From the Beagle’s first landfall at St Jago in the Cape Verde Islands, Darwin studied the rocks of the volcanic islands the ship visited: Fernando Noronha, Ascension, St Helena, the Galapagos, Tahiti and others. He describes lava flows, craters, raised beaches and the separation of trachyte and basalt, and reflects on how and where volcanic islands form.
The second of Darwin’s geological books from the voyage, showing the young naturalist reasoning as a field geologist. Download the free EPUB.