panoramic view of coast, Chiloe.
• Inside Island of Chiloe. San Carlos.
• Hide Bridge, Santiago de Chile.
• Chilenos.
• South American bit.
• Bridge of the Incas, Uspallata Pass.
• Lima and San Lorenzo.
• Coquimbo, Chile.
• Huacas, Peruvian pottery.
• Testudo Abingdonii, Galapagos Islands.
• Galapagos Archipelago.
• Finches from Galapagos Archipelago.
• Amblyrhynchus Cristatus.
• Opuntia Galapageia.
• Ava or Kava (Macropiper methysticum), Tahiti.
• Eimeo and Barrier-Reef.
• Fatahua Fall, Tahiti.
• Tahitian.
• Hippah, New Zealand.
• Sydney, 1835.
• Hobart Town and Mount Wellington.
• Australian group of weapons and throwing sticks.
• Inside an atoll, Keeling Island.
• Whitsunday Island.
• Barrier-reef, Bolabola.
• Sections of barrier-reefs.
• Section of coral-reef.
• Section of coral-reef.
• Bolabola Island.
• Corals.
• Birgos Latro, Keeling Island.
• St. Louis, Mauritius.
• St. Helena.
• Cellular formation of volcanic bomb.
• Cicada Homoptera.
• Homeward bound.
• Ascension. Terns and noddies.