In the years leading up to Charles Darwin's famous voyage on the Beagle, the ship and its captain Robert Fitzroy (1805–65) had participated in an expedition to the desolate southern coast of South America. Volume 1 of this three-volume work, published in 1839, describes that 1826–30 expedition, while Volumes 2 and 3 cover the second voyage. Compiled by Robert Fitzroy (1805–65), captain of the Beagle from 1828, Volume 1 is based on the journals of Phillip Parker King (1791–56), the expedition's commander, whose account of his earlier survey of Australia is also reissued. Tasked with surveying the coast from Montevideo to Cape Horn and north to Chilóe, and 'collecting and preserving specimens of … natural history', the expedition spent its first two field seasons around Tierra del Fuego, enduring hunger, scurvy and severe weather. It reached Chilóe in 1829, and returned to England a year later.
1. Departure from Monte Video; 2. Enter the Strait of Magalhaens (or Magellan); 3. Prepare the Beagle for surveying the Strait; 4. Eagle Bay - Gabriel Channel; 5. Loss of the Saxe Coburg sealer; 6. Patagonians; 7. Leave Rio de Janeiro; 8. Humming-birds, Fuegians, whales; 9. Winter setting in, scurvy; 10. Account of the Beagle's cruise; 11. Bad weather, perilous situation; 12. Adventure sails from Rio de Janeiro to the River Plata; 13. Beagle and Adelaide anchor in Possession Bay; 14. Frost and snow; 15. Extracts from the journals of Lieutenants Skyring and Graves; 16. Province and islands of Chilóe; 17. Beagle sails to sea coast of Tierra del Fuego; 18. Adelaide's last cruise; 19. Termination of the Andes, zoological remarks; 20. Beagle sails from San Carlos; 21. Cape Desolation; 22. Mr Murray discovers the Beagle Channel; 23. Glaciers, mountains, tides; 24. A few nautical remarks upon the passage round Cape Horn; Appendix; Index.
