Second Officer Wickham was entrusted to see that the ship was in good order, and so thorough was he that he once said to Darwin, who was constantly casting his net for specimens, "If I were the skipper, I'd soon have you and your beastly belittlement out of this ship with all your devilish, damned mess." And Darwin, much amused, wrote this down in his journal, and added, "Wickham is a most capital fellow." The discipline and system of ship-life, the necessity of working in a small space, and of improving the calm weather, and seizing every moment when on shore, all tended to work in Darwin's nature exactly the habit that was needed to make him the greatest naturalist of his age.
Every sort of life that lived in the sea was new and wonderful to him. Very early on this trip Darwin began to work on the "Cirripedia" (barnacles), and we hear of Captain Fitz-Roy obligingly hailing homeward-bound ships, and putting out a small boat, rowing alongside, asking politely, to the astonishment of the party hailed, "Would you oblige us with a few barnacles off the bottom of your ship?" All this that the Volunteer, who was dubbed the "Flycatcher," might have something upon which to work.
When on shore a sailor was detailed by Captain Fitz-Roy just to attend the "Flycatcher," with a bag to carry the specimens, geological, botanical and zoological, and a cabin-boy was set apart to write notes. This boy, who afterward became Governor of Queens and a K.C.B., used in after years to boast a bit, and rightfully, of his share in producing "The Origin of Species." When urged to smoke, Darwin replied, "I am not making any new necessities for myself."
When the weather was rough the "Flycatcher" was sick, much to the delight of Wickham; but if the ship was becalmed, Darwin came out and gloried in the sunshine, and in his work of dissecting, labeling, and writing memoranda and data. The sailors might curse the weather—he did not. Thus passed the days. At each stop many specimens were secured, and these were to be sorted and sifted out at leisure.
On shore the Captain had his work to do, and it was only after a year that Darwin accidentally discovered that the sailor who was sent to carry his specimens was always armed with knife and revolver, and his orders were not so much to carry what Wickham called, "the damned plunder," as to see that no harm befell the "Flycatcher."
Fitz-Roy's interest in the scientific work was only general: longitude and latitude, his twenty-four chronometers, his maps and constant soundings, with minute records, kept his time occupied.
For Darwin and his specimens, however, he had a constantly growing respect, and when the long five-year trip was ended, Darwin realized that the gruff and grim Captain was indeed his friend. Captain Fitz-Roy had trouble with everybody on board in turn, thus proving his impartiality; but when parting was nigh, tears came to his eyes as he embraced Darwin, and said, with prophetic yet broken words, "The 'Beagle's' voyage may be remembered more through you than me—I hope it will be so!" And Darwin, too moved for speech, said nothing except through the pressure of his hand.
he idea of evolution took a firm hold upon the mind of Darwin, in an instant, one day while on board the "Beagle." From that very hour the thought of the mutability of species was the one controlling impulse of his life.
On his return from the trip around the world he found himself in possession of an immense mass of specimens and much data bearing directly upon the point that creation is still going on.