On this day, the sun glowing on the morning beach made us feel good. It reminded us of Charles Darwin, who arrived late at night on the Beagle in the Bay of Valparaiso. In the morning he awakened and looked ashore and he felt so well that he wrote, “When morning came everything appeared delightful. After Tierra del Fuego, the climate felt quite delicious, the atmosphere so dry and the heavens so clear and blue with the sun shining brightly, that all nature seemed sparkling with life.”58 Darwin was not saying how it was with Valparaiso, but rather how it was with him. Being a naturalist, he
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“On this day, the sun glowing on the morning beach made us feel good. It reminded us of Charles Darwin, who arrived late at night on the Beagle in the Bay of Valparaiso. In the morning he awakened and looked ashore and he felt so well that he wrote, “When morning came everything appeared delightful. After Tierra del Fuego, the climate felt quite delicious, the atmosphere so dry and the heavens so clear and blue with the sun shining brightly, that all nature seemed sparkling with life.” 58 Darwin was not saying how it was with Valparaiso, but rather how it was with him. Being a naturalist, he said, “All nature seemed sparkling with life,” but actually it was he who was sparkling. He felt so very fine that he can, in these charged though general adjectives, translate his ecstasy over a hundred years to us. And we can feel how he stretched his muscles in the morning air and perhaps took off his hat—we hope a bowler—and tossed it and caught it.”
Reference
Steinbeck, John (1951). “The Log from the Sea of Cortez” (Penguin Classics). Kindle Edition. Chapter 19 MARCH 29, p. 158 of 289, 59%.
