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"The Voyage of the Beagle" by Charles Darwin

book review by Riley Burnham 4/23/2023

extremely solid stuff 👍👍👍

i liked this one a lot; was wild(!)

easier-to-read than OTOOS [more of a story than an explanation/lecture], Darwin takes us [via his journals, etc.] onto the Beagle, which sails around much of the world; describing the terrain, hydrography, botany, zoology, etc. [he's a naturalist by profession it seems], collecting survey data for his benefactor [& a noble pursuit for the species, he asserts -- that being the attainment of knowledge]

i'd really really recommend reading [audiobook: good!] this book, as it intimately describes, as a snapshot w/ great detail, a then changing from 'savage' to 'civilized' world

the end has an essay by Captain FitzRoy, which is simultaneously interesting & wild [pushes belief, really]

of note: FitzRoy mentions the "globe" to be 8,000 miles in diameter... & notes we'd then only penetrated 1-2 miles in; then he [different than Darwin] goes on & on about dinosaurs... his bit feels like a detraction/distraction -- also my audiobook, unabridged, notes an edit removes 5 pages from the OG manuscript...

i'm inspired to read more works by Royal Navy/explorer folks; learning about trade & whatnot