CHARLES DARWIN TO W.D. FOX. Lima, July, 1835.
My dear Fox,
I have lately received two of your letters, one dated June and the other November, 1834 (they reached me, however, in an inverted order). I was very glad to receive a history of this most important year in your life. Previously I had only heard the plain fact that you were married. You are a true Christian and return good for evil, to send two such letters to so bad a correspondent as I have been. God bless you for writing so kindly and affectionately; if it is a pleasure to have friends in England, it is doubly so to think and know that one is not forgotten because absent. This voyage is terribly long. I do so earnestly desire to return, yet I dare hardly look forward to the future, for I do not know what will become of me. Your situation is above envy: I do not venture even to frame such happy visions. To a person fit to take the office, the life of a clergyman is a type of all that is respectable and happy. You tempt me by talking of your fireside, whereas it is a sort of scene I never ought to think about. I saw the other day a vessel sail for England; it was quite dangerous to know how easily I might turn deserter. As for an English lady, I have almost forgotten what she is—something very angelic and good. As for the women in these countries, they wear caps and petticoats, and a very few have pretty faces, and then all is said. But if we are not wrecked on some unlucky reef, I will sit by that same fireside in Vale Cottage and tell some of the wonderful stories, which you seem to anticipate and, I presume, are not very ready to believe. Gracias a dios, the prospect of such times is rather shorter than formerly.
From this most wretched 'City of the Kings' we sail in a fortnight, from thence to Guayaquil, Galapagos, Marquesas, Society Islands, etc., etc. I look forward to the Galapagos with more interest than any other part of the voyage. They abound with active volcanoes, and, I should hope, contain Tertiary strata. I am glad to hear you have some thoughts of beginning Geology. I hope you will; there is so much larger a field for thought than in the other branches of Natural History. I am become a zealous disciple of Mr. Lyell's views, as known in his admirable book. Geologising in South America, I am tempted to carry parts to a greater extent even than he does. Geology is a capital science to begin, as it requires nothing but a little reading, thinking, and hammering. I have a considerable body of notes together; but it is a constant subject of perplexity to me, whether they are of sufficient value for all the time I have spent about them, or whether animals would not have been of more certain value.
I shall indeed be glad once again to see you and tell you how grateful I feel for your steady friendship. God bless you, my very dear Fox.
Believe me, Yours affectionately, CHAS. DARWIN.
CHARLES DARWIN TO J.S. HENSLOW. Sydney, January, 1836.
My dear Henslow,
This is the last opportunity of communicating with you before that joyful day when I shall reach Cambridge. I have very little to say: but I must write if it is only to express my joy that the last year is concluded, and that the present one, in which the "Beagle" will return, is gliding onwards. We have all been disappointed here in not finding even a single letter; we are, indeed, rather before our expected time, otherwise, I dare say, I should have seen your handwriting. I must feed upon the future, and it is beyond bounds delightful to feel the certainty that within eight months I shall be residing once again most quietly in Cambridge. Certainly, I never was intended for a traveller; my thoughts are always rambling over past or future scenes; I cannot enjoy the present happiness for anticipating the future, which is about as foolish as the dog who dropped the real bone for its shadow....
In our passage across the Pacific we only touched at Tahiti and New Zealand; at neither of these places or at sea had I much opportunity of working. Tahiti is a most charming spot. Everything which former navigators have written is true. 'A new Cytheraea has risen from the ocean.' Delicious scenery, climate, manners of the people are all in harmony. It is, moreover, admirable to behold what the missionaries both here and at New Zealand have effected. I firmly believe they are good men working for the sake of a good cause. I much suspect that those who have abused or sneered at the missionaries have generally been such as were not very anxious to find the natives moral and intelligent beings. During the remainder of our voyage we shall only visit places generally acknowledged as civilised, and nearly all under the British flag. These will be a poor field for Natural History, and without it I have lately discovered that the pleasure of seeing new places is as nothing. I must return to my old resource and think of the future, but that I may not become more prosy, I will say farewell till the day arrives, when I shall see my Master in Natural History, and can tell him how grateful I feel for his kindness and friendship.