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
assistance which the kindest friend could offer.
DOWN, BROMLEY, KENT, June 9, 1845
[1] I must take this opportunity of returning my sincere thanks to Mr.
Bynoe, the surgeon of the Beagle, for his very kind attention to me
when I was ill at Valparaiso.
THE VOYAGE OF THE BEAGLE
CHAPTER I
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 Confervae
and Infusoria--Causes of discoloured Sea.
AFTER having been twice driven back by heavy southwestern gales, Her
Majesty's ship Beagle, a ten-gun brig, under the command of Captain
Fitz Roy, R. N., sailed from Devonport on the 27th of December, 1831.
The object of the expedition was to complete the survey of Patagonia
3