d as
he listened to Jameson's Wernerian outpourings at Salisbury Crags, he
'determined never to attend to geology,' registering the terrible vow
'never as long as I lived to read a book on Geology, or in any way to
study the science[96].'

As it became evident that Charles Darwin would never make a doctor, his
father, after two years' trial, sent him to Cambridge with the object of
his qualifying for a clergyman. But at Christ's College, in that
University, he again took his own line--which was not that of
divinity--riding, shooting and beetle-hunting being his chief delights.
Nevertheless, at Cambridge as at Edinburgh, he seems to have shown an
appreciation for good and instructive society, and in Henslow, the
judicious and amiable Professor of Botany, the young fellow found such
sympathy and kindly help that he came to be distinguished as 'the man
who walks with Henslow[97].'

After achieving a 'pass degree,' Darwin went back to the University for
an extra term, and by the advice of Henslow began to 'think about' the
despised Science of Geology. He was introduced to that inspiring
teacher, Sedgwick, with whom he made a geological excursion into Wales;
but though he said he 'worked like a tiger' at geology, yet he, when he
got the chance of shooting on his uncle's estate, had to make the
confession, 'I should have thought myself mad to give up the first days
of partridge-shooting for geology or any other science[98].'

There is a sentence in one of the letters written at this time which
suggests that, even at this early period in his geological career,
Darwin had begun to experience some misgivings concerning the
catastrophic doctrines of his teachers and contemporaries. He says:--

'As yet I have only indulged in hypotheses, but they are such
powerful ones that I suppose, if they were put into action but
for one day, the world would come to an end[99].'

Was he not poking fun at other hypotheses besides his own?

Darwin's real scientific education began when, after some hesitation on
his father's part, he was allowed to accept the invitation, made to him
through his friend Henslow, to accompany, at his own expense, the
surveying ship _Beagle_ in a cruise to South America and afterwards
round the world. In the narrow quarters of the little 'ten-gun brig,'
he learned methodical habits and how best to economise space and time;
during his long expeditions on shore, rendered possible by the work of a
sur