Charles Lyell

Buckland taught him. He visited Cuvier and Humboldt in Paris, wrote excitedly to Mantell about Lamarck’s ideas, and became a close colleague of Sedgwick and Whewell. He made volcanic observations with Murchison in France and Italy, corresponded with Agassiz, and asked Fitzroy to look out for erratic boulders (Fitzroy gave Darwin Lyell’s book to read, as influential on him as it was on others). Hooker, Huxley, Herschel and Darwin all became good friends (he also knew Browning), Whewell expressed concern about his evolutionary beliefs, while the brilliant but obtuse Owen made a point of antagonising him (as with many others).