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Updated: May 23, 2025
A part of Charles Darwin's duty to the British Government was to write a narrative of the voyage, and this account of his trip upon the Beagle is one of the great classics of travel in the English language. It won the confidence and respect of a wide circle of readers.
The new boat behaves handsomely, even excelling in speed the lost gig, the oars and sailing-gear of which, luckily saved, have fitted it out complete. Under canvas, with a fair wind, they easily make ten knots an hour; and as they have such a wind for the remainder of the day, are carried into the Beagle Channel without need of wetting an oar.
You have a perfect reliance upon the unseen, and there follows a calm, sweet solace, which you cannot express. No doubts enter, when you are confronted with the great spirit, which seems to preside over virgin nature. 'But my emotions on the "Beagle" were as a flood. Here I was sailing to a quarter of the world which the Creator, in His goodness, had provided for the support and happiness of men.
The volcano of Aconcagua is particularly magnificent. This huge and irregularly conical mass has an elevation greater than that of Chimborazo; for, from measurements made by the officers in the Beagle, its height is no less than 23,000 feet. The Cordillera, however, viewed from this point, owe the greater part of their beauty to the atmosphere through which they are seen.
Early on the morning of the 4th of September, 1839, the Beagle was once more slipping out of Port Essington before a light land wind. We had taken a hearty farewell of our friends at Victoria, in whose prosperity we felt all the interest that is due to those who pioneer the way for others in the formation of a new settlement.
Next evening we got into Albany, and on the morning of the 15th the Beagle was running out of King George's Sound. It was resolved that we should touch at South Australia, to secure a good meridian distance by short stages between Swan River and Sydney.
The "Beagle" sailed from Valparaiso to the south, for the purpose of surveying the southern part of Chile, the island of Chiloe, and the broken land called the Chonos Archipelago, as far south as the Peninsula of Tres Montes. On the 21st we anchored in the bay of S. Carlos, the capital of Chiloe. This island is about ninety miles long, with a breadth of rather less than thirty.
The Flinders, the Albert, the Adelaide, Victoria, and Fitzroy, all owe their names to the commander of the BEAGLE, and with her last cruise the maritime explorations of Australia may be said to close.
They readily attack wounded birds: a cormorant in this state having taken to the shore, was immediately seized on by several, and its death hastened by their blows. The Beagle was at the Falklands only during the summer, but the officers of the Adventure, who were there in the winter, mention many extraordinary instances of the boldness and rapacity of these birds.
At length one gives tongue. "What starts? Does Lord Eldon start?" "No, he don't," replies the owner. "Does Trick, by Catton?" "Yes, and Conolly rides but mind, three pounds over." "Does John Bull?" "No John's struck out." "Polly Hopkins does, so does Talleyrand, also O, Fy! out of Penitence; Beagle and Paradox also and perhaps Pickpocket."
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