The Enchanted Islands: The Galapagos Discovered

For most of us today, the enchantment of the Galapagos lies not in the rather forbidding scenery that Darwin and Melville described so vividly, but in their truly fascinating wildlife. No less fascinating, but much less familiar, is the history of their original discovery, and the accounts of them given by their early visitors, as set out by John Hickman in this highly readable book which covers its history from prior to the Spaniards (supported by Thor Heyerdahl's discovery of Chimu pottery), through its use by smugglers and whalers. After 1832, the govemment of Ecuador assumed nominal responsibility for the administration of the Galpagos, though it was some time before any close control was exercised.In Darwin's footsteps came a series of scientific expeditions led among others by Rollo Beck, William Beebe, Victor Wolfgang von Hagen and David Lack. In 1959, the Charles Darwin Foundation for the Galapagos Islands was formally constituted under Belgian law, and in 1964 the Research Station on Santa Cruz Island was opened. A few years later the Galapagos National Park Service came into operation. The whole story with its ups and downs, its successes and failures, is told in a masterful manner by John Hickman combining historical detail with human interest to great effect.