It is now late in the evening, and to-night I am going to sleep on board. On Monday we most certainly sail, so you may guess what a desperate state of confusion we are all in. If you were to hear the various exclamations of the officers, you would suppose we had scarcely had a week's notice. I am just in the same way taken all ABACK, and in such a bustle I hardly know what to do. The number of things to be done is infinite. I look forward even to sea-sickness with something like satisfaction, anything must be better than this state of anxiety. I am very much obliged for your last kind and affectionate letter. I always like advice from you, and no one whom I have the luck to know is more capable of giving it than yourself. Recollect, when you write, that I am a sort of protege of yours, and that it is your bounden duty to lecture me. I will now give you my direction; it is at first, Rio; but if you will send me a letter on the first Tuesday (when the packet sails) in February, directed to Monte Video, it will give me very great pleasure; I shall so much enjoy hearing a little Cambridge news. Poor dear old Alma Mater! I am a very worthy son in as far as affection goes. I have little more to write about...I cannot end this without telling you how cordially I feel grateful for the kindness you have shown me during my Cambridge life. Much of the pleasure and utility which I may have derived from it is owing to you. I long for the time when we shall again meet, and till then believe me, my dear Henslow, Your affectionate and obliged friend, CH. DARWIN. Remember me most kindly to those who take any interest in me. CHAPTER 1.VI. -- THE VOYAGE. "There is a natural good-humoured energy in his letters just like himself."--From a letter of Dr. R.W. Darwin's to Prof. Henslow. [The object of the "Beagle" voyage is briefly described in my father's 'Journal of Researches,' page 1, as being "to complete the Survey of Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego, commenced under Captain King in 1826 to 1830; to survey the shores of Chile, Peru, and some island in the Pacific; and to carry a chain of chronometrical measurements round the world."]