ALL are well-acquainted with Darwin, the naturalist and author of many books including The Origin of Species and The Descent of Man, which deal with theories relating to evolution of man from animal, governed by survival of the fittest. But only some may know how the initial research work was done by him to achieve what has been preserved in the pages of his assiduous works.
His is the singular example of a man who rose from initial failures to the towering height of success and glory. It will not be wrong to say that Darwin was a child of the revolution of thought that was going on for about one hundred years ago before him. At this time it was commonly believed that the world was only about 6,000 years old and that it was created by God about 4,000 B.C. and that even after the lapse of 6,000 years, it was still the same.
In mythical language it can be said that the world was the same as He had left it when He rested after six days of work. However, a contrary opinion was held by a very small group who believed that the world was much, much more than 6,000 years old and that the world and all the creatures on it had undergone many changes and the process continues. In short, the world was not simply a going concern but rather a growing concern. Instead of a once-for-all act of creation, as mythically believed, the theory of evolution had been in the air for some time even before Darwin. His own grandfather was one of its most ardent and persuasive advocate of evolution. But the majority of the people, not only the men of church but scientists as well, were against the idea until Darwin — the grandson, Charles Darwin — formulated the theory supported with evidence, which won general acceptance.
Charles Darwin was born in Shrewsbury, in the outskirts of London, in 1809, on the very day when the world also witnessed the birth of Abraham Lincoln. His father, Robert Darwin, was a wealthy physician and his grandfather, Erasnus Darwin, was a celebrated writer whose books on nature are often mistakenly attributed as a harbinger of the grandson’s views.
Charles lost his mother when he was ten and thus his father was his sole parent whom he respected more than he loved. His father, being a physician, wanted the son to take to medicine, in pursuit of which he was sent to Edinburgh. But the son had more inclination towards natural science. Moreover, anaesthetics had not been invented then and the sight of two operations performed on children without chloroform was more than Charles could bear. In this manner, his medical career was over as a failure and he was recalled from Edinburgh and a new career was planned for him.
The new career was a very surprising choice, which seems to indicate that the father had no respect for the son’s intelligence. For two generations, the Darwins had been unbelievers. In their philosophy, Christianity was for women and children. Yet, the father now proposed the son should enter the church and the son surprisingly raised no objection. He was packed off to Cambridge, which later on proved to be a vain pursuit. During his stay in Cambridge, Charles read with care a book written by a German traveller who, during five years of travel in South America, acquired knowledge in the sciences of Geology, Geography and Mineralogy.
The book stirred the imagination of the young Darwin who yearned for an opportunity to gain knowledge on natural science under similar conditions. As luck would have it, suddenly, out of the blue, the chance was offered to him to follow the path traversed by the German traveller.
The British Admiralty had, in 1820, launched a frigate, H.M.S. Beagle, designed for scientific exploration and in 1831, a five-year expedition programme was prepared for completing survey of the shores of Chile, Peru and some islands in the Pacific.
Charles, through the intervention of a wise uncle, could make his father agree to avail the chance, which meant the second choice of career had to be abandoned by Charles. Thus, in December 1831, Darwin, though sick, launched himself on the voyage of the Beagle, as he called it in his autobiography and later on wrote a book under this title. It was for him a glorious day, like giving eyes to a blind man. It was his zeal and excitement which bore him up through the hardships and exertions of the next five years. Until his theories of evolution process, men had been accustomed to explain everything in terms of Biblical creation, but not so after Charles returned from the voyage.
In the voyage, Charles started collecting minerals and fossils to add to his collection of plant and animal life. There are many stories from these days of expedition to illustrate his zeal. Tearing the bark off a decaying tree, he found three different beetles all together. When he had one beetle in each hand, the third seemed likely to escape; so he tried the expedient of putting one for safe keeping in his mouth, but it secreted such a pungent liquid that he almost lost it.
The Voyage of the Beagle was his first and the most readable book and it is the long record of his observations in various fields, fascinating for its intellectual enthusiasm and quietly narrated adventures. When he wandered in a Brazilian forest, he was extremely excited by the elegance of the grasses, the novelty of the parasitical plants, the beauty of the flowers, the glossy green of the foliage and above all, by the luxuriance of the vegetation. He was overawed by the most paradoxical mixture of sound and silence which pervaded in the shady parts of the wood — the noise of the insects was so loud that it may be heard even in the vessel he had left anchored several hundred feet away and yet within the recesses of the forest a universal silence reigned.
Along the coast of Brazil, having a length of about 2,000 miles, he came across solid rocks which indicated immense antiquity of the earth. In the forest, he encountered varieties of birds and frogs, specimen of which he collected for study. In Brazil, he examined a small invertebrate animal of the genus Planaria and kept detailed notes about it. During his five years’ voyage, he had found no fewer than twelve different species of terrestrial planariae in different places.
Once he experimented by cutting a little slug-like creature in half by a transverse section. In a fortnight, the two halves grew the missing parts and in the course of twenty-five days, each half became as perfect as the original one.
During his sojourn of coastal areas, Darwin came across effects of great drought which threw some light on the cases where a vast numbers of prehistoric animals of all kinds had been embedded. He made a note of the innumerable species of animals which have become extinct and that there was a close relationship between extinct species and the living sloths, anteaters and armadillos.
The specimens and other proofs collected during the five-year expedition in the voyage on the Beagle provided the subject for his books The Origin of Species and The Descent of Man.
The greatest contribution to geology has been provided by Darwin from the expedition of the Beagle. The frigate H.M.S. Beagle was completing its chronometrical expedition when it arrived at Cocos-Keeling on April 1, 1836. This was a coral island or atoll and the only one in which Darwin could land. He found that there are various kinds of coral reef, but an atoll is a circular ring of coral arising only a few feet above sea level, covered with a dense foliage of coconut trees and enclosing a lagoon whose green water contrasted strongly with the deep blue of the surrounding ocean — it was indeed a very picturesque sight.
The substance of the coral reefs is formed by the activity of which used to be called the coral insects. But according to Darwin, insect was a wrong term. They were rightly called zoophytes — invertebrate animals resembling plants, essentially same as the sea anemone. Darwin has given a detailed account of the coral reefs in his book titled The Structure and Distribution Of Coral Reefs. It is generally accepted by geologists as the most authentic and is in conformity with the naturalist’s theory of natural selection.
On his return from the five-year expedition voyage on board H.M.S. Beagle, he chose a wife, Emma Wedgwood, who was in fact his cousin. He married even though his health had started failing. During the expedition, he was bitten by an assortment of bugs, which resulted in protracted illness. He was now a shadow of what he was when he started the expedition. But his zeal was above his health.
This is the preamble of the legend called Darwin before he became a Darwinian. It was the assimilation of knowledge through study of species of animals and plants and rocks, too, which he acquired in the voyage which enabled him to leave records for posterity in the form of several books.
Charles Darwin died in April 1882. Although he wished to be buried in his beloved village, educated people’s sentiment demanded and was fulfilled by burying him in Westminster Abbey beside Sir Isaac Newton. Darwinism has not ended with Darwin. The process of biological evolution, in the words of the pioneer, continues. |
