James
Island Is Only Ten Miles From The Nearest Part Of Albemarle
Island, But The Two Points Where The Collections Were Made
Are Thirty-Two Miles Apart.
I must repeat, that neither the
nature of the soil, nor height of the land, nor the climate,
nor the general character of the associated beings, and
therefore their action one on another, can differ much in the
different islands.
If there be any sensible difference in their
climates, it must be between the Windward group (namely,
Charles and Chatham Islands), and that to leeward; but
there seems to be no corresponding difference in the productions
of these two halves of the archipelago.
The only light which I can throw on this remarkable difference
in the inhabitants of the different islands, is, that
very strong currents of the sea running in a westerly and
W.N.W. direction must separate, as far as transportal by the
sea is concerned, the southern islands from the northern
ones; and between these northern islands a strong N.W. current
was observed, which must effectually separate James
and Albemarle Islands. As the archipelago is free to a
most remarkable degree from gales of wind, neither the
birds, insects, nor lighter seeds, would be blown from island
to island. And lastly, the profound depth of the ocean between
the islands, and their apparently recent (in a geological
sense) volcanic origin, render it highly unlikely that they
were ever united; and this, probably, is a far more important
consideration than any other, with respect to the geographical
distribution of their inhabitants. Reviewing the facts
here given, one is astonished at the amount of creative force,
if such an expression may be used, displayed on these small,
barren, and rocky islands; and still more so, at its diverse
yet analogous action on points so near each other. I have
said that the Galapagos Archipelago might be called a satellite
attached to America, but it should rather be called a
group of satellites, physically similar, organically distinct,
yet intimately related to each other, and all related in a
marked, though much lesser degree, to the great American
continent.
I will conclude my description of the natural history of
these islands, by giving an account of the extreme tameness
of the birds.
This disposition is common to all the terrestrial species;
namely, to the mocking-thrushes, the finches, wrens, tyrant-
flycatchers, the dove, and carrion-buzzard. All of them are
often approached sufficiently near to be killed with a switch,
and sometimes, as I myself tried, with a cap or hat. A gun
is here almost superfluous; for with the muzzle I pushed a
hawk off the branch of a tree. One day, whilst lying down,
a mocking-thrush alighted on the edge of a pitcher, made of
the shell of a tortoise, which I held in my hand, and began
very quietly to sip the water; it allowed me to lift it from
the ground whilst seated on the vessel: I often tried, and
very nearly succeeded, in catching these birds by their legs.
Formerly the birds appear to have been even tamer than at
present. Cowley (in the year 1684) says that the "Turtledoves
were so tame, that they would often alight on our hats
and arms, so as that we could take them alive, they not fearing
man, until such time as some of our company did fire at
them, whereby they were rendered more shy." Dampier
also, in the same year, says that a man in a morning's walk
might kill six or seven dozen of these doves. At present,
although certainly very tame, they do not alight on people's
arms, nor do they suffer themselves to be killed in such large
numbers. It is surprising that they have not become wilder;
for these islands during the last hundred and fifty years have
been frequently visited by bucaniers and whalers; and the
sailors, wandering through the wood in search of tortoises,
always take cruel delight in knocking down the little birds.
These birds, although now still more persecuted, do not
readily become wild. In Charles Island, which had then
been colonized about six years, I saw a boy sitting by a well
with a switch in his hand, with which he killed the doves
and finches as they came to drink. He had already procured
a little heap of them for his dinner, and he said that he had
constantly been in the habit of waiting by this well for the
same purpose. It would appear that the birds of this
archipelago, not having as yet learnt that man is a more
dangerous animal than the tortoise or the Amblyrhynchus,
disregard him, in the same manner as in England shy birds, such
as magpies, disregard the cows and horses grazing in our fields.
The Falkland Islands offer a second instance of birds
with a similar disposition. The extraordinary tameness of
the little Opetiorhynchus has been remarked by Pernety,
Lesson, and other voyagers. It is not, however, peculiar to
that bird: the Polyborus, snipe, upland and lowland goose,
thrush, bunting, and even some true hawks, are all more or
less tame. As the birds are so tame there, where foxes,
hawks, and owls occur, we may infer that the absence of all
rapacious animals at the Galapagos, is not the cause of their
tameness here. The upland geese at the Falklands show, by
the precaution they take in building on the islets, that they
are aware of their danger from the foxes; but they are not
by this rendered wild towards man. This tameness of the
birds, especially of the water-fowl, is strongly contrasted with
the habits of the same species in Tierra del Fuego, where for
ages past they have been persecuted by the wild inhabitants.
In the Falklands, the sportsman may sometimes kill more
of the upland geese in one day than he can carry home;
whereas in Tierra del Fuego it is nearly as difficult to kill
one, as it is in England to shoot the common wild goose.
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