h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Mother Nature Father Sky - A1075501
Author: Dr Montague Trout - U188966

Doing this for a bet.

How much?

Too much I suspect.

So what is the bet? To put it in PR?

How many BD? Yes, I read money in the kingdom of Bahrain. A bit less baffling than this one

this article reads like one of Paul Harvey's installments of THE REST OF THE STORY. He was always using devices like only using someone's first name. It's a good article and I'm glad it's in peer review so now if some subeditor questions why I had a link to it in my Article
on Tierra Del Fuego(Which is also in peer review) I can say I expected this article would also be edited
One thing you will note about Peer review, if you don't keep adding to these threads at least once a day they disappear into the background and no scout ever picks up on them.

An excellent piece of writing, but I'm afraid it is probably not explanatory enough to make an Edited Entry.I'm familiar with Fitzroy, the shame he felt and the fuss caused by Darwin's theory, but not everybody will be, so this entry will only mystify them.

I also suspect that some of this is fiction, invented to add to the dramatic tension.

What is the significance of the title?

Hmm, this has a bit of a fishy smell to it...

Very well written. I would allow it in the EG, with perhaps a more descriptive title, but otherwise, I suspect the UG would be happy to give it a home.

Sprout

Of course it smells fishy. He's a Trout, after all...

Pin *not wishing to comment further/accompanied by zipping noise*

Beautifully written.

Dr T, does the fact that you have put this in here for a bet mean that you are not going to reply to any of our comments and questions?

Sorry Gnomon ... I'll change the title. Any suggestions?

"Evolution of a Tragedy"

Odd really. He may have thought he'd once been stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea and now he's stuck between Biscay and Sole.

Interestingly, and by bizarre coincidence, two books on FitzRoy have just been released.

Evolution's Captain by Peter Nichols
Fitzroy by John and Mary Gribbin

A review of both in The Sunday Times (UK newspaper) states that "he got up early without waking his wife, kissed his daughter, locked himself in his dressing room, and cut his throat with a razor".

So now it's all changed. Topped Tailed and defictionalised.

Trout

I'll report you to the Royal Society for the Prevention of the Excessive Use of Commas! Look at this:

"Whether by luck, or by fate, or by omnipotent divination, FitzRoy was, by 1830, in command of HMS Beagle, a hydrographic survey vessel of the Royal Navy, after the ship's former skipper, Captain Pringle-Stockes, had shot himself out of loneliness."

This sort, of thing, amuses, you, does it?

I'm a commaholic.

It looks good.

You say 'the father of weather forecast'. That should be 'the father of the weather forecast' or 'the father of weather forecasting'.

There's at least one Fitzroy among the FitzRoys.

Might it be worth saying that at the time of the Darwin Beagle voyage, the Book of Genesis was coming under fire by people of learning?

There's a very nice chunk on this chappy in the new Bill Bryson "Short History of Neartly Everything" - he's obviously in vogue right now...

Bryson states that FR "chose Darwin in part because he liked the shape of Darwin's nose" and also because darwin was trained for the ministry (so many people today forget that Darwin was, to the very end of his life, an extremely godly man)

Back to Bryson: "He and Drawin were constantly engaged in quarrelsm some 'bordering on insanity' as Darwin later recalled...Even in his calmer moods, FitzRoy proved starngely unkowable. Darwin was astounded to learn upon the conclusion of teir voyage that almost at once FitzRoy married a young womn to whom he had long been betrothed. In five years in Darwin's company, he had not once hinted at an attachment or even mentioned her name"

Darwin named one of his discoveries - a dolphin - after FR: Delphinus fitzroyi

According to Robert MacFarlane writing in The Sunday Times, Darwin describes Fitzroy as "... the strongest marked character I have ever came across". He also thought that "... some part of [FitzRoy's] brain wants mending".

My feeling is that FitzRoy was a man of principle and did indeed hold Darwin in high esteem. Conversely, I get the feeling that Darwin may have been something of a chameleon, faking his friendship to get his way.

Trout

PS - the dolphin yes, that definitely needs to go in. I think FitzRoy may have reciprocated naming a hill or something geographical for Darwin.