The Naturalist on the River Amazons is a record of adventures, habits of animals, sketches of Brazilian and Indian life and aspect of nature under the Equator, during the author's eleven years of travel, in two volumes, this is the first.

The Naturalist on the River Amazons is a record of adventures, habits of animals, sketches of Brazilian and Indian life and aspect of nature under the Equator, during the author's eleven years of travel, in two volumes this is the second.

Beautifully presented facsimile reproductions of the drawings and notes of pioneering entomologist Henry Walter Bates documenting his 11-year-long travels in the Amazon in the mid-1850s. This charming book showcases the two journals produced by entomologist Henry Walter Bates during his groundbreaking travels and discoveries in the Amazon from 1848 to 1859, on which his classic work The Naturalist on the River Amazon, was based. It includes facsimile reproductions of stunning illustrated pages taken from his Amazon journals, as well as an essay describing his travels. The journals reveal how a self-taught naturalist and butterfly enthusiast had a profound impact on the science of evolution. Bates, a trusted companion of Alfred Russel Wallace, traveled with him to the Amazon in 1848. There he became fascinated by close similarities in appearance between unrelated butterflies, and discovered a scientific phenomenon we now refer to as Batesian mimicry: species that are highly desirable to predators began evolving to look more like other, more toxic species in order to avoid predation. Bates spent a total of 11 years in the Amazon; when he returned to England, he had collected, by his own estimate, some 14,000 species of insects, of which no less than 8,000 were previously unknown. This beautiful book offers valuable new insight into the scientific implications and findings of Henry Walter Bates's rich and fruitful time in the Amazon, and it is the ideal book for anyone interested in science, scientific history, and science illustrations.

This is Volume II of the Himalayan Journals or the notes of a naturalist travelling in Bengal, The Sikkim and Nepal Himalayas, the Khasia Mountains.

First published in 2003. Sir Joseph Hooker (1817-1911) was one of the greatest British botanists and explorers of the nineteenth century. He succeeded his father as Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and was a close friend and supporter of Charles Darwin. His journey to the Himalayas and India was undertaken between 1847 and 1851 to collect plants for Kew, and his account, published in 1854, was dedicated to Darwin. Hooker collected some 7,000 species in India and Nepal, and carried out surveys and made maps which proved of economic and military importance to the British. He makes many observations about the inhabitants of the areas he visited, making this volume a useful resource for anyone interested in nineteenth-century India.

There have always been more or less scientific travellers, but a new epoch began with the voyages of Captain James Cook. His first, on board the converted Whitby Collier HMS Endeavour, was the result of cooperation between the Admiralty and the Royal Society. This series only skims the surface of the rich collections of scientific travel books in the library of the Natural History Museum. From this volume we learn much about the voyage of the first fleet, the first desperate years of the colony in Sydney, and the exploration of its neighbourhood.

First Published in 2003. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.