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.

by Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin was twenty-two when he sailed as naturalist aboard HMS Beagle in 1831, and this journal of the nearly five-year voyage, first published in 1839, made his name long before the theory of evolution did. He records the geology of the South American coasts, the bones of giant extinct mammals in Patagonia, the gauchos of the pampas, the people of Tierra del Fuego, an earthquake in Chile, the crossing of the Andes, the Galápagos Islands with their distinct birds and tortoises, and the coral reefs of the Pacific and Indian Oceans. It is a scientific travel book, alert, observant and often lyrical, in which the questions behind his later work can already be heard. The full text is available to read online in your browser on Vinteuil, and the first chapter is free.