N
OTA DAMANZARA, Pa
ROBINSON
CRUSOE
3
i

-Fix
-ki
....
:
ARTES
LIBRARY
1837
VERITAS
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
LURIBUS
NË DHUN
TUEBOR
ARTAPPARAMVALIADAU
SCIENTIA
OF THE
KURSSIT
QUERIS PENINSULAM AMINAM”
CIRCUMSPICE
AMARAWAY AQUATAN
GIFT OF
REGENT LLHUBBARD
1
!
NILLARYGI
ABRAHAMOON
ABRAHAMSON
ROBINSON CRUSOE
}
BY
DANIEL DEFOE
R.
London
E. King, Limited
Tabernacle Street, E.C.
1901

1ZY
CONTENTS
PART I
Chap. L.—My birth and parents—At nineteen years of age I determineu
to go to sea-Dissuaded by my parents-Elope with a schoolfellow,
and ge on board ship-A storm arises, during which I am dreadfully
frightened-Ship founders-Myself and crew saved by a boat from
another vessel, and landed near Yarmouth-Meet my companion's
father there, who advises me never to go to sea more, but all in
vain
p. 1
CHAP. II.—Make a trading voyage to Guinea very successfully-Death of
my captain-Sail another trip with his mate-The vengeance of
Providence for disobedience to parents now overtakes me-Taken by
a Sallee rover, and all sold as slaves-My master frequently sends me
a-fishing, which suggests an idea of escape-Make my escape in an
open boat, with a Moresco boy
P. 10
CHAP. III.-Make for the southward in the uopes of meeting some
European vessel-See savages along shore-Shoot a large leopard-Am
taken up by a merchantman-Arrive at the Brazila, and buy & settle-
ment there-Cannot be quiet, but sail on a voyage of adventure to
Guinea-Ship strikes on a sandbank in unknown land-All lost but
myself, who am driven ashore half dead
p. 10
w
CONTENTS.
CHAP. IV.-Appearance of the wreck and country next day-Swim on
board of the ship, and, by means of a contrivance, get a quantity of
stores on shore-Shoot a bird, but it turns out perfect carrion-
Moralise upon my situation-The ship blown off land, and totally
lost-Set out in search of a proper place for a habitation See numbers
of goats—Melancholy reflections
p. 33
CHAP. V.-I begin to keep a journal-Christen my desert island the
Island of Despair--Fall upon various schemes to make tools, baskets,
etc., and begin to build my house-At a great loss of an evening for
candle, but fall upon an expedient to supply the want-Strange dis-
covery of corn—A terrible earthquake and storm
P. 48
CHAP. VI.-Observe the ship driven further aground by the late storm-
Procure a vast quantity of necessaries from the wreck-Catch a large
turtle-I fall ill of a fever and ague-Terrible dream, and serious re-
flections thereupon-Find a Bible in one of the seamen's chests thrown
ashore, the reading whereof gives me great comfort
p. 58
CHAP. VI. I begin to take a survey of my island-Discover plenty of
tobacco, grapes, lemons, and sugar-canes, wild, but no human inhabi-
tants-Besolve to lay up a store of these articles, to furnish me against
the wet season-My cat, which I supposed lost, returns with kittens-
1 regulate my diet, and shut myself up for the wet season-Sow my
grain, which comes to nothing; but I discover and remedy my error-
Take account of the course of the weather
p. 68
OHAP. VIII.-Make a second tour through the island-Catch a young
parrot, which I afterwards teach to speak-My mode of sleeping at
night-Find the other side of the island much more pleasant than
mine, and covered with turtle and sea-fowl-Catch a young kid, which
I teme-Return to my old habitation-Great plague with my
harvest
A 75
CHAP. IX.-I attempt to mould earthenware, and succeed-Description
of my
mode of baking-Begin to make a boat-After it is finished, am
unable to get it down to the water-Serious reflections-My ink and
biscuit exhausted, and clothes in a bad state-Contrive to make a
desss of skins
CONTENTS.
CHAP. X-I succeed in getting a canoe afloat, and set out on a voyage in
the sixth year of my reign or captivity-Blown out to sea-Reach the
shore with great difficulty--Fall asleep, and am awakened by a voice
calling my name-Devise various schemes to tame goats, and at last
succeed
P. 95
CHAP. XI.-Description of my figure-Also of my dwelling and enclosures
-Dreadful alarm on seeing the print of a man's foot on the shore-
Reflections-Take every possible measure of precaution
P. 103
CHAP. XII.-I observe a canoe out at sea-Find on the shore the
remnant of a feast of cannibals-Horror of mind thereon-Double arm
myself-Terribly alarmed by a goat-Discover a singular cave or
grotto, of which I form my magazine-My fears on account of the
savages begin to subside
p. 113
CHAP. XIII.-Description of my situation in the twenty-third year of my
residence-Discover nine naked savages round the fire on my side of
the island-My horror on beholding the dismal work they were about
-I determine on the destruction of the next party, at all risks—A ship
lent off the island-Go on board the wreck, which I discern to be
Spanish-Procure a great variety of articles from the vessel.
P. 125
CHAP. XIV. Reflections-An extraordinary dream-Discover five canoes
of savages on shore-Observe from my station two miserable wretches
dragged out of the boats to be devoured-One of them makes his escape,
and runs directly towards me, pursued by two others--I take measures so
as to destroy his pursuers, and save his life-Christen him by the name
of Friday, and he becomes a faithful and excellent servant
plan
p. 135
CHAP. XV.-I am at great pains to instruct Friday respecting my
abhorrence of the cannibal practices of the savages-He is amazed
at the effects of the gun, and considers it an intelligent being-Begins
to talk English tolerably-A dialogue-I instruct him in the knowledge
of religion, and find him very apt-He describes to me some white men
who had come to his country, and still lived there
P. 147
CHAP. XVI.-I aecermine to go over to the continent-Friday and I con-
struct a boat equal to carry twenty men-His dexterity in managing
ber-Friday brings intelligence of three canoes of savages on shore---
•
CONTENTS.
Resolve to go down upon them-Friday and I fire upon the wretches,
and save the life of a poor Spaniard-List of the killed and wounded-
Discover a poor Indian bound in one of the canoes, who turns out to
be Friday's father
p. 158
CHAP. XVII.-I learn from the Spaniard that there were sixteen more of
his countrymen among the savages-The Spaniard and Friday's father,
well armed, sail on a mission to the continent-I discover an English
ship lying at anchor off the island-her boat comes on shore with three
prisoners-The crew straggle into the woods, their boat being aground-
Discover myself to the prisoners, who prove to be the captain and mate
of the vessel, and a passenger-Secure the mutineers
P. 170
CHAP. XVIII.-The ship makes signals for her boat-On receiving no
answer, she sends another boat on shore-Methods by which we secure
this boat's crew, and recover the ship
P. 181
CHAP. XIX.-I take leave of the island, and, after a long voyage, arrive
in England-Go down into Yorkshire, and find the greater part of my
family dead-Resolve to go to Lisbon for information respecting my
plantation at the Brasils-Meet an old friend there, by whose means I
become rich-Set out for England overland-Much annoyed by wolves
on the road
p. 198
CHAP. XX-Strange battle betwixt Friday and a bear-Terrible engage-
ment with a whole army of wolves-Arrive in England safely, and
settle my affairs there-I marry, and have a family
p. 204
PART IL
CHAP. XXI.-Reflections-Unsettled state of mind, and conversation with
my wife thereon-Purchase a farm in the county of Bedford-Lose my
wife-I determine to revisit my island, and for that purpose settle all
my affairs in England-Description of the cargo I carried out with me
-Save the crew of a vessel burnt at sea
P. 215
CHAP. XXII.-Steer for the West Indies Distrossing account of a Bristol
ship, the crew of which we mve, in a state of starvation--Arrive at my
CONTENTS.
T
wland-Friday's joy en discovering it-Affecting interview betwixs
him and his father on landing-Narrative of the occurrences on the
island during my absence
p. 229
CHAP. XXIII.-Narrative continued-Insolence of three Englishmen to
the Spaniards-They are disarmed and brought to order-A great body
of savages land upon the island-They turn out to be two adverse
nations met there by chance-A bloody battle betwixt them-Several of
the vanquished party secured by the Spaniards
A 242
CHAP. XXIV.-Fresh broils betwixt the turbulent Englishmen and
Spaniards - The English make a voyage to the mainland, and
return in twenty days-Particulars of their voyage-Description of the
men and women they brought with them-The colony discovered by
an unlucky accident to the savages, who invade the island but are
defeated
p. 253
CHAP. XXV.-The island is invaded by a formidable fleet of savages-A
terrible engagement, in which the cannibals are utterly routed-Thirty-
seven wretches, the survivors, are saved, and employed by my people as
servants-Description of Will Atkins' ingenious contrivances for his
accommodation
p. 270
CHAP. XXVI.—I hold conversations with the Spaniards, and learn the
history of their situation among the savages from which I relieved
them-I inform the colony for what purpose I am come, and what I
mean to do for them-Distribution of the stores I brought with me-
The priest I saved at sea solemnises the marriages of the sailors
and female Indians, who had hitherto lived together as man and
wife
• p. 280
CHAP. XXVIL-Sincere and worthy character of the priest-Dialogue
with Will Atkins and myself-Conversation betwixt Atkins and his
Indian wife on the subject of religion-Her baptism-Settlement of the
commonwealth
p. 303
CHAP. XXVIIL-I entertain the prospect of converting the Indians—
Amiable character of the young woman we saved in a famished state a
sea-Her own relation of her sufferings from hunger-Sail from the
island for the Brazils-Encounter and rout a whole fleet of savages—
Death of Friday---Arrival at Braxil
818
Vili
CONTENTS.
CHAP. XXIX.-I despatch a number of additional recruits, and a quantity
of extra stores, to the island, and take my leave of it for ever-I
determine to go with the sip to the East Indies-Arrive at Mada-
gascar-Dreadful occurrences thers
P. 324
CHAP. XXX.-Difference with may nephew on account of the cruelties
practised at Madagascar-Five men lost on the Arabian shore, off the
Gulf of Persia-The seamen refuse to sail if I continue on board, in
consequence of which I am left on shore-Make a very advantageous
trading voyage, in company with an English merchant, and purchase
• vessel
p. 336
CHAP. XXXI.-Make a trading voyage in this ship-Put into the river of
Cambodia-Am warned of my danger by a countryman, in con-
sequence of which we set sail, and are pursued-Great difficulty in
making our escape
p. 842
CHAP. XXXII.-Obliged to come to anchor on a savage coast, to repair
our ship-We are attacked by the natives, whom our carpenter
disperses by a whimsical contrivance-Serious reflections upon our
disagreeable situation
P. 350
CHAP. XXXIII.-We arrive in China in safety-Dispose of the ship-
Description of the inhabitants-Arrive at Pekin, and find an oppor-
tunity of returning to Europe
P. 357
CHAP. XXXIV.-Set out by the caravan-Account of the valuable effects
we took with us-Further description of the interior of China-Pass
the great wall-Attacked by Tartars, who are dispersed by the resolu-
tion of a Scots merchant-The old pilot saves my life-We are again
attacked, and defeat the Tartars
p. 368
Chap. XXXV.—Further account of our journey-Description of an idol :
which we destroy-Great danger we incur thereby-Account of our
travels through Muscovy
p. 375
CHAP. XXXVI.-Conversations with a Russian grandee-Set out on my
journey homewards-Harassed by Kalmucks on the road-Arrival at
Archangel—Sail from thence, and arrive safely in England -
884
{
E

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES
or
ROBINSON CRUSOE
PART I
CHAPTER L
My birth and parentage-At nineteen years of age I determined to go to
sea-Dissuaded by my parents-Elope with a schoolfellow, and go on
board ship-A storm arises, during which I am dreadfully frightened
-Ship founders-Myself and crew saved by a boat from another
vessel, and landed near Yarmouth-Meet my companion's father
there, who advises me never to go to sea more, but all in vain.
}

WAS born in the year 1632, in the city of York, of a
good family, though not of that country, iny father
being a foreigner of Bremen, who settled first at
Hull. He got a good estate by merchandise, and
leaving off his trade, lived afterwards at York, from
whence he had married my mother, whose relations
were named Robinson, a very good family in that
country, and from whom I was called Robinson Kreutznaer; but,
by the usual corruption of words in England, we are now called-
nay, we call ourselves and write our name-Crusoe; and so my
companions always called me.
I had two elder brothers, one of whom was lieutenant-colonel to
an English regiment of foot in Flanders, formerly commanded by
the famous Colonel Lockhart, and was killed at the battle near
Dunkirk against the Spaniards. What became of my second
brother I never knew, any more than my father or mother knew
what became of me.
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
Being the third son of the family, and not bred to any trade, my
head began to be filled very early with rambling thoughts. My
father, who was very ancient, had given me a competent share of
learning, as far as house-education and a country free school gene-
rally go, and designed me for the law; but I would be satisfied with
nothing but going to sea; and my inclination to this fed me so
strongly against the will, nay, the commands of my father, and
against all the entreaties and persuasions of my mother and other
friends, that there seemed to be something fatal in that propensity
of nature, tending directly to the life of misery which was to befall
me.
My father, a wise and grave man, gave me serious and excellent
counsel against what he foresaw was my design He called me one
morning into his chamber, where he was confined by the gout, and
expostulated very warmly with me upon this subject. He asked me
what reasons, more than a mere wandering inclination, I had for
leaving my father's house and my native country, where I might be
well introduced, and had a prospect of raising my fortune by applica-
tion and industry, with a life of ease and pleasure. He told me it
was men of desperate fortunes on one hand, or of aspiring, superior
fortunes on the other, who went abroad upon adventures, to rise by
enterprise, and make themselves famous in undertakings of a nature
out of the common road; that these things were all either too far
above me, or too far below me; that mine was the middle state, or
what might be called the upper station of low life, which he had
und, by long experience, was the best state in the world, the most
suited to human happiness, not exposed to the miseries and hard-
ships, the labour and sufferings, of the mechanic part of mankind,
and not embarrassed with the pride, luxury, ambition, and envy of
the upper part of mankind. He told me I might judge of the hap-
piness of this state by this one thing-viz, that this was the state of
life which all other people envied; that kings have frequently
lamented the miserable consequence of being born to great things,
and wished they had been placed in the middle of the two extremes,
between the mean and the great; that the wise man gave his testi-
mony to this, as the standard of felicity, when he prayed to have
neither poverty nor riches.
He bade me observe it, and I should always find that the calam-
ities of life were shared among the upper and lower part of mankind,
but that the middle station had the fewest disasters, and was not
exposed to so many vicissitudes as the higher or lower part of man-
kind; nay, they were not subjected to so many distempers and un-
easiness, either of body or min as those were who, by vicious
living, luxury, and extravagances on the one hand, or by hard labour,
want of necessaries, and mean or insufficient diet on the other hand,
bring distemper upon themselves by the natural consequences of
their way of living; that the middle station of life was calculated
for all kind of virtue and all kind of enjoyments; that peace and
ROBINSON CRUSOR
plenty were the handmaids of a middle fortune; that temperance,
moderation, quietness, health, society, all agreeable diversions, and
all desirable pleasures, were the blessings attending the middle
station of life; that this way men went silently and smoothly
through the world, and comfortably out of it, not embarrassed with
the labours of the hands or of the head, not sold to a life of slavery
for daily bread, nor harassed with perplexed circumstances, which
rob the soul of peace and the body of rest, nor enraged with the
passion of envy, or the secret burning lust of ambition for great
things; but, in easy circumstances, sliding gently through the
world, and sensibly tasting the sweets of living, without the bitter;
feeling that they are happy, and learning by every day's experience
to know it more sensibly.
After this he pressed me earnestly, and in the most affectionate
manner, not to play the young man, nor to precipitate myself into
miseries which nature, and the station of life I was born in, seemed
to have provided against; that I was under no necesssity of seek-
ing my bread, that he would do well for me, and endeavour to
enter me fairly into the station of life which he had just been recom-
mending to me; and that if I was not very easy and happy in the
world, it must be my mere fate or fault that must hinder it; and
that he should have nothing to answer for, having thus discharged
his duty in warning me against measures which he knew would be
to my hurt, in a word, that as he would do very kind things for me
if I would stay and settle at home as he directed, so he would not
have so much hand in my misfortunes as to give me any encourage-
ment to go away; and to close all, he told me I had my elder brother
for an example, to whom he had used the same earnest persuasions
to keep him from going into the Low Country wars, but could not
prevail, his young desires prompting him to run into the army,
where he was killed; and though he said he would not cease to
pray for me, yet he would venture to say to me, that if I did take
this foolish step, God would not bless me, and I should have leisure
hereafter to reflect upon having neglected his counsel, when there
might be none to assist in my recovery.
I observed in this last part of his discourse, which was truly
prophetic, though I suppose my father did not know it to be so
himself I say, I observed the tears run down his face very
plentifully, especially when he spoke of my brother who was
killed; and that when he spoke of my having leisure to repent,
and none to assist me, he was so moved that he broke off the dis
course, and told me his heart was so full he could say no more to
me.
I was sincerely affected with this discourse, and, indeed, whe
could be otherwise? and I resolved not to think of going abroad
any more, but to settle at home according to my father's desire.
But alas ! a few days wore it all off; and, in short, to prevent any
of my father's further importunities, in a few weeks after I resolved

Ά
life and adventures of
...
to run quite away from him. However, I did not act quite so
hastily as the first heat of my resolution prompted; but I took my
mother at a time when I thought her a little more pleasant than
ordinary, and told her that my thoughts were so entirely bent upon
seeing the world that I should never settle to anything with
resolution enough to go through with it, and my father had better
give me his consent than force me to go without it; that I was
now eighteen years old, which was too late to go apprentice to a
trade or clerk to an attorney; that I was sure if I did I should
never serve out my time, but I should certainly run away from my
master before my time was out, and go to sea; and if she would
speak to my father to let me go one voyage abroad, if I came home
again, and did not like it, I would go no more; and I would
promise, by a double diligence, to recover the time that I had lost.
This put my mother into a great passion; she told me she knew
it would be to no purpose to speak to my father upon any such
subject; that he knew too well what was my interest to give his
consent to anything so much for my hurt; and that she wondered
how I could think of any such thing after the discourse I had had
with my father, and such kind and tender expressions as she knew
my father had used to me; and that, in short, if I would ruin my
self, there was help for me; but I might depend I should
never have their consent to it; that for her part, she would not
have so much hand in my destruction; and I should never have it
to say that my mother was willing when my father was not.
Though my mother refused to move it to my father, yet I heard
afterwards that she reported all the discourse to him, and that my
father, after showing a great concern at it, said to her, with a sigh,
"That boy might be happy if he would stay at home; but if he
goes abroad, he will be the most miserable wretch that ever was
born: I can give no consent to it.”
It was not till almost a year after this that I broke loose, though,
in the meantime, I continued obstinately deaf to all proposals of
settling to business, and frequently expostulated with my father and
mother about their being so positively determined against what
they knew my inclinations prompted me to. But being one day at
Hull, where I went casually, and without any purpose of making an
elopement at that time; but, I say, being there, and one of my com-
panions being about to sail to London in his father's ship, and
prompting me to go with them with the common allurement of sea-
faring men, that it should cost me nothing for my passage, I
consulted neither father nor mother any more, nor so much as sent
them word of it; but leaving them to hear of it as they might, with-
out asking God's blessing or my father's, without any consideration
of circumstances or consequences, and in an ill hour, God knows,
on the 1st of September 169 I went on board a ship bound
for London. Never any young adventurer's misfortunes, I believe,
began sooner, or continued longer, than mine. The ship was no
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
}
sooner out of the Humber than the wind began to blow and the
sea to rise in a most frightful manner; and, as I had never been
at sea before, I was most inexpressibly sick in body and terrified
in mind I began now seriously to reflect upon what I t d done,
and how justly I was overtaken by the judgment of heaven for
my wicked leaving my father's house, and abandoning my duty.
All the good counsels of my parents, my father's tears and my
mother's entreaties, came now fresh into my mind; and my
conscience, which was not yet come to the pitch of hardness to
which it has since, reproached me with the contempt of advice, and
the breach of my duty to God and my father.
All this while the storm increased, and the sea went very high,
though nothing like what I have seen many times since; no, nor
what I saw a few days after; but it was enough to affect me then,
who was but a young sailor, and had never known anything of the
matter. I expected every wave would have swallowed us up, and
that every time the ship fell down, as I thought it did, in the trough
or hollow of the sea, we should never rise more; in this agony of
mind, I made many vows and resolutions, that if it would please
God to spare my life in this one voyage, if ever I got once my foot
upon dry land again, I would go directly home to my father, and
never set it into a ship again while I lived; that I would take his
advice, and never run myself into such miseries as these any more.
Now I saw plainly the goodness of his observations about the
middle station of life, how easy, how comfortably he had lived all
his days, and never had been exposed to tempests at sea or
troubles on shore; and I resolved that I would, like a true repent-
ing prodigal, go home to my father.
These wise and sober thoughts continued all the while the storm
lasted, and indeed some time after; but the next day the wind was
abated, and the sea calmer, and I began to be a little inured to it :
however, I was very grave for all that day, being also a little sea-
sick still; but towards night the weather cleared up, the wind was
quite over, and a charming fine evening followed; the sun went
down perfectly clear, and rose so the next morning; and having
little or no wind, and a smooth sea, the sun shining upon it, the
sight was, as I thought, the most delightful that ever I saw.
I had slept well in the night, and was now no more sea-sick, but
very cheerful, looking with wonder upon the sea that was so rough
and terrible the day before, and could be so calm and so pleasant
in so little a time after. And now, lest my good resolutions should
continue, my companion, who had enticed me away, comes to me;
"Well, Bob," says he, clapping me upon the shoulder, "how do you
do after it? warrant you were frighted, wer'n't you, last night,
when it blew but a capful of wind?" "A capful d'you call it ?"
said I; "twas a terrible storm." "A storm, you fool you," replies
he;
do you call that a storm? why, it was nothing at all; give us
but a good ship and sea-room, and we think nothing of such a
Nok
お
​life and adventures of
**
squall of wind as that; but you're but a fresh-water sailor, Bob
Come, let us make a bowl of punch, and we'll forget all that; d'ye
see what charming weather 'tis now?" To make short this sad
part of my story, we went the way of all sailors; the punch was
made, and I was made half-drunk with it: and in that one night's
wickedness I drowned all my repentance, all my reflections upon
my past conduct, all my resolutions for the future In a word, as
the sea was returned to its smoothness of surface and settled calm-
ness by the abatement of that storm, so the hurry of my thoughts
being over, my fears and apprehensions of being swallowed up by
the sea being forgotten, and the current of my former desires re-
turned, I entirely forgot the vows and promises that I made in my
distress. I found, indeed, some intervals of reflection; and the
serious thoughts did, as it were, endeavour to return again some-
times; but I shook them off, and roused myself from them as
it were from a distemper, and applying myself to drinking
and company, soon mastered the return of those fits-for so I called
them; and I had in five or six days got as complete a victory over
conscience as any young fellow that resolved not to be troubled
with it could desire. But I was to have another trial for it still; and
Providence, as in such cases generally it does, resolved to leave me
entirely without excuse; for if I would not take this for a deliver-
ance, the next was to be such a one as the worst and most hardened
wretch among us would confess both the danger and the mercy of.
The sixth day of our being at sea we came into Yarmouth Roads;
the wind having been contrary and the weather calm, we had made
but little way since the storm. Here we were obliged to come to
an anchor, and here we lay, the wind continuing contrary—viz., at
south-west, for seven or eight days, during which time a great many
ships from Newcastle came into the same Roads, as the common
harbour where the ships might wait for a wind for the river.
We had not, however, rid here so long but we should have tided
it up the river, but that the wind blew too fresh, and after we had
lain four or five days, blew very hard. However, the Roads being
reckoned as good as a harbour, the anchorage good, and our ground-
tackle very strong, our men were unconcerned, and not in the least
apprehensive of danger, but spent the time in rest and mirth, after
the manner of the sea; but the eighth day, in the morning, the wind
increased, and we had all hands at work to strike our top-masts,
and make everything snug and close, that the ship might ride as
easy as possible. By noon the sea went very high indeed, and our
ship rode forecastle in, shipped several seas, and we thought once
or twice our anchor had come home; upon which our master
ordered out the sheet-anchor, st that we rode with two anchors
ahead, and the cables veered out to the better end.
By this time it blew a terrible storm indeed; and now I began to
ee terror and amazement in the faces even of the seamen them-
selves. The master, though vigilant in the business of preserving
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
the ship, yet as he went in and out of his cabin by me, I could hear
him softly to himself say, several times "Lord be merciful to us !
we shall be all lost; we shall be all undone !" and the like During
these first hurries I was stupid, lying still in my cabin, which was in
the steerage, and cannot describe my temper: I could ill resume
the first penitence which I had so apparently trampled upon and
hardened myself against: I thought the bitterness of death had
been past, and that this would be nothing like the first; but when
the master himself came by me, as I said just now, and said we
should be all lost, I was dreadfully frighted. I got up out of my
cabin and looked out; but such a dismal sight I never saw the
sea ran mountains high, and broke upon us every three or four
minutes; when I could look about, I could see nothing but distress
round us; two ships that rode near us, we found, had cut their
masts by the board, being deep laden; and our men cried out, that
a ship which rode about a mile ahead of us was foundered. Two
more ships, being driven from their anchors, were run out of the
Roads to sea, at all adventures, and that not with a mast standing.
The light ships fared the best, as not so much labouring in the sea;
but two or three of them drove, and came close by us, running away
with only their spritsail out before the wind.
Towards evening the mate and boatswain begged the master of our
ship to let them cut away the fore-mast, which he was very unwilling
to do; but the boatswain protesting to him that if he did not the ship
would founder, he consented; and when they had cut away the fore-
mast, the main-mast stood so loose, and shook the ship so much,
they were obliged to cut that away also, and make a clear deck.
Any one must judge what a condition I must be in at all this,
who was but a young sailor, and who had been in such a fright
before at but a little. But if I can express at this distance the
thoughts I had about me at that time, I was in tenfold more horror
of mind upon account of my former convictions, and the having
returned from them to the resolutions I had wickedly taken at
first, than I was at death itself; and these, added to the terror of
the storm, put me into such a condition that I can by no words
describe it. But the worst was not come yet; the storm continued
with such fury, that the seamen themselves acknowledged they had
never seen a worse We had a good ship, but she was deep laden,
and wallowed in the sea, so that the seamen every now and then
cried out she would founder. It was my advantage, in one respect,
that I did not know what they meant by founder till I inquired.
However, the storm was so violent, that I saw, what is not often
seen, the master, the boatswain, and some others more sensible
than the rest, at their prayers, and expecting every moment when
the ship would go to the bottom. In the middle of the night, and
under all the rest of our distresses, one of the men that had been
down to see cried out we had sprung a leak; another said there
was four feet water in the hold. Then all hands were called to the
B
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
pump. At that word, my heart, as I thought, died within me and I
fell backwards upon the side of my bed where I sat, into the cabin.
However, the men roused me, and told me that I, that was able to
do nothing before, was as well able to pump as another; at which
I stirred up and went to the pump, and worked very heartily.
While this was doing the master seeing some light colliers, who,
not able to ride out the storm, were obliged to slip and run away
to the sea, and would come near us, ordered to fire a gun as a
signal of distress. I, who knew nothing what they meant, thought
the ship had broken, or some dreadful thing happened In a word,
I was so surprised that I fell down in a swoon. As this was a time
when everybody had his own life to think of, nobody minded me,
or what was become of me; but another man stepped up to
the pump, and thrusting me aside with his foot, let me lie, thinking
I had been dead; and it was a great while before I came to myself.
We worked on; but the water increasing in the hold, it was
apparent that the ship would founder; and though the storm began
to abate a little, yet it was not possible she could swim till we might
run into any port; so the master continued firing guns for help;
and a light ship, wł› had rid it out just ahead of us, ventured a
boat out to help us. It was with the utmost hazard the boat came
near us; but it was impossible for us to get on board, or for the
boat to lie near the ship's side, till at last the men rowing very
heartily, and venturing their lives to save ours, our men cast them
a rope over the stern with a buoy to it, and then veered it out a
great length, which they, after much labour and hazard, took hold
of, and we hauled them close under our stern, and got all into their
boat. It was to no purpose for them or us, after we were in the
boat, to think of reaching their own ship; so all agreed to let her
drive, and only to pull her in towards shore as much as we could;
and our master promised them, that if the boat was staved upon
shore, he would make it good to their master: so partly rowing,
and partly driving, our boat went away to the northward, sloping
towards the shore almost as far as Winterton Ness.
We were not much more than a quarter of an hour out of our
ship till we saw her sink, and then I understood for the first time
what was meant by a ship foundering in the sea. I must acknow-
ledge I had hardly eyes to look up when the seamen told me she
was sinking; for from the moment that they rather put me into the
boat than that I might be said to go in, my heart was, as it were,
dead within me, partly with fright, partly with horror of mind, and
the thoughts of what was yet before me.
While we were in this condition-the men yet labouring at the
oar to bring the boat near the shore we could see (when, our boat
mounting the waves, we were able to see the shore) a great many
people running along the strand to assist us when we should come
near; but we made but slow way towards the shore; nor were we
able to reach the shore, till, being past the lighthouse at Winterton,
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
9
the shore falls off ot the westward towards Cromer, and so the land
broke off a little the violence of the wind. Here we got in, and,
though not without much difficulty, got all safe on shore, and
walked afterwards on foot to Yarmouth, where, as unfortunate
men, we were used with great humanity, as well by the magistrates
of the town, who assigned us good quarters, as by particular
merchants and owners of ships, and had money given us sufficient
to carry us either to London or back to Hull, as we thought fit.
Had I now had the sense to have gone back to Hull, and have
gone home, I had been happy, and my father, as in our blessed
Saviour's parable, had even killed the fatted calf for me; for hearing
the ship I went away in was cast away in Yarmouth Roads, it was a
great while before he had any assurances that I was not drowned.
But my ill fate pushed me on now with an obstinacy that nothing
could resist; and though I had several times loud calls from my
reason and my more composed judgment to go home, yet I had no
power to do it. I know not what to call this, nor will I urge that it
is a secret overruling decree, that hurries us on to be the instru-
ments of our own destruction, even though it be before us, and that
we rush upon it with our eyes open. Certainly, nothing but some
such decreed unavoidable misery, which it was impossible for me to
escape, could have pushed me forward against the calm reasonings
and persuasions of my most retired thoughts, and against two such
visible instructions as I had met with in my first attempt.
}}
My comrade, who had helped to harden m_before, and who was
the master's son, was now less forward than I. The first time he
spoke to me after we were at Yarmouth, which was not till two or
three days, for we were separated in the town to several quarters;
I say, the first time he saw me, it appeared his tone was altered;
and, looking very melancholy, and shaking his head, he asked me
how I did, and telling his father who I was, and how I had come
this voyage only for a trial, in order to go further abroad: his
father, turning to me with a very grave and concerned tone,
"Young man," says he, "you ought never to go to sea any
more; you ought to take this for a plain and visible token
that you are not to be a seafaring man. "Why, sir," said I
"will you go to sea no more?" "That is another case," said
he; "it is my calling, and therefore my duty; but as you
made this voyage on trial, you see what a taste heaven has given
you of what you are to expect if you persist Perhaps this has all
befallen us on your account, like Jonah in the ship of Tarshish.
Pray," continues he, "what are you; and on what account did you
go to sea?" Upon that I told him some of my story; at the end
of which he burst out into a strange kind of passion: "What had I
done," says he, "that such an unhappy wretch should come into
my ship? I would not set my foot in the same ship with thee again
for a thousand pounds." This indeed was, as I said, an excursion
of his spirits, which were yet agitated by the sense of his loss, and
10
K
life and ADVENTURES OF
was farther than he could have authority to go. However, he after-
wards talked very gravely to me, exhorting me to go back to my
father, and not tempt Providence to my ruin, telling me I might see
visible hand of heaven against me. And, young man," said he,
depend upon it, if you do not go back, wherever you go, you will
meet with nothing but disasters and disappointments, till your
father's words are fulfilled upon you."
We parted soon after; for I made him little answer, and I saw
him no more; which way he went I knew not. As for me, having
some money in my pocket, I travelled to London by land; and
there, as well as on the road, had many struggles with myself, what
course of life I should take, and whether I should go home or to sea.
As to going home, shame opposed the best motions that offered
to my thoughts, and it immediately occurred to me how I should be
laughed at among the neighbours, and should be ashamed to see,
not my father and mother only, but even everybody else; from
whence I have since often observed, how incongruous and irrational
the common temper of mankind is, especially of youth, to that
reason which ought to guide them in such cases-viz., thatthey are
not ashamed to sin, and yet are ashamed to repent; not ashamed
of the action for which they ought justly to be esteemed fools, but
are ashamed of the returning, which only can make them be
esteemed wise men.
64
In this state of life, however, I remained some time, uncertain
what measures to take, and what course of life to lead. An irresis-
tible reluctance continued to going home; and as I stayed away
awhile, the remembrance of the distress I had been in wore off, and
as that abated, the little motion I had in my desires to return wore
off with it, till at last I quite laid aside the thoughts of it, and looked
out for a voyage.
CHAPTER IL
Make a trading voyage to Guinea very successfully-Death of my captain
-Sail another trip with his mate-The vengeance of Providence for
disobedience to parents now overtakes me-Taken by a Sallee rover,
and all sold as slaves-My master frequently sends me a fishing,
which suggests an idea of escape-Make my escape in an open boat,
with a Moresco boy.

HAT evil influence which carried me first away from
my father's house-which hurried me into the wild
and indigested notion of raising my fortune, and that
impressed those conceits so forcibly upon me, as to
make me deaf to all good advice, and to the en-
treaties and even the commands of my father-I say, the same
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
XX
influence, whatever it was, presented the most unfortunate of all enter-
prises to my view; and I went on board a vessel bound to the coast
of Africa; or, as our sailors vulgarly called it, a voyage to Guinea.
It was my great misfortune that in all these adventures I did not
ship myself as a sailor; when, though I might indeed have worked
a little harder than ordinary yet at the same time I should have
learnt the duty and office of a fore-mas man, and in time might
have qualified myself for a mate or lieutenant, if not for a master.
But as it was always my fate to choose for the worse, so I did here;
for having money in my pocket and good clothes upon my back, Í
would always go on board in the habit of a gentleman; and so I
neither had any business in the ship, nor learned to do any.
It was my lot first of all to fall into pretty good company in Lon-
don, which does not always happen to such loose and misguided
young fellows as I then was; the devil generally not omitting to
lay some snare for them very early; but it was not so with me. I
first got acquainted with the master of a ship who had been on the
coast of Guinea; and who, having had very good success there,
was resolved to go again. This captain taking a fancy to my con-
versation, which was not at all disagreeable at that time, hearing
me say I had a mind to see the world, told me if I would go the
voyage with him I should be at no expense; I should be his mess-
mate and his companion; and if I could carry anything with me, I
should have all the advantage of it that the trade would admit ; and
perhaps I might meet with some encouragement.
I embraced the offer; and entering into a strict friendship with
this captain, who was an honest, plain-dealing man, I went the
voyage with him, and carried a small adventure with me, which,
by the disinterested honesty of my friend the captain, I increased
very considerably; for I carried about £40 in such toys and trifles
as the captain directed me to buy. These £40 I had mustered
together by the assistance of some of my relations whom I corre-
sponded with; and who, I believe, got my father, or at least my
mother, to contribute so much as that to my first adventure.
This was the only voyage which I may say was successful in all
my adventures, which I owe to the integrity and honesty of my
friend the captain; under whom also I got a competent knowledge
of the mathematics and the rules of navigation, learned how to
keep an account of the ship's coue, take an observation, and, in
short, to understand some things that were needful to be under-
stood by a sailor; for, as he took delight to instruct me, I took
delight to learn; and, in a word, this voyage made me both a
sailor and a merchant; for I brought home five pounds nine ounces
of gold-dust for my adventure, which yielded me in London, at my
return, almost £300; and this filled me with those aspiring
thoughts which have since so completed my ruin.
Yet even in this voyage I had my misfortunes too; particularly,
that I was continually sick, being thrown into a violent calenture
13
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
by the excessive heat of the climate; our principal trading being
upon the coast, from latitude of 15° north even to the line itself.
I was now set up for a Guinea trader; and my friend, to my
great misfortune, dying soon after his arrival, I resolved to go the
same voyage again, and I embarked in the same vessel with one
who was his mate in the former voyage, and had now got the com-
mand of the ship This was the unhappiest voyage that ever man
made; for though I did not carry quite £100 of my new-gained
wealth, so that I had £200 left, which I had lodged with my
friend's widow, who was very just to me, yet I fell into terrible mis-
fortunes; the first was this-our ship making her course towards
the Canary Islands, or rather between those Islands and the
African shore, was surprised in the grey of the morning by a
Turkish rover of Sallee, who gave chase to us with all the sail she
could make. We crowded also as much canvas as our yards would
spread, or our masts carry, to get clear; but finding the pirate
gained upon us, and would certainly come up with us in a few
hours, we prepared to fight; our ship having twelve guns, and the
rogue eighteen. About three in the afternoon he came up with us,
and bringing to, by mistake, just athwart our quarter, instead of
athwart our stern, as he intended, we brought eight of our guns to
bear on that side, and poured in a broadside upon him, which made
him sheer off again, after returning our fire, and pouring in also his
small shot from near two hundred men which he had on board.
However, we had not a man touched, all our men keeping close.
He prepared to attack us again, and we to defend ourselves.
But laying us on board the next time upon our other quarter, he
entered sixty men upon our decks, who immediately fell to cutting
and hacking the sails and rigging. We plied them with small shot,
half-pikes, powder-chests, and such like, and cleared our deck of
them twice. However, to cut short this melancholy part of our
story, our ship being disabled, and three of our men killed, and
eight wounded, we were obliged to yield, and were carried all
prisoners into Sallee, a port belonging to the Moors.
The usage I had there was not so dreadful as at first I appre-
hended; nor was I carried up the country to the emperor's court,
as the rest of our men were, but was kept by the captain of the
rover as his proper prize, and made his slave, being young and
nimble, and fit for his business. At this surprising change of my
circumstances, from a merchant to a miserable slave, I was per-
fectly overwhelmed; and now I looked back upon my father's
prophetic discourse to me, that I should be miserable and have
none to relieve me, which I thought was now so effectually brought
to pass that I could not be worse; for now the hand of Heaven
had overtaken me, and I was undone without redemption; but,
alas ! this was but a taste of the misery I was to go through, as will
appear in the sequel of this story.
As my new patron, or master, had taken me home to his house,
•
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
13
so I was in hopes that he would take me with him when he went to
sea again, believing that it would some time or other be his fate to
be taken by a Spanish or Portugal man-of-war; and that then I
should be set at liberty. But this hope of mine was soon taken
away; for when he went to sea, he left me on shore to look after
his little garden, and do the common drudgery of slaves about his
house; and when he came home again from his cruise, he ordered
me to lie in the cabin to look after the ship.
Here I meditated nothing but my escape, and what method I
might take to effect it, but found no way that had the least proba-
bility in it; nothing presented to make the supposition of it
rational; for I had nobody to communicate it to that would
embark with me-no fellow-slave, no Englishman, Irishman, or
Scotchman there but myself; so that for two years, though I often
pleased myself with the imagination, yet I never had the least
encouraging prospect of putting it in practice.
After about two years, an odd circumstance presented itself,
which put the old thought of making some attempt for my liberty
again in my head. My patron lying at home longer than usual
without fitting out his ship, which, as I heard, was for want of
money, he used constantly, once or twice a-week, sometimes oftener
if the weather was fair, to take the ship's pinnace, and go out into
the road a-fishing; and as he always took me and young Maresco
with him to row the boat, we made him very merry, and I proved
very dexterous in catching fish; insomuch that sometimes he would
send me with a Moor, one of his kinsmen, and the youth-the
Maresco, as they called him-to catch a dish of fish for him.
It happened one time, that going a-fishing in a calm morning, a
fog rose so thick that, though we were not half-a-league from the
shore, we lost sight of it; and rowing we knew not whither or
which way, we laboured all day, and all the next night; and when
the morning came, we found we had pulled off to sea instead of
pulling in for the shore; and that we were at least two leagues from
the shore. However, we got well in again, though with a great
deal of labour and some danger; for the wind began to blow pretty
fresh in the morning; but we were all very hungry.
But our patron, warned by this disaster, resolved to take more
care of himself for the future; and having lying by him the long-
boat of our English ship that he had taken, he resolved he would
not go a-fishing any more without a compass and some provision;
so he ordered the carpenter of his ship, who also was an English
slave, to build a little state-room, or cabin, in the middle of the
long-boat, like that of a barge, with a place to stand behind it to
steer, and haul home the main-sheet; the room before for a hand
or two to stand and work the sails. She sailed with what we call a
shoulder-of-mutton sail; and the boom gibed over the top of the
cabin, which lay very snug and low, and had in it room for him
to lie, with a slave or two, and a table to eat on, with
•
14
LIFE AND AdventuRES OF
some small lockers to put in some bottles of such liquor as he
thought fit to drink; and his bread, rice, and coffee.
We went frequently out with his boat a-fishing; and as I was
most dexterous to catch fish for him, he never went without me. It
happened that he had appointed to go out in this boat, either for
pleasure or for fish, with two or three Moors of some distinction in
that place, and for whom he had provided extraordinarily, and had,
therefore, sent on board the boat over-night a larger store of provisions
than ordinary; and had ordered me to get ready three fusees with
powder and shot, which were on board his ship, for that they
designed some sport of fowling as well as fishing.
I got all things ready as he had directed, and waited the next
morning with the boat washed clean, her ancient and pendants out,
and everything to accommodate his guests; when by-and-by my
patron came on board alone, and told me his guests had put off
going, from some business that fell out, and ordered me, with the
man and boy, as usual, to go out with the boat and catch them
some fish, for that his friends were to sup at his house, and com-
manded that as soon as I got some fish I should bring it home to
his house; all which I prepared to do.
This moment my former notions of deliverance darted into my
thoughts, for now I found I was likely to have a little ship at my
command; and my master being gone, I prepared to furnish
myself, not for fishing business, but for a voyage; though I knew
not, neither did I so much as consider, whither I should steer-
anywhere to get out of that place was my desire.
My first contrivance was to make a pretence to speak to this
Moor, to get something for our subsistence on board; for I told
him we must not presume to eat of our patron's bread. He said
that was true; so he brought a large basket of rusk or biscuit, and
three jars of fresh water, into the boat. I knew where my patron's
case of bottles stood, which it was evident, by the make, were
taken out of some English prize, and I conveyed them into the
boat while the Moor was on shore, as if they had been there before
for our master.. I conveyed also a great lump of bees-wax into the
boat, which weighed about half a hundredweight, with a parcel of
twine or thread, a hatchet, a saw, and a hammer, all of which were
of great use to us afterwards, especially the wax, to make candles.
Another trick I tried upon him, which he innocently came into also:
his name was Ismael, which they call Muley, or Moely; so I called
to him-"Moely," said I, our patron's guns are on board the
boat; can you not get a little powder and shot? It may be we may
kill some alcamies (a fowl like our curlews) for ourselves, for I know
he keeps the gunner's stores in the ship." "Yes," says he, “I'll
bring some;" and accordingly he brought great leather pouch,
which held a pound and a half of powder, or rather more; and
another with shot, that had five or six pounds, with some bullets,
and put all into the boat. At the same time I had found
16
1
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
25
powder of my master's in the great cabin, with which I filled one of
the large bottles in the case, which was almost empty, pouring what
was in it into another; and thus furnished with everything needful,
we sailed out of the port to fish. The castle, which is at the
entrance of the port, knew who we were, and took no notice of us;
and we were not above a mile out of the port before we hauled in
our sail and set us down to fish. The wind blew from the N.N.E.,
which was contrary to my desire, for had it blown southerly I had
been sure to have made the coast of Spain, and at least reached to
the bay of Cadiz; but my resolutions were, blow which way it
would, I would be gone from that horrid place where I was, and
leave the rest to fate.
After we had fished some time and caught nothing, for when I
had fish on my hook I would not pull them up, that he might not
see them, I said to the Moor, "This will not do; our master will
not be thus served; we must stand farther off." He, thinking no
harm, agreed, and, being in the head of the boat, set the sails; and,
as I had the helm, I ran the boat out near a league farther, and
then brought her to, as if I would fish; when, giving the boy the
helm, I stepped forward to where the Moor was, and making as if I
stooped for something behind him, I took him by surprise with my
arm under his waist, and tossed him clear overboard into the sea.
He rose immediately, for he swam like a cork, and called to me,
begged to be taken in, told me he would go all over the world with
me. He swam so strong after the boat that he would have reached
me very quickly, there being but little wind; upon which I stepped
into the cabin, and fetching one of the fowling-pieces, I presented it
at him, and told him I had done him no hurt, and if he would be
quiet I would do him none : But," said I, "you swim well enough
to reach to the shore, and the sea is calm ; make the best of your
way to shore, and I will do you no harm; but if you come near the
boat I'll shoot you through the head, for I am resolved to have my
liberty;" so he turned himself about, and swam for the shore, and
I make no doubt but he reached it with ease, for he was an excellent
swimmes.
»
I could have been content to have taken this Moor with me, and
have drowned the boy, but there was no venturing to trust him.
When he was gone, I turned to the boy, whom they called Xury,
and said to him, "Xury, if you will be faithful to me, I'll make you
a great man; but if you will not stroke your face to be true to me,"
that is, swear by Mahomet and his father's beard, "I must throw
you into the sea too." The boy smiled in my face, and spoke so
innocently, that I could not distrust him, and swore to be faithful to
me, and go all over the world with ine.
While I was in view of the Moor that was swimming, I stood out
directly to sea with the boat, rather stretching to windward, that
they might think me gone towards the Straits' mouth (as indeed any
one that had been in their wits must have been supposed to do):
1
16
life and adventures of
1.
:
for who would have supposed we were sailed on to the southward,
to the truly Barbarian coast, where whole nations of Negroes were
sure to surround us with their canoes, and destroy us; where we
could not go on shore but we should be devoured by savage beasts,
or more merciless savages of human kind.
But as soon as it grew dusk in the evening, I changed my course,
and steered directly south and by east, bending my course a little
towards the east, that I might keep in with the shore; and having
a fair, fresh gale of wind, and a smooth, quiet sea, I made such sail
that I believe by the next day, at three o'clock in the afternoon,
when I first made the land, I could not be less than one hundred
and fifty miles south of Sallee; quite beyond the Emperor of
Morocco's dominions, or indeed of any other king thereabouts, for
we saw no people.
Yet such was the fright I had taken of the Moors, and the dread-
ful apprehensions I had of falling into their hands, that I would not
stop, or go on shore, or come to an anchor; the wind continuing
fair till I had sailed in that manner five days; and then the wind
shifting to the southward, I concluded also that if any of our vessels
were in chase of me, they also would now give over; so I ventured
to make to the coast, and came to an anchor in the mouth of a
little river, I knew not what, nor where, neither what latitude, what
country, what nation, or what river. I neither saw, nor desired to
see any people; the principal thing I wanted was fresh water. We
came into this creek in the evening, resolving to swim on shore as
soon as it was dark and discover the country; but as soon as it was
quite dark, we heard such dreadful noises of the barking, roaring,
and howling of wild creatures, of we knew not what kinds, that the
poor boy was ready to die with fear, and begged of me not to go on
shore till day "Well, Xury," said I, “then I won't; but it may be
that we may see men by day, who will be as bad to us as those
lions." "Then we give them the shoot gun," says Xury, laughing,
"make them run wey." Such English Xury spoke by conversing
among us slaves. However, I was glad to see the boy so cheerful,
and I gave him a dram (out of our patron's case of bottles) to cheer
him up. After all, Xury's advice was good, and I took it; we
dropped our little anchor, and lay still all night; I say still, for we
slept none; for in two or three hours we saw vast great creatures
(we knew not what to call them) of many sorts, come down to the
sea-shore and run into the water, wallowing and washing them-
selves for the pleasure of cooling the.nselves; and they made such
hideous howlings and yellings, that I never indeed heard the like
Xury was dreadfully frighted, and indeed so was I too; but we
were both more frighted when we heard one of these mighty
creatures come swimming towards our boat; we could not see him,
but we might hear him by his blowing to be a monstrous huge and
furious beast Xury said it was a lion, and it might be so for aught
I know; but poor Xury cried to me to weigh the anchor and row
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
17
<"
away; No," says I, "Xury; we can slip our cable, with the buoy
to it, and go off to sea; they cannot follow us far." I had no
sooner said so, but I perceived the creature (whatever it was)
within two oars' length, which something surprised me; however, I
immediately stepped to the cabin-door, and taking up my gun, fired
at him; upon which he immediately turned about, and swam
towards the shore again.
But it is impossible to describe the horrid noises, and hideous
cries and howlings that were raised, as well upon the edge of the
shore as higher within the country, upon the noise or report of the
gun, a thing I have some reason to believe those creatures had
never heard before: this convinced me that there was no going on
shore for us in the night on that coast, and how to venture on shore
in the day was another question too; for to have fallen into the
hands of any of the savages had been as bad as to have fallen into
the hands of the lions and tigers; at least we were equally
apprehensive of the danger of it.
Be that as it would, we were obliged to go on shore somewhere
or other for water, for we had not a pint left in the boat; when and
where to get to it was the point. Xury said, if I would let him go
on shore with one of the jars, he would find if there was any water,
and bring some to me. I asked him why he would go? why
should not go, and he stay in the boat? The boy answered with so
much affection as made me love him ever after. Says he, “If wild
mans come, they eat me, you go wey." "Well, Xury," said I,
we will both go, and if the wild mans come, we will kill them,
they shall eat neither of us." So I gave Xury a piece of rusk bread
to eat and a dram out of our patron's case of bottles which I
mentioned before; and we hauled the boat in as near the shore as
we thought was proper, and so waded on shore; carrying nothing
but our arms and two jars for water.
"(
I did not care to go out of sight of the boat, fearing the coming
of canoes with savages down the river; but the boy seeing a low
place about a mile up the country, rambled to it, and by-and-by I
saw him come running towards me. I thought he was pursued by
some savage, or frighted with some wild beast, and I ran forwards
towards him to help him; but when I came nearer to him I saw
something hanging over his shoulders, which was a creature that
he had shot, like a hare, but different in colour, and longer legs:
however, we were very glad of it, and it was very good meat; but
the great joy that poor Xury came with, was to tell me he had
found good water and seen no wild mans.
But we found afterwards that we need not take such pains for
water, for a little higher up the creek where we were we found the
water fresh when the tide was out, which flowed but a little way
up; so we filled our jars, and feasted on the hare we had killed,
and prepared to go on our way, having seen no footsteps of any
human creature in that part of the country.
i
18
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
As I had been one voyage to this coast before, I knew very well
that the islands of the Canaries, and the Cape de Verd Islands
also, lay not far off from the coast. But as I had no instruments te
take an observation to know what latitude we were in, and no!
exactly knowing, or at least remembering, what latitude they were
in, I knew not where to look for them, or when to stand off to sea
towards them; otherwise I might now easily have found some of
these islands. But my hope was, that if I stood along this coast till
I came to that part where the English traded, I should find some
of their vessels upon ´heir usual design of trade, that would relieve
and take us in.
By the best of my calculation, that place where I now was must
be that country which, lying between the Emperor of Morocco's
dominions and the Negroes, lies waste and uninhabited, except by
wild beasts; the Negroes having abandoned it, and gone farther
south, for fear of the Moors; and the Moors not thinking it worth
inhabiting, by reason of its barrenness; and, indeed, both forsaking
it because of the prodigious number of tigers, lions, leopards, and
other furious creatures which harbour there; so that the Moors
use it for their hunting only, where they go like an army, two or
three thousand men at a time: and, indeed, for near a hundred
miles together upon this coast we saw nothing but a waste, un-
inhabited country by day, and heard nothing but howlings and
roaring of wild beasts by night.
Once or twice in the day-time I thought I saw the Pico of
Teneriffe, being the high top of the Mountain Teneriffe in the
Canaries, and had a great mind to venture out, in hopes of reach-
ing thither; but having tried twice, I was forced in again by
contrary winds, the sea also going too high for my little vessel; so
I resolved to pursue my first design, and keep along the shore.
Several times I was obliged to land for fresh water, after we had
left this place; and once in particular, being early in the morning,
we came to an anchor under a little point of land, which was pretty
high; and the tide beginning to flow, we lay still to go farther in.
Xury, whose eyes were more about him than it seems mine were,
calls softly to me, and tells me that we had best go farther off the
shore; "For," says he, "look, yonder lies a dreadful monster on
the side of that hillock, fast asleep." I looked where he pointed,
and saw a dreadful monster indeed, for it was a terrible, great lion
that lay on the side of the shore, under the shade of a piece of the
hill that hung, as it were, a little over him. Xury," says I, you
shall go on shore and kill him. Xury looked frighted, and said,
"Me kill he eat me at one mouth " one mouthful he meant
However, I said no more to the boy, but bade him lie still, and I
took our biggest gun, which was almost musket bore, and loaded it
with a good charge of powder, and with two slugs, and laid it
down; then I loaded another gun with two bullets; and the third
(for we had three pieces) I loaded with five smaller bullets. I took
(C

ROBINSON CRUSOE,
19
the best aim I could with the first piece to have shot him in the
head, but he lay so with his leg raised a little above his nose that
the slugs hit his leg about the knee, and broke the bone. He
started up, growling at first, but finding his leg broken, fell down
again; and then got upon three legs, and gave the most hideous
roar that ever I heard. I was a little surprised that I had not hit
him on the head; however, I took up the second piece imme-
diately, and though he began to move off, fired again, and shot him
in the head, and had the pleasure to see him drop and make but
little noise, but lie struggling for life. Then Xury took heart, and
would have me let him go on shore. "Well, go," said I so the
boy jumped into the water, and taking a little gun in one hand,
swam to shore with the other hand, and coming close to the
creature, put the muzzle of the piece to his ear, and shot him in the
head again, which despatched him quite.
This was game indeed to us, but this was no food; and I was
very sorry to lose three charges of powder and shot upon a creature
that was good for nothing to us. However, Xury said he would
have some of him; so he comes on board, and asked me to give
him the hatchet. "For what, Xury?” said I. "Me cut off his
head," said he. However, Xury could not cut off his head, but he
cut off a foot, and brought it with him, and it was a monstrous
great one.
I bethought myself, however, that perhaps the skin of him might,
one way or other, be of some value to us; and I resolved to take
off his skin if I could. So Xury and I went to work with him; but
Xury was much the better workman at it, for I knew very ill how
to do it. Indeed, it took us both up the whole day, but at last we
got off the hide of him, and spreading it on the top of our cabin, the
sun effectually dried it in two days' time, and it afterwards served
me to lie upon.
CHAPTER IIL
Make for the southward in hopes of meeting with some European vessel
-See savages along shore-Shoot a large leopard-Am taken up by a
merchantman-Arrive at the Brazila, and buy a settlement there-
Cannot be quiet, but sail on a voyage of adventure to Guines-Ship
strikes on a sandbank in unknown land-All lost but myself, who am
driven ashore half dead.
A
FTER this stop, we made on to the southward con-
tinually for ten or twelve days, living very sparingly
on our provisions, which began to abate very much,
and going no oftener to the shore than we were
obliged to for fresh water. My design in this was to
make the River Gambia or Senegal, that is to say, anywhere about

20
life and adventures of
the Cape de Verd, where I was in hopes to meet with some
European ship; and if I did not, I knew not what course I had to
take, but to seek for the islands, or perish there among the
Negroes. I knew that all the ships from Europe, which sailed
either to the coast of Guinea, or to Brazil, or to the East Indies,
made this Cape, or those islands; and, in a word, I put the whole
of my fortune upon this single point, either that I must meet with
some ship or must perish.
When I had pursued this resolution about ten days longer, as I
have said, I began to see that the land was inhabited; and in two
or three places, as we sailed by, we saw people stand upon the
shore to look at us; we could also perceive they were quite black
and naked. I was once inclined to have gone on shore to them;
but Xury was my better counsellor, and said to me,
CC No go, no
go." However, I hauled in nearer the shore that I might talk to
them, and I found they ran along the shore by me a good way. I
observed they had no weapons in their hand, except one, who had
a long slender stick, which Xury said was a lance, and that they
could throw them a great way with good aim; so I kept at a
distance, but talked with them by signs as well as I could; and
particularly made signs for something to eat they beckoned to me
to stop my boat, and they would fetch me some meat. Upon this,
I lowered the top of my sail and lay by, and two of the ran up
into the country, and in less than half-an-hour came back, and
brought with them two pieces of dried flesh and some corn, such as
is the produce of their country; but we neither knew what the one
or the other was; however, we were willing to accept it, but how to
come at it was our next dispute, for I would not venture on shore
to them, and they were as much afraid of us; but they took a safe
way for us all, for they brought it to the shore and laid it down, and
went and stood a great way off till we fetched it on board, and then
came close to us again.
We made signs of thanks to them, for we had nothing to make
them amends; but an opportunity offered that very instant to
oblige them wonderfully; for while we were lying by the shore
came two mighty creatures, one pursuing the other (as we took it)
with great fury from the mountains towards the sea; whether it
was the male pursuing the female, or whether they were in sport or
in rage, we could not tell, any more than we could tell whether
was usual or strange, but I believe it was the latter; because, in
the first place, those ravenous creatures seldom appear but in the
night, `and, in the second place, we found the people terribly
frighted, especially the women, The man that had the lance or
dart did not fly from them, but the rest did; however, as the two
creatures ran directly into the water, they did not offer to fall upon
any of the Negroes, but plunged themselves into the sea, and swam
about, as if they had come for their diversion; at last one of them
began to come nearer our boat than at first I expected; but I lay
܀ ܐ
M
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
ready for him, for I had loaded my gun with all possible expedition,
and bade Xury load both the others. As soon as he came fairly
within my reach, I fired, and shot him directly in the head; im-
mediately he sank down into the water, but rose instantly, and
plunged up and down, as if he was struggling for life, and so indeed
he was; he immediately made to the shore; but between the
wound, which was his mortal hurt, and the strangling of the water,
he died just before he reached the shore. í
It is impossible to express the astonishment of these poor
creatures at the noise and fire of my gun; some of them were even
ready to die for fear, and fell down as dead with the very terror;
but when they saw the creature dead, and sunk in the water, and
that I made signs to them to come to the shore, they took heart
and came, and began to search for the creature. I found him by
his blood staining the water; and by the help of a rope, which I
slung round him, and gave the Negroes to haul, they dragged him
on shore, and found that it was a most curious leopard, spotted,
and fine to an admirable degree; and the Negroes held up their
hands with admiration, to think what it was I had killed him with.
The other creature, frighted with the flash of fire and the noise of
the gun, swam on shore, and ran up directly to the mountains from
whence they came; nor could I, at that distance, know what it
wag I found quickly the Negroes wished to eat the flesh of this
creature, so I was willing to have them take it as a favour from
me; which, when I made signs to them that they might take him,
they were very thankful for. Immediately they fell to work with
him; and though they had no knife, yet, with a sharpened piece of
wood, they took off his skin as readily, and much more readily,
than we could have done with a knife. They offered me some of
the flesh, which I declined, pointing out that I would give it them;
but made signs for the skin, which they gave me very freely, and
brought me a great deal more of their provisions, which, though I
did not understand, yet I accepted. I then made signs to them
for some water, and held out one of my jars to them, turning it
bottom upward, to show that it was empty, and that I wanted to
have it filled They called immediately to some of their friends,
and there came two women, and brought a great vessel made of
earth, and burnt, as I supposed, in the sun; this they set down to
me, as before, and I sent Xury on shore with my jars, and filled
them all three. The women were as naked as the men.
I was now furnished with roots and corn, such as it was, and
water; and leaving my friendly Negroes, I made forward for about
eleven days more, without offering to go near the shore, till I saw
the land run out a great length into the sea, at about the distance
of four or five leagues before me; and the sea being very calm, I
kept a large offing to make this point. At length, doubling the
point, at about two leagues from the land, I saw plainly land on the
other side, to seaward; then I concluded, as 'it was most certain
33
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
indeed, that this was the Cape de Verd, and those the island.
called, from thence, Cape de Verd Islands. However, they were
at a great distance, and I could not well tell what I had best to do;
for if I should be taken with a fresh of wind, I might neither reach
one or other.
In this dilemma, as I was very pensive, I stepped into the cabin,
and sat down, Xury having the helm; when, on a sudden, the boy
cried out, "Master, master, a ship with a sail !" and the foolish boy
was frighted out of his wits, thinking it must needs be some of his
master's ships sent to pursue us, but I knew we were far enough
out of their reach. I jumped out of the cabin, and immediately
saw, not only the ship, but that it was a Portuguese ship; and, as
I thought, was bound to the coast of Guinea, for Negroes. But,
when I observed the course she steered, I was soon convinced they
were bound some other way, and did not design to come any nearer
to the shore; upon which I stretched out to sea as much as I
could, resolving to speak with them if possible.
With all the sail I could make, I found I should not be able to
come in their way, but that they would be gone by before I could
make any signal to them; but after I had crowded to the utmost,
and began to despair, they, it seems, saw by the help of their glasses
that it was some European boat, which they supposed must belong
to some ship that was lost; so they shortened sail to let me come
up I was encouraged with this, and as I had my patron's ancient
on board, I made a waft of it to them, for a signal of distress, and
fired a gun, both which they saw; for they told me they saw the
smoke, though they did not hear the gun. Upon these signals they
very kindly brought to, and lay by for me; and in about three
hours' time I came up with them.
They asked me what I was, in Portuguese, and in Spanish, and
in French, but I understood none of them; but at last a Scotch
sailor, who was on board, called to me and I answered him, and
told him I was an Englishman, that I had made my escape out of
slavery from the Moors, at Sallee; they then bade me come on
board, and very kindly took me in, and all my goods.
It was an inexpressible joy to me, which any one will belleve,
that I was thus delivered, as I esteemed it, from such a miserable
and almost hopeless condition as I was in; and I immediately
offered all I had to the captain of the ship, as a return for my
deliverance; but he generously told me he would take nothing
from me, but that all I had should be delivered safe to me when Ï
came to the Brazils. "For," says he, "I have saved your life on
no other terms than I would be glad to be saved myself: and it
may, one time or other, be my lot to be taken up in the same
condition. Besides," said he, "when I carry you to the Brazils, so
great a way from your own country, if I should take from you what
you have, you will be starved there, and then I only take away that
life I have given. No, no," says he : “Seignor Inglese" (Mr. Eng-
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
fishman), "I will carry you thither in charity, and those things will
help to buy your subsistence there, and your passage home again."
As he was charitable in this proposal, so he was just in the
performance to a tittle for he ordered the seamen that none
should touch anything that I had: then he took everything into
his own possession, and gave me back an exact inventory of them,
that I might have them, even to my three earthen jars.
As to my boat, it was a very good one; and that he saw, and
told me he would buy it of me for his snip's use; and asked me
what I would have for it? I told him he had been so generous to
me in everything that I could not ofter to make any price of the
boat, but left it entirely to him : upon which he told me he would
give me a note of hand to pay me eighty pieces of eight for it at
Brazil; and when it came there, if any one offered to give more, he
would make it up. He offered me also sixty pieces of eight more
for my boy Xury, which I was loath to take; not that I was
unwilling to let the captain have him, but I was very loath to sell
the poor boy's liberty, who had assisted me so faithfully in
procuring my own. However, when I let him know my reason, he
owned it to be just, and offered me this medium, that he would give
the boy an obligation to set him free in ten years, if he turned
Christian: upon this, and Xury saying he was willing to go to him,
I let the captain have him.
}
We had a very good voyage to the Brazils, and I arrived in the
Bay de Todos los Santos, or All Saints' Bay, in about twenty-two
days after. And now I was once more delivered from the most
miserable of all conditions of life; and what to do next with myself
I was to consider.
The generous treatment the captain gave me I can never enough
remember: he would take nothing of me for my passage, gave me
twenty ducats for the leopard's skin, and forty for the lion's skin,
which I had in my boat, and caused everything I had in the ship
to be punctually delivered to me; and what I was willing to sell he
bought of me, such as the case of bottles, two of my guns, and a
piece of the lump of bees'-wax-for I had made candles of the
rest in a word, I made about two hundred and twenty pieces of
eight of all my cargo; and with this stock I went on shore in the
Brazils.
I had not beer long here before I was recommended to the house
of a good, honest man, like himself, who had an ingenio, as they
call it (that is, a plantation and a sugar-house) I lived with him
some time, and acquainted myself, by that means, with the manner
of planting and making of sugar; and seeing how well the planters
lived, and how they got rich suddenly, I resolved, if I could get a
license to settle there, I would turn planter among them: resolving,
in the meantime, to find out some way to get my money, which I
had left in London, remitted to me. To this purpose, getting a
kind of letter of naturalisation, I purchased as much land that was
34
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
uncured as my money would reach, and formed a plan for my
plantation and settlement; such a one as might be suitable to the
stock which I proposed to myself to receive from England.
I had a neighbour, a Portuguese, of Lisbon, but born of English
parents, whose name was Wells, and in much such circumstances
as I was. I call him my neighbour, because his plantation lay next
to mine, and we went on very sociably together. My stock was but
low, as well as his; and we rather planted for food than anything
else, for about two years. However, we began to increase, and
our land began to come into order; so that the third year we
planted some tobacco, and made each of us a large piece of ground
ready for planting canes in the year to come. But we both wanted
help; and now I found, more than before, I had done wrong in
parting with my boy Xury.
But, alas! for me to do wrong that never did right, was no great
wonder. I had no remedy but to go on: I had got into an employ-
ment quite remote to my genius, and directly contrary to the life I
delighted in, and for which I forsook my father's house, and broke
through all his good advice. Nay, was coming into the very
middle station, or upper degree of Iw life, which my father advised
me to before, and which, if I resolved to go on with, I might as well
have stayed at home, and never have fatigued myself in the world
as I had done; and I used often to say to myself, I could have
done this as well in England, among my friends, as have gone five
thousar miles off to do it among strangers and savages, in a
wilderness, and at such a distance as never to hear from any part of
the world that had the least knowledge of me.
In this manner I used to look upon my condition with the utmost
egret I had nobody to converse with, but now and then this
neighbour; no work to be done, but by the labour of my hands;
and I used to say, I lived just like a man cast away upon some
desolate island, that had nobody there but himself. But how just
has it been--and how should all men reflect, that when they
compare their present conditions with others that are worse, heaven
may oblige them to make the exchange, and be convinced of their
former felicity by their experience-I say, how just has it been, that
the truly solitary life I reflected on, in an island of mere desolation,
should be my lot, who had so often unjustly compared it with the
life which I then ved, in which, had I continued, I had, in all
probability, been exceeding prosperous and rich.
I was, in some degree, settled in my measures for carrying on
the plantation before my kind friend, the captain of the ship that
took me up at sea, went back-for the ship remained there, in pro-
viding his lading and preparing for his voyage, nearly three months;
when telling him what little stock I had left behind me in London,
he gave me this friendly and sincere advice:-"Seignor Inglese,"
says he (for so he always called me), “if you will give me letters,
and a procuration in form to me, with orders to the person who has
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
25
your money in London to send your effects to Lisbon, to such per-
sons as I shall direct, and in such goods as are proper for this
country, I will bring you the produce of them, God willing, at my
return; but,'nce human affairs are all subject to changes and
disasters, I would have you give orders but for one hundred pounds
sterling, which, you say, is half your stock, and let the hazard be
run for the first; so that, if it come safe, you may order the rest the
same way, and, if it miscarry, you may have the other half to have
recourse to for your supply."
This was so wholesome advice, and looked so friendry, that I
could not but be convinced it was the best course I could take; so
I accordingly prepared letters to the gentlewoman with whom I
had left my money, and a procuration to the Portuguese captain, as
be desired.
I wrote the English captain's widow a full account of all my
adventures-my slavery, escape, and how I had met with the
Portuguese captain at sea, the humanity of his behaviour, and what
condition I was now in, with all other necessary directions for my
supply; and when this honest captain came to Lisbon, he found
means, by some of the English merchants there, to send over, not
the order only, but a full account of my story to a merchant in Lon-
don, who represented it effectually to her; whereupon she not only
delivered the money, but out of her own pocket sent the Portugal
captain a very handsome present for his humanity and charity to
me.
The merchant in London, vesting this hundred pounds in English
goods, such as the captain had written for, sent them directly to him
at Lisbon, and he brought them all safe to me to the Brazils;
among which, without my direction (for I was too young in my
business to think of them), he had taken care to have all sorts of
tools, ironwork, and utensils necessary for my plantation, and
which were of great use to me.
When this cargo arrived I thought my fortune made, for I was
surprised with the joy of it; and my good steward, the captain, had
laid out the five pounds, which my friend had sent him for a present
for himself, to purchase and bring me over a servant, under bond
for six years' service, and would not accept of any consideration,
except a little tobacco, which I would have him accept, being of my
own produce.
Neither was this all; for my goods being all English manu-
facture, such as cloths, stuffs, baize, and things particularly valuable
and desirable in the country, I found means to sell them to a very
great advantage; so that I might say I had more than four times
the value of my first cargo, and was now infinitely beyond my poor
neighbour-I mean in the advancement of my plantation; for the
first thing I did, I bought me a negro slave, and an European
servant also-I mean another besides that which the captain
brought me from Lisbon
#6
life and adventures of
But as abused prosperity is oftentimes made the very means of
our greatest adversity, so it was with me. I went on the next
year with great success in my plantation: I raised fifty great rolls
of tobacco on my own ground more than I had disposed of for
necessaries among my neighbours; and these fifty rolls, being each
of above a hundredweight, were well cured, and laid by against the
return of the fleet from Lisbon: and now increasing in business
and wealth, my head began to be full of projects and undertakings
beyond my reach; such as are, indeed, often the ruin of the best
heads in business. Had I continued in the station I was now in, I
had room for all the happy things to have yet befallen me for
which my father so earnestly recommended a quiet, retired life,
and of which he had so sensibly described the middle station of
life to be full of; but other things attended me, and I was still to
be the wilful agent of all my own miseries; and particularly, to
increase my fault, and double the reflections upon myself, which in
my future sorrows I should have leisure to make, all these mis-
carriages were procured by my apparent obstinate adhering to my
foolish inclination of wandering abroad, and pursuing that inclina-
tion, in contradiction to the clearest views of doing myself good in
a fair and plain pursuit of those prospects, and those measures of
life, which nature and Providence concurred to present me with,
and to make my duty.
As I had once done thus in my breaking away from my parents,
so I could not be content now, but I must go and leave the happy
view I had of being a rich and thriving man in my new plantation,
only to pursue a rash and immoderate desire of rising faster than
the nature of the thing admitted; and thus I cast myself down
again into the deepest gulf of human misery that ever man fell into,
or perhaps could be consistent with life and a state of health in the
world.
:
To come, then, by the just degrees, to the particulars of this part
of my story :--You may suppose, that having now lived almost four
years in the Brazils, and beginning to thrive and prosper very well
upon my plantation, I had not only learned the language, but had
contracted acquaintance and friendship among my fellow-planters,
as well as among the merchants a: St. Salvador, which was our
port; and that, in my discourses among them, I had frequently
given them an account of my two voyages to the coast of Guinea:
the manner of trading with the Negroes there, and how easy it was
to purchase upon the coast for trifles-such as beads, toys, knives,
scissors, hatchets, bits of glass, and the like-not only gold dust,
Guinea grains, elephants' teeth, etc., but Negroes, for the service of
the Brazils, in great numbers.
They listened always very attentively to my discourses on these
heads, but especially to that part which related to the buying of
Negroes, which was a trade at that time, not only not far entered
into, but, as far as it was, had been carried on by assientos, or
ROBINSON CRUSOB.
permission of the kings of Spain and Portugal, and engrossed in
the public stock: so that few Negroes were bought, and those
excessively dear.
It happened, being in company with some merchants and
planters of my acquaintance, and talking of those things very
earnestly, three of them came to me next morning, and told me
they had been musing very much upon what I had discoursed with
them of the last night, and they came to make a secret proposal to
me; and, after enjoining me secrecy, they told me that they had a
mind to fit out a ship to go to Guinea; that they had all planta-
tions as well as I, and were straitened for nothing so much as
servants; that as it was a trade that could not be carried on,
because they could not publicly sell the Negroes when they came
home, so they desired to make but one voyage, to bring the
Negroes on shore privately, and divide them among their own
plantations; and, in a word, the question was, whether I would go
their supercargo in the ship, to manage the trading part upon the
coast of Guinea; and they offered me that I should have my equal
share of the Negroes, without providing any part of the stock.
This was a fair proposal, it must be confessed, had it been made
to any one that had not had a settlement and a plantation of his
own to look after, which was in a fair way of coming to be very
considerable, and with a good stock upon it; but for me, that was
thus entered and established, and had nothing to do but to go on as
I had begun, for three or four years more, and to have sent for the
other hundred pounds from England; and who in that time, and
with that little addition, could scarce have failed of being worth
three or four thousand pounds sterling, and that increasing too-
for me to think of such a voyage was the most preposterous thing
that ever man in such circumstances could be guilty of.
But I, that was born to be my own destroyer, could no more
resist the offer than I could restrain my first rambling designs
when my father's good counsel was lost upon me. In a word, I
told them I would go with all my heart, if they would undertake to
look after my plantation in my absence, and would dispose of it to
such as I should direct, if I miscarried. This they all engaged to
do, and entered into writings or covenants to do so; and I made a
formal will, disposing of my plantation and effects in case of my
death, making the captain of the ship that had saved my life, as
before, my universal heir, but obliging him to dispose of my effects
as I had directed in my will; one half of the produce being to
himself, and the other be shipped in England.

In short, I took al ible caution to preserve my effects and
to keep up my plan.no Had I used half as much prudence to
have looked into ay wp interest, and have made a judgment of
what I ought to have done and not to have done, I had certainly
never gone away from so prosperous an undertaking, leaving all the
probable views of a thriving circumstance, and gone upon a voyage
28.
LIFE AND ADventures of
to sea, attended with all its common hazards, to say nothing of the
reasons I had to expect particular misfortunes to myself.
But I was hurried on, and obeyed blindly the dictates of my
fancy rather than my reason, and, accordingly, the ship being
ntted out, and the cargo furnished, and all things done, as by agree-
ment, by my partners in the voyage, I went on board in an evil
hour, the 1st September 1659, being the same day eight years that
I went from my father and mother at Hull, in order to act the rebel
to their authority, and the fool to my own interests.
Our ship was about one hundred and twenty tons burden, carried
six guns and fourteen men, besides the master, his boy, and myself.
We had on board no large cargo of goods, except of such toys as
were fit for our trade with the Negroes, such as beads, bits of glass,
shells, and other trifles, especially little looking-glasses, knives,
scissors, hatchets, and the like.
The same day I went on board we set sail, standing away to the
northward upon our own coast, with design to stretch over for the
African coast when we came about ten or twelve degrees of
northern latitude, which, it seems, was the manner of course in
those days. We had very good weather, only excessively hot, all
the way upon our own coast, till we came to the height of Cape St.
Augustino; from whence, keeping further off at sea, we lost sight
of land, and steered as if we were bound for the isle Fernando de
Noronha, holding our course N.E. by N., and leaving those isles on
the east. In this course we passed the line in about twelve days'
time, and were, by our last observation, in seven degrees twenty-
two minutes northern latitude, when a violent tornado, or hurricane,
took us quite out of our knowledge. It began from the south-east,
came about to the north-west, and then settled in the north-east ;
fron, whence it blew in such a terrible manner, that for twelve days
together we could do nothing but drive, and, scudding away before
it, let it carry us whither ever fate and the fury of the winds
directed; and, during these twelve days, I need not say that I
expected every day to be swallowed up; nor, indeed, did any in the
ship expect to save their lives.
In this distress we had, besides the terror of the storm, one of
our men die of the calenture, and one man and the boy washed
overboard. About the twelfth day, the weather abating a little, the
master made an observation as well as he could, and found that he
was in about eleven degrees north latitude, but that he was twenty-
two degrees of longitude difference west from Cape St. Augustino;
so that he found he was upon the coast of Guiana, or the north part
of Brazil, beyond the river Amazons, towards that of the river
Oroonoque, commonly called the Great River, and began to
consult with me what course he should take, for the ship was leaky,
and very much disabled, and he was going directly back to the
coast of Brazil.
I was positively against that; and looking over the charts of the
ROBINSON CRUSoe.
sea-coast of America with him, we concluded there was no inhabited
country for us to have recourse to till we came within the circle of
the Caribbee Islands, and therefore resolved to stand away for
Barbadoes; which, by keeping off at sea, to avoid the indraft of
the Bay or Gulf of Mexico, we might easily perform, as we hoped,
in about fifteen days' sail; whereas we could not possibly make our
voyage to the coast of Africa, without some assistance both to our
ship and to ourselves.
With this design we changed our course, and steered away
N.W. by W., in order to reach some of our English islands, where
I hoped for relief. But our voyage was otherwise determined; for,
being in the latitude of twelve degrees eighteen minutes, a second
storm came upon us, which carried us away with the same im-
petuosity westward, and drove us so out of the way of all human
commerce, that, had all our lives been saved as to the sea, we were
rather in danger of being devoured by savages than ever returning
to our own country.
In this distress, the wind still blowing very hard, one of our men
early in the morning cried out, "Land !" and we had no sooner
run out of the cabin to look out, in hopes of seeing whereabouts in
the world we were, than the ship struck upon a sand, and in a
moment, her motion being so stopped, the sea broke over her in
such a manner that we expected we should all have perished im-
mediately; and we were immediately driven into our close quarters,
to shelter us from the very foam and spray of the sea.
It is not easy for any one who has not been in the like condition
to describe or conceive the consternation of men in such circum-
stances. We knew nothing where we were, or upon what land it
was we were driven-whether an island or the main, whether
inhabited or not inhabited. As the rage of the wind was still great,
though rather less than at first, we could not so much as hope to
have the ship hold many autos without breaking into pieces,
unless the winds, by a kind of miracle, should turn immediately
about. In a word, we sat looking upon one another, and expecting
death every moment, and every man, accordingly, preparing for
another world; for there was little or nothing more for us to do in
this. That which was our present comfort, and all the comfort we
had, was that, contrary to our expectation, the ship did not break
yet, and that the master said the wind began to abate.
Now, though we thought that the wind did a little abate, yet the
ship having thus struck upon the sand, and sticking tos ast for
us to expect her getting off, we were in a dreadful condition indeed,
and had nothing to do but to think of saving our lives as well as we
could. We had a boat at our stern just before the storm, but she
was first staved by dashing against the ship's rudder, and in the
next place she broke away, and either sunk, or was driven off to
sea; so there was no hope from her. We had another boat on
board, but how to get her off into the sea was a doubtful thing,
کر
30
LIFE AND ADVENTUREs of
持
​However, there was no time to debate, for we fancied that the ship
would break in pieces every minute, and some told us she was
actually broken already.
In this distress the mate of our vessel laid hold of the boat, and
with the help of the rest of the men got her slung over the ship's
side; and getting all into her, let go, and committed ourselves,
being eleven in number, to God's mercy and the wild sea; for
though the storm was abated considerably, yet the sea ran dread-
fully high upon the shore, and might be well called den wild zee, as
the Dutch call the sea in a storm.
And now our case was very dismal indeed; for we all saw plainly
that the sea went so high that the boat could not live, and that we
should be inevitably drowned. As to making sail, we had none,
nor if we had could we have done anything with it; so we worked
at the oar towards the land, though with heavy hearts, like men
going to execution; for we all knew that when the boat came near
the shore she would be dashed in a thɔusand pieces by the breach
of the sea. However, we committed our souls to God in the most
earnest manner; and the wind driving us towards the shore, we
hastened our destruction with our own hands, pulling as well as we
could towards land.
What the shore was, whether rock or sand, whether steep or
shoal, we knew not. The only hope that could rationally give us
the least shadow of expectation was, if we might find some bay or
gulf, or the mouth of some river, where by great chance we might
have run our boat in, or got under the lee of the land, and perhaps
made smooth water. But there was nothing like this appeared;
but as we made nearer and nearer the shore, the land looked more
frightful than the sea.
After we had rowed, a rather driven about a league and a half,
as we reckoned it, a raging wave, mountain-like, came rolling
astern of us, and plainly bade us expect the coup de grace.
It took
us with such a fury, that it overset the boat at once; and separat-
ing us, as well from the boat as from one another, gave us no time
to say, “O God!
O God! or we were all swallowed up in a moment.
Nothing can describe the confusion of thought which I felt when
I sank into the water; for though I swam very well, yet I could
not deliver myself from the waves so as to draw breath, till that
wave having driven me, or rather carried me, a vast way on towards
the shore, and having spent itself, went back, and left me upon the
land almost dry, but half-dead with the water I took in. had so
much presence mind, as well as breath left, that seemg myself
nearer the mainland than I expected, I got upon my feet, and
endeavoured to make on towards the land as fast as I could before
another wave should return and take me up again; but I soon
found it was impossible to avoid it; for I saw the sea come after
me as high as a great hill, and as furious as an enemy, which I had
no means or strength to contend with: my business was to hold my
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
31
breath, and raise myself upon the water, if I could; and so, by
swimming, to preserve my breathing, and pilot myself towards the
shore, if possible, my greatest concern now being that the sea, as it
would carry me a great way towards the shore when it came on,
might not carry me back again with it when it gave back towards
the sea
The wave that came upon me again buried me at once twenty or
thirty feet deep in its own body, and I could feel myself carried
with a mighty force and swiftness towards the shore a very great
way; but I held my breath, and assisted myself to swim still
forward with all my might. I was ready to burst with holding my
Sreath, when, as I felt myself rising up, so, to my immediate relief,
I found my head and hands shoot out above the surface of the
water; and though it was not two seconds of time that I could keep
myself so, yet it relieved me greatly, gave me breath, and new courage.
I was covered again with water a good while, but not so long
but I held it out; and finding the water had spent itself, and began
to return, I struck forward against the return of the waves, and felt
ground again with my feet. I stood still a few moments to recover
breath, and till the waters went from me, and then took to my heels
and ran with what strength I had further towards the shore. But
neither would this deliver me from the fury of the sea, which came
pouring in after me again; and twice more I was lifted up by the
waves and carried forward as before, the shore being very flat.
The last time of these two had well-nigh been fatal to me, for
the sea having hurried me along, as before, landed me, or rather
dashed me, against a piece of rock, and that with such force, that it
left me senseless, and indeed helpless, as to my own deliverance;
for the blow taking my side and breast, beat the breath, as it
were, quite out of my body; and had it returned again imme-
diately, I must have been strangled in the water; but I recovered
a little before the return of the waves, and seeing I should be
covered again with the water, I resolved to hold fast by a piece
of the rock, and so to hold my breath, if possible, till the wave
went back Now, as the waves were not so high as at first, being
nearer land, I held my hold till the wave abated, and then fetched
another run, which brought me so near the shore, that the next
wave, though it went over me, yet did not so swallow me up as to
carry me away; and the next run I took, I got to the main land,
where, to my great comfort, I clambered up the cliffs of the shore,
and sat me down upon the grass, free from danger and quite out of
the reach of the water.
I was now landed ana safe on shore, and began to look up and
thank God that my life was saved, in a case wherein there was,
some minutes before, scarce any room to hope. I believe it is
impossible to express, to the life, what the ecstasies and transports
of the soul are, when it is so saved, as I may say, out of the very
grave : and I do not wonder now at the custom, when a malefactor,
33
life and adventures of
who has the halter about his neck, is tied up, and just going to be
turned off, and has a reprieve brought to him-I say, I do not
wonder that they bring a surgeon with it, to let him blood that
very moment they tell him of it, that the surprise may not drive
the animal spirits from the heart and overwhelm him.
"For sudden joys, like griefs, confound at first.'
I walked about on the shore lifting up my hands, and my whole
being, as I may say, wrapt up in a contemplation of my deliverance ;
making a thousand gestures and motions, which I cannot describe;
reflecting upon all my comrades that were drowned, and that there
should not be one soul saved but myself; for, as for them, I never
saw them afterwards, or any sign of them, except three of their
hats, one cap, and two shoes that were not fellows.
I cast my eye to the stranded vessel, when, the breach and froth
of the sea being so big, I could hardly see it, it lay so far off; and
considered, Lord! how was it possible I could get on shore?
After I had solaced my mind with the comfortable part of my
condition, I began to look round me, to see what kind of place I
was in, and what was next to be done; and I soon found my
comforts abate, and that, in a word, I had a dreadful deliverance;
for I was wet, had no clothes to shift me, nor anything either to eat
or drink to comfort me; neither did I see any prospect before me
but that of perishing with hunger or being devoured by wild beasts;
and that which was particularly afflicting to me was, that I had no
weapon, either to hunt and kill any creature for my sustenance, or
to defend myself against any other creature that might desire to
kill me for theirs. In a word, I had nothing about me but a knife,
a tobacco-pipe, and a little tobacco in a box. This was all my
provisions; and this threw me into terrible agonies of mind, that
for a while I ran about like a madman. Night coming upon
me, I began, with a heavy heart, to consider what would be my
lot if there were any ravenous beasts in that country, as at night
they always come abroad for their prey.
All the remedy that offered to my thoughts at that time, was to
get up into a thick bushy tree like a fir, but thorny, which grew near
me, and where I resolved to sit all night, and consider the next day
what death I should die, for as yet I saw no prospect of life. I
walked about a furlong from the shore, to see if I could find any
fresh water to drink, which I did, to my great joy; and having
drank, and put a little tobacco into my mouth to prevent hunger,
went to the tree, and getting up into it, endeavoured to place my-
self so that if I should sleep I might not fall. And having cut me
a short stick, like a truncheon, for my defence, I took up my
lodging; and having been excessively fatigued, I fell fast asleep,
and slept as comfortably as, I believe, few could have done in my
condition, and found myself more refreshed with it than, I think, I
tver was oa such an occasion,
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
85

CHAPTER IV.
Appearance of the wreck and country next day-Swim on board of the
ship, and, by means of a contrivance, get a quantity of stores on
shore-Shoot a bird, but it turns out perfect carrion-Moralise upon
my situation-The ship blown off land, and totally lost-Set out in
search of a proper place for a habitation-See numbers of goats-
Melancholy reflections.
W
in
HEN I waked it was broad day, the weather clear,
and the storm abated, so that the sea did not rage
and swell as before. But that which surprised me
most was, that the ship was lifted off in the night
from the sand where she lay by the swelling of the
tide, and was driven up almost as far as the rock which I at first
mentioned, where I had been so bruised by the wave dashing me
against it. This being within about a mile from the shore where I
was, and the ship seeming to stand upright still, I wished myself
on board, that at least I might save some necessary things for my
use.
When I came down from my apartment in the tree, I looked
about me again, and the first thing I found was the boat, which lay,
as the wind and the sea had tossed her up, upon the land, about
two miles on my right hand. I walked as far as I could upon the
shore to have got to her; but found a neck or inlet of water
between me and the boat which was about half-a-mile broad; so I
came back for the present, being more intent upon getting at the
ship, where I hoped to find something for my present subsistence.
A little after noon I found the sea very calm, and the tide ebbed
so far out that I could come within a quarter of a mile of the ship.
And here I found a fresh renewing of my grief; for I saw
evidently, that if we had kept on board, we had been all safe-that
is to say, we had all got safe on shore, and I had not been so
miserable as to be left entirely destitute of all comfort and company
as I now was, This forced tears to my eyes again; but as there
was little relief in that, I resolved, if possible, to get to the ship; so
I pulled off my clothes-for the weather was het to extremity-and
took the water, But when I came to the ship my difficulty was
still greater to knew how to get on board; for, as she lay aground,
and high out of the water, there was nothing within my reach to
lay hold of. I swam round her twice, and the second time I spied
a small piece of rope, which I wondered I did not see at first, hung
down by the fore-chains so low, as that with great difficulty I got
hold of it, and by the help of that rope I got up into the forecastle
of the ship. Here I found that the ship was bulged, and had

34
life and adventures of
6
great deal of water in her hold, but that she lay so on the side of a
bank of hard sand, or rather earth, that her stern lay lifted up upon
the bank, and her head low, almost to the water. By this means
all her quarter was free, and all that was in that part was dry; for
you may be sure my first work was to search, and to see what was
spoiled and what was free. And, first, I found that all the ship
provisions were dry and untouched by the water, and being Very
well disposed to eat, I went to the bread-room and filled my
pockets with biscuit, and ate it as I went about other things, or I
had no time to lose. I also found some rum in the great cabin, of
which I took a large dram, and which I had, indeed, need enough
of to spirit me for what was before me. Now I wanted nothing but
a boat to furnish myself with many things which I foresaw would
be very necessary to me.
It was in vain to sit still and wish for what was not to be had;
and this extremity roused my application. We had several spare
yards, and two or three large spars of wood, and a spare top-mast
or two in the ship: I resolved to fall to work with these, and I flung
as many of them overboard as I could manage for their weight,
tying every one with a rope, that they might not drive away.
When this was done I went down the ship's side, and pulling them
to me, I tied four of them together at both ends as well as I could,
in the form of a raft, and laying two or three short pieces of plank
upon them cross-ways, I found I could walk upon it very well, but
that it was not able to bear any great weight, the pieces being too
light. So I went to work, and with a carpenter's saw I cut a spare
top-mast into three lengths, and added them to my raft, with a
great deal of labour and pains. But the hope of furnishing myself
with necessaries encouraged me to go beyond what I should have
been able to have done upon another occasion.
My raft was now strong enough to bear any reasonable weight.
My next care was what to load it with, and how to preserve what I
laid upon it from the surf of the sea; but I was not long con-
sidering this. I first laid all the plank or boards upon it that I
could get, and having considered well what I most wanted, I first
got three of the seamen's chests, which I had broken open and
emptied, and lowered them down upon my raft; the first of these I
filled with provisions-viz., bread, rice, three Dutch cheeses, five
pieces of dried goat's flesh (which we lived much upon), and a little
remainder of European corn, which had been laid by for some fowls
which we brought to sea with us, but the fowls were killed. There
had been some barley and wheat together; but, to my great dis-
appointment, I found afterwards that the rats had eaten or spoiled
it all As for liquors, I found several cases of bottles belonging to
our skipper, in which were some cordial waters; and, in all, about
five or six gallons of rack. These I stowed by themselves, there
being no need to put then. into the chest, nor any room for them.
While I was doing this, I found the tide begin to flow, though very
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
35
calm ; and I had the mortification to see my coat, shirt, and waist-
coat, which I had left on the shore, upon the sand, swim away. As
for my breeches, which were only linen, and open-knee'd, I swam
on board in them and my stockings. However, this set me on
rummaging for clothes, of which I found enough, but took no more
than I wanted for present use, for I had other things which my eye
was more upon-as, first, tools to work with on shore. And it was
after long searching that I found out the carpenter's chest, which
was, indeed, a very useful prize to me, and much more valuable
than a ship-load of gold would have been at that time. I got it
down to my raft, whole as it was, without losing time to look into
it, for I knew in general what it contained.
There were
My next care was for some ammunition and arms.
two very good fowling-pieces in the great cabin, and two pistols.
These I secured first, with some powder-horns and a small bag of
shot, and two old rusty swords. I knew there were three barrels
of powder in the ship, but knew not where our gunner had stowed
them; but with much search I found them, two of them dry and
good, the third had taken water. Those two I got to my raft, with
the arms. And now I thought myself pretty well freighted, and
began to think how I should get to shore with them, having neither
sail, oar, nor rudder; and the least capful of wind would have over-
set all my navigation.
I had three encouragements-Ist, a smooth, calm sea; 2ndly, the
tide rising, and setting in to the shore; 3rdly, what little wind there
was blew me towards the land. And thus, having found two or
three broken oars belonging to the boat-and, besides the tools
which were in the chest, I found two saws, an axe, and a hammer ;
with this cargo I put to sea. For a mile or thereabouts my raft
went very well, only that I found it drive a little distant from the
place where I had landed before; by which I perceived that there
was some indraft of the water, and consequently, I hoped to find
some creek or river there, which I might make use of as a port
to get to land with my cargo.
As I imagined, so it was. There appeared before me a little
opening of the land, and I found a strong current of the tide set
into it; so I guided my raft as well as I could, to keep in the
middle of the stream.
But here I had like to have suffered a second shipwreck, which,
if I had, I think, verily, would have broken my heart; for, knowing
nothing of the coast, my raft ran aground at one end of it upon a
shoal, and not being aground at the other end, it wanted but a little
that all my cargo had slipped off towards the end that was afloat,
and so fallen into the water.. I did my utmost, by setting my back
against the chests, to keep them in their places, but could not
thrust off the raft with all my strength; neither durst I stir from
the posture I was in; but holding up the chests with all my might,
I stood in that manner near half-an-hour, in which time the rising
36
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
of the water brought me a little more upon a level; and a little
after, the water still rising, my raft floated again, and I thrust her off
with the oar I had into the channel, and then driving up higher, I at
length found myself in the mouth of a little river, with land on both
sides, and a strong current of tide running up. I looked on both
sides for a proper place to get to shore, for I was not willing to be
driven too high up the river: hoping, in time, to see some ship at sea,
and therefore resolved to place myself as near the coast as I could.
At length I spied a little cove on the right shore of the creek, to
which, with great pain and difficulty, I guided my raft, and at last
got so near, that, reaching ground with my oar, I could thrust
her directly in. But here I had like to have dipped all my cargo
into the sea again; for that shore lying pretty steep-that is to
say, sloping-there was no place to land, but where one end of my
float, if it ran on shore, would lie so high, and the other sink lower, as
before, that it would endanger my cargo again. All that I could do
was to wait till the tide was at the highest, keeping the raft with
my oar like an anchor, to hold the side of it fast to the shore, near
a flat piece of ground, which I expected the water would flow over;
and so it did. As soon as I found water enough-for my raft drew
about a foot of water-I thrust her upon that flat piece of ground,
and there fastened or moored her, by sticking my two broken oars
into the ground, one on one side, near one end, and one on the
other side near the other end; and thus I lay till the water ebbed
away, and left my raft and all my cargo safe on shore.
My next work was to view the country, and seek a proper place
for my habitation, and where to stow my goods to secure them from
whatever might happen. Where I was, I yet knew not; whether
on the continent or on an island; whether inhabited or not in-
habited; whether in danger of wild beasts or not. There
was a hill not above a mile from me, which rose up very
steep and high, and which seemed to overtop some other hills,
which lay as in a ridge from it northward. I took out one of the
fowling-pieces, and one of the pistols, and a horn of powder; and
thus armed, I travelled for discovery up to the top of that hill,
where, after I had with great labour and difficulty got to the top,
I saw my fate, to my great affliction-viz, that I was in an island
environed every way with the sea : no land to be seen except some
rocks, which lay a great way off; and two small islands, less than
shis, which lay about three leagues to the west.
I
found also that the island I was in was barren, and, as I saw
good reason to believe, uninhabited except by wild beasts, of whom,
however, I saw none. Yet I saw abundance of fowls, but knew not
their kinds; neither when I killed them could I tell what was fit
for food, and what not. At my coming back, I shot at a great bird
which I saw sitting upon a tree on the side of a great wood. I
believe it was the first gun that had been fired there since the
creation of the world. I had no sooner fired, than from all parts of
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
37
the wood there arose an innumerable number of fowls, of many
sorts, making a confused screaming and crying, and every one
according to his usual note, but not one of them of any kind that I
knew. As for the creature I killed, I took it to be a kind of hawk,
its colour and beak resembling it, but it had no talons or claws
more than common. Its flesh was carrion, and fit for nothing.
Contented with this discovery, I came back to my raft, and fell to
work to bring my cargo on shore, which took me up the rest of that
day. What to do with myself at night I knew not, nor indeed
where to rest, for I was afraid to lie down on the ground, not
knowing but some wild beast might devour me, though, as I after-
wards found, there was really no need for those fears.
However, as well as I could, I barricaded myself round with the
chests and boards that I had brought on shore, and made a kind of
hut for that night's lodging. As for food, I yet saw not which way
to supply myself, except that I had seen two or three creatures, like
hares, run out of the wood where I shot the fowl.
I now began to consider that I might yet get a great many things
out of the ship which would be useful to me, and particularly some
of the rigging and sails, and such other things as might come to
land; and I resolved to make another voyage on board the vessel,
if possible. And as I knew that the first storm that blew must
necessarily break her all in pieces, I resolved to set all other things
apart till I had got everything out of the ship that I could get.
Then I called a council-that is to say, in my thoughts-whether I
should take back the raft; but this appeared impracticable: so I
resolved to go as before, when the tide was down; and I did so,
only that I stripped before I went from my hut, having nothing on
but my chequered shirt, a pair of linen drawers, and a pair of pumps
on my feat.
I got on board the ship as before, and prepared a second raft;
and, having had experience of the first, I neither made this so
unwieldy, nor loaded it so hard, but yet I brought away several
things very useful to me; as, first, in the carpenter's stores I found
two or three bags full of nails and spikes, a great screw-jack, a
dozen or two of hatchets, and, above all, that most useful thing
called a grindstone. All these I secured, together with severa
things belonging to the gunner, particularly two or three iron crows,
and two barrels of musket bullets, seven muskets, another fowling-
piece, with some small quantity of powder more; a large bagful of
small shot, and a great roll of sheet-lead; but this last was so
heavy, I could not hoist it up to get it over the ship's side.
Besides these things, I took all the men's clothes that I could
find, and a spare fore-top sail, a hammock, and some bedding; and
with this I loaded my second raft, and brought them all safe on
shore, to my very great comfort.
was under some apprehension, during my absence from the
land, that at least my provisions might be devoured on shore: but
38
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
when I came back I found no sign of any visitor; only there sat
a creature like a wild cat upon one of the chests, which, when I
came towards it, ran away a little distance, and then stood still.
She sat very composed and unconcerned, and looked full in my
face, as if she had a mind to be acquainted with me. I presented
my gun at her, but, as she did not understand it, she was perfectly
unconcerned at it, nor did she offer to stir away; upon which I
tossed her a bit of biscuit, though, by the way, I was not very free
of it, for my store was not great: however, I spared her a bit, I say,
and she went to it, smelled at it, and ate it, and looked (as if
pleased) for more; but I thanked her, and could spare no more:
so she marched off.
Having got my second cargo on she-though I was fain to open
the barrels of powder, and bring them by parcels, for they
were too heavy, being large casks-I went to work to make me a
little tent with the sail and some poles which I cut for that
purpose and into this tent I brought everything that I knew
would spoil either with rain or sun; and I piled all the empty
chests and casks up in a circle round the tent, to fortify it from any
cudden attempt, either from man or beast.
When I had done this, I blocked up the door of the tent with
some boards within, and an empty chest set up on end without;
and spreading one of the beds upon the ground, laying my two
pistols just at my head, and my gun at length by me, I went to bed
for the first time, and slept very quietly all night, for I was very
weary and heavy; for the night before I had slept little, and had
laboured very hard all day to fetch all those things from the ship,
and to get them on shore.
I had the biggest magazine of all kinds now that ever was laid
up, I believe, for one man: but I was not satisfied still, for while
the ship sat upright in that posture, I thought I ought to get every-
thing out of her that I could: so every day at low water I went on
board, and brought away something or other; but particularly the
third time I went I brought away as much of the rigging as I could,
as also all the small ropes and rope-twine I could get, with a piece
of spare canvas, which was to mend the sails upon occasion, and
the barrel of wet gunpowder. In a word, I brought away all the
sails, first and last; only that I was fain to cut them in pieces, and
bring as much at a time as I could, for they were no more useful to
be sails, but as mere canvas only.
But that which comforted me more still, was, that last of all, after
I had made five or six such voyages as these, and thought I had
nothing more to expect from the ship that was worth my meddling
with-I say, after all this, I found a great hogshead of bread, three
large runlets of rum, orpirits, a box of sugar, and a barrel of fine
flour; this was surprising to me, because I had given over expecting
any more provisions, except what was spoiled by the water. I soon
emptied the hogshead of the bread, and wrapped it up, parcel by
ROBINSON Crusoe.
39
parcel, in pieces of the sails, which I cut out; and, in a word, I got
all this safe on shore also,
The next day I made another voyage, and now, having plundered
the ship of what was portable and fit to hand out, I began with the
cables. Cutting the great cable into pieces, such as I could move,
I got two cables and a hawser on shore, with all the ironwork Í
could get ; and having cut down the spritsail-yard, and the mizen-
yard, and everything I could, to make a large raft, I loaded it with
all these heavy goods, and came away. . But my good luck began
now to leave me; for this aft was so unwieldy, and so overladen,
that, after I had entered the little cove where I had landed the rest
of my goods, not being able to guide it so handily as I did the
other, it overset, and threw me and all my cargo into the water.
As for myself, it was no great harm, for I was near the shore; but
as to my cargo, it was a great part of it lost, especially the iron,
which 1 expected would have been of great use to me; however,
when the tide was out, I got most of the pieces of the cable ashore,
and some of the iron, though with infinite labour; for I was fain to
dip for it into the water, a work which fatigued me very much.
After this, I went every day on board, and brought away what I
could get.
I had been new thirteen days on shore, and had been eleven
times on board the ship, in which time I had brought away all that
one pair of hands could well be supposed capable to bring; though
I believe verily, had the calm weather held, I should have brought
away the whole ship, piece by piece. But preparing the twelfth
time to go on board, I found the wind began to rise: however, at
low water I went on board, and though I thought I had rummaged
the cabin so effectually that nothing more could be found, yet I
discovered a locker with drawers in it, in one of which I found two
or three razors, and one pair of large scissors, with some ten or a
dozen of good knives and forks: in another I found about thirty-six
pounds value in money—some European coin, some Brazil, some
pieces of eight, some gold, and some silver.
I smiled to myself at the sight of this money: "O drug!" said
I, aloud, "what art thou good for? Thou art not worth to me-no,
not the taking off the ground; one or those knives is worth all this
heap; I have no manner of use for thee-e'en remain where thou
art, and go to the bottom, as a creature whose life is not worth
saving.” However, upon second thoughts, I took it away; and
wrapping all this in a piece of canvas, I began to think of making
another raft; but while I was preparing this, I found the sky
overcast, and the wind began to rise, and in a quarter of an hour it
blew a fresh gale from the shore. It presently occurred to me
that it was in vain to pretend to make a raft with the wind off
shore; and that it was my business to be gone before the tide
of flood began, otherwise I might not be able to reach the shore
St all
Accordingly, I let myself down into the water, and swam

40
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
across the channel which lay between the ship and the sands, and
even that with difficulty enough, partly with the weight of the
things I had about me, and partly the roughness of the water; for
the wind rose very hastily, and before it was quite high water it
blew a storm.
But I had got home to my little tent, where I lay, with all my
wealth about me, very secure. It blew very hard all night, and in
the morning, when I looked out, behold, no more ship was to be
seen! I was a little surprised, but recovered myself with the satis-
factory reflection that I had lost no time, nor abated any diligence,
to get everything out of her that could be useful to me; and that,
indeed, there was little left in her that I was able to bring away, if
I had had more time.
I now gave over any more thoughts of the ship, or of anything
out of her, except what might drive on shore from her wreck; as,
indeed, divers pieces of her afterwards did; but those things were
of small use to me.
My thoughts were now wholly employed about securing myself
against either savages, if any should appear, or wild beasts, if any
were in the island; and I had inany thoughts of the method how
to do this, and what kind of dwelling to make-whether I should
make me a cave in the earth or a tent upon the earth; and, in
short, I resolved upon both; the manner and description of which,
it may not be improper to give an account of.
I soon found the place was in was not fit for my settlement,
because it was upon a low, moorish ground, near the sea, and I
believed it would not be wholesome, and more particularly because
there was no fresh water near it; so I resolved to find a more
healthy and more convenient spot of ground.
I consulted several things in my situation, which I found would
be proper for me: Ist, health and fresh water, I just now mentioned;
2ndly, shelter from the heat of the sun; 3rdly, security from
ravenous creatures, whether man or beast; 4thly, a view to the sea,
that if God sent any ship in sight, I might not lose any advantage
for my deliverance, of which I was not willing to banish all my
expectation yet.
In search of a place proper for this, I found a little plain on the
side of a rising hill, whose front towards this little plain was steep
as a house-side, so that nothing could come down upon me from
the top. On the one side of the rock there was a hollow place, worn
a little way in, like the entrance or door of a cave; but there was
not really any cave or way into the rock at all.
On the flat of the green, just before this hollow place, I resolved
to pitch my tent This plain was not above a hundred yards
broad, and about twice as long, and lay like a green before my
door; and, at the end of it, descended irregularly every way down
into the low ground by the seaside. It was on the N.N.W. side of
the hill; so that it was sheltered from the heat every day, till it
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
41
came to a W. and by S. sun, or thereabouts, which, in those
countries, is near the setting.
Before I set up my tent I drew a half-circle before the hollow
place, which took in about ten yards in its semi-diameter from the
rock, and twenty yards in its diameter from its beginning and
ending.
In this half-circle I pitched two rows of strong stakes, driving
them into the ground till they stood very firm like piles, the biggest
end being out of the ground above five feet and a-half, and
sharpened on the top. The two rows did not stand above six inches
from one another.
Then I took the pieces of cable which I had cut in the ship, and
laid them in rows, one upon another, within the circle, between
these two rows of stakes, up to the top placing other stakes in the
inside, leaning against them, about two feet and a-half high, like a
spur to a post; and this fence was so strong, that neither man nor
beast could get into it or over it. This cost me a great deal of time
and labour, especially to cut the piles in the woods, bring them to
the place, and drive them into the earth.
The entrance into this place I made to be, not by a door, but by
a short ladder to go over the top; which ladder, when I was in, I
lifted over after me; and so I was completely fenced in and
fortified, as I thought, from all the world, and consequently slept
secure in the night, which otherwise I could not have done; though,
as it appeared afterwards, there was no need of all this caution from
the enemies that I apprehended danger from.
Into this fence or fortress, with infinite labour, I carried all my
riches, all my provisions, ammunition, and stores, of which you
have the account above; and I made a large tent, which, to pre-
serve me from the rains that in one part of the year are very
violent there, I made double-one smaller tent within, and one
larger tent above it; and covered the uppermost with a large tar-
paulin, which I had saved among the sails.
And now lay no more for a while in the bed which I had
brought on shore, but in a hammock, which was indeed a very
good one, and belonged to the mate of the ship.
Into this tent I brought all my provisions, and everything that
would spoil by the wet; and having thus enclosed all my goods, I
made up the entrance, which till now I had left open, and so passed
and repassed, as I said, by a short ladder.
When I had done this, I began to work my way into the rock,
and bringing all the earth and stones that I dug down out through
my tent, I laid them up within my fence, in the nature of a terrace,
so that it raised the ground within about a foot and a half; and
thus I made me a cave, just behind my tent, which served me like
■ cellar to my house.
It cost me much labour and many days before all these things
vere brought to perfection; and, therefore, I must go back to some
life and advenTURES OF
other things which took up some of my thoughts. At the same
time it happened, after I had laid my scheme for the setting up my
tent, and making the cave that a storm of rain falling from a thick,
dark cloud, a sudden flash of lightning happened, and after that, à
great clap of thunder, as is naturally the effect of it. I was not so
much surpised with the lightning as I was with the thought which
darted into my mind as swift as the lightning itself-Oh, my powder !
My very heart sank within me when I thought that, at one blast, all
my powder might be destroyed; on which, not my defence only, but
the providing my food, as I thought, entirely depended. I was
nothing near so anxious about my own danger, though, had the
powder took fire, I should never have known who had hurt me.
Such impression did this make upon me, that after the storm
was over I laid aside all my works, my building and fortifying, and
applied myself to make bags and boxes, to separate the powder,
and to keep it a little and a little in a parcel, in the hope that
whatever might come, it might not all take fire at once; and to
keep it so apart, that it should not be possible to make one part
fire another. I finished this work in about a fortnight; and I think
my powder, which in all was about two hundred and forty pounds
weight, was divided in not less than a hundred parcels. As to the
barrel that had been wet, I did not apprehend any danger from that;
so I placed it in my new cave, which, in my fancy, I called my kitchen;
and the rest I hid up and down in holes among the rocks, so that no
wet might come to it, marking very carefully where I laid it.
In the interval of time while this was doing, I went out once at
least every day with my gun, as well to divert myself as to see
if I could kill anything fit for food; and, as near as I could, to
acquaint myself with what the island produced. ine first time I
went out, I presently discovered that there were goats in the
island, which was a great satisfaction to me; but then it was
attended with this misfortune to me -viz., that they were so shy, sa
subtle, and so swift of foot, that it was the most difficult thing in
the world to come at them; but I was not discouraged at this,
not doubting but I might now and then shoot one, as it soon
happened; for after I had found their haunts a little, I laid wait
in this manner for them: I observed if they saw me in the
valleys, though they were upon the rocks, they would run away, as
in a terrible fright; but if they were feeding in the valleys, and I
was upon the rocks, they took no notice of me; from whence I
concluded, that by the position of their optics, their sight was so
directed downward, that they did not readily see objects that were
above them; so afterwards I took this method-I always climbed the
rocks first, to get above them, and then had frequently a fair mark.
The first shot I made among these creatures, I killed a she-goat,
which had a little kid by her, which she gave suck to, which
grieved me heartily; for when the old one fell, the kid stood stock
still by her, till I came and took her up; and not only so, but
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
43
when I carried the old one with me, upon my shoulders, the kid
followed me quite to my enclosure; upon which I laid down the
dam, and took the kid in my arms, and carried it over my pale, in
hopes to have bred it up tame; but it would not eat; so I was
forced to kill it and eat it myself. These two supplied me with
flesh a great while, for I ate sparingly, and saved my provisions, my
bread especially, as much as possibly I could.
Having now fixed my habitation, I found it absolutely necessary
to provide a place to make a fire in, and fuel to burn; and what I
did for that, and also how I enlarged my cave, and what con-
veniences I made, I shall give a full account of in its place; but I
must now give some little account of myself, and of my thoughts
about living, which, it may well be supposed, were not a few.
I had a dismal prospect of my condition; for as I was not cast
away upon that island without being driven, as is said, by a violent
storm, quite out of the course of our intended voyage, and a great
way-viz., some hundreds of leagues, out of the ordinary course of
the trade of mankind, I had great reason to consider it as a deter-
mination of heaven, that in this desolate place, and in this desolate
manner, I should end my life. The tears would run plentifully
down my face when I made these reflections; and sometimes I
would expostulate with myself why Providence should thus com-
pletely ruin His creatures, and render them so absolutely miserable;
so without help, abandoned, so entirely depressed, that it could
hardly be rational to be thankful for such a life.
But something always returned swift upon me to check these
thoughts, and to reprove me; and particularly one day, walking
with my gun in my hand by the sea-side, I was very pensive upon
the subject of my present condition, when reason, as it were, expos-
tulated with me the other way, thus: "Well, you are in a desolate
condition, it is true; but, pray remember, where are the rest of you?
Did not you come eleven of you in the boat? Where are the ten?
Why were they not saved, and you lost? Why were you singled
out Is it better to be here or there?" And then I pointed to the
All evils are to be considered with the good that is in them,
and with what worse attends them.
sea.
Then it occurred to me again, how well I was furnished for my
subsistence, and what would have been my case if it had not hap-
pened (which was a hundred thousand to one) that the ship floated
from the place where she first struck, and was driven so near to the
shore, that I had time to get all these things out of her; what would
have been my case, if I had been forced to have lived in the condi-
tion in which I at first came on shore, without necessaries of life, or
necessaries to supply and procure them? "Particularly," said I,
aloud (though to myself), "what should I have done without a gun
without ammunition, without any tools to make anything, or to
work with, without clothes, bedding, a tent, or any manner of
covering?" and that now I had all these to sufficient quantity, and
44
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
was in a fair way to provide myself in such a manner as to live
without my gun, when my ammunition was spent so that I had a
tolerable view of subsisting, without any want, as long as I lived;
for I considered from the beginning how I would provide for the
accidents that might happen, and for the time that was to come,
even not only that my ammunition should be spent, bu* even after
my health and strength should decay.
I confess had not entertained any notion of my ammunition
being destroyed at one blast-I mean my powder being blown
up by lightning; and this made the thoughts of it so surprising
to me, when it lightened and thundered, as I observed just now.
And now being to enter into a melancholy relation of a scene of
silent life, such, perhaps, as was never heard of in the world before,
I shall take it from its beginning, and continue it in its order. It
was, by my account, the 30th of September, when, in the manner as
above said, I first set foot upon this horrid island; when the sun,
being to us in its autumnal equinox, was almost over my head; for
I reckoned myself, by observation, to be in the latitude of nine
degrees, twenty-two minutes north of the line.
After I had been there about ten or twelve days, it came into my
thoughts that I should lose my reckoning of time for want of books,
and pen and ink, and should even forget the Sabbath days; but to
prevent this, I cut with my knife upon a large post, in capital letters,
and making it into a great cross, I set up on the shore where I first
landed, “I came on shore here on the 30th of September 1659.”
Upon the sides of this square post I cut every day a notch with
my knife, and every seventh notch was as long again as the rest,
and every first day of the month as long again as that long one;
and thus I kept my calendar, or weekly, monthly, and yearly
reckoning of time.
In the next place, we are to observe that among the many things
which I brought out of the ship, in the several voyages which, as
above mentioned, I made to it, I got several things of less value,
but not at all less useful to me, which I omitted setting down before;
as, in particular, pens, ink, and paper, several parcels in the
captain's, mate's, gunner's, and carpenter's keeping; three or four
compasses, some mathematical instruments, dials, perspectives,
charts, and books of navigation, all which I huddled together,
whether I might want them or no; also, I found three very good
Bibles, which came to me in my cargo from England, and which I
had packed up among my things; some Portuguese books also;
and among them two or three Popish prayer-books, and several
other books, all which I carefully secured And I must not forget
that we had in the ship a dog and two cats, of whose eminent
history I may have occasion to say something in its place; for I
carried both the cats with me; and as for the dog, he jumped out
of the ship of himself, and swam on shore to me the day after
I went on shore with my first cargo, and was a trusty servant to me
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
45
many years; I wanted nothing that he could fetch me, nor any
company that he could make up to me; I only wanted to have him
talk to me, but that would not do. As I observed before, I found
pens, ink, and paper, and I husbanded them to the utmost; and 1
shall show that while my ink lasted, I kept things very exact, but
after that was gone I could not, for I could not make any ink by
any means that I could devise.
And this put me in mind that I wanted many things, notwith-
standing all that I had amassed together; and of these, ink was
one; as also a spade, pick-axe, and shovel, to dig or remove the
earth; needles, pins, and thread; as for linen, I soon learned to
want that without much difficulty.
This want of tools made every work I did go on heavily; and it
was near a whole year before I had entirely finished my little pale,
or surrounded my habitation. The piles, or stakes, which were as
heavy as I could well lift, were a long time in cutting and preparing
in the woods, and more, by far, in bringing home; so that I spent
sometimes two days in cutting and bringing home one of those
posts, and a third day in driving it into the ground; for which
purpose I got a heavy piece of wood at first, but at last bethought
myself of one of the iron crows; which, however, though I found it,
made driving those posts or piles very laborious and tedious work.
But what need I have been concerned at the tediousness of any
thing I had to do, seeing I had time enough to do it in? nor had I
any other employment, if that had been over, at least that I could
foresee, except the ranging the island to seek for food, which I did,
more or less, every day
I now began to consider seriously my condition, and the circum-
stances I was reduced to; and I drew up the state of my affairs in
writing, not so much to leave them to any that were to come after
me for I was likely to have but few heirs-as to deliver my
thoughts from daily poring over them, and afflicting my mind; and
as my reason began now to master my despondency, I began to
comfort myself as well as I could, and to set the good against the
evil, that I might have something to distinguish my case from
worse; and I stated very impartially, like debtor and creditor, the
comforts I enjoyed against the miseries I suffered, thus :--
S
EVIL.
I am cast upon a horrible,
desolate island, void of all hope
of recovery.
I am singled out and separ-
ated, as it were, from all the
world, to be miserable.
GOOD.
But I am alive; and not
drowned, as all my ship's com-
pany were.
But I am singled out, too,
from all the ship's crew, to be
spared from death; and He that
miraculously saved
saved me from
death can deliver me from this
condition.
46
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
EVIL.
I am divided from mankind—
a solitaire; one banished from
human society.
I have not clothes to cover
me.
I am without any defence, or
means to resist any violence of
man or beast.
I have no soul to speak to or
relieve me.
GOOD.
But I am not starved, and
perishing on a barren place,
affording no sustenance.
But I am in a hot climate,
where, if I had clothes, I could
hardily wear them.
But I am cast on an island
where I see no wild beasts to
hurt me, as I saw on the coast
of Africa; and what if I had
been shipwrecked there?
But God wonderfully sent the
ship in near enough to the shore,
that I have got out as many
necessary things as will either
supply my wants or enable me to
supply myself, even as long as I
live.
Upon the whole, here was an undoubted testimony, that there was
scarce any condition in the world so miserable but there was some-
thing negative or something positive to be thankful for in it; and
let this stand as a direction from the experience of the most miser-
able of all conditions in this world: that we may always find in it
something to comfort ourselves from, and to set, in the description
of good and evil, on the credit side of the account.
Having now brought my mind a little to relish my condition, and
given over looking out to sea, to see if I could spy a ship-I say,
giving over these things, I began to apply myself to arrange my
way of living, and to make things as easy to me as I could.
I have already described my habitation, which was a tent under
the side of a rock, surrounded with a strong pale of posts and
cables; but I might now rather call it a wall, for I raised a kind of
wall up against it of turfs, about two feet thick on the outside; and
after some time (I think it was a year and a-half) I raised afters
from it, leaning to the rock, and thatched or covered it with boughs
of trees, and such things as I could get, to keep out the rain; which
I found at some times of the year very violent.
I have already observed how I brought all my goods into this
pale, and into the cave which I had made behind me. But I must
observe, too, that at first this was a confused heap of gods, which,
as they lay in no order, s they took up all my place, I had no
room to turn myself: so I set myself to enlarge my cave, and work
farther into the earth; for it was a loose sandy rock, which yielded
easily to the labour I bestowed on it: and so when I found I was
pretty safe as to beasts of prey, I worked sideways, to the right
hand, into the rock; and then, turning to the right again, worked
Robinson Crusoe.
47
quite out, and made me a door to come out on the outside of my
pale or fortification. This gave me not only egress and regress,
as it was a back way to my tent and to my storehouse, but gave me
room to store my goods.
And now I began to apply myself to make such necessary things
as I found I most wanted, particularly a chair and a table; for
without these I was not able to enjoy the few comforts 1 had in the
world; I could not write or eat, or do several things, with so much
pleasure without a table: so I went to work. And here I must
needs observe, that as reason is the substance and origin of the
mathematics, so by stating and squaring everything by reason, and
by making the most rational judgment of things, every man may be,
in time, master of every mechanic art. I had never handled a tool
in my life; and yet, in time, by labour, application, and con-
trivance, I found, at last, that I wanted nothing but I could have
made it, especially if I had had tools. However, I made abundance
of things, even without tools; and some with no more tools than
an adze and a hatchet, which perhaps were never made that way
before, and that with infinite labour. For example, if I wanted a
board, I had no other way but to cut down a tree, set it on an edge
before me, and hew it flat on either side with my axe, till I brought
it to be thin as a plank, and then dub it smooth with my adze. It
is true, by this method I could make but one board out of a whole
tree; but this I had no remedy for but patience, any more than I
had for the prodig is deal of time and labour which it took me up
to make a plank or board: but my time or labour was little worth,
and so it was as well employed one way as another.
However, I made me a table and a chair, as I observed above,
in the first place; and this I did out of the short pieces of boards
that I brought on my raft from the ship. But when I had wrought
out some boards as above, I made large shelves, of the breadth of
a foot and a half, one over another all along one side of my cave, to
lay all my tools, nails, and iron-work on; and, in a word, to
separate everything at large into their places, that I might come
easily at them. knocked pieces into the wall of the rock to hang
my guns and all things that would hang up; so that, had my cave
been to be seen, it looked like a general magazine of all necessary
things; and I had everything so ready at my hand, that it was a
great pleasure to me to see all my goods in such order, and
especially to find my stock of all necessaries so great.
And now it was that I began to keep a journal of every day's
employment; for, indeed, at first, I was in too much hurry, and not
only hurry as to labour, but in too much discomposure of mind ;
and my journal would have been full of many dull things; for
example, I must have said thus :-" Sept. 30th.-After I had got to
shore, and had escaped drowning, instead of being thankful to God
for my deliverance, having first vomited, with the great quantity of
salt water which had got into my stomach, and recovering myself
48
LIFE AND Adventures of
a little, I ran about the shore wringing my hands and beating
my head and face, exclaiming at my misery, and crying out, 'I was
undone, undone !' till, tired and faint, I was forced to lie down
on the ground to repose, but durst not sleep for fear of being
devoured."
:
Some days after this, and after I had been on board the ship,
and got all that I could out of her, yet I could not forbear getting
up to the top of a little mountain, and looked out to sea, in hopes of
seeing a ship; then fancy, at a vast distance, I spied a sail, please
myself with the hopes of it, and then after looking steadily, till I
was almost blind, lose it quite, and sit down and weep like a child,
and thus increase my misery by my folly.
But having gotten over these things in some measure, and
having settled my household staff and habitation, made me a table
and a chair, and all as handsome about me as I could, I began to
keep my journal; of which I shall here give you the copy (though
in it will be told all these particulars over again) as long as it
lasted; for having no more ink, I was forced to leave it off.
CHAPTER V.
I begin to keep a journal-Christen my desert island the Island of Despair
-Fall upon various schemes to make tools, baskets, etc., and begin
to build my house-At a great loss of an evening for candle, but fall
upon an expedient to supply the want-Strange discovery of corn-A
terrible earthquake and storm.
THE JOURNAL
EPTEMBER 30, 1659.—I, poor, miserable Robinson
Crusoe, being shipwrecked, during a dreadful storm,
in the offing, came on shore on this dismal, unfor-
tunate island, which I called "The Island of Des-
pair all the rest of the ship's company being
drowned, and myself almost dead.
All the rest of the day I spent in afflicting myself at the dismal
circumstances I was brought to-viz., I had neither food, house,
clothes, weapon, nor place to fly to; and in despair of any relief,
saw nothing but death before me—either that I should be devoured
by wild beasts, murdered by savages, or starved to death for want
of food, At the approach of night I slept in a tree, for fear of wild
creatures; but slept soundly, though it rained all night.
October 1.-In the morning I saw, to my great surprise, the ship
had floated with the high tide, and was driven on shore agair
much nearer the island; which, as it was some comfort, on one
hand-for, seeing her set upright, and not broken to pieces, I

17
robinson crusoe.
49
hoped, if the wind abated, I might get on board, and get some food
and necessaries out of her for my relief-so, on the other hand, it
renewed my grief at the loss of my comrades, who, I imagined, if we
had all stayed on board, might have saved the ship, or, at least, that
they would not have been all drowned, as they were; and that, had
the men been saved, we might, perhaps, have built us a boat, out of
the ruins of the ship, to have carried us to some other part of the
world. I spent great part of this day in perplexing myself on these
things; but, at length, seeing the ship almost dry, I went upon the
sand as near as I could, and then swam on boa. This day also it
continued raining, though with no wind at all.
."
From the 1st of October to the 24th.-All these days entirely
spent in many several voyages to get all I could out of the ship,
which I brought on shore every tide of flood upon rafts. Much
rain also in the days, though with some intervals of fair weather;
but it seems this was the rainy season.
Oct. 20.-I overset my raft, and all the goods I had got upon it;
but, being in shoal water, and the things being chiefly heavy, I
recovered many of them when the tide was out.
Oct. 25.-It rained all night and all day, with some gusts of wind;
during which time the ship broke in pieces, the wind blowing a little
harder than before, and was no more to be seen, except the wreck
of her, and that only at low water. I spent this day in covering and
securing the goods which I had saved, that the rain might not spoil
them.
Oct. 26.-I walked about the shore almost all day, to find out a
place to fix my habitation, greatly concerned to secure myself from
any attack in the night, either from wild beasts or men. Towards
night, I fixed upon a proper place, under a rock, and marked out a
semicircle for my encampment; which I resolved to strengthen with
a work, wall, or fortification, made of double piles, lined within with
cables, and without with turf.
From the 26th to 30th I worked very hard in carrying all my
goods to my new habitation. though some part of the time it rained
exceedingly hard.
The 31st, in the morning, r went out into the island with my gun,
to see for some food, and discover the country; when I killed a she-
goat, and her kid followed me home, which I afterwards killed also,
because it would not feed.
November 1.—I set up my tent under a rock, and lay there for the
first night; making it as large as I could, with stakes driven in to
swing my hammock upon.
Nov. 2.-I set up all my chests and boards, and the pieces of
timber which made my rafts, and with them formed a fence round
me, a little within the place I had marked out for my fortification.
Nov. 3-I went out with my gun, and killed two fowls like ducks,
which were very good food. In the afternoon went to work to
make me a table.
50
life and adventures of
Nov. 4-This morning I began to order my times of work, of
going out with my gun, time of sleep, and time of diversion-viz.,
every morning I walked out with my gun for two or three hours, if
it did not rain; then employed myself to work till about eleven
o'clock; then eat what I had to live on ; and from twelve to two I
lay down to sleep, the weather being excessively hot; and then, in
the evening, to work again. The working part of this day and of
the next were wholly employed in making my table, for I was yet
but a very sorry workman, though time and necessity made me a
complete natural mechanic soon after, as I believe they would do
any one else.
Nov. 5.-This day went abroad with my gun and my dog, and
killed a wild cat; her skin pretty soft, but her flesh good for
nothing; every creature that I killed I took off the skins and pre-
served them. Coming back by the sea shore, I saw many sorts of
sea-fowls, which I did not understand; but was surprised, and
almost frightened, with two or three seals, which, while I was
gazing at, not well knowing what they were, got into the sea, and
escaped me for that time.
Nov. 6.-After my morning walk I went to work with my table
again, and finished it, though not to my liking; nor was it long
before I learned to mend it.
Nov. 1-Now it began to be settled fair weather. The 7th, 8th,
9th, 10th, and part of the 12th (for the 11th was Sunday) I took
wholly up to make me a chair, and with much ado brought it to a
tolerable shape, but never to please me; and even in the making I
pulled it in pieces several times.
Note.-I soon neglected my keeping Sundays; for, omitting my
mark for them on my post, I forgot which was which.
Air
Nov. 13. This day it rained, which refreshed me exceedingly,
and cooled the earth; but it was accompanied with terrible thunder
and tning, which frightened me dreadfully, for fear of my
powder. As soon as it was over, I resolved to separate my stock
of powder into as many little parcels as possible, that it might not
be in danger.
Nov. 14, 15, 16-These three days I spent in making little
square chests, or boxes, which might hold about a pound, or two
pounds at most, of powder; and so, putting the powder in, I
stowed it in places as secure and remote from one another as pos-
sible. On one of these three days I killed a large bird that was
good to eat, but I knew not what to call it.
Nov. 17.-This day I began to dig behind my tent into the rock,
to make room for my further conveniency.
Note. Three things I wanted exceedingly for this work-viz., a
pickaxe, a shovel, and a wheelbarrow or basket; so I desisted
from my work, and began to consider how to supply that want, and
make me some tools. As for the pickaxe, I made use of the iron
crows, which were proper enough, though heavy; but the next
<
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
51
thing was a shovel or spade; this was so absolutely necessary,
that, indeed, I could do nothing effectually without it; but what
kind of one to make I knew not.
Nov. 18.-The next day, in searching the woods, I found a tree
of that wood, or like it, which, in the Brazils, they call the iron-tree,
for its exceeding hardness. Of this, with great labour, and almost
spoiling my axe, I cut a piece, and brought it home, too, with diffi-
culty enough, for it was exceeding heavy. The excessive hardness
of the wood, and my having no other way, made me a long while
upon this machine, for I worked it effectually by little and little
into the form of a shovel or spade; the handle exactly shaped like
ours in England, only that the board part having no iron shod upon
it at bottom, it would not last me so long; however, it served
well enough for the uses which I had occasion to put it to; but
never was a shovel, I believe, made after that fashion, or so long in
making.
I was still deficient, for I wanted a basket or a wheelbarrow. A
basket I could not make by any means, having no such things as
twigs that would bend to make wicker-ware—at least, none yet found
out; and as to a wheelbarrow, I fancied I could make all but the
wheel; but that I had no notion of; neither did I know how to go
about it; besides, I had no possible way to make the iron gudgeons
for the spindle or axis of the wheel to run in; so I gave it over, and
so, for carrying away the earth which I dug out of the cave, I made
me a thing like a hod which the labourers carry mortar in when
they serve the bricklayers. This was not so difficult to me as the
making the shovel; and yet this and the shovel, and the attempt
which I made in vain to make a wheelbarrow, took me up no less
than four days-I mean always excepting my morning walk with
my gun, which I seldom failed, and very seldom failed also bringing
home something fit to eat.
Nov. 23.-My other work having now stood still, because of my
making these tools, when they were finished I went on, and working
every day, as my strength and time allowed, I spent eighteen days
entirely in widening and deepening my cave, that it might hold my
goods commodiously.
Note. During all this time I worked to make this room or cave
spacious enough to accommodate me as a warehouse, or magazine,
a kitchen, a dining-room, and a cellar. As for my lodging, I kept
to the tent; except that sometimes, in the wet season of the year,
it rained so hard that I could not keep myself dry, which caused
me afterwards to cover all my place within my pale with long
poles, in the form of rafters, leaning against the rock, and load
them with flags and large leaves of trees, like a thatch.
December 10.-1 began now to think my cave or vault finished,
when on a sudden (it seems I had made it too large) a great
quantity of earth fell down from the top on one side; so much
that, in short, it frighted me, and not without reason, too, for if I
52
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
3
had been under it, I had never wanted a grave-digger. I had now
• great deal of work to do over again, for I had the loose earth to
carry out; and, which was of more importance, I had the ceiling
to prop up, so that I might be sure no more would come down.
Dec. 11.This day I went to work with it accordingly, and got
two shores-ór posts pitched upright to the top, with two pieces of
boards across over each post; this I finished the next day; and
setting more posts up with boards, in about a week more I had the
roof secured, and the posts, standing in rows, served me for parti-
tions to part off the house.
Dec. 17.-From this day to the 20th I placed shelves, and knocked
up nails on the posts, to hang everything up that could be hung up;
and now I began to be in some order within doors.
Dec. 20.-Now I carried everything into the cave, and began to
furnish my house, and set up some pieces of boards like a dresser,
to order my victuals upon; but boards began to be very scarce with
me; also, I made me another table.
Dec. 24.-Much rain all night and all day. No stirring out.
Dec. 25.-Rain all day.
No rain, and the earth much cooler than before, and
Dec. 26.
pleasanter..
Dec. 27.-Killed a young goat, and lamed another, so that I
caught it and led it home in a string; when I had it at home, I
bound and splintered up its leg, which was broke.
N.B-I took such care of it that it lived, and the leg grew
well and as strong as ever; but, by my nursing it so long, it grew
tame, and fed upon the little green at my door, and would not go
away. This was the first time that I entertained a thought of
breeding up some tame creatures, that I might have food when my
powder and shot was all spent.
Dec. 28, 29, 30, 31.-Great heats, and no breeze, so that there
was no stirring abroad, except in the evening, for food; this time I
spent in putting all my things in order within doors.
January 1.-Very hot still but I went abroad early and late
with my gun, and lay still in the middle of the day. This evening,
going farther into the valleys which lay towards the centre of the
island, I found there were plenty of goats, though exceedingly shy,
and hard to come at; however, I resolved to try if I could not
bring my dog to hunt them down.
Jan. 2.-Accordingly, the next day I went out with my dog, and
set him upon the goats; but I was mistaken, for they all faced
about upon the dog, and he knew his danger too well, for he would
not come near them.
Jan. 3.-I began my fence or wall; which, being still jealous of
my being attacked by somebody, I resolved to make very thick and
Strong.
N.B.-This wall being described before, I purposely omit what
was said in the journal; it is sufficient to observe, that I was no
!
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
33
less time than from the 2d of January to the 14th of Aprit working,
finishing, and perfecting this wall, though it was no more than
about twenty-four yards in length, being a half-circle from one
place in the rock to another place, about eight yards from it, the
door of the cave being in the centre behind it.
All this time I worked very hard, the rains hindering me many
days, nay, sometimes weeks together; but I thought I should
never be perfectly secure till this wall was finished; and it is scarce
credible what inexpressible labour everything was done with,
especially the bringing piles out of the woods and driving them
into the ground; for I made them much bigger than I needed to
have done. /)
When this wall was finished, and the outside double-fenced, with
a turf wall raised up close to it, I persuaded myself that if any
people were to come on shore there, they would not perceive any-
thing like a habitation; and it was very well I did so, as may be
observed hereafter, upon a very remarkable occasion.
During this time I made my rounds in the woods for game every
day when the rain permitted me, and made frequent discoveries in
these walks of something or other to my advantage; particularly,
I found a kind of wild pigeons, which build, not as wood-pigeons in
a tree, but rather as house-pigeons, in the holes of the rocks; and
taking some young ones, I endeavoured to breed them up tame, and
did so; but when they grew older they flew away, which perhaps
was at first for want of feeding them, for I had nothing to give
them; however, frequently found their nests, and got their young
ones, which were very good meat. And now, in the managing my
household affairs, I found myself wanting in many things, which I
thought at firet it was impossible for me to make; as, indeed,
with some of them it was: for instance, I could never make a cask
to be hooped. I had a small runlet or two, as I observed before;
but I could never arrive at the capacity of making one by them,
though I spent many weeks about it; I could neither put in the
heads, or join the staves so true to one another as to make them
hold water; so I gave that also over. In the next place, I was at a
great loss for candles; so that as soon as ever it was dark, which
was generally by seven o'clock, I was obliged to go to bed. I re-
membered the lump of beeswax with which I made candles in my
African adventure; but I had none of that now; the only remedy
I had was, that when I had killed a goat I saved the tallow, and
with a little dish made of clay, which I baked in the sun, to which
I added a wick of some oakum, I made me a lamp; and this gave
me light, though not a clear, steady light, like a candle In the
middle of all my labours it happened that, rummaging my things, I
found a little bag, which, as I hinted before, had been filled with
corn for the feeding of poultry-not for this voyage, but before, as I
suppose, when the ship came from Lisbon. The little remainder of
corn that had been in the bag was all devoured by the rats, and I
*
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
sthing in the bag but husks and dust; and being willing to
the bag for some other use (I think it was to put powder in,
en I divided it for fear of the lightning, or some such use), I
shook the husks of corn out of it on one side of my fortification,
under the rock.
It was a little before the great rains just now mentioned that I
threw this stuff away, taking no notice, and not so much as remem-
bering that I had thrown anything there, when, about a month
after, or thereabouts, I saw some few stalks of something green
shooting out of the ground, which I fancied might be some plant I
had not seen; but I was surprised, and perfectly astonished, when,
after a little longer time, I saw about ten or twelve ears come out,
which were perfect green barley, of the same kind as our European
-nay, as our English barley.
It is impossible to express the astonishment and confusion of my
thoughts on this occasion. I had hitherto acted upon no religious
foundation at all; indeed, I had very few notions of religion in my
head, nor had entertained any sense of anything that had befallen
me otherwise than as chance, or, as we lightly say, what pleases
God, without so much as inquiring into the end of Providence in
these things, or His order in governing events for the world. But
after I saw barley grow there, in a climate which I knew was not
proper for corn, and especially that I knew not how it came there,
it startled me strangely, and I began to suggest that God had
miraculously caused His grain to grow without any help of seed
sown, and that it was so directed purely for my sustenance on that
wild, miserable place.
}
This touched my heart a little, and brought tears out of my eyes,
and I began to bless myself that such a prodigy of nature should
happen upon my account; and this was the more strange to me,
because I saw near it still, all along by the side of the rock,
some other straggling stalks, which proved to be stalks of rice, and
which I knew, because I had seen it grow in Africa when I was
ashore there.
I not only thought these the pure productions of Providence for
my support, but not doubting that there was more in the place, I
went all over that part of the island, where I had been before,
peering in every corner, and under every rock, to see for more of it,
but I could not find any. At last it occurred to my thoughts that
I shook a bag of chickens' meat out in that place, and then the
wonder began to cease; and I must confess my religious thankful-
ness to God's providence began to abate, too, upon the discovering
that all this was nothing but what was common; though I ought
to have been as thankful for so strange and unforeseen a providence
as if it had been miraculous; for it was really the work of
Providence to me, that should order or appoint that ten or twelve
grains of corn should remain unspoiled, when the rats had destroyed
all the rest, as if it had been dropped from heaven ; as also, that I
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
33
should throw it out in that particular place, where, it being in the
shade of a high rock, it sprang up immediately; whereas, if I had
thrown it anywhere else, at that time, it had been burnt up and
destroyed.
I carefully saved the ears of this corn, you may be sure, in theis
season, which was about the end of June; and, laying up every
corn, I resolved to sow them all again, hoping, in time, to have
some quantity sufficient to supply me with bread. But it was not
till the fourth year that I could allow myself the least grain of this
corn to eat, and even then but sparingly, as I shall say afterwards,
in its order; for I lost all that I sowed the first season by not
observing the proper time; for I sowed it just before the dry
season, so that it never came up at all, at least not as it would have
done; of which in its place.
Besides this barley, there were, as above, twenty or thirty stalks
of rice, which I preserved with the same care and for the same use,
or to the same purpose-to make me bread, or rather food; for I
found ways to cook it without baking, though I did that also after
some time.
But to return to my Journal-
I worked excessive hard these three or four months to get my
wall done; and the 14th of April I closed it up, contriving to go
into it, not by a door but over the wall, by a ladder, that there
might be no sign on the outside of my habitation.
April 16.—I finished the ladder; so I went up the ladder to the
top, and then pulled it up after me, and let it down in the inside.
This was a complete enclosure to me; for within I had room
enough, and nothing could come at me from without, unless it could
first mount my wall.
The very next day after this wall was finished I had almost had
all my labour overthrown at once, and myself killed. The case was
thus-As I was busy in the inside, behind my tent, just at the
entrance into my cave, I was terribly frighted with a most dreadful,
surprising thing indeed; for, all on a sudden, I found the earth
come crumbling down from the roof of my cave, and from the edge
of the hill over my head, and two of the posts I had set up in the
cave cracked in a frightful manner. I was heartily scared; but
thought nothing of what was really the cause, only thinking that
the top of my cave was fallen in, as some of it had done before :
and for fear I should be buried in it I ran forward to my ladder,
and not thinking myself safe there neither, I got over my wall for
fear of the pieces of the hill, which I expected might roll down
upon me I had no sooner stepped down upon the firm ground,
than I plainly saw it was a terrible earthquake; for the ground I
stood on shook three times at about eight minutes' distance, with
three such shocks as would have overturned the strongest building
that could be supposed to have stood on the earth; and a great
piece of the top of a rock which stood about half-a-mile from mę
56
life and adventures of
next the sea fell down with such a terrible noise as I never heard
in all my life. I perceived also the very sea was put into violent
motion by it; and I believe the shocks were stronger under the
water than on the island.
I was so much amazed with the thing itself, having never felt the
like, nor discoursed with any one that had, that I was like one dead
or stupefied; and the motion of the earth made my stomach sick,
like one that was tossed at sea; but the noise of the falling of the
rock awaked me, as it were, and rousing me from the stupefied
condition I was in, filled me with horror; and I thought of nothing
then but the hill falling upon my tent and all my household goods,
and burying all at once; and this sunk my very soul within me a
second time.
After the third shock was over, and I felt no more for some time,
I began to take courage; and yet I had not heart enough to go
over my wall again, for fear of being buried alive, but sat still upon
the ground greatly cast down and disconsolate, not knowing what
to do. All this while I had not the least serious religious thought;
nothing but the common "Lord have mercy upon me !" and when
it was over that went away too.
While I sat thus, I found the air overcast, and grow cloudy, as if
it would rain. Soon after that the wind arose by little and little,
so that in less than half-an-hour it blew a most dreadful hurricane,
the sea was all on a sudden covered over with foam and froth; the
shore was covered with the breach of the water; the trees were
torn up by the roots; and a terrible storm it was This held about
three hours, and then began to abate; and in two hours more it
was quite calm, and began to rain very hard. All this while I sat
upon the ground very much terrified and dejected; when on a
sudden it came into my thoughts, that these winds and rain being
the consequences of the earthquake, the earthquake itself was spent
and over, and I might venture into my cave again. With this
thought my spirits began to revive; and the rain also helping to
persuade me, I went in and sat down in my tent. But the rain was
so violent that my tent was ready to be beaten down with it; and
I was forced to go into my cave, though very much afraid and
uneasy, for fear it should fall on my head. This violent rain forced
me to a new work-viz., to cut a hole through my new fortification,
like a sink, to let the water go out, which would else have flooded
my cave, After I had been in my cave for some time, and found
still no more shocks of the earthquake follow, I began to be more
composed. And now, to support my spirits, which indeed wanted
it very much, I went to my little store, and took a small sup of
rum; which, however, I did then and always very sparingly,
knowing I could have no more when that was gone. It continued
raining all that night, and great part of the next day, so that I could
not stir abroad; but my mind being more composed, I began to
think of what I had best do; concluding that if the island was
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
57
subject to these earthquakes, there would be no living for me in a
cave, but I must consider of building a little but in an open place,
which I might surround with a wall, as I had done here, and so
make myself secure from wild beasts or men; for I concluded if I
stayed where I was, I should certainly, one time or other, be buried
alive.
With these thoughts, I resolved to remove my tent from the
place where it stood, which was just under the hanging precipice of
the hill; and which, if it should be shaken again, would certainly
fall upon my tent; and I spent the two next days, being the 19th
and 20th of April, in contriving where and how to remove my habi-
tation. The fear of being swallowed up alive made me that I never
slept in quiet; and yet the apprehension of lying abroad without
any fence was almost equal to it; but still, when I looked about,
and saw how everything was put in order, how pleasantly concealed
was, and how safe from danger, it made me very loath to remove.
In the meantime, it occurred to me that it would require a vast deal
of time for me to do this, and that I must be contented to venture
where I was, till I had formed a camp for myself, and had secured
it so as to remove to it. So with this resolution I composed myself
for a time, and resolved that I would go to work with all speed to
build me a wall with piles and cables, etc., in a circle, as before,
and set my tent up in it when it was finished; but that I would
venture to stay where I was till it was finished, and fit to remove.
This was the 21st.
April 22.—The next morning I began to consider of means te
put this resolve into execution; but I was at a great loss about my
tools. I had three large axes, and abundance of hatchets (for we
carried the hatchets for traffic with the Indians); but with much
chopping and cutting knotty hard wood, they were all full of
notches, and dull; and though I had a grindstone, I could not turn
it and grind my tools too. This cost me as much thought as a
statesman would have bestowed upon a grand point of politics, or a
judge upon the life and death of a man. At length I contrived a
wheel with a string, to turn it with my foot, that I might have both
my hands at liberty.
Note.-I had never seen any such thing in England, or at least,
not to take notice how it was done, though since I have observed it
is very common there; besides that, my grindstone was very large
and heavy. This machine cost me a full week's work to bring it to
perfection.
April 28, 29.-These two whole days I took up in grinding
my tools, my machine for turning my grindstone performing very
well.
April 30.-Having perceived my bread had been low a great
while, now I took a survey of it, and reduced myself to one biscuit
cake a day, which made my heart very heavy.
May 1.-In the morning, looking towards the sea side, the tide
77,
58
life and adventures of
being low, I saw something lie on the shore bigger than ordinary,
and it looked like a cask; when I came to it, I found a small
barrel, and two or three pieces of the wreck of the ship, which were
driven on shore by the late hurricane; and looking towards the
wreck itself, I thought it seemed to lie higher out of the water than
it used to do. I examined the barrel which was driven on shore,
and soon found it was a barrel of gunpowder; but it had taken
water, and the powder was caked as hard as a stone; however, I
rolled it farther on shore for the present, and went on upon the
sands, as near as I could to the wreck of the ship, to look for more.
CHAPTER VI.
Observe the ship driven further aground by the late storm-Procure a vast
quantity of necessaries from the wreck-Catch a large turtle-I fall ill
of a fever and ague-Terrible dream, and serious reflections thereupon
-Find a Bible in one of the seamen's chests thrown ashore, the read-
ing whereof gives me great comfort.

W
HEN I came down to the ship I found it strangely
removed. The forecastle, which lay before buried in
sand, was heaved up at least six feet, and the stern,
which was broke in pieces and parted from the rest
by the force of the sea, soon after I had left rummag-
ing her, was tossed, as it were, up, and cast on one side; and the
sand was thrown so high on that side next her stern, that whereas
there was a great place of water before, so that I could not come
within a quarter of a mile of the wreck without swimming, I could
now walk quite up to her when the tide was out. I was surprised
with this at first, but soon concluded it must be done by the earth-
quake; and as by this violence the ship was more broke open than
formerly, so many things came daily on shore, which the sea had
loosened, and which the winds and water rolled by degrees to the
land.
This wholly diverted my thoughts from the design of removing
my habitation, and I busied myself mightily, that day especially, in
searching whether I could make any way into the ship; but I found
nothing was to be expected of that kind, for all the inside of the
ship was choked up with sand. However, as I had learned not to
despair of anything, I resolved to pull everything to pieces that I
could of the ship, concluding that everything I could get from her
would be of some use or other to me.
May 3.-I began with my saw, and cut piece of a beam through,
which I thought held some of the upper part or quarter-deck
Logether, and when I had cut it through, I cleared away the sand
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
59
as well as I could from the side which lay highest; but the tide
coming in, I was obliged to give over for that time.
May 4.—I went a-fishing, but caught not one fish that I durst ear
of, till I was weary of my sport; when, just going to leave off, I
caught a young dolphin. I had made me a long line of some rope-
yarn, but I had no hooks; yet I frequently caught fish enough, as
much as I cared to eat; all which I dried in the sun, and ate them
dry.
May 5.-Worked on the wreck; cut another beam asunder, and
brought three great fir planks off from the decks, which I tied
together, and made to float on shore when the tide of flood came
on.
May 6.-Worked on the wreck; got several iron bolts out of her
and other pieces of iron-work. Worked very hard, and came home
very much tired, and had thoughts of giving it over.
May 7.-Went to the wreck again, not with an intent to work, but
found the weight of the wreck had broke itself down, the beams
being cut; that several pieces of the ship seemed to lie loose, and
the inside of the hold lay so open that I could see into it; but it
was almost full of water and sand.
May 8.-Went to the wreck, and carried an iron crow to wrench up
the deck, which lay now quite clear of the water or sand. I wrenched
open two planks, and brought them on shore also with the tide. I
left the iron crow in the wreck for next day.
May 9.-Went to the wreck, and with the crow made way into
the body of the wreck, and felt several casks, and loosened them
with the crow, but could not break them up. I felt also a roll of
English lead, and could stir it, but it was too heavy to remove.
May 10-14-Went every day to the wreck; and got a great
many pieces of timber, and boards, or plank, and two or three
hundredweight of iron.
May 15. I carried two hatchets, to try if I could not cut a piece
off the roll of lead by placing the edge of one hatchet and driving
it with the other; but as it lay about a foot and a half in the water,
I could not make any blow to drive the hatchet.
May 16.-It had blown hard in the night, and the wreck appeared
more broken by the force of the water; but I stayed so long in the
woods, to get pigeons for food, that the tide prevented my going to
the wreck that day.
May 17.-I saw some pieces of the wreck blown on shore, at a
great distance, near two miles off me, but resolved to see what they
were, and found it was a piece of the head, but too heavy for me to
bring away.
May 24-Every day, to this day, I worked on the wreck ; and
with hard labour I loosened some things so much with the crow,
that the first blowing tide several casks floated out, and two of the
seamen's chests; but the wind blowing from the shore, nothing
came to land that day but pieces of timber, and a hogshead, which

LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
had some Brazil pork in it; but the salt water and the sand had
spoiled it. I continued this work every day to the 15th of June,
except the time necessary to get food, which I always appointed,
during this part of my employment, to be when the tide was up,
that I might be ready when it was ebbed out; and by this time I
had got timber and plank and iron-work enough to have built a
good boat, if I had known how; and also I got, at several times
and in several pieces, near one hundredweight of the sheet-lead.
June 16.-Going down to the sea-side, I found a large tortoise or
turtle. This was the first I had seen, which, it seems, was only my
misfortune, not any defect of the place, or scarcity; for had I hap-
pened to be on the other side of the island, I might have had
hundreds of them every day, as I found afterwards; but perhaps
had paid dear enough for them.
June 17.-I spent in cooking the turtle. I found in her three-
score eggs; and her flesh was to me, at that time, the most
savoury and pleasant that ever I tasted in my life, having had no
flesh, but of goats and fowls, since I landed in this horrid place.
June 18.-Rained all day, and I stayed within.
stayed within. I thought at
this time the rain felt cold, and I was something chilly; which A
knew was not usual in that latitude.
June 19-Very ill, and shivering, as if the weather had becu
cold.
June 20-No rest all night; violent pains in my head, and
feverish.
June 21.-Very ill; frighted almost to death with the apprehen-
ions of my sad condition-to be sick, and no help. Prayed to
God, for the first time since the storm off Hull, but scarce knew
what I said, or why, my thoughts being all confused.
June 22.-A little better; but under dreadful apprehensions of
sickness.
June 23-Very bad again; cold and shivering, and then a violent
headache.
June 24.-Much better.
June 25.-An ague very violent; the fit held me seven hours
cold fit and hot, with faint sweats after it.
June 26.-Better; and having no victuals to eat, took my gun,
but found myself very weak. However, I killed a she-goat, and
with much difficulty got it home, and broiled some of it, and ate.
I would fain have stewed it, and made some broth, but had no pot,
June 27.-The ague again so violent that I lay a-bed all day,
and neither ate nor drank. I was ready to perish for thirst; but sc
weak, I had not strength to stand up, or to get myself any water to
drink. Prayed to God again, but was light-headed; and when I
was not, I was so ignorant that I knew not what to say; only I lay
and cried, “Lord, look upon me! Lord, pity me! Lord, have mercy
upon me!" I suppose I did nothing else for two or three hours;
till, the fit wearing off, I fell asleep, and did net wake till far in the
ROBINSON CRUSOE
61
night. When I awoke, I found myself much refreshed, but weak,
and exceeding thirsty. However, as I had no water in my habita
tion, I was forced to lie till morning, and went to sleep again. In
this second sleep I had this terrible dream :-I thought that I was
sitting on the ground, on the outside of my wall, where I sat when
the storm blew after the earthquake, and that I saw a man descend
from a great black cloud, in a bright flame of fire, and light upon
the ground He was all over as bright as a flame, so that I could
but just bear to look towards him; his countenance was most in-
expressibly dreadful, impossible for words to describe. When he
stepped upon the ground with his feet, I thought the earth trembled,
just as it had done before in the earthquake, and all the air looked,
to my apprehension, as if it had been filled with flashes of fire. He
was no sooner landed upon the earth, but he moved forward
towards me, with a long spear or weapon in his hand, to kill me ;
and when he came to a rising ground, at some distance, he spoke to
me-or I heard a voice so terrible that it is impossible to express
the terror of it. All that I can say I understood was this:-
"Seeing all these things have not brought thee to repentance, now
thou shalt die;"-at which words, I thought he lifted up the spear
that was in his hand to kill me.
No one that shall ever read this account will expect that I should
be able to describe the horrors of my soul at this terrible vision. I
mean, that even while it was a dream, I even dreamed of those
horrors. Nor is it any more possible to describe the impression
that remained upon my mind when I awaked, and found it was but
a dream.
I had, alas! no divine knowledge. What I had received by the
good instruction of my father was then worn out by an uninter-
rupted series, for eight years, of seafaring wickedness, and a constant
conversation with none but such as were, like myself, wicked and
profane to the last degree. I do not remember that I had, in all
that time, one thought that so much as tended either to looking
upwards towards God, or inwards towards a reflection upon my
own ways; but a certain stupidity of soul, without desire of good,
or conscience of evil, had entirely overwhelmed me; and I was all
that the most hardened, unthinking, wicked creature among our
common sailors can be supposed to be; not having the least sense,
either of the fear of God in danger, or of thankfulness to God in
deliverance.
In the relating what is already past of my story, this will be me
more easily believed when I shall add, that through all the variety
of miseries that had to this day befallen me, I never had so much
as one thought of it being the hand of God, or that it was a just
punishment for my sin-my rebellious behaviour against my father
-or my present sins, which were great-or so much as a punish-
ment for the general course of my wicked life. When I was on the
desperate expedition on the desert shores of Africa, I never had so
62
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
ON
:
much as one thought of what would become of me, or one wish to
God to direct me whither I should go, or to keep me from the
danger which apparently surrounded nie, as well from voracious
creatures as cruel savages. But I was merely thoughtless of a God
or a Providence, acted like a mere brute, from the principles of
nature, and by the dictates of common sense only, and, indeed,
hardly that. When I was delivered and taken up at sea by the
Portugal captain, well used, and dealt justly and honourably with,
as well as charitably, I had not the least thankfulness in my
thoughts. When, again, I was shipwrecked, ruined, and in danger
of drowning on this island, I was as far from remorse, or looking on
it as a judgment. I only said to myself often, that I was an
unfortunate dog, and born to be always miserable.
It is true, when I got on shore first bere, and found all my ship's
crew drowned and myself spared, I was surprised with a kind of
ecstasy, and some transports of soul, which, had the grace of God
assisted, might have come up to true thankfulness; but it ended
where it began, in a mere common flight of joy, or, as I may say,
being glad I was alive, without the least reflection upon the distin-
guished goodness of the hand which had preserved me, and had
singled me out to be preserved when all the rest were destroyed, or
an inquiry why Providence had been thus merciful unto me. Even
just the same common sort of joy which seamen generally have,
after they are got safe ashore from a shipwreck, which they drown
all in the next bowl of punch, and forget almost as soon as it is
over; and all the rest of my life was like it. Even when I was
afterwards, on due consideration, made sensible of my condition,
how I was cast on this dreadful place, out of the reach of human
kind, out of all hope of relief, or prospect of redemption, as soon as
I saw but a prospect of living, and that I should not starve and
perish for hunger, all the sense of my affliction wore off; and I
began to be very easy, applied myself to the works proper for my
preservation and supply, and was far enough from being afflicted at
my condition, as a judgment from heaven, or as the hand of God
against me: these were thoughts which very seldom entered my
head.
The growing up of the corn, as is hinted in my Journal, had at
first some little influence upon me, and began to affect me with
seriousness, as long as I thought it had something miraculous in it;
but as soon as ever that part of the thought was removed, all the
impression that was raised from it wore off also, as I have noted
already. Even the earthquake, though nothing could be more
terrible in its nature, or more immediately directing to the invisible
power which alone directs such things, yet no sooner was the first
fright over, but the impression it had made went off also. I had no
more sense of God or His judgments-much less of the present
affliction of my circumstances being from His hand-than if I had
been in the most prosperous condition of life. But now, when i
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
01
began to be sick, and a leisurely view of the miseries of death
came to place itself before me; when my spirits began to sink
under the burden of a strong distemper, and nature was exhausted
with the violence of the fever; conscience, that had slept so long,
began to awake, and I began to reproach myself with my past life,
in which I had so evidently, by uncommon wickedness, provoked
the justice of God to lay me under uncommon strokes, and to deal
with me in so vindictive a manner. These reflections oppressed me
for the second or third day of my distemper; and in the violence,
as well of the fever as of the dreadful reproaches of my conscience,
extorted some words from me like praying to God, though I cannot
say they were either a prayer attended with desires or with hopes :
it was rather the voice of mere fright and distress. My thoughts
were confused, the convictions great upon my mind, and the horror
of dying in such a miserable condition raised vapours into my head
with the mere apprehension; and in these hurries of my soul I
knew not what my tongue might express. But it was rather excla-
mation, such as, "Lord, what a miserable creature am 11 If I
I
should be sick, I shall certainly die for want of help; and what
will become of me!" Then the tears burst out of my eyes, and I
could say no more for a good while. In this interval the good
advice of my father came to my mind, and presently his prediction,
which I mentioned at the beginning of this story-viz., that if I did
take this foolish step, God would not bless me, and I would have
leisure hereafter to reflect upon having neglected his counsel when
there might be none to assist in my recovery. "Now," said I, aloud,
46
my dear father's words are come to pass; God's justice has over-
taken me, and I have none to help or hear me. I rejected the voice
of Providence, which had mercifully put me in a posture or station
of life wherein I might have been happy and easy; but I would
neither see it myself, nor learn to know the blessing of it from my
parents I left them to mourn over my folly, and now I am left to
mourn under the consequences of it. I refused their help and
assistance, who would have lifted me in the world, and would have
made everything easy to me; and now I have difficulties to struggle
with, too great for even nature itself to support, and no assistance,
no help, no comfort, no advice. Then I cried out, "Lord, be my
help, for I am in great distress." This was the first prayer, if I may
call it so, that I had made for many years.
But to return to my Journal-
June 28.-Having been somewhat refreshed with the sleep I had
had, and the fit being entirely off, I got up; and though the fright
and terror of my dream was very great, yet I considered that the fit
of the ague would return again the next day, and now was my time
to get something to refresh and support myself when I should be
ill; and the first thing I did, I filled a large square case-bottle with
water, and set it upon my table, in reach of my bed; and to take
off the chill or aguish disposition of the water, I put að but a quarter
==
64
life and adventures of
of a pint of rum into it, and mixed them together. Then I got me
a piece of the goat's flesh and broiled it on the coals, but could eat
very little. I walked about, but was very weak, and withal very
sad and heavy-hearted under a sense of my miserable condition,
dreading the return of my distemper the next day. At night I
made my supper of three of the turtle's eggs, which I roasted in the
ashes, and ate, as we call it, in the shell, and this was the first bit
of meat I had ever asked God's blessing to, that I could remember,
in my whole life. After I had eaten I tried to walk, but found
myself so weak that I could hardly carry a gun, for I never went
out without that; so I went but a little way, and sat down upon the
ground, looking out upon the sea, which was just before me, and
very calm and smooth. As I sat here, some such thoughts as these
occurred to me-What is this earth and sea, of which I have seen
so much? Whence is it produced? And what am I, and all the
other creatures wild and tame, human and brutal? Whence are
we? Sure we are all made by some secret power, who formed the
earth and sea, the air and sky. And who is that? Then it followed
most naturally, it is God that has made all. Well, but then it came
on strangely, if God has made all these things, He guides and
governs them all, and all things that concern them; for the power
that could make all things must certainly have power to guide and
direct them. If so, nothing can happen in the great circuit of His
works, either without His knowledge or appointment.
-
And if nothing happens without His knowledge, He knows that I
am here, and am in this dreadful condition; and if nothing happens
without His appointment, He has appointed all this to befall me.
Nothing occurred to my thought to contradict any of these con-
clusions, and therefore it rested upon me with the greater force,
that it must needs be that God had appointed all this to befall me ;
that I was brought into this miserable circumstance by His direc-
tion, He having the sole power, not of me only, but of everything
that happened in the world. Immediately it followed-Why has
God done this to me? What have I done to be thus used? My
conscience presently checked me in that inquiry, as if I had
blasphemed, and methought it spoke to me like a voice-"Wretch !
dost thou ask what thou hast done? Look back upon a dreadful
misspent life, and ask thyself what thou hast not done? Ask, why
is it that thou wert not long ago destroyed? Why wert thou not
drowned in Yarmouth Roads; killed in the fight when the ship
was taken by the Sallee man-of-war; devoured by the wild beasts
on the coast of Africa; or drowned here, when all the crew perished
but thyself? Dost thou ask, what have I done?" I was struck
dumb with these reflections, as one astonished, and had not a word.
to say no, not to answer to myself, but rose up pensive and sad,
walked back to my retreat, and went up over my wall, as if I had
been going to bed; but my thoughts were sadly disturbed, and I
had no inclination to sleep; so I sat down in my chair, and lighted
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
65
my lamp, for it began to be dark. Now, as the apprehension of the
return of iny distemper terrified me very much, it occurred to my
thought, that the Brazilians take no physic but their tobacco for
almost all distempers, and I had a piece of a roll of tobacco iu one
of the chests, which was quite cured, and some also that was green,
and not quite cured.
I went, directed by heaven no doubt; for in this chest 1 found a
cure both for soul and body. I opened the chest, and found what
I looked for, the tobacco; and as the few books I had saved lay
there too, I took out one of the Bibles which I mentioned before,
and which to this time I had not found leisure or inclination to look
into. I say, I took it out, and brought both that and the tobacco
with me to the table. What use to make of the tobacco I knew
not, in my distemper, or whether it was good for it o no: but I
tried several experiments with it, as if I was resolved it should hit
one way or other. I first took a piece of leaf, and chewed it in my
mouth, which, indeed, at first almost stupefied my brain, the
tobacco being green and strong, and that I had not been much used
to. Then I took some and steeped it an hour or two in some rum,
and resolved to take a dose of it when I lay down; and, lastly, I
burnt some upon a pan of coals, and held my nose close over the
smoke of it as long as I could bear it, as well for the heat as almost
for suffocation. In the interval of this operation I took
up the
Bible and began to read; but my head was too much disturbed
with the tobacce to bear reading, at least at that time; only, having
opened the book casually, the first words that occurred to me were
these, "Call on Me in the day of trouble, and I will deliver thee,
and thou shalt glorify Me." These words were very apt to my case,
and made some impression upon my thoughts at the time of reading
them, though not so much as they did afterwards; for, as for being
delivered, the word had no sound, as I may say, to me; the thing
was so remote, so impossible in my apprehension of things, that I
began to say, as the children of Israel did when they were promised
flesh to eat, "Can God spread a table in the wilderness?" so I
began to say, “Can God himself deliver me from this place?" And
as it was not for many years that any hopes appeared, this prevailed
very often upon my thoughts; but, however, the words made a
great impression upon me, and I mused upon them very often.
It grew now late, and the tobacco had, as I said, dozed my head so
much that I inclined to sleep; s left my lamp burning in the
cave, lest I should want anything in the night, and went to bed.
But before I lay down, I did what I never had done in all my life
-I kneeled down, and prayed to God to fulfil the promise to me,
that if I called upon Him in the day of trouble, He would deliver
me. After my broken and imperfect prayer was over, I drank the
rum in which I had steeped the tobacco, which was so strong and
rank of the tobacco that I could scarcely get it down; immediately
upon this I went to bed. I found presently it flew up into my head
66
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
violently; but I fell into a sound sleep, and waked no more till, by
the sun, it must necessarily be near three o'clock in the afternoon
the next day-nay, to this hour I am partly of opinion that I slept
all the next day and night, and till almost three the day after; for
otherwise I know not how I should lose a day out of my reckoning
in the days of the week, as it appeared some years after I had done;
for if I had lost it by crossing and recrossing the Line, I should have
lost more than one day; but certainly I lost a day in my account,
and never knew which way. Be that, however, one way or the
other, when I awaked I found myself exceedingly refreshed, and my
spirits lively and cheerful; when I got up I was stronger than I was
the day before, and my stomach better, for I was hungry; and, in
short, I had no fit the next day, but continued much altered for the
better., This was the 29th.
The 30th was my well day, of course, and I went abroad with my
gun, but did not care to travel too far. I killed a sea-fow! or two,
something like a brand goose, and brought them home, but was
not very forward to eat them; so I ate some more of the turtle's
eggs, which were very good. This evening I renewed the medicine,
which I had supposed did me good the day before-the tobacco
steeped in rum; only I did not take so much as before, nor did
I chew any of the leaf, or hold my head over the smoke; however,
I was not so well the next day, which was the first of July, as I
hoped I should have been ; for I had a little spice of the cold fit,
but it was not much.
එ
July 2.—I renewed the medicine all the three ways; and dosed
myself with it as at first, and doubled the quantity which I drank.
July 3.-I missed the fit for good and all, though I did not recover
my full strength for some weeks after. While I was thus gathering
strength my thoughts ran exceedingly upon this scripture, "I will
deliver thee;" and the impossibility of my deliverance lay much
upon my mind, in bar of my ever expecting it; but as I was dis-
couraging myself with such thoughts, it occurred to my mind that I
red so much upon my deliverance from the main affliction, that I
disregarded the deliverance I had received, and I was as it were
made to ask myself such questions as these-viz., Have I not been
delivered, and wonderfully too, from sickness from the most dis-
tressed condition that could be, and that was so frightful to me?
and what notice had I taken of it! Had I done my part? God
had delivered me, but I had not glorified Him-that is to say, I had
not owned and been thankful for that as a deliverance; and how
could I expect greater deliverance? This touched my heart very
much; and immediately I knelt down, and gave God thanks aloud
for my recovery from my sickness.
July 4-In the morning I took the Bible; and beginning at the
New Testament, I began seriously to read it, and imposed upon
myself to read a while every morning and every night; not tying
myself to the number of chapters, but long as my thoughts should
A
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
67
engage me.
It was not long after I set seriously to this work till I
found my heart more deeply and sincerely affected with the wicked-
ness of my past life. The impression of my dream revived; and
the words, "All these things have not brought thee to repentance,"
ran seriously through my thoughts. I was earnestly begging of
God to give me repentance, when it happened providentially, the
very day, that, reading the Scripture, I came to these words:"He
is exalted a Prince and a Saviour, to give repentance and to give
remission. I threw down the book; and with my heart as well as
my hands lifted up to heaven, in a kind of ecstasy of joy, I cried out
aloud, "Jesus, thou son of David! Jesus, thou exalted Prince and
Saviour I give me repentance!" This was the first time I could
say, in the true sense of the words, that I prayed in all my life; for
now I prayed with a sense of my condition, and a true Scripture
view of hope, founded on the encouragement of the Word of God;
and from this time, I may say, I began to hope that God would hear
me.
Now I began to construe the words mentioned above, Call on
Me, and I will deliver thee," in a different sense from what I had
ever done before; for then I had no notion of anything being called
deliverance, but my being delivered from the captivity I was in; for
though I was indeed at large in the place, yet the island was
certainly a prison to me, and that in the worse sense in the world.
But now I learned to take it in another sense: now I looked back
upon my past life with such horror, and my sins appeared so
dreadful, that my soul sought nothing of God but deliverance from
the load of guilt that bore down all my comfort. As for my solitary
life, it was nothing; I did not so much as pray to be delivered
from it or think of it; it was all of no consideration in comparison
to this. And I add this part here, to hint to whoever shall read it,
that whenever they come to a true sense of things, they will find
deliverance from sin a much greater blessing than deliverance from
affliction.
i
But, leaving this part, I return to my Journal-
My condition began now to be, though not less miserable as to
my way of living, yet much easier to my mind; and my thoughts
being directed, by a constant reading the Scripture and praying to
God, to things of a higher nature, I had a great deal of comfort
within, which, till now, I knew nothing of; also, my health and
strength returned, I bestirred myself to furnish myself with every-
thing that I wanted, and make my way of living as regular as I
could.
From the 4th of July to the 14th I was chiefly employed in
walking about with my gun in my hand, a little and a little at a
time, as a man that was gathering up his strengh after a fit of sick-
ness; for it is hardly to be imagined how low I was, and to what
weakness I was reduced. The application which I made use of
was perfectly new, and perhaps which had never cured an ague
68
Life and ADVENTures of
before; either can I recommend it to any to practise, by this
experiment: and though it did carry off the fit, yet it rather
contributed to weakening me; for I had frequent convulsions in my
nerves and limbs for some time. I learned from it also this, in
particular, that being abroad in the rainy season was the most
pernicious thing to my health that could be, especially in those
rains which came attended with storms and hurricanes of wind;
for as the rain which came in the dry season was almost always
accompanied with such storms, so I found that rain was much
more dangerous than the rain which fell in September and October.
}
CHAPTER VII.
I begin to take a survey of my island-Discover plenty of tobacco, grapes,
lemons, and sugar-canes, wild, but no human inhabitants-Resolve to
lay up a store of these articles, to furnish me against the wet season-
My cat, which I supposed lost, returns with kittens-I regulate my
diet, and shut myself up for the wet season-Sow my grain, which
comes to nothing; but I discover and remedy my error-Take account
of the course of the weather.

HAD now been in this unhappy island above ten
months. All possibility of deliverance from this con-
dition seemed to be entirely taken from me; and I
firmly believe that no human shape had ever set foot
upon that place. Having now secured my habitation,
as I thought, fully to my mind, I had a great desire to make a more
perfect discovery of the island, and to see what other productions I
might find, which I yet knew nothing of.
It was on the 15th of July that I began to take a more particular
survey of the island itself. I went up the creek first, where, as I
hinted, I brought my rafts on shore. I found, after I came about
two miles up, that the tide did not flow any higher, and that it was
no more than a little brook of running water, very fresh and good;
but this being the dry season, there was hardly any water in some
parts of it—at least not enough to run in any stream, so as it could
be perceived. On the banks of this brook I found many pleasant
savannahs or meadows, plain, smooth, and covered with grass;
and on the rising parts of them, next to the higher grounds, where
the water, as might be supposed, never overflowed, I found a great
deal of tobacco, green, and growing to a great and very strong
stalk. There were divers other plants, which I had no notion of or
understanding about, that might, perhaps, have virtues of their
own, which I could not find out. I searched for the cassava root,
which the Indians, in all that climate, make their bread of, but I
could find none. I saw large plants of aloes, but did not under-
ROBINSON crusoe.
69
stand them. I saw several sugar-canes, but wild, and, for want of
cultivation, imperfect. I contented myself with these discoveries
for this time, and came back, musing with myself what course I
might take to know the virtue and goodness of any of the fruits or
plants which I should discover, but could bring it to no conclusion;
for, in short, I had made so little observation while I was in the
Brazils, that I knew little of the plants in the field; at least, very
little that might serve to any purpose now in my distress.
The next day, the sixteenth, I went up the same way again; and
after going something further than I had gone the day before, I
found the brook and the savannahs cease, and the country become
more woody than before. In this part I found different fruits, and
particularly I found melons upon the ground, in great abundance,
and grapes upon the trees. The vines had spread, indeed, over
the trées, and the clusters of grapes were just now in their prime,
very ripe and rich. This was a surprising discovery, and I was
exceeding glad of them; but I was warned by my experience to
eat sparingly of them; remembering that when I was ashore in
Barbary, the eating of grapes killed several of our Englishmen,
who were slaves there, by throwing them into fluxes and fevers.
But I found an excellent use for these grapes; and that was, to
cure or dry them in the sun, and keep them as dried grapes or
raisins are kept, which I thought would be, as indeed they were,
wholesome and agreeable to eat when no grapes could be had.
I spent all that evening there, and went not back to my habita-
tion; which, by the way, was the first night, as I might say, I had
lain from home. In the night I took my first contrivance, and got
up in a tree, where I slept well; and the next morning proceeded
upon my discovery; travelling nearly four miles, as I might judge
by the length of the valley, keeping still due north, with a ridge of
hills on the south and north side of me. At the end of this march I
came to an opening, where the country seemed to descend to the
west; and a little spring of fresh water, which issued out of the side
of the hill by me, and ran the other way, that is, due east; and the
country appeared so fresh, so green, so flourishing, everything being
in a constant verdure or flourish of spring, that it looked like a
planted garden. I descended a little on the side of that delicious
vale, surveying it with a secret kind of pleasure, though mixed with
my other afflicting thoughts, to think that this was all my own; that
I was king and lord of all this country indefeasibly, and had a right
of possession; and if I could convey it, I might have it in inherit-
ance as completely as any lord of a manor in England I saw
here abundance of cocoa trees, orange, and lemon, and citron
trees; but all wild, and very few bearing any fruit, at least not
then. However, the green limes that I gathered were not only
pleasant to eat, but very wholesome; and I mixed their juice
afterwards with water, which made it very wholesome, and very
cool and refreshing. I found now I had business enough to gather
70
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
and carry home; and I resolved to lay up a store as well of grapes
as limes and lemons, to furnish myself for the wet season, which I
knew was approaching. In order to do this, I gathered a great
heap of grapes in one place, a lesser heap in another place, and a
great parcel of limes and lemons in another place; and taking a
few of each with me, I travelled homewards; resolving to come
again, and bring a bag or sack, or what I could make, to carry the
rest home. Accordingly, having spent three days in this journey, I
came home (so I must now call my tent and my cave); but before
I got thither the grapes were spoiled; the richness of the fruit and
the weight of the juice having broken them and bruised them,
they were good for little or nothing; as to the limes, they were
good, but I could bring but a few.
The next day, being the nineteenth, I went back, having made
me two small bags to bring home my harvest; but I was surprised,
when coming to my heap of grapes, which were so rich and fine
when I gathered them, to find them all spread about, trod to pieces,
and dragged about, some here, some there, and abundance eaten
and devoured. By this I concluded there were some wild creatures
thereabouts, which had done this; but what they were I knew not.
However, as I found there was no laying them up on heaps, and no
carrying them away in a sack, but that one way they would be
destroyed, and the other way they would be crushed with their own
weight, I took another course; for I gathered a large quantity of
the grapes, and hung them upon the out branches of the trees, that
they might cure and dry in the sun; and as for the limes and
lemons, I carried as many back as I could well stand under.
When I came home from this journey, I contemplated with great
pleasure the fruitfulness of that valley, and the pleasantness of the
situation; the security from storms on that side of the water, and
the wood and concluded that I had pitched upon a place to fix my
abode which was by far the worst part of the country. Upon the
whole, I began to consider of removing my habitation, and looking
out for a place equally safe as where now I was situate, if possible,
in that pleasant, fruitful part of the island.
This thought ran long in my head, and I was exceeding fond of
it for some time, the pleasantness of the place tempting me; but
when I came to a nearer view of it, I considered that I was now by
the sea-side, where it was at least possible that something might
happen to my advantage; and, by the same ill fate that brought me
hither, might bring some other unhappy wretches to the same place;
and though it was scarce probable that any such thing should ever
happen, yet to inclose myself among the hills and woods in the
centre of the island was to anticipate my bondage, and to render
such an affair not only improbable, but impossible; and that there-
fore I ought not by any means to remove. However, I was so
enamoured of this place, that I spent much of my time there for the
whole of the remaining part of the month of July; and though, upon
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
ג'
7
second thoughts, I resolved not to remove, yet I built me a little
kind of a bower, and surrounded it at a distance with a strong fence,
being a double hedge, as high as I could reach, well staked and
filled between with brushwood; and here I lay very secure, some-
times two or three nights together; always going over it with a
ladder; so that I fancied now I had my country house and my sea-
coast house; and this work took me up to the beginning of
August.
{
I had but newly finished my fence, and began to enjoy my labour,
when the rains came on, and made me stick close to my first habi-
tation; for though I had made me a tent like the other, with a
piece of a sail, and spread it very well, yet I had not the shelter of
a hill to keep me from storms, nor a cave behind me to retreat into
when the rains were extraordinary.
About the beginning of August, as I said, I had finished my
bower, and began to enjoy myself. The 3d of August, I found the
grapes I had hung up perfectly dried, and, indeed, were excellent
good raisins of the sun; so I began to take them down from the
trees, and it was very happy that I did so, for the rains which
followed would have spoiled them, and I had lost the best part of
my winter food; for I had above two hundred large bunches of
them. No sooner had I taken them all down, and carried the
most of them home to my cave, than it began to rain; and from
hence, which was the 14th of August, it rained, more or less, every
day till the middle of October; and sometimes so violently, that I
could not stir out of my cave for several days.
In this season I was much surprised with the increase of my
family; I had been concerned for the loss of one of my cats, who
ran away from me, or, as I thought, had been dead, and I heard no
more tidings of her, till, to my astonishment, she came home about
the end of August, with three kittens. This was the more strange
to me because, though I had killed a wild cat, as I called it, with
my gun, yet I thought it was quite a different kind from our
European cats; but the young cats were the same kind of house-
breed as the old one; and both my cats being females, I thought it
very strange. But from these three cats I afterwards came to be
so pestered with cats that I was forced to kill them like vermin or
wild beasts, and to drive them from my house as much as
possible.
From the 14th of August to the 26th, incessant rain, so that I
could not stir, and was now very careful not to be much wet. In
this confinement I began to be straitened for food: but venturing
out twice, I one day killed a goat; and the last day, which was the
26th, found a very large tortoise, which was a treat to me, and my
food was regulated thus:-I ate a bunch of raisins for my break-
fast; a piece of the goat's flesh, or of the turtle, for my dinner,
broiled; for, to my great misfortune, I had no vessel to boil or stew
anything; and two or three of the turtle's eggs for my supper.
72
life and adventures of
During this confinement in my cover by the rain, I worked daily
two or three hours at enlarging my cave, and by degrees worked it
on towards one side, till I came to the outside of the hill, and made
a door or way out, which came beyond my fence or wall; and so I
came in and out this way. But
But I was not perfectly eary at lying
so open; for, as I had managed myself before, I was in a perfect
inclosure; whereas now, I thought I lay exposed, and open for any-
thing to come in upon me; and yet I could not perceive that there
was any living thing to fear, the biggest creature that I had yet seen
upon the island being a goat.
Sept. 30.-I was now come to the unhappy anniversary of my
landing. I cast up the notches on my post, and found I had been
on shore three hundred and sixty-five days. I kept this day as a
solemn fast, setting it apart for religious exercise, prostrating
myself on the ground with the most serious humiliation, confessing
my sins to God, acknowledging His righteous judgments upon me,
and praying to Him to have mercy on me through Jesus Christ;
and not having tasted the least refreshment for twelve hours, even
till the going down of the sun, I then ate a biscuit-cake and a bunch
I had
of grapes, and went to bed, finishing the day as I began it.
all this time observed no Sabbath-day; for as at first I had no
sense of religion upon my mind, I had, after some time, omitted to
distinguish the weeks, by making a longer notch than ordinary for
the Sabbath-day, and so did not really know what any of the days
were; but now, having cast up the days as above, I found I had
been there a year; so I divided it into weeks, and set apart every
seventh day for a Sabbath; though I found at the end of my
account I had lost a day or two in my reckoning, A little after
this, my ink began to fail me, and so I contented myself to use it
more sparingly, and to write down only the most remarkable
events of my life, without continuing a daily memoranduin of other
things.
The rainy season and the dry season began now to appear
regular to me, and I learned to divide them so as to provide for
them accordingly; but I bought all my experience before I had it,
and this I am going to relate was one of the most discouraging
experiments that I made.
I have mentioned that I had saved the few ears of barley and
rice, which I had so surprisingly found spring up, as I thought, of
themselves, and I believe there were about thirty stalks of rice, and
about twenty of barley; and now I thought it a proper time to sow
it, after the rains, the sun being in its southern position, going from
me. Accordingly, I dug up a piece of ground as well as I could
with my wooden spade, and dividing it into two parts, I sowed my
grain; but as I was sowing, it casually occurred to my thoughts that
I would not sow it all at first, because I did not know when was the
proper time for it, so I sowed about two-thirds of the seed, leaving
about a handful of each. It was a great comfort to me afterwards
ROBINSON CRUSOE,
93
that I did so, for not one grain of what I sowed this time came to
anything for the dry months following, the earth having had no
rain after the seed was sown, it had no moisture to assist its
growth, and never came up at all till the wet season had come
again, and then it grew as if it had been but newly sown. Finding
my first seed did not grow, which I easily imagined was by the
drought, I sought for a moister piece of ground to make another
trial in, and I dug up a piece of ground near my new bower, and
sowed the rest of my seed in February, a little before the vernal
equinox; and this having the rainy months of March and April to
water it, sprung up very pleasantly, and yielded a very good crop ;
but having part of the seed left only, and not daring to sow all that
I had, I had but a small quantity at last, my whole crop not
amounting to above half a peck of each kind. But by this experi-
ment 1 was made master of my business, and knew exactly when
the proper season was to sow, and that I might expect two seed
times and two harvests every year.
While this corn was growing I made a little discovery, which was
of use to me afterwards. As soon as the rains were over, and the
weather began to settle, which was about the month of November,
I made a visit up the country to my bower, where, though I had not
been some months, yet I found all things just as I left them. The
circle or double hedge that I had made was not only firm and
entire, but the stakes which I had cut out of some trees that grew
thereabouts were all shot out and grown with long branches, as
much as a willow-tree usually shoots the first year after lopping its
head. I could not tell what tree to call it that these stakes were
cut from. I was surprised, and yet very well pleased, to see the
young trees grow: and I pruned them, and led them up to grow as
much alike as I could; and it is scarce credible how beautiful a
figure they grew into in three years; so that though the hedge
made a circle of about twenty-five yards in diameter, yet the trees,
for such I might now call them, soon covered it, and it was a com-
plete shade, sufficient to lodge under all the dry season. This
made me resolve to cut some more stakes, and make me a hedge
like this, in a semi-circle round my wall (I mean that of my first
dwelling), which I did; and placing the trees or stakes in a double
row, at about eight yards distance from my first fence, they grew
presently, and were at first a fine cover to my habitation, and after-
wards served for a defence also, as I shall observe in its order.
I found now that the seasons of the year might generally be
divided, not into summer and winter, as in Europe, but into the
rainy seasons and the dry seasons, which were generally thus :-
The half of February, the whole of March, and the half of April-
rainy, the sun being then on or near the equinox.
The half of April, the whole of May, June, and July, and the
half of August-dry, the sun being then to the north of the
Line.
74
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
Ine half of August, the whole of September, and the half of
October-rainy, the sun being then come back.
The half of October, the whole of November, December, ana
January, and the half of February-dry, the sun being then to the
south of the Line.
The rainy seasons sometimes held longer or shorter as the winds
happened to blow, but this was the general observation I made.
After I had found, by experience, the ill consequences of being
abroad in the rain, I took care to furnish myself with provisions
beforehand, that I might not be obliged to go out, and I sat within
doors as much as possible during the wet months. This time I
found much employment, and very suitable also to the time, for I
found great occasion for many things which I had no way to furnish
myself with but by hard labour and constant application; particu-
larly I tried many ways to make myself a basket, but all the twigs I
could get for the purpose proved so brittle that they would do
nothing. It proved of excellent advantage to me now, that when I
was a boy, I used to take great delight in standing at a basket-
maker's, in the town where my father lived, to see them make their
wicker-ware; and being, as boys usually are, very officious to help,
and a great observer of the manner in which they worked those
things, and sometimes lending a hand, I had by these means full
knowledge of the methods of it, and I wanted nothing but the
materials, when it came into my mind that the twigs of that tree
from whence I cut my stakes that grew might possibly be as tough
as the sallows, willows, and osiers in England, and I resolved to
try. Accordingly, the next day I went to my country house, as I
called it, and cutting some of the smaller twigs, I found them to my
purpose as much as I could desire; whereupon I came the next
time prepared with a hatchet to cut down a quantity, which I soon
found, for there was great plenty of them. These I set up to dry
within my circle or hedge, and when they were fit for use I carried
them to my cave; and here, during the next season, I employed
myself in making, as well as I could, a great many baskets, both to
carry earth or to carry or lay up anything, as I had occasion; and
' made them
though I did not finish them very handsomely, yet
sufficiently serviceable for my purpose; and thus, afterwards, I
took care never to be without them; and as my wicker-ware
decayed, I made more, especially strong, deep baskets to place my
corn in, instead of sacks, when I should come to have any quantity
of it.
Having mastered this difficulty, and employed a world of time
about it, I bestirred myself to see, if possible, how to supply two
wants. I had no vessels to hold anything that was liquid, except
two runlets, which were almost full of rum, and some glass bottles
-some of the common size, and others which were case bottles,
square, for the holding of water, spirits, etc. I had not so much as
a pot to boil anything, except a great kettle, which I saved out of
ROBINSON CRUSOE,
75
the ship, and which was too big for such as I desired it—via, to
make broth, and stew a bit of meat by itself. The second thing I
fain would have had was a tobacco-pipe, but it was impossible to
me to make one; however, I found a contrivance for that, too, at
last. I employed myself in planting my second rows of stakes or
piles, and in this wicker-working all the summer or dry season,
when another business took me up more time than it could be
imagined I could spare
CHAPTER VIIL
Make a second tour through the island-Catch a young parrot, which 1
afterwards teach to speak-My mode of sleeping at night-Find the
other side of the island much more pleasant than mine, and covered
with turtle and sea-fowl-Catch a young kid, which I tame-Return
to my old habitation-Great plague with my harvest.
MENTIONED before that I had a great mind to see
the whole island, and that I had travelled up the
brook, and so on to where I built my bower, and
where I had an opening quite to the sea, on the other
side of the island. I now resolved to travel quite
across to the sea-shore on that side; so, taking my gun, a hatchet,
and my dog, and a larger quantity of powder and shot than usual,
with two biscuit-cakes and a great bunch of raisins in my pouch for
my store, I began my journey. When I had passed the vale where
my bower stood, as above, I came within view of the sea to the
west, and it being a very clear day, I fairly descried land-whether
an island or a continent I could not tell; but it lay very high,
extending from the W. to the W.S.W. at a very great distance; by
my guess it could not be less than fifteen or twenty leagues off.
I could not tell what part of the world this might be, otherwise than
that I knew it must be part of America, and, as I concluded, by all
my observations, must be near the Spanish dominions, and perhaps
was all inhabited by savages, where, if I had landed, I had been in
a worse condition than I was now; and therefore I acquiesced in
the dispositions of Providence, which I began now to own and to
believe ordered everything for the best; I say I quieted my mind
with this, and left off afflicting myself with fruitless wishes of being
there.
•
Besides, after some thought upon this affair, I considered that if
this land was the Spanish coast, I should certainly, one time or
other, see some vessel pass or repass one way or other; but if not.
then it was the savage coast between the Spanish country and
Brazils, where are found the worst of savages; for they are canni-
2

76
life and adventures of
bals, or men-eaters, and fail not to murder and devour all the
human bodies that fall into their hands.
With these considerations, I walked very leisurely forward. I
found that side of the island where I now was much pleasanter than
mine the open or savannah fields sweet, adorned with flowers and
grass, and full of very fine woods. I saw abundance of parrots, and
fain I would have caught one, if possible, to have kept it to be tame,
and taught it to speak to me. I did, after some painstaking, catch
a young parrot, for I knocked it down with a stick, and having
recovered it, I brought it home; but it was some years before I
could make him speak, however, at last I taught him to call me
by name very familiarly But the accident that followed, though it
be a trifle, will be very diverting in its place.
I was exceedingly diverted with this journey. I found in the low
grounds hares (as I thought them to be) and foxes; but they
differed greatly from all the other kinds I had met with, nor could I
satisfy myself to eat them, though I killed several. But I had no
need to be venturous, for I had no want of food, and of that which
was very good, too, especially these three sorts, viz.-goats, pigeons,
and turtle, or tortoise, which, added to my grapes, Leadenhall
market could not have furnished a table better than I, in proportion
to the company; and though my case was deplorable enough, yet I
had great cause for thankfulness that I was not driven to any
extremities for food, but had rather plenty, even to dainties.
I never travelled in this journey above two miles outright in a
day, or thereabouts; but I took so many turns and re-turns to see
what discoveries I could make, that I came weary enough to the
place where I resolved to sit down all night; and then I either
reposed myself in a tree, or surrounded myself with a row of stakes
set upright in the ground, either from one tree to another, or so as
Do wild creature could come at me without waking me.
As soon as I came to the sea-shore, I was surprised to see that I
had taken up my lot on the worst side of the island, for here,
indeed, the shore was covered with innumerable turtles, whereas on
the other side I had found but three in a year and a-half. Here
was also an infinite number of fowls of many kinds, some which I
had seen, and some which I had not seen before, and many of them
very good meat, but such as I knew not the names of, except those
called penguins.
I could have shot as many as I pleased, but was very sparing of
my powder and shot, and therefore had more mind to kill a she-
goat, if I could, which I could better feed on; and though there
were many goats here, more than on my side the island, yet it was
with much more difficulty that I could come near them, the country
being flat and even, and they saw me much sooner than when I was
on the hills.
I confess this side of the country was much pleasanter than mine;
bat yet I had not the least inclination to remove, for as I was fixed
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
in my habitation it became natural to me, and I seemed all the
while I was here to be as it were upon a journey, and from home.
However, I travelled along the shore of the sea towards the east, I
suppose about twelve miles, and then setting up a great pole upon
the shore for a mark, I concluded I would go home again, and
that the next journey I took should be on the other side of the
island east from my dwelling, and so round till I came to my post
again.
I took another way to come back than that I went, thinking I
could easily keep all the island so much in my view that I could not
miss finding my first dwelling by viewing the country; but I found
myself mistaken, for being come about two or three miles, I found
myself descended into a very large valley, but so surrounded with
hills, and those hills covered with wood, that I could not see which
was my way by any direction but that of the sun, nor even then,
unless I knew very well the position of the sun at that time of the
day. It happened, to my further misfortune, that the weather
proved hazy for three or four days while I was in the valley, and
not being able to see the sun, I wandered about very uncomfortably,
and at last was obliged to find the sea-side, look for my post, and
come back the same way I went and then, by easy journeys, I
turned homeward, the weather being exceeding hot, and my gun,
ammunition, hatchet, and other things very heavy.
In this journey my dog surprised a young kid, and seized upon
it; and I, running in to take hold of it, caught it, and saved it alive
from the dog. I had a great mind to bring it home if I could, for
had often been musing whether it might not be possible to get a
kid or two, and so raise a breed of tame goats, which might supply
me when my powder and shot should be all spent. I made a collar
for this little creature, and with a string, which I made of some
rope-yarn, which I always carried about me, I led him along, though
with some difficulty, till I came to my bower, and there I enclosed
him and left him, for I was very impatient to be at home, from
whence I had been absent above a month.
I cannot express what a satisfaction it was tº me to come into my
old hutch, and lie down in my hammock-hed. This little wandering
journey, without settled place of abode, had been so unpleasant to
me, that my own house, as I called it to myself, was a perfect
settlement to me compared to that; and it rendered everything
about me so comfortable, that I resolved I would never go a great
way from it again while it should be my lot to stay on the
island.
I reposed myself here a week, to rest and regale myself after my
long journey; during which most of the time was taken up in the
weighty affair of making a cage for my Poll, who began now to be
a mere domestic, and to be well acquainted with me. Then I
began to think of the poor kid which I had penned in within my
little circle, and resolved to go and fetch it home, or give it some

78
life and adventures of
food; accordingly I went, and found it where I left it, for indeed it
could not get out, but was almost starved for want of food. I went
and cut boughs of trees, and branches of such shrubs as I could
find, and threw it over, and having fed it, I tied it as I did before,
to lead it away; but it was so tame with being hungry, that I had
no need to have tied it, for it followed me like a dog and as I
continually fed it, the creature became so loving, so gentle, and so
fond, that it became from that time one of my domestics also, and
would never leave me afterwards,
:
The rainy season of the autumnal equinox was now come, and I
kept the 30th of September in the same solemn manner as before,
being the anniversary of my landing on the island, having now
been there two years, and no more prospect of being delivered
than the first day I came there. I spent the whole day in humble
and thankful acknowledgments of the many wonderful mercies
which my solitary condition was attended with, and without whicè
it might have been infinitely more miserable. I gave humble and
hearty thanks that God had been pleased to discover to me that in
was possible I might be more happy in this solitary condition that
I should have been in the liberty of society, and in all the pleasures
of the world; that He could fully make up to me the deficiencies
of my solitary state, and the want of human society, by His presence
and the communications of His grace to my soul; supporting,
comforting, and encouraging me to depend upon His providence
here, and hope for His eternal presence hereafter.
It was now that I began sensibly to feel how much more happy
this life I now led was, with all its miserable circumstances, than
the wicked, cursed, abominable life I led all the past part of my
days; and now I changed both my sorrows and my joys; my very
desires altered, my affections changed their gusts, and my delights
were perfectly new from what they were at my first coming, or,
indeed, for the two years past.
Before, as I walked about, either on my hunting, or for viewing
the country, the anguish of my soul at my condition would break
out upon me on a sudden, and my very heart would die within me,
to think of the woods, the mountains, the deserts I was in, and how
I was a prisoner, locked up with the eternal bars and bolts of the
ocean, in an uninhabited wilderness, without redemption. In the
midst of the greatest composure of my mind, this would break out
upon me like a storm, and make me wring my hands and weep like
a child
Sometimes it would take me in the middle of my work,
and I would immediately sit down and sigh, and look upon the
ground for an hour or two together; and this was still worse to me,
for if I could burst out into tears, or vent myself by words, it would
go off, and the grief, having exhausted itself, would abate.
But now I began to exercise myself with new thoughts: I daily
read the word of God, and applied all the comforts of it to my
present state. One morning, being very sad, I opened the Bible
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
79
upon these words, "I will never, never leave thee, nor forsake
thee." Immediately it occurred that these words were to me; why
else should they be directed in such a manner, just at the moment
when I was mourning ever my condition, as one forsaken of God
and man? *Well, then," said I, "if God does not forsake me, of
what ill consequence can it be, or what matters it, though the world
should all forsake me, seeing on the other hand, if I had all the
world, and should lose the favour and blessing of God, there would
be no comparison in the loss?"
From this moment I began to conclude in my mind that it was
possible for me to be more happy in this forsaken, solitary con-
dition than it was probable I should ever have been in any other
particular state in the world; and with this thought I was going to
give thanks to God for bringing me to this place. I know not what
it was, but something shocked my mind at that thought, and I
durst not speak the words. "How canst thou become such a
hypocrite," said I, even audibly, "to pretend to be thankful for a
condition, which, however thou mayest endeavour to be contentea
with, thou wouldst rather pray heartily to be delivered from?" So
I stopped there; but though I could not say I thanked God for
being there, yet I sincerely gave thanks to God for opening my
eyes, by whatever afflicting providences, to see the former condition
of my life, and to mourn for my wickedness, and repent I never
opened the Bible, or shut it, but my very soul within me blessed
God for directing my friend in England, without any order of mine,
to pack it up among my goods, and for assisting me afterwards to
save it out of the wreck of the ship.
Thus, and in this disposition of mind, I began my third year;
and though I have not given the reader the trouble of so particular
an account of my works this year as the first; yet in general it may
be observed that I was very seldom idle, but having regularly
divided my time according to the several daily employments that
were before me, such as, first, my duty to God, and the reading the
Scriptures, which I constantly set apart some time for thrice every
day; secondly, the going abroad with my gun for food, which
generally took me up three hours in every morning, when it did not
rain; thirdly, the ordering, cutting, preserving, and cooking what I
had killed or caught for my supply: these took up great part of
the day. Also, it is to be considered, that in the middle of the day,
when the sun was in the zenith, the violence of the heat was too
great to stir out; so that about four hours in the evening was all
the time I could be supposed to work in, with this exception, that
sometimes I changed my hours of hunting and working, and
went to work in the morning, and abroad with my gun in the
afternoon.
To this short time allowed for labour I desire may be added the
exceeding laboriousness of my work; the many hours which, for
want of tools, want of help, and want of skill, everything I did took up
to
life and adventures of
out of my time. For example, I was full two and forty days in making
a board for a long shelf, which I wanted in my cave; whereas, twe
sawyers, with their tools and a saw pit, would have cut six of them
out of the same tree in half a day.
My case was this: it was to be a large tree which was to be cut
down, because my board was to be a broad one. This tree I was
three days in cutting down, and two more cutting off the boughs,
and reducing it to a log or piece of timber. With inexpressible
hacking and hewing I reduced both the sides of it into chips till it
began to be light enough to move; then I turned it, and made one
side of it smooth and flat as a board from end to end; then, turning
that side downward, cut the other side till I brought the plank to
be about three inches thick, and smooth on both sides. Any one
may judge the labour of my hands in such a piece of work; but
labour and patience carried me through that, and many other things.
I only observe this in particular, to show the reason why so much of
my time went away with so little work-viz., that what might be a
little to be done with help and tools, was a vast labour and required
a prodigious time to do alone, and by hand. But notwithstanding
this, with patience and labour I got through everything that my
circumstances made necessary to me to do, as will appear by what
follows.
I was now, in the months of November and December, expecting
my crop of barley and rice. The ground I had manured and dug
up for them was not great; for, as I observed, my seed of each was
not above the quantity of half a peck, for I had lost one whole crop
by sowing in the dry season. But now my crop promised very well,
when on a sudden I found I was in danger of losing it all again by
enemies of several sorts, which it was scarcely possible to keep from
it; as, first the goats, and wild creatures which I called hares, who,
tasting the sweetness of the blade, lay in it night and day, as soon
as it came up, and eat it so close, that it could get no time to shoot
up into stalk.
This I saw no remedy for but by making an enclosure about it
with a hedge; which I did with a great deal of toil, and the more,
because it required speed. However, as my arable land was but
small, suited to my crop, I got it totally well fenced in about three
weeks' time; and shooting some of the creatures in the day time, I
set my dog to guard it in the night, tying him up to a stake at the
gate, where he would stand and bark all night long; so in a little time
the enemies forsook the place, and the corn grew very strong and
well, and began to ripen apace.
But as the beasts ruined me before, while my corn was in the
olade, so the birds were as likely to ruin me now when it was in the
ear; for, going along by the place to see how it throve, I saw my
little crop surrounded with fowls, of I know not how many sorts,
who stood, as it were, watching till I should be gone. I immediately
let fly among them, for I always had my gun with me. I had no
"
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
81
sooner shot, but there rose up a little cloud of fowls, which I had
not seen at all, from among the corn itself.
This touched me sensibly, for I foresaw that in a few days they
would devour all my hopes; that I should be starved, and never be
able to raise a crop at all; and what to do I could not tell; how-
ever, I resolved not to lose my corn, if possible, though I should
watch it night and day. In the first place, I went among it to see
what damage was already done, and found they had spoiled a good
deal of it; but that as it was yet too green for them, the loss was
not so great but that the remainder was likely to be a good crop if
It could be saved.

7
I stayed by it to load my gun, and then coming away, I could
easily see the thieves sitting upon all the trees about me, as if they
only waited till I was gone away, and the event proved it to be so;
for as I walked off, as if I was gone, I was no sooner out of their
sight than they dropped down one by one into the corn again. I
was so provoked, that I could not have patience to stay till more
came on, knowing that every grain that they ate now was, as it
might be said, a peck-loaf to me in the consequence; but coming
up to the hedge, I fired again, and killed three of them. This was
what I wished for; so I took them up, and served them as we serve
notorious thieves in England-hanged them in chains, for a terror
to others. It is impossible to imagine that this should have such
an effect as it had, for the fowls would not only not come at the
corn, but, in short, they forsook all that part of the island, and I
could never see a bird near the place as long as my scarecrows
hung there. This I was very glad of, you may be sure, and about
the latter end of December, which was our second harvest of the
year, I reaped my corn.
I was sadly put to it for a scythe or sickle to cut it down, and all
I could do was to make one, as well as I could, out of one of the
broadswords, or cutlasses, which I saved among the arms out of the
ship. However, as my first crop was but small, I had no great
difficulty to cut it down; in short, I reaped it in my way, for I cut
nothing off but the ears, and carried it away in a great basket which
I had made, and so rubbed it out with my hands; and at the end
of all my harvesting, I found that out of my half-peck of seed I had
near two bushels of rice, and about two bushels and a-half of
barley; that is to say, by my guess, for I had no measure at that
time.

However, this was a great encouragement to me, and I foresaw
that, in time, it would please God to supply me with bread. And
yet here I was perplexed again, for I neither knew how to grind, or
make meal of my corn, or indeed, how to clean it and part it; nor,
if made into meal, how to make bread of it; and if how to make it,
yet I knew not how to bake it. These things being added to my
desire of having a good quantity for store, and to secure a constant
apply, I resolved not to laste any of this crop, but to preserve it all
82
life and adventures of
for seed against the next season; and, in the meantime, to employ
all my study and hours of working to accomplish this great work of
providing myself with corn and bread.
It might be truly said, that now I worked for my bread. I
believe few people have thought much upon the strange multitude
of little things necessary in the providing, producing, curing, dress-
ing, making, and finishing this one article of bread.
I, that was reduced to a mere state of nature, found this to my
daily discouragement; and was made more ensible of it every
hour, even after I had got the first handful of seed-corn, which, as I
have said, came up unexpectedly, and indeed to a surprise.
First, I had no plough to turn up the earth-no spade or shovel
to dig it. Well, this I conquered by making me a wooden spade,
as I observed before; but this did my work but in a wooden man-
ner; and though it cost me a great many days to make it, yet, for
want of iron, it not only wore out soon, but made my work the
harder, and made it be performed much worse. However, this I
bore with, and was content to work it out with patience, and bear
with the badness of the performance. When the corn was sown, I
had no harrow, but was forced to go over it myself, and drag a
great heavy bough of a tree over it, to scratch it, as it may be
called, rather than rake or harrow it. When it was growing, and
grown, I have observed already how many things I wanted to fence
it, secure it, mow or reap it, cure and carry it home, thrash, part it
from the chaff, and save it. Then I wanted a mill to grind it,
sieves to dress it, yeast and salt to make it into bread, and an oven
to bake it; but all these things I did without, as shall be observed;
and yet the corn was an inestimable comfort and advantage to me
too. All this, as I said, made everything laborious and tedious to
me; but that there was no help for. Neither was my time so much
loss to me, because, as I had divided it, a certain part of it was
every day appointed to these works; and as I had resolved to use
none of the corn for bread till I had a greater quantity by me,
I had the next six months to apply myself wholly, by labour
and invention, to furnish myself with utensils proper for the
performing all the operations necessary for making the corn,
when I had it, fit for my use.

ROBINSON CRUSOE.
&
CHAPTER IX
I attempt to mould earthenware, and succeed-Description of my mode
of baking-Begin to make a boat-After it is finished, am unable to
get it down to the water-Serious reflections-My ink and biscuit
exhausted, and clothes in a bad state-Contrive to make a dress of
skins.

UT first I was to prepare more land, for I had now
seed enough to sow above an acre of ground. Before
I did this, I had a week's work at least to make me a
spade, which, when it was done, was but a sorry one
indeed, and very heavy, and required double labour to
work with it. However, I got through that, and sowed my seed in
two large flat pieces of ground, as near my house as I could find
them to my mind, and fenced them in with a good hedge, the
stakes of which were all cut off that wood which I had set before,
and knew it would grow; so that, in a year's time, I knew I should
have a quick or living hedge, that would want but little repair.
This work did not take me up less than three months, because a
great part of that time was the wet season, when I could not go
abroad. Within-doors, that is when it rained, and I could not go
out, I found employment in the following occupations-always
observing, that all the while I was at work I diverted myself with
talking to my parrot, and teaching him to speak; and I quickly
taught him to know his own name, and at last to speak it out pretty
loud, "Foli,” which was the first word I ever heard spoken in the
island by any mouth but my own. This, therefore, was not my work,
but an assistance to my work; for now, as I said, I had a great em-
ployment upon my hands, as follows: I had long studied to make, by
some means or other, some earthen vessels, which, indeed, I wanted
sorely, but knew not where to come at them. However, consider-
ing the heat of the climate, I did not doubt but if I could find out
any clay, I might make some pots that might, being dried in the
sun, be hard enough and strong enough to bear handling, and to
hold anything that was dry, and required to be kept so; and as
this was necessary in the preparing corn, meal, etc., which was the
thing I was doing, I resolved to make some as large as I could,
and fit only to stand like jars, to hold what should be put into
them.
A
It would make the reader pity me, or rather laugh at me, to tell
how many awkward ways I took to raise this paste; what odd,
misshapen, ugly things I made; how many of them fell in and
how many fell out, the clay not being stiff enough to bear its own
weight; how many cracked by the over-violent heat of the sun,
being set out too hastily; and how many fell in pieces with only
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
removing, as well before as after they were dried; and, in a word,
how, after having laboured hard to find the clay-to dig it, to
temper it, to bring it home, and work it-I could not make above
two large earthen ugly things (I cannot call them jars) in about
two months' labour.
However, as the sun baked these two very dry and Card, I lifted
them very gently up, and set them down again in two great wicker-
baskets, which I had made on purpose for them, that they might
not break; and as between the pot and the basket there was a
little room to spare, I stuffed it full of the rice and barley straw;
and these two pots being to stand always dry I thought would hold
my dry corn, and perhaps the meal, when the corn was bruised.
Though I miscarried so much in my design for large pots, yet I
made several smaller things with better success; such as little
round pots, flat dishes, pitchers, and pipkins, and any things my
hand turned to; and the heat of the sun baked them quite hard.
But all this would not answer my end, which was to get an
earthen pot to hold what was liquid, and bear the fire, which none
of these could do. It happened after some time, making a pretty
large fire for cooking my meat, when I went to put it out after I
had done with it, I found a broken piece of one of my earthen-
ware vessels in the fire, burnt as hard as a stone, and red as
a tile. I was agreeably surprised to see it, and said to myself, that
certainly they might be made to burn whole, if they would burt
broken.
This set me to study how to order my fire, so as to make it burn
some pots. I had no notion of a kiln, such as the potters burn
in, or of glazing them with lead, though I had some lead to do it
with; but I placed three large pipkins and two or three pots in a
pile, one upon another, and placed my firewood all round it, with a
great heap of embers under them. I plied the fire with fresh fuel
round the outside and upon the top, till I saw the pots in the inside
red-hot quite through, and observed that they did not crack at all.
When I saw them clear red, I let them stand in that heat about
five or six hours, till I found one of them, though it did not crack,
did melt or run; for the sand which was mixed with the clay melted
by the violence of the heat, and would have run into glass if I had
gone on; so I slacked my fire gradually till the pots began to abate
of the red colour; and watching them all night, that I might not
let the fire abate too fast, in the morning I had three very good
(I will not say handsome) pipkins, and two other earthen pots, as
hard burnt as could be desired, and one of them perfectly glazed
with the running of the sand.
After this experiment, I need not say that I wanted no sort of
earthenware for my use; but I must needs say as to the shapes of
them, they were very indifferent, as any one may suppose, when I
had no way of making them but as the children make dirt pies,
or as a woman would make pies that never learned to raise paste.
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
85
No joy at a thing of so mean a nature was ever equal to mine,
when I found I had made an earthen pot that would bear the fire
and I had hardly patience to stay till they were cold before I sei
one on the fire again, with some water in it, to boil me some meat,
which it did admirably well; and with a piece of a kid I made
some very good broth, though I wanted oatmeal, and several other
ingredients requisite to make it as good as I would have had it
been.
My next concern was to get me a stone mortar to stamp or beat
some corn in; for as to the mill, there was no thought of arriving
at that perfection of art with one pair of hands. To supply this
want, I was at a great loss; for, of all the trades in the world, I
was as perfectly unqualified for a stone-cutter as for any whatever;
neither had I any tools to go about it with. I spent many a day to
find out a great stone big enough to cut hollow, and make fit for a
mortar, and could find none at all, except what was in the solid
rock, and which I had no way to dig or cut out; nor indeed were
the rocks in the island of hardness sufficient, but were all of a
sandy, crumbling stone, which neither would bear the weight of a
heavy pestle, nor would break the corn without filling it with sand.
So, after a great deal of time lost in searching for a stone, I gave it
over, and resolved to look out for a great block of hard wood,
which I found, indeed much easier; and getting one as big as I
had strength to stir, I rounded it, and formed it on the outside with
my axe and hatchet, and then, with the help of fire and infinite
labour, made a hollow place in it, as the Indians in Brazil make
their canoes. After this, I made a great heavy pestle, or beater, of
the wood called the iron-wood; and this I prepared and laid by
against I had my next crop of corn, which I proposed to myself to
grind, or rather pound, into meal, to make bread.
My next difficulty was to make a sieve, or searce, to dress my
meal, and to part is from the bran and the husk; without which I
did not see it possible I could have any bread. This was a most
difficult thing even to think on, for to be sure I had nothing like
the necessary thing to make it-I mean fine thin canvas or stuff to
searce the meal through. And here I was at a full stop for many
months; nor did I really know what to do. Linen I had none left
but what was mere rags; I had goats' hair, but neither knew how to
weave it or spin it; and had I known how, here were no tools to
work it with. All the remedy that I found for this was, that at last
I did remember I had, among the seamen's clothes which were
saved out of the ship, some neckcloths of calico or muslin; and
with some pieces of these I made three small sieves proper enough
for the work; and thus I made shift for some years: how I did
afterwards, I shall show in its place.
The baking part was the next thing to be considered, and how I
should make bread when I came to have corn; for, first, I had no
yeast. As to that part, there was no supplying the want, so I did
86
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
not concern myself much about it. But for an oven I was indeed in
great pain. At length I found out an experiment for that also, which
was this: I made some earthen vessels very broad, but not deep,
that is to say, about two feet diameter, and not above nine inches
deep. These I burned in the fire, as I had done the other, and
laid them by; and when I wanted to bake, I made a great fire
upon my hearth, which I had paved with some square tiles, of my
own baking and burning also: but I should not call them square.
When the firewood was burned pretty much into embers, or live
coals, I drew them forward upon this hearth, so as to cover it all
over, and there I let them lie till the hearth was very hot Then,
sweeping away all the embers, I set down my loaf or leaves, and
whelming down the earthen pot upon them, drew the embers all
round the outside of the pot, to keep in and add to the heat; and
thus, as well as in the best oven in the world, I baked my barley-
loaves, and became, in little time, a good pastrycook into the
bargain; for I made myself several cakes and puddings of the
rice; but I made no pies, neither had I anything to put into them,
supposing I had, except the fiesh either of fowls or goats.
It need not be wondered at if all these things took me up most
part of the third year of my abode here; for it is to be observed
that in the intervals of these things I had my new harvest and
husbandry to manage; for I reaped my corn in its season, and
carried it home as well as I could, and laid it up in the ear, in my
large baskets, till I had time to rub it out, for I had no floor to
thrash it on, or instrument to thrash it with.
And now, indeed, my stock of corn increasing, I really wanted to
build my barns bigger; I wanted a place to lay it up in, for the
increase of the corn now yielded me so much, that I had of the
barley about twenty bushels, and of the rice, as much or more;
insomuch that now I resolved to begin to use it freely; for my
bread had been quite gone a great while; also I resolved to see
what quantity would be sufficient for me a whole year, and to sow
but once a year.
墨
​Upon the whole, I found that the forty bushels of barley and rice
were much more than I could consume in a year; so I resolved to
sow just the same quantity every year that I sowed the last, in
hopes that such a quantity would fully provide me with bread, etc.
All the while these things were doing, you may be sure my
thoughts ran many times upon the prospect of land which I had
seen from the other side of the island; and I was not without
secret wishes that I were on shore there, fancying that, seeing the
mainland, and an inhabited country, I might find some way or
other to convey myself further, and perhaps at last find some
means of escape.
But all this while I made no allowance for the dangers of such
an undertaking, and how I might fall into the hands of savages,
and perhaps such as I might have reason to think far worse than
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
87
the lions and tigers of Africa: that if I once came in their power, I
should run a hazard of more than a thousand to one of being killed
and perhaps of being eaten; for I had heard that the people of the
Caribbean coast were cannibals, or man-eaters, and I knew by the
latitude that I could not be far from that shore. Then, supposing
they were not cannibals, yet they might kill me, as many Europeans
who had fallen into their hands had been served, even when they
had been ten or twenty together-much more I, that was but one,
and could make little or no defence; all these things, I say, which
I ought to have considered well, and did come into my thoughts
afterwards, yet gave me no apprehensions at first, and my head ran
mightily upon the thought of getting over to the shore.
Now I wished for my boy Xury, and the long-boat with shoulder-
of-mutton sail, with which I sailed above a thousand miles on the
coast of Africa; but this was in vain: then I thought I would ge
and look at our ship's boat, which, as I have said, was blown up
upon the shore a great way, in the storm, when we were first cast
away. She lay almost where she did at first, but not quite; and was
turned, by the force of the waves and the winds, almost bottom
upward, against a high ridge of beachy, rough sand, but no water
about her. If I had had hands to have refitted her, and to have
launched her into the water, the boat would have done well enough,
and I might have gone back into the Brazils with her easily
enough; but I might have foreseen that I could no more turn her
and set her upright upon her bottom than I could remove the
island; however, I went to the woods, and cut levers and rollers,
and brought them to the boat, resolving to try what I could do;
suggesting to myself that if I could but turn her down, I might
repair the damage she had received, and she would be a very good
boat, and I might go to sea in her very easily.
I spared no pains, indeed, in this piece of fruitless toil, and spent,
I think, three or four weeks about it; at last finding it impossible
to heave it up with my little strength, I fell to digging away the
sand, to undermine it, and so to make it fall down, setting pieces of
wood to thrust and guide it right in the fall.
But when I had done this, I was unable to stir it up again, or to
get under it, much less to move it forward towards the water; so I
was forced to give it over; and yet, though I gave over the hope's
of the boat, my desire to venture over for the main increased, rather
then decreased, as the means for it seemed impossible.
This at length put me upon thinking whether it was not possible
to make myself a cance, or periagua, such as the natives of those
climates make, even without tools, or, as I might say, without
hands, of the trunk of a great tree. This I not only thought possible,
but easy, and pleased myself extremely with the thoughts of making
it, and with my having much more convenience for it than any of
the Negroes or Indians; but not at all considering the particular
Inconveniences which I lay under more than the ludians did-yu,
88
LIFE AND ADventures of
want of hands to move it, when it was made, into the water-a
difficulty much harder for me to surmount than all the consequences
of want of tools could be to them; for what was it to me, if when I
had chosen a vast tree in the woods, and with much trouble cut it
down, if I had been able with my tools to hew and dub the outside
into the proper shape of a boat, and burn or cut out the inside to
make it hollow, so as to make a boat of it-if, after all this, I must
leave it just there where I found it, and not be able to launch it into
the water?
One would have thought I could not have had the least refection
upon my mind of my circumstances while I was making this boat,
but I should have immediately thought how I should get it into the
sea; but my thoughts were so intent upon my voyage over the sea
in it, that I never once considered how I should get it off the land:
and it was really, in its own nature, more easy for me to guide it
over forty-five miles of sea than about forty-five fathoms of land,
where it lay, to set it afloat in the water.
I went to work upon this boat the most like a fool than ever man
did who had any of his senses awake. I pleased myself with the
design, without determining whether I was ever able to undertake it ;
not but that the difficulty of launching my boat came often into my
head; but I put a stop to my inquiries into it by this foolish
answer which I gave myself—"Let me first make it; I warrant I
will find some way or other to get it along when it is done.”
This was a most preposterous method; but the eagerness of my
fancy prevailed, and to work I went I felled a cedar-tree, and I
question much whether Solomon ever had such a one for the build-
ing of the Temple of Jerusalem; it was five feet ten inches
diameter at the lower part next the stump, and four feet eleven ·
inches diameter at the end of twenty-two feet; after which it
lessened for a while, and then parted into branches. It was not
without infinite labour that I felled this tree; I was twenty days
hacking and hewing at it at the bottom; I was fourteen more
getting the branches and limbs and the vast spreading head cut off,
which I hacked and hewed through with axe and hatchet, and
inexpressible labour: after this, it cost me a month to shape it and
dub it to a proportion, and to something like the bottom of a boat,
that it might swim upright as it ought to do. It cost me near three
months more to clear the inside, and work it out so as to make an
exact boat of it; this I did, indeed, without fire, by mere mallet and
chisel, and by the dint of hard labour, till I had brought it to be a
very handsome periagua, and big enough to have carried six-and-
twenty men, and consequently big enough to have carried me and
all my cargo.
When I had gone through this work I was extremery delighted
with it. The boat was really much bigger than ever I saw a canoe
or periagua, that was made of one tree, m my life. Many a weary
stroke it had cost, you may be sure; and had I gotten it into the
PR
7
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
89
water, I make no question but I should have begun the maddest
voyage, and the most unlikely to be performed, that ever was
undertaken.
But all my devices to get it into the water failed me; though
they cost me infinite labour too. It lay about one hundred
yards from the water, and not more; but the first inconvenience
was, it was up hill towards the creek. Well, to take away this
discouragement, I resolved to dig into the surface of the earth,
and so make a declivity: this I began, and it cost me a pro-
digious deal of pains (but who grudge pains who have their
deliverance în view?); but when this was worked through, and
this difficulty managed, it was still much the same, for I could
no more stir the canoe than I could the other boat. Then I
measured the distance of ground, and resolved to cut a dock or
canal, to bring the water up to the canoe, seeing I could not
bring the canoe down to the water. Well, I began this work
and when I began to enter upon it, and calculate how deep it
was to be dug. how broad, how the stuff was to be thrown out, I
found that, by the number of hands I had, being none but my
own, it must have been ten or twelve years before I could have
gone through with it; for the shore lay so high, that at the
ipper end it must have been at least twenty feet deep; so at
ength, though with great reluctancy, I gave this attempt over
ulso.
This grieved he heartily; and now I saw, though too late, the
folly of beginning a work before we count the cost, and before we
judge rightly of our own strength to go through with it.
In the middle of this work I finished my fourth year in this
place, and kept my anniversary with the same devotion, and
with as much comfort as ever before; for, by a constant study
and serious application to the Word of God, and by the assist-
ance of His grace, I gained a different knowledge from what I
had before. I entertained different notions of things. I looked
now upon the world as a thing remote, which I had nothing to do
with, no expectations from, and, indeed, no desires about: in a
word, I had nothing indeed to do with it, nor was ever likely to
have, so I thought it looked, as we may perhaps look upon it
hereafter-viz., as a place I had lived in, but was come out of it;
and well might I say, as Father Abraham to Dives, "Between
me and thee is a great gulf fixed.”
In the first place, I was removed from all the wickedness of
the world here; I had neither the lusts of the flesh, the lusts of
the eye, nor the pride of life. I had nothing to cavet, for I had
all that I was now capable of enjoying; I was lord of the whole
manor; or, if I pleased, I might call myself king or emperor
over the whole country which I had possession of: there were
no rivals; I had no competitor, none to dispute sovereignty or
command with me: I might have raised ship-loadings of corn,
99
life and adventures of
out I had no use for it; so I let as little grow as I thought
enough for my occasion. I had tortoise or turtle enough, but
now and then one was as much as I could put to any use: I had
timber enough to have built a fleet of ships; and I had grapes
enough to have made wine, or to have cured into raisins, to
have loaded that fleet when it had been built.
But all I could make use of was all that was valuable: I had
enough to eat and supply my wants, and what was all the rest to
me? If I killed more flesh than I could eat, the dog must eat
it, or vermin; if I sowed more corn than I could eat, it must be
spoiled; the trees that I cut down were lying to rot on the
ground; I could make no more use of them but for fuel, and that
I had no occasion for but to dress my food.
In a word, the nature and experience of things dictated to me,
upon just reflection, that all the good things of this world are no
farther good to us than they are for our use; and that, whatever we
may heap up to give others, we enjoy just as much as we can use,
and no more, The most covetous, griping miser in the world
would have been cured of the vice of covetousness if he had been
in my case; for I possessed infinitely more than I knew what to do
with. I had no room for desire, except it was of things which I had
not, and they were but trifles, though, indeed, of great use to me.
I had, as I hinted before, a parcel of money, as well gold as silver,
about thirty-six pounds sterling. Alas I there the sorry, useless
stuff lay; I had no manner of business for it; and often thought
with myself that I would have given a handful of it for a gross of
tobacco-pipes; or for a hand-mill to grind my corn; nay, I would
have given it all for a sixpenny-worth of turnip and carrot seed out
of England, or for a handful of peas and beans, and a bottle of ink.
As it was, I had not the least advantage by it or benefit from it;
but there it lay in a drawer, and grew mouldy with the damp of the
cave in the wet seasons; and if I had had the drawer full of
diamonds, it had been the same case-they had been of no manner
of value to me, because of no use.
I had now brought my state of life to be much easier in itself
than it was at first, and much easier to my mind, as well as to my
body. I frequently sat down to meat with thankfulness, and
admired the hand of God's providence, which had thus spread my
table in the wilderness. I learned to look more upon the bright
side of my condition, and less upon the dark side, and to consider
what I enjoyed rather than what I wanted; and this gave me some-
times such secret comforts, that I cannot express them; and which
I take notice of here, to put those discontented people in mind of
it, who cannot enjoy comfortably what God has given them,
because they see and covet something that He has not given them.
All our discontents about what we want appeared to me to spring
from the want of thankfulness for what we have.
Another reflection was of great use to me, and doubtless would
ROBINSON Crusoe.
be so to any one that should fall into such distress as mine was ;
and this was, to compare my present condition with what I at first
expected it would be; nay, with what it would certainly have been,
if the good providence of God had not wonderfully ordered the ship to
be cast up nearer to the shore, where I not only could come at her,
but could bring what I got out of her to the shore, for my relief and
comfort; without which, I had wanted for tools to work, weapons
for defence, and gunpowder and shot for getting my food.
I spent whole hours, I may say whole days, in representing to
myself, in the most lively colours, how I must have acted if I had
got nothing out of the ship How I could not have so much as got
any food, except fish and turtles; and that, as it was long before I
found any of them, I must have perished first; that I should have
lived, if I had not perished, like a mere savage; that if I had killed
a goat or a fowl, by any contrivance, I had no way to flay or open
it, or part the flesh from the skin and the bowels, or to cut it up;
but must gnaw it with my teeth, and pull it with my claws, like a
beast.
}
These reflections made me very sensible of the goodness of
Providence to me, and very thankful for my present condition, with
all its hardchips and misfortunes; and this part also I cannot but
recommend to the reflection of those who are apt, in their misery,
to say, "Is any affliction like mine?" Let them consider how
much worse the cases of some people are, and their case might
have been, if Providence had thought fit.
I had another reflection, which assisted me also to comfort my
mind with hopes; and this was comparing my present situation
with what I had deserved, and had therefore reason to expect from
the hand of Providence. I had lived a dreadful life, perfectly
destitute of the knowledge and fear of God. I had been well
instructed by father and mother; neither had they been wanting to
me in their early endeavours to infuse a religious awe of God into
my mind, a sense of my duty, and what the nature and end of my
being required of me. But, alas! falling early into the seafaring
life which, of all lives, is the most destitute of the fear of God,
though His terrors are always before them; I say, falling early into
the seafaring life, and into seafaring company, all that little sense
of religion which I had entertained was laughed out of me by my
messmates; by a hardened despising of dangers, and the views of
death, which grew habitual to me by my long absence from all
manner of opportunities to converse with anything but what was
like myself, or to hear anything that was good or tended
towards it.
© So void was I of everything that was good, or the least sense of
what I was, or was to be, that, in the greatest deliverances I
enjoyed-such as my escape from Sallee; my being taken up by
the Portuguese master of the ship; my being planted so well in the
Brazils; my receiving the cargo from England, and the like—
92
life and adventures of
never had once the words, "Thank God," so much as on my mind,
or in my mouth; nor in the greatest distress had I so much as a
thought to pray to Him, or so much as to say, "Lord, have mercy
upon me!" no, nor to mention the name of God, unless it was to
swear by, and blaspheme it.
I had terrible reâections upon my mind for many months, as I
have already observed, on account of my wicked and hardened life
past; and when I looked about me, and considered what particular
providences had attended me since my coming into this place, and
how God had dealt bountifully with me-had not only punished me
less than my iniquity had deserved, but had so plentifully provided
for me-this gave me great hopes that my repentance was accepted,
and that God had yet mercy in store for me.
With hese reflections I worked my mind up, not only to a
resignation to the will of God in the present disposition of my
circumstances, but even to a sincere thankfulness for my condition;
and that I, who was yet a living man, ought not to complain, seeing
I had not the due punishment of my sins; that I enjoyed so many
mercies which I had no reason to have expected in that place; that
I ought never more to repine at my condition, but to rejoice, and to
give daily thanks for that daily bread, which nothing but a crowd
of wonders could have brought; that I ought to consider I had
been fed even by a miracle, even as great as that of feeding Elijah
by ravens ; nay, by a long series of miracles: and that I could
hardly have named a place in the uninhabitable part of the world
where I could have been cast more to my advantage; a place
where, as I had no society, which was my affliction on one hand, so
I found no ravenous beasts, no furious wolves or tigers, to threaten
my life
nɔ venomous creatures, or poisons, which I might feed on
to my hurt; no savages to murder and devour me. In a word, as
my life was a life of sorrow one way, so it was a life of mercy
another; and I wanted nothing to make it a life of comfort but to be
able to make my sense of God's goodness to me, and care over me in
this condition, be my daily consolation; and after I did make a just
improvement on these things I went away, and was no more sad.
I had now been here so long, that many things which I had
brought on shore for my help wee either quite gone, or very much
wasted and near spent.
My ink, as I observed, had been gone some time, all but a very
little, which I eked out with water, a little and a little, till it was so
pale, it scarce left any appearance of black upon the paper. As
long as it lasted I made use of it to minute down the days of the
month on which any remarkable thing happened to me; and first,
by casting up times past, I remembered that there was a strange
concurrence of days in the various providences which befell me,
and which, if I had been superstitiously inclined to observe days as
fatal or fortunate, I might have had reason to have looked upon
with a great deal of curiosity.
robinson crusoe.
First, I had observed, that the same day that I broke away from
my father and friends, and ran away to Hull, in order to go to sea,
the same day afterwards I was taken by the Sallee man-of-war, and
made a slave; the same day of the year that I escaped out of the
wreck of that ship in Yarmouth Roads, that same day year after-
wards I made my escape from Sallee in a boat; the same day of
the year I was born on-viz., the 30th of September, that same day
I had my life so miraculously saved twenty-six years after, when I
was cast on shore in this island; so that my wicked life and my
solitary life began both on a day.
The next thing to my ink being wasted was that of my bread-I
mean the biscuit which I brought ort of the ship; this I had
husbanded to the last degree, allowing myself but one cake of
bread a-day for above a year; and yet I was quite without bread
for near a year before I got any corn of my own; and great reason
I had to be thankful that I had any at all, the getting it being, as
has been already observed, next to miraculous.
I
My clothes, too, began to decay; as to linen, I had had none a
good while, except some chequered shirts which 1 found in the
chests of the other seamen, and which I carefully preserved ;
because many times I could bear no other clothes on but a shirt ;
and it was a very great help to me that I had, among all the men's
clothes of the ship, almost three dozen of shirts. There were also,
indeed, several thick watch-coats of the seamen's which were left,
but they were too hot to wear; and though it is true that the
weather was so violently hot that there was no need of clothes, yet
I could not go quite naked-no, though I had been inclined to it,
which was not-nor could I abide the thought of it, though I was
alone. The reason why I could not go naked was, I could not bear
the heat of the sun so well when quite naked as with some clothes
on; nay, the very heat frequently blistered my skin: whereas, with a
shirt on, the air itself made some motion, and whistling under the
shirt, was twofold cooler than without it. No more could I ever
bring myself to go out in the heat of the sun without a cap or a hat ;
the heat of the sun, beating with such violence as it does in that
place, would give me the headache presently, by darting so
directly on my head, without a cap or hat on, so that I could
not bear it; whereas, if I put on my hat it would presently go
away.
Upon these views I began to consider about putting the few rags
I had, which I called clothes, into some order; I had worn out all
the waistcoats I had, and my business was now to try if I could
not make jackets out of the great watch-coats which I had by me,
and with such other materials as I had; so I set to work, tailoring,
or rather, indeed, botching, for I made most piteous work of it.
However, I made shift to make two or three new waistcoats, which
I hoped would serve me a great while: as for breeches or drawers,
I made but a very sorry shift indeed till afterwards.
94
LIFE AND ADVENTURES of
I have mentioned that I saved the skins of all the creatures that
I killed, I mean four-footed ones, and I had them hung up, stretched
out with sticks in the sun, by which means some of them were so
dry and hard that they were fit for little, but others were very
useful. The first thing I made of these was a great cap for my
head, with the hair on the outside, to shoot off the rain; and this I
performed so well, that after I made me a suit of clothes wholly of
these skins-that is to say, a waistcoat, and breeches open at the
knees, and both loose, for they were rather wanting to keep me
cool than to keep me warm. I must not omit to acknowledge that
they were wretchedly made; for if I was a bad carpenter, I was
worse tailor. However, they were such as I made very good shin
with, and when I was out, if it happened to rain, the hair of my
waistcoat and cap being outermost, I was kept very dry.
f
After this, I spent a great deal of time and pains to make an
umbrella; I was, indeed, in great want of one, and had a great
mind to make one: I had seen them made in the Brazils, where
they are very useful in the great heats there, and I felt the heats
every jot as great here, and greater too, being nearer the equinox ;
besides, as I was obliged to be much abroad, it was a most useful
thing to me, as well for the rains as the heats. I took a world of
pains with it, and was a great while before I could make anything
likely to hold: nay, after I had thought I had hit the way, I spoiled
two or three before I made one to my mind: but at last I made ne
that answered indifferently well: the main difficulty I found was
to make it let down. I could make it spread, but if it did not let
down too, and draw in, it was not portable for me any way but just
over my head, which would not do. However, at last, as I said, I
made one to answer, and covered it with skins, the hair upwards,
so that it cast off the rain like a pent-house, and kept off the sun so
effectually, that I could walk out in the hottest of the weather with
greater advantage than I could before in the coolest, and when
I had no need of it could close it, and carry it under my arm.
Thus I lived mighty comfortably, my mind being entirely com-
posed by resigning myself to the will of God, and throwing myself
wholly upon the disposal of His providence. This made my life
better than sociable, for when I began to regret the want of
conversation, I would ask myself, whether thus conversing mutually
with my own thoughts, and (as I hope I may say) with even God
Himself, by ejaculations, was not better than the utmost enjoyment
of human society in the world?
*

ROBINSON CRUSOE,
25
CHAPTER X.
I succeed in getting a canoe afloat, and set out on a voyage in the sixth
year of my reign, or captivity-Blown out to sea--Reach the shore
with great difficulty-Fall asleep, and an awakened by voice
calling my name-Devise various schemes to tame guats, and at last
succeed.

CANNOT say that, after this, for five years, any
extraordinary thing happened to me, but I lived on in
the same course, in the same posture and place, as
before; the chief things I was employed in, besides
my yearly labour of planting my barley and rice, and
curing my raisins, of both which I always kept up just enough to
have sufficient stock of one year's provisions beforehand; I say,
besides this yearly labour, and my daily pursuit of going out with
my gun, I had one labour, to make a canoe, which at last I finished:
so that, by digging a canal to it of six feet wide and four feet deep,
I brought it into the creek, almost half-a-mile. As for the first,
which was so vastly big, for I made it without considering before-
hand, as ought to have done, how I should be able to launch it,
so, never being able to bring it into the water, or bring the water to
it, I was obliged to let it lie where it was as a memorandum to
teach me to be wiser the next time : indeed, the next time, though
I could not get a tree proper for it, and was in a place where I
could not get the water to it at any less distance than, as I have
said, near half-a-mile, yet, as I saw it was practicable at last, I
never gave it over; and though I was near two years about it, yet
I never grudged my labour, in hopes of having a boat to go off to
sea at last.
However, though my little periagua was finished, yet the size of
it was not at all answerable to the design which I had in view when
I made the first; I mean of venturing over to the terra firma,
where it was above forty miles broad; accordingly, the smallness
of my boat assisted to put an end to that design, and now I thought
no more of it. As I had a boat, my next design was to make a
cruise round the island; for as I had been on the other side in
one place, crossing, as I have already described it, over the land,
so the discoveries I made in that little journey made me very eager
to see other parts of the coast; and now I had a boat, I thought of
nothing but sailing round the island.
For this purpose, that I might do everything with discretion and
consideration, I fitted up a little mast in my boat, and made a sail
too out of some of the pieces of the ship's sails which lay in store,
and of which I had a great stock by me. Having fitted my mast
96
life and adventures of
and sail, and tried the boat, I found she would sail very well; then
I made little lockers or boxes at each end of my boat, to put
provisions, necessaries, ammunition, etc., into, to be kept dry,
either from rain or the spray of the sea; and a little, long, hollow
place I cut in the inside of the boat, where I could lay my gun,
making a flap to hang down over it to keep it dry.
I fixed my umbrella also in a step at the stern, like a mast, to
stand over my head, and keep the heat of the sun off me, like an
awning; and thus I every now and then took a little voyage upon
the sea, but never went far out, nor far from the little creek. At
last, being eager to view the circumference of my little kingdom,
I resolved upon my cruise; and accordingly I victualled my
ship for the voyage, putting in two dozen of loaves (cakes I
should call them) of barley bread, an earthen pot full of parched
rice (a food I ate a good deal of), a little bottle of rum, half a
goat, and powder and shot for killing more, and two large watch-
coats, of those which, as I mentioned before, I had saved out of
the seamen's chests; these I took, one to lie upon, and the other
to cover me in the night.
It was the 6th of November, in the sixth year of my reign-or my
captivity, which you please-that I set out on this voyage, and I
found it much longer than I expected; for though the island itself
was not very large, yet when I came to the east side of it, I found
a great ledge of rocks lie out about two leagues into the sea, some
above water, some under it; and beyond that a shoal of sand,
lying dry half-a-league more, so that I was obliged to go a great
way out to sea to double the point.
When I first discovered them, I was going to give over my enter-
prise, and come back again, not knowing how far it might oblige
me to go out to sea; and above all, doubting how I should get
back again: so I came to an anchor; for I had made a kind of
an anchor with a piece of a broken grappling which I got out of
the ship.
Having secured my boat, I took my gun and went on shore,
climbing up a hill, which seemed to overlook that point where Í
saw the full extent of it, and resolved to venture.
In my viewing the sea from that hill where I stood, I perceived a
strong, and, indeed, a most furious current, which ran to the east,
and even came close to the point; and I took the more notice of
it because I saw there might be some danger that when I came into
it I might be carried out to sea by the strength of it, and not be
able to make the island again; and indeed, had I not got first upon
this hill, I believe it would have been so; for there was the same
current on the other side the island, only that it set off at a further
distance, and I saw there was a strong eddy under the shore; so I
had nothing to do but to get out of the first current, and I should
presently be in an eddy.
I lay bere, however, two days, because the wind blowing pretty
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
97
fresh at E.S.E., and that being just contrary to the current, made a
great breach of the sea upon the point; so that it was not safe for
me to keep too close to the shore for the breach, ner to go too far
off, because of the stream.
The third day, in the morning, the wind having abated overnight,
the sea was calm, and I ventured: but I am a warning to all rash
and ignorant pilots; for no sooner was I come to the point, when I
was not even my boat's length from the shore, but I found myself in
a great depth of water, and a current like the sluice of a mill it
carried my boat along with it with such violence that all I could do
could not keep her so much as on the edge of it; but I found it
hurried me farther and farther out from the eddy, which was on my
left hand. There was no wind stirring to help me, and all I could
do with my paddles signified nothing: and now I began to give
myself over for lost; for as the current was on both sides of the
island, I knew in a few leagues distance they must join again, and
then I was irrecoverably gone; nor did I see any possibility of
avoiding it; so that I had no prospect before me but of perishing,
not by the sea, for that was calm enough, but of starving from
hunger. I had, indeed, found a tortoise on the shore, as big almost
as I could lift, and had tossed it into the boat; and I had a great
jar of fresh water, that is to say, one of my earthen pots; but what
was all this to being driver into the vast ocean, where, to be sure,
there was no shore, no m£inland or island, for a thousand leagues
at least ?
And now I saw how easy it was for the providence of God to
make even the most miserable condition of mankind worse. Now
I looked back upon my desolate, solitary island as the most
pleasant place in the world, and all the happiness my heart could
wish for was to be but there again. I stretched out my hands to it,
with eager wishes-" O happy desert!" said I, "I shall never see
thee more. O miserable creature whither am I going?" Then
I reproached myself with my unthankful temper, and that I had
repined at my solitary condition; and now what would I give to be
on shore there again! Thus, we never see the true state of our
condition till it is illustrated to us by its contraries, nor know how
to value what we enjoy, but by the want of it It is scarcely
possible to imagine the consternation I was now in, being driven
from my beloved island (for so it appeared to me now to be) into
the wide ocean, almost two leagues, and in the utmost despair of
ever recovering it again. However, I worked hard till, indeed, my
strength was almost exhausted, and kept my boat as much to the
northward, that is, towards the side of the current which the eddy
lay on, as possibly I could; when about noon, as the sun passed
the meridian, I thought I felt a little breeze of wind in my face,
springing up from S.S.E. This cheered my heart a little, and
especially when, in about half-an-hour more, it blew a pretty gentle
gale. By this time I had got at a frightful distance from the
08
life and adventures of
island, and had the least cloudy or hazy weather intervened, I had
been undone another way, too; for I had no compass on board,
and should never have known how to have steered towards the
island, if I had but once lost sight of it; but the weather continuing
clear, applied myself to get up my mast again, and spread my
sail, ading away to the north as much as possible, to get out of
the current.
Just as I had set ny mast and sail, and the boat began to stretch
away, I saw even by the clearness of the water some alteration of
the current was near; for where the current was so strong the water
was foul; but perceiving the water clear, I found the current
abate and presently I found to the east, at about half-a-mile, a
breach of the sea upon some rocks: these rocks I found caused the
current to part again, and as the main stress of it ran away more.
southerly, leaving the rocks to the north-east, so the other retarned
by the repulse of the rocks, and made a strong eddy, which ran
back again to the north-west, with a very sharp stream.
They who know what it is to have a reprieve brought to them
upon the ladder, or to be rescued from thieves just going to murder
them, or who have been in such extremities, may guess what my
present surprise of joy was, and how gladly I put my boat into the
stream of this eddy; and the wind also freshening, how gladly I
spread my sail to it, running cheerfully before the wind, and with a
strong tide or eddy under foot.
This eddy carried me about a league in my way back again,
directly towards the island, but about two leagues more to the
northward than the current which carried me away at first ; so that
when I came near the island, I found myself open to the northern
shore of it, that is to say, the other end of the island, opposite to
that which I went out from.
!
When I had made something more than a league of way by the.
help of this current or eddy, I found it was spent, and served me
no further. However, I found that being between two great cur-
rents-viz., that on the south side, which had hurried me away,
and that on the north, which lay about a league on the other side;
I say, between these two, in the wake of the island, I found the
water at least still, and running no way; and having still a breeze of
wind fair for me, I kept on steering directly for the island, though
not making such fresh way as I did before.
About four o'clock in the evening, being then within a league of
the island, I found the point of the rocks which occasioned this
disaster stretching out, as is described before, to the southward, and
casting off the current more southerly, had, of course, made another
eddy to the north; and this I found very strong, but not directly
setting the way my course lay, which was due west, but almost fulf
north. However, having a fresh gale, I stretched across this eddy,
slanting north-west; and in about an hour came within about a mile
of the shore, where, it being smooth water, I soon got to land
ROBINSON crusoe.
୫
99
When I was on shore, I fell on my knees, and gave God thanks
for my deliverance, resolving to lay aside all thoughts of my deliver-
ance by my boat; and refreshing myself with such things as I had,
I brought my boat close to the shore, in a little cove that I had
spied under some trees, and laid me down to sleep, being quite
spent with the labour and fatigue of the voyage.
I was now at a great loss which way to get home with my boat!
I had run so much hazard, and knew too much of the case, to think
of attempting it by the way I went out; and what might be at the
other side (I mean the west side) I knew not, nor had I any mind
to run any more ventures: so I resolved on the next morning to
make my way westward along the shore, and to see if there was no
creek where I might lay up my frigate in safety, so as to have her
again if I wanted her. In about three miles, or thereabouts, coast-
ing the shore, I came to a very good inlet or bay, about a mile over,
which narrowed till it came to a very little rivulet or brook, where I
found a very convenient harbour for my boat, and where she lay as
if she had been in a little dock made on purpose for her. Here I
put in, and having stowed my boat very safe, I went on shore to
look about me, and see where I was.
I soon found I had but a little passed by the place where I had
been before, when I travelled on foot to that shore; so taking
nothing out of my boat but my gun and umbrella, for it was
exceedingly hot, I began my march. The way was comfortable
enough after such a voyage as I had been upon, and I reached my
old bower in the evening, where I found everything standing as I
left it; for I always kept it in good order, being, as I said before, my
country-house.
I got over the fence, and laid me down in the shade to rest my
limbs, for I was very weary, and fell asleep; but judge you, if you
can, that read my story, what a surprise I must be in when I was
awaked out of my sleep by a voice calling me by my name several
times, "Robin, Robin, Robin Crusoe: poor Robin Crusoe! Where
are you, Robin Crusoe? Where are you? Where have you been?"
I was so dead asleep at first, being fatigued with rowing, or pad-
dling, as it is called, the first part of the day, and with walking the
latter part, that I did not wake thoroughly; but dozing between
sleeping and waking, thought I dreamed that somebody spoke to
me; but as the voice continued to repeat, "Robin Crusoe, Robin
Crusoe," at last I began to wake more perfectly, and was at first
dreadfully frightened, and started up in the utmost consternation:
but no sooner were my eyes open, but I saw my Poll sitting on the
top of the hedge; and immediately knew that it was he that spoke
to me; for just in such bemoaning language I had used to talk to
him and teach him; and he had learned it so perfectly that he would
sit upon my finger, and lay his bill close to my face, and cry, "Poor
Robin Crusoe! Where are you? Where have you been? How
came you here?" and such things as I had taught him.
100
LIFE AND ADVENTURES of
27
However, even though I knew it was the parrot, and that indeed
it could be nobody else, it was a good while before I could compose
myself. First, I was amazed how the creature got thither; and
then, how he should just keep about the place, and nowhere else;
but as I was well satisfied it could be nobody but honest Poll, I got
over it; and holding out my hand, and calling him by his name,
"Poll," the sociable creature came to me, and sat upon my thumb, as
he used to do, and continued talking to me, "Poor Robin Crusoe !
and how did I come here? and where had I been?" just as if he
had been overjoyed to see me again; and so I carried him home
along with me.
í
I had now had enough of rambling to sea for some time, and had
enough to do for many days to sit still and reflect upon the danger
I had been in. I would have been very glad to have had my boat
again on my side of the island; but I knew not how it was practic-
able to get it about. As to the east side of the island, which I had
gone round, I knew well enough there was no venturing that way;
my very heart would shrink, and my very blood run chill, but to
think of it; and as to the other side of the island, I did not know
how it might be there; but supposing the current ran with the
same force against the shore at the east as it passed by it on the
other, I might run the same risk of being driven down the stream,
and carried by the island, as I had been before of being carried
away from it: so with these thoughts, I contented myself to be
without any boat, though it had been the product of so many
months' labour to make it, and of so many more to get it into the
In this government of my temper I remained near a year; and
lived a very sedate, retired life, as you may well suppose; and my
thoughts being very much composed as to my condition, and fully
comforted in resigning myself to the dispositions of Providence, I
thought I lived really very happily in all things except that of
society.
I improved myself in this time in all the mechanic exercises which
my necessities put me upon applying myself to; and I believe I
should, upon occasion, have made a very good carpenter, especially
considering how few tools I had.
Besides this, I arrived at an unexpected perfection in my earthen-
ware, and contrived well enough to make them with a wheel, which
I found infinitely easier and better; because I made things round
and shaped, which before were filthy things indeed to look on.
But I think I was never more vain of my own performance, or more
joyful for anything I found out, thån for my being able to make a
tobacco-pipe; and though it was a very ugly, clumsy thing when it
was done, and only burned red, like other earthenware, yet as it
was hard and firm, and would draw the smoke, I was exceedingly
comforted with it, for I had been always used to smoke; and there
were pipes in the ship, but I forgot them at first, not thinking there
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
101
was tobacco in the island; and afterwards, when I searched the
ship again, I could not come at any pipes.
:
In my wickerware, also, I improved much, and made abundance
of necessary baskets, as well as my invention showed me; though
not very handsome, yet they were such as were very handy and
convenient for laying things up in, or fetching things home. For
example, if I killed a goat abroad, I could hang it up in a tree, flay
it, dress it, and cut it in pieces, and bring it home in a basket; and
the like by a turtle; I could cut it up, take out the eggs, and a
piece or two of the flesh, which was enough for me, and bring them
home in a basket, and leave the rest behind me. Also, large deep
baskets were the receivers of my corn, which I always rubbed out
as soon as it was dry, and cured, and kept it in great baskets.
I began now to perceive my powder abated considerably; this
was a want which it was impossible for me to supply, and I began
seriously to consider what I must do when I should have no more
powder; that is to say, how I should kill any goats. I had, as is
observed, in the third year of my being here, kept a young kid, and
bred her up tame, and I was in hopes of getting a he-goat; but I
could not by any means bring it to pass, till my kid grew an old
goat; and as I could never find in my heart to kill her, she died at
last of mere age.
But being now m the eleventh year of my residence, and, as I
have said, my ammunition growing low, I set myself to study some
art to trap and snare the goats, to see whether I could not catch
some of them alive; and particularly, I wanted a she-goat great
with young. For this purpose I made spares to hamper them; and
I do believe they were more than once taken in them; but my
tackle was not good, for I had no wire, and I always found them
broken, and my bait devoured. At length, I resolved to try a pit-
fall; so I dug several large pits in the earth, in places where I had
observed the goats used to feed, and over those pits I placed
hurdles, of my own making too, with a great weight upon them;
and several times I put ears of barley and dry rice, without setting
the trap; and I could easily perceive that the goats had gone in
and eaten up the corn, for I could see the marks of their feet. At
length, I set three traps in one night, and going the next morning I
found them all standing, and yet the bait eaten and gone, this was
very discouraging. However, I altered my traps; and, not to
trouble you with particulars, going one morning to see my traps, I
found in one of them a large old he-goat; and in one of the others,
three kids, a male and two females.
As to the old one, I knew not what to do with himfi; he was so
fierce I durst not go into the pit to him; that is to say, to bring
him away alive, which was what I wanted. I could have killed
him, but that was not my business, nor would it answer my end;
so I even let him out, and he ran away as if he had been frightened
out of his wits. But I did not then know what I afterwards
10
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
learned, that hunger will tame a lion. If I had let him stay three
or four days without food, and then have carried him some water to
drink, and then a little corn, he would have been as tame as one of
the kids; for they are mighty sagacious, tractable creatures, where
they are well used.
However, for the present I let him go, knowing no better at that
time: then I went to the three kids, and. taking them one by one, I
tied them with strings together, and with some difficulty brought
them all home.
It was a good while before they would feed; but throwing them
some sweet corn, it tempted them, and they began to be tame.
And now I found that if I expected to supply myself with goats'
flesh, when I had no powder or shot left, breeding some up tame
was my only way, when, perhaps, I might have them about my
house like a flock of sheep. But, then, it occurred to me that I
must keep the tame from the wild, or else they would always run
wild when they grew up; and the only way for this was to have
some enclosed piece of ground, well fenced either with hedge or
pale, to keep them in so effectually, that those within might not
break out, or those without break in.
This was a great undertaking for one pair of hands; yet, as I saw
there was an absolute necessity for doing it, my first work was to
find out a proper piece of ground, where there was likely to be
herbage for them to eat, water for them to drink, and cover to keep
them from the sun.
Those who understand such enclosures will think I had very
little contrivance when I pitched upon a place very proper for all
these (being a plain, open piece of meadow land, or savannah, as
our people call it in the western colonies), which had two or three
little drills of fresh water in it, and at one end was very woody-I
say, they will smile at my forecast, when I shall tell them I began
by enclosing this piece of ground in such a manner that my hedge
or pale must have been at least two miles about. Nor was the
madness of it so great as to the compass, for if it was ten miles
about, I was like to have time enough to do it in; but I did not
consider that my goats would be as wild in so much compass as if
they had had the whole island, and I should have so much room to
chase them in that I should never catch them.
My hedge was begun and carried on, I believe, about fifty yards
when this thought occurred to me; so I presently stopped short,
and, for the beginning, I resolved to enclose a piece of about oné
hundred and fifty yards in length, and one hundred yards in
breadth, which, as it would maintain as many as I should have in
any reasonable time, so, as my stock increased, I could add more
ground to my enclosure
This was acting with some prudence, and I went to work with
courage. I was about three months hedging in the first piece
and, till I had done it, I tethered the three kids in the best part of
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
103
#t, and used them to feed as near me as possible, to make them
familiar; and very often I would go and carry them some ears of
barley, or a handful of rice, and feed them out of my hand; so that
after my enclosure was finished and I let them loose, they would
follow me up and down, bleating after me for a handful of corn.
This answered my end, and in about a year and a-half I had ■
flock of about twelve goats, kids and all; and in two years more I
had three-and-forty, besides several that I took and killed for my
food. After that, I enclosed five several pieces of ground to. feed
them in, with little pens to drive them into, to take them as I
wanted, and gates out of one piece of ground into another.
But this was not all; for now I not only had goats' flesh xo feed
on when I pleased, but milk too-a thing which, indeed, in the
beginning, I did not so much as think of, and which, when it came
into my thoughts, was really an agreeable surprise, for now I set
up my dairy, and had sometimes a gallon or two of milk in a day.
And as Nature, who gives supplies of food to every creature,
dictates even naturally how to make use of it, so I, that had never
milked a cow, much less a goat, or seen butter or cheese made only
when I was a boy, after a great many essays and miscarriages,
made both butter and cheese at last, also salt (though I found it
partly made to my hand by the heat of the sun upon some of the
rocks of the sea), and never wanted it afterwards. How mercifully
can our Creator treat His creatures, even in those conditions in
which they seemed to be overwhelmed in destruction! How can
He sweeten the bitterest providences, and give us cause to praise
Him for dungeons and prisons! What a table was here spread for
me in the wilderness, where I saw nothing at first but to perish for
hunger!
CHAPTER XI.
Description of my figure-Also of my dwelling and enclosures-Dreadful
alarm on seeing the print of a man's foot on the shore-Reflections-
Take every possible measure of precaution.

T would have made a Stoic smile to have seen me and
my little family sit down to dinner. There was my
majesty, the prince and lord of the whole island; I
had the lives of all my subjects at my absolute com-
mand; I could hang, draw, give liberty, and take it
away, and no rebels among all my subjects. Then, to see how like
a king I dined, too, all alone, attended by my servants! Poll, as if
he had been my favourite, was the only person permitted to talk to
me. My dog, who was now grown old and crazy, and had found no
species to multiply his kind upon, sat always at my right hand; and
104
life and adveNTURES OF
two cats, one on one side of the table, and one on the other, expect-
ing now and then a bit from my hand, as a mark of especial
favour.
But these were not the two cats which I brought on shore at
first, for they were both of them dead, and had been interred near
my habitation by my own hand; but one of them having multiplied
by I know not what kind of creature, these were two which I had
preserved tame; whereas the rest ran wild in the woods, and
became indeed troublesome to me at last, for they would often come
into my house, and plunder me too, till at last I was obliged to shoot
them, and did kill a great many; at length they left me. With this
attendance, and in this plentiful manner, I lived'; neither could I be
said to want anything but society; and of that, some time after
this, I was likely to have much.
I was something impatient, as I have observed, to have the use
of my boat, though very loath to run any more hazards; and there-
fore sometimes I sat contriving ways to get her about the island,
and at other times I sat myself down contented enough without her.
But I had a strange uneasiness in my mind to go down to the point
of the island where, as I have said in my last ramble, I went up the
hill to see how the shore lay, and how the current set, that I might
see what I had to do this inclination increased upon me every
day, and at length I resolved to travel thither by land, following
the edge of the shore. I did so; but had any one in England met
such a man as I was, it must either have frightened him, or raised
a great deal of laughter; and as I frequently stood still to look at
myself, I could not but smile at the notion of my travelling through
Yorkshire with such an equipage, and in such a dress. Be pleased
to take a sketch of my figure, as follows:-
I had a great high shapeless cap, made of a goat's skin, with a
fiap hanging down behind, as well to keep the sun from me as to
shoot the rain off from running into my neck, nothing being so
hurtful in these climates as the rain upon the flesh under the
clothes.
I had a short jacket of goat's skin, the skirts coming down to
about the middle of the thighs, and a pair of open-kneed breeches
of the same; the breeches were made of the skin of an old he-goat,
whose hair hung down such a length on either side, that, like
pantaloons, it reached to the middle of my legs; stockings and
shoes I had none, but had made me a pair of somethings, I scarce
know what to call them, like buskins, to flap over my legs, and lace
on either side like spatterdashes, but of a most barbarous shape,
as indeed were all the rest of my clothes.
I had on a broad belt of goat's skin driea, which I drew together
with two thongs of the same instead of buckles, and in a kind of a
frog on either side of this, instead of a sword and dagger, hung a
little saw and a hatchet, one on one side, and one on the other. I
had another belt not so bread, and fastened in the same manner,
ROBINSON CRUSOE,
105
か
​which hung over my shoulder, and at the end of it, under my left
arm, hung two pouches, both made of goat's skin, too, in one of
which hung my powder, in the other my shot. At my back I
carried my basket, and on my shoulder my gun, and over my head
a great clumsy, ugly, goat's-skin umbrella, but which, after all, was
the most necessary thing I had about me next to my gun. As for
my face, the colour of it was really not so mulatto-like as one might
expect from a man not at all careful of it, and living within nine or
ten degrees of the equinox My beard I had once suffered to grow
till it was about a quarter of a yard long; but as I had both scissors
and razors sufficient, I had cut it pretty short, except what grew on
my upper lip, which I had trimmed into a large pair of Mahometan
whiskers, such as I had seen worn by some Turks at Sallee, for the
Moors did not wear such, though the Turks did; of these
moustachios, or whiskers, I will not say they were long enough to
hang my hat upon them, but they were of a length and shape
monstrous enough, and such as in England would have passed for
frightful.
But all this is by-the-by; for, as to my figure, I had so few to
observe me, that it was of no manner of consequence, so I say no
more of that. In this kind of dress I went my new journey, and
was out five or six days. I travelled first along the sea shore,
directly to the place where I first brought my boat to an anchor to
get upon the rocks; and having no boat now to take care of, I went
over the land a nearer way to the same height that I was upon
before, when, looking forward to the points of the rocks which lay
out, and which I was obliged to double with my boat, as is said
above, I was surprised to see the sea all smooth and quiet-no rip-
pling, no motion, no current, any more there than in other places.
I was at a strange loss to understand this, and resolved to spend
some time in the observing it, to see if nothing from the sets of the
tide had occasioned it; but I was presently convinced how it was-
viz, that the tide of ebb setting from the west, and joining with the
current of waters from some great river on the shore, must be the
occasion of this current, and that, according as the wind blew more
forcibly from the west or from the north, this current came nearer,
or went farther from the shore; for, waiting thereabouts till evening,
I went up to the rock again, and then the tide of ebb being made,
I plainly saw the current again as before, only that it ran farther
off, being near half-a-lengue from the shore, whereas in my case it
set close upon the shore, and hurried me and my canoe along with
it, which at another time it would not have done.
·
This observation convinced me that I had nothing to do but to
observe the ebbing and the flowing of the tide, and I might very
easily bring my boat about the island again; but when I began to
think of putting it in practice, I had such terror upon my spirits at
the remembrance of the danger I had been in, that I could not
think of it again with any patience, but, on the contrary, I took up
108
life and adventures of
another resolution, which was more safe, though more laborious→
and this was, that I would build, or rather make, me another
periagua or canoe, and so have one for one side of the island, and
one for the other.
λ
You are to understand that now I had, as I may call it, two
plantations in the island-one my little fortification or tent, with the
wall about it, under the rock, with the cave behind me, which by
this time I had enlarged into several apartments or caves, one
within another. One of these, which was the driest and largest, and
had a door out beyond my wall or fortification-that is to say,
beyond where my wall joined to the rock, was all filled up with the
large earthen pots, of which I have given an account, and with
fourteen or fifteen great baskets, which would hold five or six
bushels each, where I laid up my stores of provisions, especially my
corn, some in the ear, cut off short from the straw, and the other
rubbed out with my hand.
;
As for my wall, made, as before, with long stakes or piles, those
piles grew all like trees, and were by this time grown so big, and
spread so very much, that there was not the least appearance, to
any one's view, of any habitation behind them.
Near this dwelling of mine, but a little farther within the land,
and upon
lower ground, lay my two pieces of corn land, which I
kept duly cultivated and sowed, and which duly yielded me their
harvest in its season; and whenever I had occasion for more corn,
I had more land adjoining as fit as that.
Besides this, I had my country-seat, and I had now a tolerable
plantation there also; for, first, I had my little bower, as-I called it,
which I kept in repair-that is to say, I kept the hedge, which
encircled it in, constantly fitted up to its usual height, the ladder
standing always in the inside. I kept the trees, which at first were
no more than stakes, but were now grown very firm and tall,
always cut, so that they might spread and grow thick and wild, and
make the more agreeable shade, which they did effectually to my
mind in the middle of this I had my tent always standing, being
a piece of a sail spread over poles, set up for that purpose, and
which never wanted any repair or renewing; and under this I had
made me a squab or couch with the skins of the creatures I had
killed, and with other soft things, and a blanket laid on them, such
as belonged to our sea-bedding, which I had saved; and a great
watch-coat to cover me. And here, whenever I had occasion to be
absent from my chief seat, I took up my country habitation.
Adjoining to this I had my enclosures for my cattle, that is to say
my goats, and I had taken an inconceivable deal of pains to fence
and enclose this ground. I was so anxious to see it kept entire, lest
the goats should break through, that I never left off till, with infinite
labour, I had stuck the outside of the hedge so full of small stakes,
and so near to one another, that it was rather a pale than a hedge,
and there was scarce room to put a hand through between them;
→
ROBINSON CRUSoe.
107
which afterwards, when those stakes grew, as they all did in the
next rainy season, made the enclosure strong like a wall, indeed
stronger than any wall.
}}
This will testify for me that I was not ide, and that 1 spared no
pains to bring to pass whatever appeared necessary for my com-
fortable support, for I considered the keeping up a breed of tame
creatures thus at my hand would be a living magazine of flesh,
milk, butter, and cheese for me as long as I lived in the place, if it
were to be forty years; and that keeping them in my reach de
pended entirely upon my perfecting my enclosures to such a degree,
that I might be sure of keeping them together; which, by this
method, indeed, I so effectually secured, that when these little
stakes began to grow, I had planted them so very thick that I was
forced to pull some of them up again.
In this place also I had my grapes growing, which I principally
depended on for my winter store of raisins, and which I never
failed to preserve very carefully, as the best and most agreeable
dainty of my whole diet; and indeed they were not only agreeable,
but medicinal, wholesome, nourishing, and refreshing to the last
degree.
As this was also about half-way between my other habitation and
the place where I had laid up my boat, I generally stayed and lay
here in my way thither, for I used frequently to visit my boat; and
I kept all things about, or belonging to her, in very good order.
Sometimes I went out in her to divert myself, but no more
hazardous voyages would I go, scarcely ever above a stone's cast or
two from the shore, I was so apprehensive of bei g hurried out of
my knowledge again by the currents or winds, or any other acci-
dent. But now I come to a new scene of my life.
It happened one day, about noon, going towards my boat, I was
exceedingly surprised with the print of a man's naked foot on the
shore, which was very plain to be seen on the sand. I stood like
one thunderstruck, or as if I had seen an apparition. I listened, I
looked round me, but I could hear nothing, nor see anything; I
went up to a rising ground to look farther; I went up the shore
and down the shore, but it was all one; I could see no other im-
pression but that one I went to it again to see if there were any
more, and to observe if it might not be my fancy; but there was no
room for that, for there was exactly the print of a foot-toes, heel,
and every part of a foot. How it came thither I knew not, nor
could I in the least imagine; but after innumerable fluttering
thoughts, like a man perfectly confused and out of myself, I came
home to my fortification, not feeling, as we say, the ground I went
on, but terrified to the last degree, looking behind me at every two
or three steps, mistaking every bush and tree, and fancying every
stump at a distance to be a man. Nor is it possible to describe
how many various shapes my affrighted imagination represented
things to me in, how many wild ideas were found every moment in
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life and ADVENTURES of
my fancy, and what strange, unaccountable whimsies came into my
thoughts by the way.
When I came to my castle (for so I think I called it ever after
this), I fled-into it like one pursued. Whether I went over by the
ladder, as first contrived, or went in at the hole in the rock, which
I had called a door, I cannot remember; no, nor could I remember
the next morning, for never frightened hare fled to cover, or fox to
earth, with more terror of mind than I to this retreat.
I slept none that night; the farther I was from the occasion of
my fright, the greater my apprehensions were, which is something
contrary to the nature of such things, and especially to the usual
practice of all creatures in fear; but I was so embarrassed with my
own frightful ideas of the thing, that I formed nothing but dismal
Imaginations to myself, even though I was now a great way off.
Sometimes I fancied it must be the devil, and reason joined in with
me in this supposition, for how should any other thing in human
shape come into the place? Where was the vessel that brought
them? What marks were there of any other footstep? And how
was it possible a man should come there? But then, to think that
Satan should take human shape upon him in such a place, where
there could be no manner of occasion for it, but to leave the print
of his foot behind him, and that even for no purpose too, for he
could not be sure I should see it-this was an amusement the other
way. I considered that the devil might have found out abundance
of other ways to have terrified me than this of the single print of a
foot; that as I lived quite on the other side of the island, he would
never have been so simple as to leave a mark in a place where it
was ten thousand to one whether I should ever see it or not, and in
the sand too, which the first surge of the sea, upon a high wind,
would have defaced entirely. All this seemed inconsistent with the
thing itself, and with all the notions we usually entertain of the
subtlety of the devil.
Abundance of such things as these assisted to argue me out of all
apprehensions of its being the devil; and I presently concluded
then that it must be some more dangerous creature-viz., that it
must be some of the savages of the mainland opposite who had
wandered out to sea in their canoes, and either driven by the
currents or by contrary winds, had made the island, and had been
on shore, but were gone away again to sea; being as loath, perhaps,
to have stayed in this desolate island as I would have been to have
had them.
While these reflections were rolling in my mind, I was very thank-
ful in my thoughts that I was so happy as not to be thereabouts at
that time, or that they did not see my boat, by which they would
have concluded that some inhabitants had been in the place, and
perhaps have searched farther for me. Then terrible thoughts
racked my imagination about their having found out my boat, and
that there were people here; and that, if so, I should certainly have
ROBINSON crusoe.
109
them come again in greater numbers and devour me; that if it
should happen that they should not find me, yet they would find my
enclosure, destroy all my corn, and carry away all my flock of tame
goats, and I should perish at last for mere want.
Thus my fear banished all my religious hope, all that former con-
fidence in God, which was founded upon such wonderful experience
as I had had of His goodness; as if He that had fed me by miracle
hitherto could not preserve, by His power, the provision which He
had made for me by His goodness. I reproached myself with my
laziness, that would not sow any more corn one year than would
just serve me till the next season, as if no accident could intervene
to prevent my enjoying the crop that was upon the ground; and
this I thought so just a reproof, that I resolved for the future to have
two or three years' corn beforehand; so that, whatever might come,
I might not perish for want of bread.
•
How strange a chequer-work of Providence is the life of man !
and by what secret different springs are the affections hurried
about, as different circumstances present! To-day we love what
to-morrow we hate; to-day we seek what to-morrow we shun; to-
day we desire what to-morrow we fear, nay, even tremble at the
apprehensions of This was exemplified in me, at this time, in the
most lively manner imaginable; for I, whose only affliction was
that I seemed banished from human society, that I was alone,
circumscribed by the boundless ocean, cut off from mankind, and
condemned to what I call silent life; that I was as one whom
heaven thought not worthy to be numbered among the living, or to
appear among the rest of His creatures; that to have seen one of
my own species would have seemed to me a raising me from death
to life, and the greatest blessing that heaven itself, next to the
supreme blessing of salvation, could bestow. I say, that I should
now tremble at the very apprehensions of seeing a man, and was
ready to sink into the ground at but the shadow or silent appear-
ance of a man having set his foot in the island.
Such is the uneven state of human life; and it affordèd me a
great many curious speculations afterwards, when I had a little
recovered my first surpris I considered that this was the station
of life the infinitely wise and good providence of God had deter-
mined for me; that as I could not foresee what the ends of Divine
wisdom might be in all this, so I was not to dispute His sovereignty;
who, as I was His creature, had an undoubted right, by creation, to
govern and dispose of me absolutely as He thought fit; and who,
as I was a creature that had offended Him, had likewise a judicial
right to condemn me to what punishment He thought fit; and that
it was my part to submit to bear His indignation, because I had
sinned against Him I then reflected, that as God, who was not
only righteous but omnipotent, had thought fit thus to punish and
afflict me, so He was able to deliver me; that if He did not think
£t to do so, it was my unquestioned duty to resign myself absolutely
110
LIFE AND ADVENTURES of
and entirely to His will; and, on the other hand, it was my duty
also to hope in Him, pray to Him, and quietly to attend to the
dictates and directions of His daily providence.
*
These thoughts took me up many hours, days, nay. I'may say
weeks and months: and one particular effect of my cogitations on
this occasion cannot omit. One morning early, lying in my bed,
and filled with thoughts about my danger from the appearances of
savages, I found it discomposed me very much; upon which these
words of the Scripture came into my thoughts-"Call upon Me in
the day of trouble, and I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify
Me. Upon this, rising cheerfully out of my bed, my heart was not
only comforted, but I was guided and encouraged to pray earnestly
to God for deliverance: when I had done praying I took up my
Bible, and opening it to read, the first words that presented to me
were, Wait on the Lord, and be of good cheer, and He shall
strengthen thy heart; wait, I say, on the Lord." It is impossible
to express the comfort this gave me. In answer, I thankfully laid
down the book, and was no more sad, at least on that occasion,
"
In the middle of these cogitations, apprehensions, and reflections,
It came into my thoughts one day that all this might be a mere
chimera of my own, and that this foot might be the print of my own
foot, when I came on shore from my boat: this cheered me up a
little, too, and I began to persuade myself it was all a delusion;
that it was nothing else but my own foot; and why might I not
come that way from the boat, as well as I was going that way to
the boat?. Again I considered, also, that I could by no means tell
for certain where I had trod, and where I had not; and that if, at
last, this was only the print of my own foot, I had played the part
of those fools who try to make stories of spectres and apparitions,
and then are frightened at them more than anybody.
Now I began to take courage, and to peep abroad again, for I
had not stirred out of my castle for three days and nights, so that I
began to starve for provisions; for I had little or nothing within
doors but some barley-cakes and water; then I knew that my goats
wanted to be milked too, which usually was my evening diversion :
and the poor creatures were in great pain and inconvenience for
want of it; and, indeed, it almost spoiled some of them, and almost
dried up their milk Encouraging myself, therefore, with the belief
that this was nothing but the print of one of my own feet, and that
1 might be truly said to start at my own shadow, I began to go
abroad again, and went to my country-house to milk my flock: but
to see with what fear I went forward, how often I looked behind
me, how I was ready, every now and then, to lay down my basket
and run for my life, it would have made any one have thought I was
haunted with an evil conscience, or that I had been lately most
terribly frightened; and so, indeed, I had However, I went down
thus two or three days, and having seen nothing, I began to be a
little bolder, and to think there was really nothing in it but my own
**
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
III
Imagination; but I could not persuade myself fully of this till I
should go down to the shore again, and see this print of a foot, and
measure it by my own, and see if there was any similitude or
fitness, that I might be assured it was my own foot: but when I
came to the place-first, it appeared evidently to me, that when I
laid up my boat I could not possibly be on shore anywhere there-
abouts; secondly, when I came to measure the mark with my own
foot, I found my foot not so large by a great deal. Both these
things filled my head with new imaginations, and gave me the
vapours again to the highest degree, so that I shook with cold like
one in an ague; and I went home again, filled with the belief that
some man or men had been on shore there; or, in short, that the
island was inhabited, and I might be surprised before I was aware ;
and what course to take for my security I knew not.
what ridiculous resolutions men take when possessed with
fear! It deprives them of the use of those means which reason
offers for their relief. The first thing I proposed to myself was, to
throw down my enclosures, and turn all my tame cattle wild into
the woods, lest the enemy should find them, and then frequent the
island in prospect of the same or the like booty: then the simple
thing of digging up my two corn-fields, lest they should find such a
grain there, and still be prompted to frequent the island: then to
demolish my bower and tent, that they might not see any vestiges
of habitation, and be prompted to look farther, in order to find out
the persons inhabiting.
These were the subject of the first night's cogitations after I was
come home again, while the apprehensions which had so overrun
my mind were fresh upon me, and my head was full of vapours.
Thus, fear of danger is ten thousand times more terrifying than
danger itself, when apparent to the eyes; and we find the burden of
anxiety greater, by much, than the evil which we are anxious about:
and what was worse than all this, I had not that relief in this
trouble that from the resignation I used to practice I hoped to
have, I looked, I thought, like Saul, who complained not only that
the Philistines were upon him, but that God had forsaken him; for
I did not now take due ways to compose my mind, by crying to God
in my distress, and resting upon His providence, as I had done
before, for my defence and deliverance; which, if I had done, I had
at least been more cheerfully supported under this new surprise, and
perhaps carried through it with more resolution.
This confusion of my thoughts kept me awake all night; but in
the morning I fell asleep; and having, by the amusement of my
mind, been, as it were, tired, and my spirits exhausted, I slept very
soundly, and waked much better composed then I had ever been
before. And now I began to think sedately; and, upon debate
with myself, I concluded that this island (which was so exceedingly
pleasant, fruitful, and no farther from the mainland than as I had
seen) was not so entirely abandoned as I might imagine; that
↓
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LIFE AND adventures of
although there were no stated inhabitants who lived on the spot, yet
that there might sometimes come boats off from the shore, who,
either with design, or perhaps never but when they were driven by
cross winds, might come to this place; that I had lived there
fifteen years now and had not met with the least shadow or figure
of any people yet; and that, if at any time they should be driven
here, it was probable they went away again as soon as ever they
could, seeing they had never thought fit to fix here upon any
occasion; that the most I could suggest any danger from was
from any casual accidental landing of straggling people from the
main, who, as it was likely, if they were driven hither, were here
against their wills, so they made no stay here, but went off again
with all possible speed; seldom staying one night on shore, lest
they should not have the help of the tides and daylight back again ;
and that, therefore, I had nothing to do but to consider of some safe
retreat, in case I should see any savages land upon the spot.
Now I began sorely to repent that I had dug my cave so large as
to bring a door through again, which door, as I said, came out
beyond where my fortification joined to the rock: upon maturely
considering this, therefore, I resolved to draw me a second fortifica-
tion, in the manner of a semicircle, at a distance from my wall, just
where I had planted a double row of trees about twelve years before,
of which I made mention: these trees having been planted so thick
before, they wanted but few piles to be driven between them, that
they might be thicker and stronger, and my wall would be soon
finished. So that I had now a double wall; and my outer wall was
thickened with pieces of timber, old cables, and everything I could
think of, to make it strong; having in it seven little holes, about as
big as I might put my arm out at. In the inside of this I thickened
my wall to about ten feet thick with continually bringing earth out
of my cave, and laying it at the foot of the wall, and walking upon
it; and through the seven holes I contrived to plant the muskets,
of which I took notice that I had got seven on shore out of the
ship; these I planted like my cannon, and fitted them into frames,
that held them like a carriage, so that I could fire all the seven guns
in two minutes' time; this wall I was many a weary month in
finishing, and yet never thought myself safe till it was done.
皮
​When this was done I stuck all the ground without my wall, for
a great length every way, as full with stakes or sticks of the osier-
like wood, which I found so apt to grow, as they could well stand ;
insomuch, that I believe I might set in near twenty thousand of
them, leaving a pretty large space between them and my wall, that
I might have room to see an enemy, and they might have no shelter
from the young trees, if they attempted to approach my outer
wall.
Thus, in two years' time, I had a thick grove; and in five or six
years' time I had a wood before my dwelling, growing so mon-
strously thick and strong that it was indeed perfectly impassable :
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
113
and no men, of what kind soever, could ever imagine that there was
anything beyond it, much less a habitation. As for the way which
I proposed to myself to go in and out (for I left no avenue), it was
by setting two ladders, one to a part of the rock which was low, and
then broke in, and left room to place another ladder upon that; so
when the two ladders were taken down, no man living could come
down to me without doing himself mischief; and if they had come
down, they were still on the outside of my outer wall.
Thus I took all the measures human prudence could suggest for
my own preservation; and it will be seen, at length, that they were
not altogether without just reason; though I foresaw nothing at
that time more than my mere fear suggested to me.
CHAPTER XII.
I observe a canoe out at sea-Find on the shore the remnant of a feast of
cannibals-Horror of mind thereon-Double arm myself-Terribly
alarmed by a goat-Discover a singular cave or grotto, of which I
form my magazine-My fears on account of the savages begin to
subside.

HILE this was doing, I was not altogether careless of
my other affairs; for I had a great concern upon me
for my little herd of goats: they were not only a
ready supply to me on every occasion, and began to
be sufficient for me, without the expense of powder
and shot, but also without the fatigue of hunting after the wild
ones; and I was loath to lose the advantage of them, and to have
them all to nurse up over again.
W
For this purpose, after long consideration, I could think of but
two ways to preserve them: one was, to find another convenient
place to dig a cave underground, and to drive them into it every
night; and the other was to enclose two or three little bits of land,
remote from one another, and as much concealed as I could, where
I might keep about half-a-dozen young goats in each place so that
if any disaster happened to the flock in general, I might be able to
raise them again with little trouble and time and this, though it
would require a good deal of time and labour, I thought was the
most rational design.
Accordingly, I spent some time to find out the most retired parts
of the island; and I pitched upon one, which was as private, indeed,
as my heart could wish it was a little damp piece of ground, in
the middle of the hollow and thick woods, where, as is observed,
I almost lost myself once before, endeavouring to come back that
way from the eastern part of the island. Here I found a clear piece
of land, near three acres, so surrounded with woods that it was
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
almost an enclosure by nature; at least, it did not want near so
much labour to make it so as the other piece of ground I had
worked so hard at.
I immediately went to work with this piece of ground; and in
less than a month's time I had so fenced it round that my flock, or
herd, call it which you please, which were not so wild now as at
first they might be supposed to be, were well enough secured in it :
so, without any further delay, I removed ten young she-goats, and
two he-goats, to this piece; and, when they were there, I continued
to perfect the fence till I had made it as secure as the other;
which, however, I did at more leisure, and it took me up more time
by a great dea All this labour I was at the expense of, purely
from my apprehensions on account of the print of a man's foot;
for, as yet, I had never seen any human creature come near the
island; and I had now lived two years under this uneasiness,
which, indeed, made my life much less comfortable than it was
before, as may be well imagined by any who know what it is to live
in the constant snare of the fear of man. And this I must observe,
with grief, too, that the discomposure of my mind had great impres-
sion also upon the religious part of my thoughts; for the dread and
terror of falling into the hands of savages and cannibals lay so upon
my spirits, that I seldom found myself in a due temper for applica-
tion to my Maker; at least, not with the sedate calmness and
resignation of soul which I was wont to do: I rather praved to God
as under great affliction and pressure of mind, surrounded with
danger, and in expectation every night of being murdered and
devoured before morning; and I must testify, from my experience,
that a temper of peace, thankfulness, love, and affection, is much
the more proper frame for prayer than that of terror and discom-
posure and that under the dread of mischief impending, a man is
no more fit for a comforting performance of the duty of praying to
God than he is for a repentance on a sick bed; for these discom-
posures affect the mind, as the others do the body; and the
discomposure of the mind must necessarily be as great a disability
as that of the body, and much greater; praying to God being
properly an act of the mind, not of the body.
But to go on after I had thus secured one part on my littſe living
stock, I went about the whole island, searching for another private
place to make such another deposit; when, wandering more to the
west point of the island than I had ever done yet, and looking out
to sea, I thought I saw a boat upon the sea, at a great distance. I
had found a perspective glass or two in one of the seamen's chests,
which I saved out of our ship, but I had it not about me; and this
was so remote that I could not tell what to make of it, though I
looked at it till my eyes were not able to hold to look any longer;
whether it was a boat or not I do not know, but as I descended
from the hill I could see no mere of it, so I gave it over; only I
resolved to go no more out without a perspective glass in my
ROBINSON CRUSOE,
115
pocket. When I was come down the hill to the end of the island,
where, indeed, I had never been before, I was presently convinced
that the seeing the print of a man's foot was not such a strange
thing in the island as I imagined; and but that it was a special
providence that I was cast upon the side of the island where the
savages never came, I should easily have known that nothing was
more frequent than for the canoes from the main, when they
happened to be a little too far out at sea, to shoot over to that side
of the island for harbour: likewise, as they often met and fought
in their canoes, the victors, having taken any prisoners, would
bring them over to this shore, where, according to their dreadful
customs, being all cannibals, they would kill and eat them; of
which hereafter.
When I was come down the hill to the shore, as I said above,
being the S.W. point of the island, I was perfectly confounded and
amazed; nor is it possible for me to express the horror of my
mind at seeing the shore spread with skulls, hands, feet, and other
bones of human bodies; and particularly I observed a place where
there had been a fire made, and a circle dug in the earth, like a
cock-pit, where I supposed the savage wretches had sat down to
their inhuman feastings upon the bodies of their fellow-creatures.
A
I was so astonished with the sight of these things, that I enter-
tained no notions of any danger to myself from it for a long while:
all my apprehensions were buried in the thoughts of such a pitch of
inhuman, hellish brutality, and the horror of the degeneracy of
human nature, which, though I had heard of it often, yet I never
had so near a view of before; in short, I turned away my face from
the horrid spectacle; my stomach grew sick, and I was just at the
point of fainting, when nature discharged the disorder from my
stomach; and having vomited with uncommon violence, I was a
little relieved, but could not bear to stay in the place a moment; so
I got up the hill again with all the speed I could, and walked on
towards my own habitation.
When I came a little out of that part of the island I stood still
awhile, as amazed, and then, recovering myself, I looked up with
the utmost affection of my soul, and, with a flood of tears in my
eyes, gave God thanks, that had cast my first lot in a part of the
world where I was distinguished from such dreadful creatures as
these; and that, though I had esteemed my present condition very
miserable, had yet given me so many comforts in it that I had still
more to give thanks for than to complain of: and this, above all,
that I had, even in this miserable condition, been comforted with
the knowledge of Himself, and the hope of His blessing: which
was a felicity more than sufficiently equivalent to all the misery
which I had suffered, or could suffer.
In this frame of thankfulness I went home to my castle, and
began to be much easier now, as to the safety of my circumstances,
than ever I was before: for I observed that these wretches never
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LIFE AND ADVENTUres of
came to this island in search of what they could get; perhaps not
seeking, not wanting, or not expecting, anything here; and having
often, no doubt, been up the covered, woody part of it without
finding anything to their purpose. I knew I had been here now
almost eighteen years, and never saw the least footsteps of human
creature there before; and I might be eighteen years more as
entirely concealed as I was now, if I did not discover myself to
them, which I had no manner of occasion to do; it being my only
business to keep myself entirely concealed where I was, unless 1
found a better sort of creatures than cannibals to make myself
known to. Yet I entertained such an abhorrence of the savage
wretches that I have been speaking of, and of the wretched, inhuman
custom of their devouring and eating one another up, that I con-
tinued pensive and sad, and kept close within my own circle, for
almost two years after this: when I say my own circle, I mean by
it my three plantations-viz., my castle, my country-seat (which I
called my bower), and my enclosure in the woods: nor did I look
after this for any other use than an enclosure for my goats; for the
aversion which nature gave me to these hellish wretches was such,
that I was as fearful of seeing them as of seeing the devil himself.
I did not so much as go to look after my boat all this time, but
began rather to think of making another; for I could not think of
ever making any more attempts to bring the other boat round the
island to me, lest I should meet with some of these creatures at sea ;
in which case if I had happened to have fallen into their hands, I
knew what would have been my lot.
Time, however, and the satisfaction I had that I was in no´danger
of being discovered by these people, began to wear off my
uneasiness about them; and I began to live just in the same com-
posed manner as before, only with this difference, that I used more
caution, and kept my eyes more about me than I did before, lest I
should happen to be seen by any of them; and particularly, I was
more cautious of firing my gun, lest any of them, being on the
island, should happen to hear it. It was, therefore, a very good
providence to me that I had furnished myself with a tame breed of
goats, and that I had no need to hunt any more about the woods,
or shoot at them; and if I did catch any of them after this, it was
by traps and snares, as I had done before; so that for two years
after this, I believe I never fired my gun once off, though I never
went out without it; and what was more, as I had saved three
pistols out of the ship, I always carried them out with me, or at
least two of them, sticking them in my goat-skin belt I also
furbished up one of the great cutlasses that I had out of the ship,
and made me a belt to hang it on also; so that I was now a most
formidable fellow to look at when I went abroad, if you add to the
former description of myself the particular of two pistols, and a
broadsword hanging at my side in a belt, but without a scabbard.
Things going on thus, as I have said, for some time, I seemed,
ROBINSON crusoe.
817
excepting these cautions, to be reduced to my former calm, sedate
way of living. All these things tended to show me, more and more,
how far my condition was from being miserable, compared to some
others; nay, to many other particulars of life which it might have
pleased God to have made my lot. It put me upon reflecting how
little repining there would be among mankind at any condition of
life if people would rather compare their condition with those that
were worse, in order to be thankful, than be always comparing
them with those which are better, to assist their murmurings and
complainings.
As in my present condition there were not really many things
which I wanted, so, indeed, I thought that the frights I had been in
about these savage wretches, and the concern I had been in for my
own preservation, had taken off the edge of my invention for my
own conveniences; and I had dropped a good design, which I had
once bent my thoughts upon, and that was to try if I could not
make some of my barley into malt, and then try to brew myself
some beer. This was really a whimsical thought, and I reproved
myself often for the simplicity of it: for I presently saw there would
be the want of several things necessary to the making my beer that
it would be impossible for me to supply; as, first, casks to preserve
it in, which was a thing that, as I have observed already, I could
never compass: no, though I spent not only many days, but weeks,
nay months, in attempting it, but to no purpose. In the next place,
I had no hops to make it keep, no yeast to make it work, no copper
or kettle to make it boil; and yet with all these things wanting, I
verily believe, had not the frights and terrors I was in about the
savages intervened, I had undertaken it, and perhaps brought it to
pass too; for I seldom gave anything over without accomplishing
it, when once I had it in my head to begin it. But my invention now
ran quite another way; for, night and day, I could think of nothing
but how I might destroy some of the monsters in their cruel, bloody
entertainment; and, if possible, save the victim they should bring
hither to destroy. It would take up a larger volume than this
whole work is intended to be to set down all the contrivances I
hatched, or rather brooded upon, in my thoughts, for the destroy-
ing these creatures, or at least frightening them so as to prevent
their coming hither any more: but all this was abortive; nothing
could be possible to take effect, unless I was to be there to do it
myself and what could one man do among them, when perhaps
there might be twenty or thirty of them together with their darts, or
their bows and arrows, with which they could shoot as true to a
mark as I could with my gun?
Sometimes I thought of digging a hole under the place where
they made their fire, and putting in five or six pounds of gun-
powder, which, when they kindled their fire, would consequently
take fire, and blow up all that was near it but as, in the first
place, I should be unwilling to waste so much powder upon them,
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES JF
my store being now within the quantity of one barrel, so neither
could I be sure of its going off at any certain time, when it might
surprise them; and, at best, that it would do little more than just
blow the fire about their ears and fright them, but not sufficient to
make them forsake the place: so I laid it aside; and then proposed
that I would place myself in ambush in some convenient place,
with my three guns all double-loaded, and in the middle of their
bloody ceremony let fly at them, when I should be sure to kill or
wound perhaps two or three at every shot; and then falling in upon
them with my three pistols and my sword, I made no doubt but
that, if there were twenty, I should kill them all.
This fancy
pleased my thoughts for some weeks, and I was so full of it, that I
often dreamed of it, and sometimes, that I was just going to let fly
at them in my sleep I went so far with it in my imagination that
I employed myself several days to find out proper places to put
myself in ambuscade, as I said, to watch for them, and I went
frequently to the place itself, which was now grown more familiar
to me; but while my mind was thus filled with thoughts of revenge
and a bloody putting twenty or thirty of them to the sword, as I
may call it, the horror I had at the place, and at the signals of the
barbarous wretches devouring one another, abetted my malice.
Well, at length I found a place in the side of the hill, where I was
satisfied I might securely wait till I saw any of their boats coming;
and might then, even before they would be ready to come on shore,
convey myself unseen into some thickets of trees, in one of which
there was a hollow large enough to conceal me entirely; and there
I might sit and observe all their bloody doings, and take my fuil
aim at their heads, when they were so close together as that it
would be next to impossible that I should miss my shot, or that
I could fail wounding three or four of them at the first shot. In
this place, then, I resolved to fulfil my design; and accordingly, I
prepared two muskets and my ordinary fowling-piece. The two
muskets I loaded with a brace of slugs each, and four or five
smaller bullets, about the size of pistol bullets; and the fowling-
piece I loaded with near a handful of swan-shot of the largest size;
I also loaded my pistols with about four bullets each; and, in this
second and third
posture, well provided with ammunition for
charge, I prepared myself for my expedition.
After I had thus laid the scheme of my design, and in my
imagination put it in practice, I continually made my tour every
morning to the top of the hill, which was froin my castle, as I called
it, about three miles or more, to see if I could observe any boats
upon the sea, coming near the island, or standing over towards it ;
but I began to tire of this hard duty, after I had for two or three
months constantly kept my watch, but came always back without
any discovery; there having nor, in all that time, been the least
appearance, not only on or near the shore, but on the whole ocean.
so far as my eye or glass could reach every way.
S
ROBINSONn Crusoe.
119
As long as I kept my daily tour to the hill to look out, so long
also I kept up the vigour of my design, and my spirits seemed to
be all the while in a suitable frame for so outrageous an execution
as the killing twenty or thirty naked savages, for an offence which I
had not at all entered into any discussion of in my thoughts, any
farther than my passions were at first fired by the horror I
conceived at the unnatural custom of the people of that country,
who, it seems, had been suffered by Providence, in His wise dis-
position of the world, to have no other guide than that of their own
abominable and vitiated passions; and, consequently, were left,
and perhaps had been so for some ages, to act such horrid things,
and receive such dreadful customs, as nothing but nature, entirely
abandoned by heaven, and actuated by some hellish degeneracy,
could have run them into. But now, when, as I have said, I began
to be weary of the fruitless excursion which I had made so long and
so far every morning in vain, so my opinion of the action itself
began to alter; and I began, with cooler and calmer thoughts, to
consider what I was going to engage in; what authority or call I
had to pretend to be judge and executioner upon these men as
criminals, whom heaven had thought fit, for so many ages, to suffer,
unpunished, to go on, and to be, as it were, the executioners of His
judgments one upon another; how far these people were offenders
against me, and what right I had to engage in the quarrel of that
blood which they shed promiscuously upon one another. I debated
this very often with myself thus-"How do I know what God
himself judges in this particular case? It is certain these people
do not commit this as a crime; it is not against their own consciences
reproving, or their light reproaching them; they do not know it to
be an offence, and then commit it in defiance of divine justice, as
we do in almost all the sins we commit. They think it no more a
crime to kill a captive taken in war than we do to kill an ox; or
to eat human flesh than we do to eat mutton."
When I considered this a little, it followed necessarily that I was
certainly in the wrong; that these people were not murderers, in
the sense that I had before condemned them in my thoughts, any
more than those Christians were murderers who often put to death
the prisoners taker in battle; or more frequently, upon many
occasions, put whole troops of men to the sword, without giving
quarter, though they threw down their arms and submitted. In the
next place, it occurred to me that although the usage they gave one
another was thus brutish and inhuman, yet it was really nothing to
me: these people had done me no injury: that if they attempted,
or I saw it necessary, for my immediate preservation, to fall upon
them, something might be said for it but that I was yet out of
their power, and they really had no knowledge of me, and conse-
quently no design upon me; and therefore it could not be just for
me to fall upon them; that this would justify the conduct of the
Spaniards in all their barbarities practised in Americą, where they
*
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
destroyed millions of these people; who, however they wers
idolaters and barbarians, and had several bloody and barbarous
rites in their customs, such as sacrificing human bodies to their
idols, were yet, as to the Spaniards, very innocent people; and
that the rooting them out of the country is spoken of with the
utmost abhorrence and detestation by even the Spaniards them-
selves at this time, and by all other Christian nations of Europe, as
a mere butchery, a bloody and unnatural piece of cruelty, unjusti
fiable either to God or man; and for which the very name of a
Spaniard is reckoned to be frightful and terrible to all people of
humanity of Christian compassion; as if the kingdom of Spain
were particularly eminent for the produce of a race of men who
were without principles of tenderness, or the common bowels of
pity to the miserable, which is reckoned to be a mark of generous
femper in the mind.
These considerations really put me to a pause, and to a kind of a
full stop; and I began, by little and little, to be off my design, and
to conclude I had taken wrong measures in my resolution to attack
the savages; and that it was not my business to meddle with them,
unless they first attacked me; and this it was my business, if
possible, to prevent: but that, if I were discovered and attacked by
them, I knew my duty. On the other hand, I argued with myself
that this really was the way not to deliver myself, but entirely to
ruin and destroy myself; for unless I was sure to kill every one
that not only should be on shore at that time, but that should ever
come on shore afterwards, if but one of them escaped to tell their
country-people what had happened, they would come over again
by thousands to revenge the death of their fellows, and I should
only bring upon myself a certain destruction, which, at present, I
had no manner of occasion for. Upon the whole, I concluded that
I ought, neither in principle nor in policy, one way or other, to
concern myself in this affair: that my business was, by all possible
means, to conceal myself from them, and not to leave the least sign
for them to guess by that there were any living creatures upon the
island-- I mean of human shape Religion joined in with this
prudential resolution; and I was convinced now, many ways, that
I was perfectly out of my duty when I was laying all my bloody
schemes for the destruction of innocent creatures-I mean innocent
as to me. As to the crimes they were guilty of towards one
another, I had nothing to do with them; they were national, and I
ought to leave them to the justice of God, who is the Governor of
nations, and knows how, by national punishments, to make a just
retribution for national offences, and to bring public judgments
upon those who offend in a public manner, by such ways as best
please Him. This appeared so clear to me now, that nothing was
a greater satisfaction to me than that I had not been suffered to do
a thing which I now saw so much reason to believe would have
been no less a sin than that of wilful murder if I had committed it:
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
fal
*
and I gave most humble thanks on my knees to God, that He had
thus delivered me from blood-guiltiness; beseeching Him to grant
me the protection of His providence, that I might not fall into the
hands of the barbarians, or that I might not lay my hands upon
them, unless I had a more clear call from heaven to do it, in
defence of my own life.
In this disposition I continued for near a year after this; and so
far was I from desiring an occasion for falling upon these wretches,
far was I from desiring
that in all that time I never once went up the hill to see whether
there were any of them in sight, or to know whether any of them
had been on shore there or not, that I might not be tempted to
renew any of my contrivances against them, or be provoked by any
advantage that might present itself to fall upon them; only this I
did; I went and removed my boat, which I had on the other side
of the island, and carried it down to the east end of the whole
island, where I ran it into a little cove, which I found under some
high rocks, and where I knew, by reason of the currents, the savages
durst not, at least would not, come with their boats upon any
account whatever. With my boat I carried away everything that I
had left there belonging to her, though not necessary for the bare
going thither-viz., a mast and sail which I had made for her, and a
thing like an anchor, but which, indeed, could not be called either
anchor or grapnel; however, it was the best I could make of its kind :
all these I removed, that there might not be the least shadow for
discovery, or appearance of any boat, or of any human habitation
upon the island. Besides this, I kept myself, as I said, more retired
than ever, and seldom went from my cell except upon my constant
employment, to milk my she-goats, and manage my little flock in
the wood, which, as it was quite on the other part of the island, was
out of danger; for certain it is that these savage people, who some-
times haunted this island, never came with any thoughts of finding
anything here, and consequently never wandered off from the coast,
and I doubt not but they might have been several times on shore
after my apprehensions of them had made me cautious, as well as
before. Indeed, I looked back with some horror upon the thoughts
of what my condition would have been if I had chopped upon them
and been discovered before that; when, naked and unarmed,
except with one gun, and that loaded often only with small shot, Í
walked everywhere, peeping and peering about the island, to see
what I could get; what a surprise should I have been in if, when I
discovered the print of a man's foot, I had, instead of that, seen
fifteen or twenty savages, and found them pursuing me, and by the
swiftness of their running no possibility of my escaping them. The
thoughts of this sometimes sank my very soul within me, and dis-
tressed my mind so much that I could not soon recover it, to think
what I should have done, and how I should not only have been
unable to resist them, but even should not have had presence of
mind enough to do what I might have done ; much less what now,
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
after so much consideration and preparation, I might be able to de
Indeed, after serious thinking of these things, I would be melan-
choly, and sometimes it would last a great while; but I resolved it
all at last into thankfulness to that Providence which had delivered
me from so many unseen dangers, and had kept me from those
mischiefs which I could have no way been the agent in delivering
myself from, because I had not the least notion of any such thing
depending, or the least supposition of its being possible. This
renewed a contemplation which often had come into my thoughts
in former times, when first I began to see the merciful dispositions
of heaven, in the dangers we run through in this life; how wonder-
fully we are delivered when we know nothing of it; how, when we
are in a quandary (as we call it), a doubt or hesitation whether to
go this way or that way, a secret hint shall direct us this way, when
we intended to go that way: nay, when sense, our own inclination,
and perhaps business, has called us to go the other way, yet a
strange impression upon the mind, from we know not what springs,
and by we know not what power, shall overrule us to go this way;
and it shall afterwards appear that had we gone that way which we
should have gone, and even to our imagination ought to have gone,
we should have been ruined and lost. Upon these and many like
reflections I afterwards made it a certain rule with me, that when-
ever I found those secret hints or pressings of mind to doing or not
doing anything that presented, or going this way or that way, I
never failed to obey the secret dictate; though I knew no other
reason for it than such a pressure or such a hint hung upon my
mind. I could give many examples of the success of this conduct
in the course of my life, but more especially in the latter part of my
inhabiting this unhappy island; besides many occasions which it
is very likely I might have taken notice of, if I had seen with the
same eyes then that I see with now. But it is never too late to be
wise; and I cannot but advise all considering men, whose lives are
attended with such extraordinary incidents as mine, or even though
not so extraordinary, not to slight such secret intimations of Provi-
dence, let them come from what invisible intelligence they will.
That I shall not discuss, and perhaps cannot account for; but
certainly they are a proof of the converse of spirits, and a secret
communication between those embodied and those unembodied,
and such a proof as can never be withstood; of which I shall have
occasion to give some remarkable instances in the remainder of my
solitary residence in this dismal place.
I believe the reader of this will not think it strange if I confess
that these anxieties, these constant dangers I lived in, and the
concern that was now upon me, put an end to all invention, and to
all the contrivances that I had laid for my future accommodations
and conveniences. I had the care of my safety more now upon my
hands than that of my food. I cared not to drive a nail, or chop
stick of wood now, for fear the noise I might make should be
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
123
heard: much less would I fire a gun for the same reason: and,
above all, I was intolerably uneasy at making any fire, lest the
smoke, which is visible at a great distance in the day, should betray
me. For this reason, I removed that part of my business which
required fire, such as burning of pots and pipes, etc., into my new
apartment in the woods; where, after I had been some time, I
found, to my unspeakable consolation, a mere natural cave in the
earth, which went in a vast way, and where, I daresay, no savage,
had he been at the mouth of it, would be so hardy as to venture in ;
nor, indeed, would any man else, but one who, like me, wanted
nothing so much as a safe retreat.
:
The mouth of this hollow was at the bottom of a grea rock,
where, by mere accident (I would say, if I did not see abundant
reason to ascribe all such things now to Providence), I was cutting
down some thick branches of trees to make charcoal; and before I
go on I must observe the reason of my making this charcoal, which
was this-I was afraid of making a smoke about my habitation, as
I said before; and yet I could not live there without baking my
bread, cooking my meat, etc.; so I contrived to burn some wood
here, as I had seen done in England, under turf, till it became
chark or dry coal and then putting the fire out, I preserved the
coal to carry home, and perform the other services for which fire
was wanting, without danger of smoke. But this is by-the-by.
While I was cutting down some wood here, I perceived that, behind
a very thick branch of low brushwood or underwood, there was a
kind of hollow place: I was curious to look in it; and getting with
difficulty into the mouth of it, I found it was pretty large, that is to
say, sufficient for me to stand upright in it, and perhaps another
with me: but I must confess to you that I made more haste out
than I did in, when looking farther into the place, and which was
perfectly dark, I saw two broad shining eyes of some creature,
whether devil or man I knew not, which twinkled like two stars;
the dim light from the cave's mouth shining directly in, and making
the reflection. However, after some pause, I recovered myself,
and began to call myself a thousand fools, and to think that he that
was afraid to see the devil was not fit to live twenty years in an
island all alone; and that I might well think there was nothing in
this cave that was more frightful than myself. Upon this, plucking
up my courage, I took up a firebrand, and in I rushed again, with
the stick flaming in my hand: I had not gone three steps in
before I was almost as frightened as before; for I heard a very
loud sigh, like that of a man in some pain, and it was followed by a
Sroken noise, as of words half expressed, and then a deep sigh
again, I stepped back, and was indeed struck with such a surprise
that put me into a cold sweat, and if I had had a hat on my
head, I will not answer for it that my hair might not have lifted it
off. But still plucking up my spirits as well as I could, and
encouraging myself a little with considering that the power and
624
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
presence of God was everywhere, and was able to protect me, t
stepped forward again, and by the light of the firebrand, holding t
up a little over my head, I saw lying on the ground a monstrous,
frightful, old he-goat, just making his will, as we say, and gasping
for life, and dying, indeed, of mere old age. I stirred him a little
to see if I could get him out, and he essayed to get up, but was not
able to raise himself; and I thought with myself he might even lie
there--for if he had frightened me, so he would certainly fright any
of the savages, if any of them should be so hardy as to come in
there while he had any life in him.
I was now recovered from my surprise, and began to loog round
me, when I found the cave was but very small-that is to say, it
might be about twelve feet over, but in no manner of shape, neither
round nor square, no hands having ever been employed in making
it but those of mere Nature. I observed also that there was a place
at the farther side of it that went in further, but was so low that it
required me to creep upon my hands and knees to go into it, and
whither it went I knew not; so, having no candle, I gave it over
for that time, but resolved to go again the next day provided with
candles and a tinder-box, which I had made of the lock of one of
the muskets, with some wildfire in the pan.
Accordingly, the next day I came provided with six large candles
of my own making (for I made very good candles now of goat's
tallow, but was hard set for candlewick, using sometimes rags of
rope-yarn, and sometimes the dried rind of a weed like nettles);
and going into this low place I was obliged to creep upon all-fours
as I have said, almost ten yards-which, by the way, I thought was
venture bold enough, considering that I knew not how far it
might go, nor what was beyond it. When I had got through the
straight, I found the roof rose higher up, I believe near twenty feet;
but never was such a glorious sight seen in the island, I dare say, a
it was to look round the sides and roof of this vault or cave-the wall
reflected a hundred thousand lights to me from my two candles.
What ft was in the rock-whether diamonds or any other precious
ones, or gold-which I rather supposed it to be-I knew not.
The place I was in was a most delightful cavity, or grotto, though
Perfectly dark; the floor was dry and level, and had a sort of a small
Dose gravel upon it, so that there was no nauseous or venomous
creature to be seen, neither was there any damp or wet on the sides
or roof, The only difficulty in it was the entrance-which, how-
ever, as it was a place of security, and such a retreat as I wanted,
i thought was a convenience; so that I was really rejoiced at the
discovery, and resolved, without any delay, to bring some of those
things which I was most anxious about to this place; particularly,
I resolved to bring hither my magazine of powder, and all my spare
arms-viz., two fowling-pieces-for I had three in all-and three
muskets-for of them I had eight in all; so I kept in my castie only
sve, which stood ready mounted like pieces of cannon on my out-
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
125
most fence, and were ready also to take out upon any expedition.
Upon this occasion of removing my ammunition I happened to
open the barrel of powder which I took up out of the sea, and
which had been wet, and I found that the water had penetrated
about three or four inches into the powder on every side, which
caking and growing hard, had preserved the inside like a kernel in
the shell, so that I had near sixty pounds of very good powder in
the centre of the cask. This was a very agreeable discovery to me
at that time; so I carried all away thither, never keeping above
two or three pounds of powder with me in my castle, for fear of a
surprise of any kind; I also carried thither all the lead I bad left
for bullets.
I fancied myself now like one of the ancient giants who were said
to live in caves and holes in the rocks, where none could come at
them; for persuaded myself, while I was here, that if five hundred
savages were to hunt me, they could never find me out-or if they
did, they would not venture to attack me here. The old goat whom
I found expiring died in the mouth of the cave the next day after 1
made this discovery; and I found it much easier to dig a great
hole there, and throw him in and cover him with earth, than to
drag him out; so I interred him there, to prevent offence to my
Dose
CHAPTER XIII,
Description of my situation in the twenty-third year of my residence-
Discover nine naked savages round a fire on my side of the island-
My horror on beholding the dismal work they were about-I deter
mine on the destruction of the next party, at all risks-A ship lost
off the island-Go on board the wreck, which I discern to be Spanish
-Procure a great variety of articles from the vessel.

WAS now in the twenty-third year of my residence in
this island, and was so naturalised to the place and
the manner of living, that, could I but have enjoyed
the certainty that no savages would come to the place
to disturb me, I could have been content to have
rapitulated for spending the rest of my time there, even to the
last moment, till I had laid me down and died, like the old goat in
I had also arrived to some little diversions and amuse-
ments, which made the time pass a great deal more pleasantly with
me than it did before-first, I had taught my Poll, as I named
before, to speak; and he did it so familiarly, and talked se
articulately and plain, that it was very pleasant to me; and he
lived with me no less than six-and-twenty years. How long he
might have lived afterwards I know not, though I know they have
a notion in the Brazils that they live a hundred years. My dog
the cave.
126
life and adventures of
was a pleasant and loving companion to me for no less than sixteen
years of my time, and then died of mere old age. As for my cats,
they multiplied, as I have observed, to that degree that I was
obliged to shoot several of them at first, to keep them from devour-
ing me and all I had; but at length, when the two old ones I
brought with me were gone, and after some time continually driving
them from me, and letting them have no provision with me, they all
ran wild into the woods, except two or three favourites, which I kept
tame, and whose young, when they had any, I always drowned;
and these were part of my family. Besides these I always kept
two or three household kids about me, whom I taught to feed out
of my hand; and I had two more parrots, which talked pretty well,
and would all call “Robin Crusoe," but none like my first; nor,
indeed, did I take the pains with any of them that I had done with
him. I had also several tame sea-fowls, whose name I knew not,
that I caught upon the shore, and cut their wings; and the little
stakes which I had planted before my castle-wall being now grown
up to a good thick grove, these fowls all lived among these low
trees, and bred there, which was very agreeable to me; so that, as
I said above, I began to be very well contented with the life I led,
if I could have been secured from the dread of the savages. But
it was otherwise directed; and it may not be amiss for all people
who shall meet with my story to make this just observation from
it :-How frequently, in the course of our lives, the evil which in
itself we seek most to shun, and which, when we are fallen into, is
the most dreadful to us, is oftentimes the very means or door of our
deliverance, by which alone we can be raised again from the afflic-
tion we are fallen into. I could give many examples of this in the
course of my unaccountable life; but in nothing was it more
particularly remarkable than in the circumstances of my last years
of solitary residence in this island.
It was now the month of December, as I said above, in my
twenty-third year; and this, being the southern solstice (for winter
I cannot call it), was the particular time of my harvest, and required
me to be pretty much abroad in the fields, when, going out early in
the morning, even before it was thorough daylight, I was surprised
with seeing a light of some fire upon the shore, at a distance from
me of about two miles, toward that part of the island where I had
observed some savages had been, us before, and not on the other
side-but, to my great affliction, it was on my side of the island.
I was indeed terribly surprised at the sight, and stopped short
within my grove, not daring to go out, lest I might be surprised;
and yet I had no more peace within, from the apprehensions I had
that if these savages, in rambling over the island, should find my
corn standing or cut, or any of my works or improvements, they
would immediately conclude that there were people in the place,
and would then never rest till they had found me out. In this
extremity I went back directly to my castle, pulled up the ladder
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
137
after me, and made all things without look as wild and natural as I
could.
Then I prepared myself within, putting myself in a posture of
defence. I loaded all my cannon, as I called them-that is to say,
my muskets, which were mounted upon my new fortification-and
all my pistols, and resolved to defend myself to the last gasp-not
forgetting seriously to commend myself to the Divine protection,
and earnestly to pray to God to deliver me out of the hands of the
barbarians. continued in this posture about two hours, and
began to be impatient for intelligence abroad, for I had no spies to
send out. After sitting a while longer, and musing what I should
do in this case, I was not able to bear sitting in ignorance longer ;
so setting up my ladder to the side of the hill, where there was a
flat place, as I observed before, and then pulling the ladder after
me, I set it up again and mounted the top of the hill, and pulling
out my perspective glass, which I had taken on purpose, I laid me
down flat on my belly on the ground, and began to look for the
place. I presently found there were no less than nine naked savages
sitting round a small fire they had made, not to warm them, for
they had no need of that, the weather being extremely hot, but, as I
supposed, to dress some of their barbarous diet of human flesh
which they had brought with them, whether alive or dead! could
not tell.

They had two canoes with them, which they had hauled up upon
the shore; and as it was then ebb of tide, they seemed to me to
wait for the return of the flood to go away again. It is not easy to
imagine what confusion this sight put me into, especially seeing
them come on my side of the island, and so near to me; but when
I considered their coming must be always with the current of the
ebb, I began afterwards to be more sedate in my mind, being
satisfied that I might go abroad with safety all the time of the flood
of tide, if they were not on shore before; and having made this
observation, I went abroad about my harvest work with the more
composure.
As I expected, so it proved; for as soon as the tide made to the
westward I saw them all take boet and row (or paddle as we call it)
away. I should have observed, that for an hour or more before
they went off they were dancing, and I could easily discern their
postures and gestures by my glass. I could not perceive, by my
nices! observation, but that they were stark naked, and had not the
least covering upon them; but whether they were men or women I
could not distinguish.
As soon as I saw them shipped and gone, i to, two guns upon
my shoulders, and two pistols in my girdle, and my great sword by
my side without a scabbard, and with all the speed I was able to
make went away to the hill where I had discovered the first appear-
ance of all; and as soon as I got thither, which was not in less than
two hours (for I could not go quickly, being so loaded with arms as
128
life and adventures of
I was), I perceived there had been three canoes more of the savages
at that place; and looking out farther, I saw they were all at sea
together, making over for the main. This was a dreadful sight to
me, especially as, going down to the shore, I could see the marks
of horror which the dismal work they had been about had left
behind it-viz, the blood, the bones, and part of the flesh of human
bodies eaten and devoured by those wretches with merriment and
sport. I was so filled with indignation at the sight, that I now
began to premeditate the destruction of the next that I saw there,
let them be whom or how many soever It seemed evident to me
that the visits which they made thus to this island were not very
frequent, for it was above fifteen months before any mcre of them
came on shore there again-that is to say, I neither saw them nor
any footsteps or signals of them in all that time; for as to the rainy
seasons, then they are sure not to come abroad, at least not so far.
Yet all this while I lived uncomfortably, by reason of the constant
apprehensions of their coming upon me by surprise: from whence
I observe, that the expectation of evil is more bitter than the
suffering, especially if there is no room to shake off that expectation
or those apprehensions.
During all this time I was in a murdering humour, and spent
most of my hours, which should have been better employed, in
contriving how to circumvent and fall upon them the very next
time I should see them-especially if they should be divided, as
they were the last time, into two parties; nor did I consider at all
that if I killed one party-suppose ten or a dozen-I was still the
next day, or week, or month, to kill another, and so another, even
ad infinitum, till I should be, at length, no less a murderer than
they were in being man-eaters--and perhaps much more so.
I spent
iny days now in great perplexity and anxiety of mind, expecting that
I should one day or other fall into the hands of these merciless
creatures; and if I did at any time venture abroad, it was not
without looking around me with the greatest care and caution
imaginable. And now I found, to my great comfort, how happy it
was that I had provided a tame flock or herd of goats, for I durst
not upon any account fire my gun, especially near that side of the
island where they usually came, lest I should alarm the savages;
and if they had fled from me now, I was sure to have them come
again with perhaps two or three hundred canoes with them in a
few days, and then I knew what to expect. However, I wore out a
year and three months more before I ever saw any more of the
savages, and then I found them again, as I shall soon observe.
It is true they might have been there once or twice; but either
they made no stay, or at least I did not see them; but in the month
of May, as near as I could calculate, and in my four-and-twentieth
year, I had a very strange encounter with them; of which in ita
place.
The perturbation of my mind, during this fifteen of sixteen
ROBINSON CRUSOE,
138
months' interval was very great; I slept unquietly, dreamed
always frightful dreams, and often started out of my sleep in the
night. In the day great troubles overwhelmed my mind ; and in
the night I dreamed often of killing the savages, and of the reasons
why I might justify doing it.
But to waive all this for a while.-It was in the middle of May.
on the sixteenth day, I think, as well as my poor wooden calendar
would reckon, for I marked all upon the post still; I say, it was on
the sixteenth of May that it blew a very great storm of wind all
day, with a great deal of lightning and thunder, and a very foul
night it was after it. I knew not what was the particular occasion
of it, but as I was reading in the Bible, and taken up with very
serious thoughts about my present condition, I was surprised with
the noise of a gun, as I thought, fired at sea This was, to be sure,
a surprise quite of a different nature from any I had met with
before; for the notions this put into my thoughts were quite of
another kind. I started up in the greatest haste imaginable; and,
in a trice, clapped my ladder to the middle place of the rock, and
pulled it after me; and mounting it the second time, got to the
top of the hill the very moment that a flash of fire bid me listen for
a second gun, which, accordingly, in about half-a-minute, I heard ;
and by the sound, knew that it was from that part of the sea where
I was driven down the current in my boat. I immediately con-
sidered that this must be some ship in distress, and that they had
some comrade, or some other ship in company, and fired these for
signals of distress, and to obtain help. I had the presence of mind,
at that minute, to think, that though I could not help them it might
be that they might help me; so I brought together all the dry
wood I could get at hand, and, making a good handsome pile, I set
it on fire upon the hill. The wood was dry, and blazed freely; and,
though the wind blew very hard, yet it burned fairly out; so that I
was certain, if there was any such thing as a ship, they must need
see it. And no doubt they did; for as soon as ever my fire blazed
up, I heard another gun, and after that several others, all from the
same quarter. I plied my fire all night long, till daybreak: and
when it was broad day, and the air cleared up, I saw something at
a great distance at sea, full east of the island, whether a sail or a
hull I could not distinguish-no, not with my glass; the distance
was so great, and the weather still something hazy also; at least,
it was so out at sea.
I looked frequently at it all that day, and soon perceived that it
did not move; so I presently concluded that it was a ship at
anchor; and being eager, you may be sure, to be satisfied, I took
my gun in my hand, and ran towards the south side of the island,
to the rocks where I had formerly been carried away by the
current; and getting up there, the weather by this time being
perfectly clear, I could plainly see, to my great sorrow, the wreck
of a ship, cast away in the night upon those concealed rocks which
130
life and adventures of
I found when I was out in my boat; and which rocks, as they
checked the violence of the stream, and made a kind of counter-
stream, or eddy, were the occasion of my recovering from the most
desperate, hopeless condition that ever I had been in in all my life.
Thus, what is one man's safety is another man's destruction; for it
seems these men, whoever they were, being out of their knowledge,
and the rocks being wholly under water, had been driven upon
them in the night, the wind blowing hard at E.N.L
Had they
seen the island, as I must necessarily suppose they did not, they
must, as I thought, have endeavoured to have saved themselves on
shore by the help of their boat; but their firing off guns for help,
especially when they saw, as I imagined, my fire, filled me with
many thoughts. First, I imagined that upon seeing my light they
might have put themselves into their boat, and endeavoured to
make the shore: but that the sea running very high, they might
have been cast away. Other times I imagined that they might
have lost their boat before, as might be the case many ways;
particularly by the breaking of the sea upon their ship, which many
times obliged men to stave, or take in pieces, their boat, and some-
times to throw it overboard with their own hands. Other times
I imagined they had some other ship or ships in company, who,
upon the signals of distress they made, had taken them up, and
carried them off. Other times I fancied they were all gone off to
sea in their boat, and being hurried away by the current that I had
been formerly in, were carried out into the great ocean, where there
was nothing but misery and perishing: and that, perhaps, they
might by this time think of starving, and of being in a condition
to eat one another.
As all these were but conjectures at best, so, in the conation
I was in, I could do no more than look on upon the misery of the
poor men, and pity them; which had still this good effect upon my
side, that it gave me more and more cause to give thanks to God,
who had so happily and comfortably provided for me in my
desolate condition; and that of two ships' companies, who were
now cast away upon this part of the world, not one life should be
spared but mine I learned here again to observe, that it is very
rare that the providence of God casts us into any condition so low,
or any misery so great, but we may see something or other to be
thankful for, and may see others in worse circumstances than our
own. Such certainly was the case of these men, of whom I couid
not so much as see room to suppose any were saved; nothing
could make it rational so much as to wish or expect that they did
not all perish there, except the possibility only of their being taken
up by another ship in company; and this was but mere possibility
indeed, for I saw not the least sign or appearance of any such thing.
I cannot explain, by any possible energy of words, what a strange
longing I felt in my soul upon this sight, breaking out sometimes
thus-" that there had been but one or two, nay, or but one soul,
ROBINSON CRUSoe.
137
saved out of this ship, to have escaped to me, that I migt but have
had one companion, one fellow-creature, to have spoke to me and
to have conversed with !" In all the time of my solitary life I
never felt so earnest, so strong a desire after the society of my
fellow-creatures, or so deep a regret at the want of it.
There are some secret springs in the affections which, when they
are set a-going by some object in view, or, though not in view, yet
rendered present to the mind by the power of imagination, that
motion carries out the soul, by its impetuosity, to such violent,
eager embracings of the object, that the absence of it is insupport-
able. Such were these earnest wishings that but one man had
been saved I believe I repeated the words, "O that it had been
but one I housand times; and my desires were so moved by it,
that when I spoke the words my hands would clinch together, and
my fingers would press the palms of my hands, so that if I had had
any soft thing in my hand I should have crushed it involuntarily ;
and the teeth in my head would strike together, and set against one
another so strong, that for some time I could not part them again.
Let the naturalists explain these things, and the reason and manner
of them. All I can do is, to describe the fact, which was even
surprising to me when I found it, though I knew not from whence
it proceeded; it was, doubtless, the effect of ardent wishes, and of
strong ideas formed in my mind, realising the comfort which the
conversation of one of my fellow Christians would have been to me.
But it was not to be; either their fate or mine, or both, forbade it;
for, till the last year of my being on this island, I never knew
whether any were saved out of that ship or no; and had only the
affliction, some days after, to see the corpse of a drowned boy come
on shore at the end of the island which was next the shipwreck.
He had no clothes on but a seaman's waistcoat, a pair of open-
kneed linen drawers, and a blue linen shirt; but nothing to direct
me so much as to guess what nation he was of. He had nothing in
his pockets but two pieces of eight and a tobacco pipe-the last was
to me of ten times more value than the first.

It was now calm, and I had a great mind to venture out in my
boat to this wreck, not doubting but I might find something on
board that might be useful to me. But that did not altogether press
me so much as the possibility that there might be yet some living
creature on board, whose life I might not only save, but might, by
saving that life, comfort my own to the last degree; and this
thought clung so to my heart that I could not be quiet night or
day, but I must venture out in my boat on board this wreck; and
committing the rest to God's providence, I thought the impression
was so strong upon my mind that it could not be resisted—that it
must come from some invisible direction, and that I should be
wanting to myself if I did not go.
Under the power of this impressio. I hastened back to my
castle, prepared everything for my voyage took a quantity of bread,
198
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
• great pot of fresh water, a compass to steer by, a bottle of rum
(for I had still a great deal of that left), and a basket of raising :
and thus, loading myself with everything necessary, I went down to
my boat, got the water out of her, got her afloat, loaded all my
cargo in her, and then went home again for more. My second
cargo was a great bag of rice, the umbrella to set up over my head
for a shade, another large pot of water, and about two dozen of
small loaves, or barley cakes, more than before, with a bottle of
goat's milk and a cheese: all which with great labour and sweat !
carried to my boat; and praying to God to direct my voyage, I put
out, and rowing or paddling the canoe along the shore, came at last
to the utmost point of the island on the north-east side. And now
I was to launch out into the ocean, and either to venture or not to
venture I looked on the rapid currents which ran constantly on
both sides of the island at a distance, and which were very terrible
to me from the remembrance of the hazard I had been in before,
and my heart began to fail me; for I foresaw that if I was driven
into either of those currents, I should be carried a great way out to
sea, and perhaps out of my reach or sight of the island again; and
that then, as my boat was but small, if any little gale of wind should
rise, I should be inevitably lost.
These thoughts so oppressed my mind that I began to give over
my enterprise; and having hauled my boat into a little creek on
the shore, I stepped out, and sat down upon a rising bit of
ground, very pensive and anxious, between fear and desire, about
my voyage; when, as I was musing, I could perceive that the tide
was turned, and the flood come on; upon which my going was
Impracticable for so many hours... Upon this, presently it occurred
to me that I should go up to the highest piece of ground I could
find, and observe, if I could, how the sets of the tide or currents
lay when the flood came in, that I might judge whether, if I was
driven one way out, I might not expect to be driven another way
home, with the same rapidity of the currents. This thought was no
sooner in my head than I cast my eye upon a little hill which suffi-
ciently overlooked the sea both ways, and from whence I had a
clear view of the currents or sets of the tide, and which way I was
to guide myself in my return. Here I found, that as the current of
ebb set out close by the south point of the island, so the current of
the flood set in close by the shore of the north side; and that I had
nothing to do but to keep to the north side of the island in my
return, and I should do well enough.
I
Encouraged by this observation, I resolved, the next morning, to
set out with the first of the tide ; and reposing myself for the night
in my canoe, under the watch-coat I mentioned, I launched out.
first made a little out to sea, full north, till I began to feel the
benefit of the current, which set eastward, and which carried me at
a great rate; and yet did not so hurry me as the current on the
south side had done before, so as to take from me all government
→
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
133
of the boat; but having a strong steerage with my paddle, I went,
at a great rate, directly for the wreck, and in less than two hours Í
came up to it. It was a dismal sight to look at: the ship, which,
by its building, was Spanish, stuck fast, jammed in between two
rocks. All the stern and quarter of her were beaten to pieces by the
sea; and as her forecastle, which stuck in the rocks, had run on
with great violence, her mainmast and foremast were brought by
the board-that is to say, broken short off; but her bowsprit was
sound, and the head and bow appeared firm. When I came close
to her, a dog appeared upon her, who, seeing-me coming, yelped
and cried; and, as soon as I called him, jumped into the sea to
come to me I took him into the boat, but found him almost dead
with hunger and thirst. I gave him a cake of my bread, and he
devoured it like a ravenous wolf that had been starving a fortnight
in the snow; I then gave the poor creature some fresh water, with
which, if I would have let him, he would have burst himself. After
this I went on board; but the first sight I met with was two men
drowned in the cook-room, or forecastle of the ship, with their arms
fast about one another. I concluded, as is indeed probable, that
when the ship struck, it being in a storm, the sea broke so high,
and so continually over her, that the men were not able to bear it,
and were strangled with the constant rushing in of the water, as
much as if they had been under water. Besides the dog, there was
nothing left in the ship that had life; nor any goods, that I could
see, but what were spoiled by the water. There were some casks of
liquor, whether wine or brandy I knew not, which lay lower in the
hold, and which, the water being ebbed out, I could see; but they
were too big to meddle with. I saw several chests, which, I believe,
belonged to some of the seamen ; and I got two of them into the
boat, without examining what was in them. Had the stern of the
ship been fixed, and the forepart broken off, I am persuaded I
might have made a good voyage; for by what I found in those two
chests I had room to suppose the ship had a great deal of wealth
on board; and, if I may guess from the course she steered, she
must have been bound from Buenos Ayres, or the Rio de la Plata,
in the south part of America, beyond the Brazils to the Havannah,
in the Gulf of Mexico, and so perhaps to Spain. She had, no
doubt, a great treasure in her, but of no use, at that time, to any
body; but what become of the crew I then knew not.
I found, besides these chests, a little cask full of liquor, or about
twenty gallons, which I got into my boat with much difficulty,
There were several muskets in the cabin, and a great powder-horn,
with about four pounds of powder in it; as for the muskets, I had
no occasion for them, so I left them, but took the powder-horn. I
took a fire-shovel and tongs, which I wanted extremely, as also two
little brass kettles, a copper pot to make chocolate, and a gridiron ;
and with this cargo, and the dog, I came away, the tide beginning
to make home again-and the same evening, about as hour within
134
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
night, I reached the island again, weary and fatigued to the last
degree. I reposed that night in the boat; and in the morning I
resolved to harbour what I had got in my new cave, and not carry
it home to my castle. After refreshing myself, I got all my cargo
on shore, and began to examine the particulars. The cask of
liquor I found to be a kind of rum, but not such as we had at the
Brazils; and, in a word, not at all good; but when I came to open
the chests, I found several things of great use to me-for example,
I found in one a fine case of bottles, of an extraordinary kind, and
filled with cordial waters, fine and very good; the bottles held
about three pints each, and were tipped with silver. I found two
pots of very good succades, or sweetmeats, so fastened also on the
top that the salt-water had not hurt them; and two more of the
same, which the water had spoiled. I found some very good shirts,
which were very welcome to me; and about a dozen and a half of
white linen handkerchiefs and coloured neckcloths; the former
were also very welcome, being exceedingly refreshing to wipe my
face in a hot day. Besides this, when I came to the till in the chest,
I found there three great bags of pieces of eight, which held about
eleven hundred pieces in all; and in one of them, wrapped up in a
paper, six doubloons of gold, and some small bars or wedges of
gold; I suppose they might all weigh near a pound. In the other
chest were some clothes, but of little value; but, by the circum-
stances, it must have belonged to the gunner's mate; though there
was no powder in it, except two pounds of fine glazed powder, in
three flasks, kept, I suppose, for charging their fowling-pieces on
occasion. Upon the whole, I got very little by this voyage that
was of any use to me; for, as to the money, I had no manner of
occasion for it; it was to me as the dirt under my feet, and I would
have given it all for three or four pair of English shoes and
stockings, which were things I greatly wanted, but had had none
on my feet for many years. I had, indeed, got two pair of shoes
now, which I took off the feet of the two drowned men whom I saw
in the wreck, and I found two pair more in one of the chests, which
were very welcome to me; but they were not like our English
shoes, either for ease or service, being rather what we call pumps
than shoes. I found in this seaman's chest about fifty pieces of
eight, in rials, but no gold: I suppose this belonged to a poorer
man than the other, which seemed to belong to some officer.
Well, however, I lugged this money home to my cave, and laid it
up, as I had done that before which I had brought from our own
ship; but it was a great pity, as I said, that the other part of this
ship had not come to my share; for I am satisfied I might have
îoaded my canoe several times over with money; and, thought I,
if I ever escape to England, it might lie here safe enough till I
come again and fetch it.
ROBINSON crusoe.
135
}
CHAPTER XIV.
!
Reflections-An extraordinary dream-Discover five canoes of savages on
shore-Observe from my station two miserable wretches dragged out
of the boats to be devoured-One of them makes his escape, and runs
directly towards me, pursued by two others-I take measures so as to
destroy his pursuers, and save his life-Christen him by the name of
Friday, and he becomes a faithful and excellent servant.

AVING now brought all my things on shore and
secured them, I went back to my boat, and rowed or
paddled her along the shore to her old harbour,
where I laid her up, and made the best of my way to
my old habitation, where I found everything safe and
quiet. I began now to repose myself, live after my old fashion, and
take care of my family affairs; and for a while I lived easy enough,
only that I was more vigilant than I used to be, looked out oftener,
and did not go abroad so much; and if at any time I did stir with
any freedom, it was always to the east part of the island, where I
was pretty well satisfied the savages never came, and where I could
go without so many precautions, and such a load of arms and
ammunition as I always carried with me if I went the other way.
I lived in this condition near two years more; but my unlucky
head, that was always to let me know it was born to make my body
miserable, was all these two years filled with projects and designs,
how, if it were possible, I might get away from this island: for
sometimes I was for making another voyage to the wreck, though
my reason told me that there was nothing left there worth the
hazard of my voyage; sometimes for a ramble one way, sometimes
another-and I believe verily, if I had had the boat that I went
from Sallee in, I should have ventured to sea, bound anywhere, I
knew not whither have been, in all my circumstances, a
memento to those who are touched with the general plague of man-
kind, whence, for aught I know, one half of their miseries flow: I
mean that of not being satisfied with the station wherein God and
Nature hath placed them-for, not to look back upon my primitive
condition, and the excellent advice of my father, the opposition to
which was, as I may call it, my original sin, my subsequent
mistakes of the same kind had been the means of my coming into
this miserable condition; for had that Providence which so happily
seated me at the Brazils as a planter blessed me wit onfined
desires, and I could have been contented to have gone on gradually,
I might have been by this time-I mean in the time of my being in
this island—one of the most considerable planters in the Brazils—
nay, I am persuaded, that by the improvements I had made in that
little time I lived there, and the increase I should probably have
136
life and adventures of
made if I had remained, I migh-nave been worth a hundred
thousand moidores-and what business had I to leave a settled
fortune, a well-stocked plantation, improving and increasing, to
turn supercargo to Guinea to fetch negroes, when patience and
time would have so increased our stock at home, that we could
have bought them at our own door from those whose business it
was to fetch them? and though it had cost us something more, yet
the difference of that price was by no means worth saving at su
great a hazard. But as this is usually the fate of young heads, so
reflection upon the folly of it is as commonly the exercise of more
years, or of the dear-bought experience of time-so it was with me
now; and yet so deep had the mistake taken root in my temper,
that I could not satisfy myself in my station, but was continually
poring upon the means and possibility of my escape from this
place and that I may, with greater pleasure to the reader, bring
on the remaining part of my story, it may not be improper to
give some account of my first conceptions on the subject of this
foolish schame for my escape, and how, and upon what foundation,
I acted.
I am now to be supposed retired in my castle, after my late
voyage to the wreck, my frigate laid up and secured under water, as
usual, and my condition restored to what it was before: I had more
wealth, indeed, than I had before, but was not at all the richer; for
I had no more use for it than the Indians of Peru had before the
Spaniards came there.
It was one of the nights in the rainy season in March, the
four-and-twentieth year of my first setting foot in this island of
solitude, I was lying in my bed or hammock, awake, very well in
health, had no pain, no distemper, no uneasiness of body, nor any
uneasiness of mind more than ordinary, but could by no means
close my eyes, that is, so as to sleep; no, not a wink all night long,
otherwise than as follows:-It is impossible to set down the
innumerable crowd of thoughts that whirled through that great
thoroughfare of the brain, the memory, in this night's time: I ran
over the whole history of my life in miniature, or by abridgment, as
1 may call it, to my coming to this island, and also of that part of
my life since I came to this island. In my reflections upon the
state of my case since I came on shore on this island, I was com
paring the happy posture of my affairs in the first years of my
habitation here, with the life of anxiety, fear, and care which I had
lived in ever since I had seen the print of a foot in the sand. Not
that I did not believe the savages had frequented the island even
all the while, and might have been several hundreds of them at
times on shore there; but I had never known it, and was incapable
of any apprehensions about it; my satisfaction was perfect, though
my danger was the same, and I was as happy in not knowing my
danger as if I had never really been exposed to it. This furnished
ny thoughts with many very profitable reflections, and particularly
Z
{
ROBINSON CRUSOE,
!3?
this one: How infinitely good that Providence is, which has pro-
vided, in its government of mankind, such narrow bounds to his
sight and knowledge of things; and though he walks in the midst
of so many thousand dangers, the sight of which, if discovered to
him, would distract his mind and sink his spirits, he is kept serene
and calm, by having the events of things hid from his eyes, and
knowing nothing of the dangers which surround him.
After these thoughts had for some time entertained me, I came to
reflect seriously upon the real danger I had been in for so many
years in this very island, and how I had walked about in the
greatest security, and with all possible tranquillity, even when per-
haps nothing but the brow of a hill, a great tree, or the casual
approach of night, had been between me and the worst kind of
destruction-viz., that of falling into the hands of cannibals and
savages, who would have seized on me with the same view as !
would on a goat or turtle; and have thought it no more crime to
kill and devour me than I did of a pigeon or a curlew. I would
unjustly slander myself if I should say I was not sincerely thankful
to my great Preserver, to whose singular protection I acknowledged,
with great humility, all these unkown deliverances were due, and
without which I must inevitably have fallen into their merciless
hands. í
When these thoughts were over, my head was for some time
taken up in considering the nature of these wretched creatures, I
mean the savages, and how it came to pass in the world that the
wise Governor of all things should give up any of his creatures to
such inhumanity-nay, to something so much below even brutality
itself as to devour its own kind: but as this ended in some (at
that time) fruitless speculations, it occurred to me to inquire what
part of the world these wretches lived in? how far off the coast was
from whence they came? what they ventured over so far from home
for what kind of boats they had? and why I might not order
myself and my business so that I might be able to go over thither,
as they were to come to me?
I never so much as troubled myself to consider what I shoula do
with myself when I went thither; what would become of me if I
fell into the hands of these savages; or how I should escape them
if they attacked me; no, nor so much as how it was possible for me
to reach the coast, and not be attacked by some or other of them,
without any possibility of delivering myself: and if I should not
fall into their hands, what I should do for provision, or whither I
should bend my course: none of these thoughts, I say, so much as
came in my way; but my mind was wholly bent upon the notion of
my passing over in my boat to the mainland. I looked upon my
present condition as the most miserable that could possibly be i
that I was not able to throw myself into anything but death, that
could be called worse; and if I reached the shore of the main I
might perhaps meet with relief, or I might coast along, as I did on
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES of
the African shore, till I came to some inhabited country, and where
I might find some relief; and after all, perhaps I might fall in with
some Christian ship that might take me in: and if the worst came
to the worst, I could but die, which would put an end to all these
miseries at once Pray note, all this was the fruit of a disturbed
mind, an impatient temper, made desperate, as it were, by the long
continuance of my troubles, and the disappointments I had met in
the wreck I had been on board of, and where I had been so near
obtaining what I so earnestly longed for-somebody to speak to,
and to learn some knowledge from them of the place where I was,
and of the probable means of my deliverance. I was agitated
wholly by these thoughts; all my calm of mind, in my resignation
to Providence, and waiting the issue of the dispositions of heaven,
seemed to be suspended; and I had, as it were, no power to turn
my thoughts to anything but to the project of a voyage to the main,
which came upon me with such force, and such an impetuosity of
desire, that it was not to be resisted.
When this had agitated my thoughts for two hours or more with
ach violence that it set my very blood into a ferment, and my
pulse beat as if I had been in a fever, merely with the extraordinary
fervour of my mind about it, Nature-as if I had been fatigued and
exhausted with the very thoughts of it-threw me into a sound
sleep. One would have thought I should have dreamed of it, but I
did not, nor of anything relating to it: but I dreamed that as I was
going out in the morning as usual from my castle, I saw upon the
shore two canoes and eleven savages coming to land, and that they
brought with them another savage, whom they were going to kill in
order to eat him, when, on a sudden, the savage that they were
going to kill jumped away, and ran for his life; and I thought in
my sleep that he came running into my little thick grove before my
fortification, to hide himself; and that I, seeing him alone, and not
perceiving that the others sought him that way, showed myself to
him, and smiling upon him, encouraged him that he kneeled down
to me, seeming to pray me to assist him; upon which I showed him
my ladder, made him go up, and carried him into my cave, and he
became my servant; and that as soon as I had got this man, I said
to myself, Now I may certainly venture to the mainland, for this
fellow wih serve me as a pilot, and will tell me what to do, and
whither to go for provisions, and whither not to go for fear of being
devoured; what places to venture into, and what to shun.".
waked with this thought; and was under such inexpressible
impressions of joy at the prospect of my escape in my dream, that
the disappointments which I felt upon coming to myself, and finding
that it was no more than a dream, were equally extravagant the
other way, and threw me into a very great dejection of spirits.
Upon this, however, I made this conclusion: that my only way
to go about to attempt an escape was, to endeavour to get a savage
into my possession: and, if possible, it should be one of their
robinson crusoe.
139
prisoners, whom they had condemned to be eaten, and should
bring hither to kill. But these thoughts still were attended with
this difficulty: that it was impossible to effect this without attacking
a whole caravan of them, and killing them all; and this was not
only a very desperate attempt, and might miscarry; but, on the
other hand, I had greatly scrupled the lawfulness of it to myself ;
and my heart trembled at the thoughts of shedding so much blood,
though it was for my deliverance. I need not repeat the arguments
which occurred to me against this, they being the same mentioned
before; but though I had other reasons to offer now-viz., that
those men were enemies to my life, and would devour me if they
could; that it was self-preservation, in the highest degree, to deliver
myself from this death of a life, and was acting in my own defence
as much as if they were actually assaulting me, and the like; I say,
though these things argued for it, yet the thoughts of shedding
human blood for my deliverance were very terrible to me, and such
as i could by no means reconcile myself to for a great while. How-
ever, at last, after many secret disputes with myself, and after great
perplexities about it (for all these arguments, one way and another,
struggled in my head a long time), the eager prevailing desire of
deliverance at length mastered all the rest; and I resolved, if
possible, to get one of these savages into my hands, cost what it
would. My next thing was to contrive how to do it, and this, indeed,
was very difficult to resolve on; but as I could pitch upon no
probable means for it, so I resolved to put myself upon the watch,
to see them when they came on shore, and leave the rest to the
event; taking such measures as the opportunity should present, let
what would be.
With these resolutions in my thoughts, I set myself upon the
scout as often as possible, and indeed so often, that I was heartily
tired of it; for it was above a year and a half that I waited; and
for great part of that time went out to the west end, and to the
south-west corner of the island almost every day, to look for
canoes, but none appeared. This was very discouraging, and began
to trouble me much, though I cannot say that it did in this case (as
it had done some time before) wear off the edge of my desire to the
thing; but the longer it seemed to be delayed, the more eager I
was for it in a word, I was not at first so careful to shun the sight
of these savages, and avoid being seen by them, as I was now eager
to be upon them Besides, I fancied myself able to manage one,
nay, two or three savages, if I had them, so as to make them
entirely slaves to me, to do whatever I should direct them, and to
prevent their being able at any time to do me any hurt. It was a
great while that I pleased myself with this affair; but nothing still
presented itself; all my fancies and schemes came to nothing, for
no savages came near me for a great while.
About a year and a half after I entertained these notions (ana oy
long musing had, as it were, resolved them all into nothing, for
140
life and adventures of
want of an occasion to put them into execution), I was surprised
one morning by seeing no less than five canoes all on shore together
on my side the island, and the people who belonged to them all
landed and out of my sight. The number of them broke all my
measures; for seeing so many, and knowing that they always came
four or six, or sometimes more in a boat, I could not tell what to
think of it, or how to take my measures to attack twenty or thirty
men single-handed; so lay still in my castle, perplexed and dis
comforted. However, I put myself into the same position for an
attack that I had formerly provided, and was just ready for action,
if anything had presented, Having waited a good while, listening
to hear if they made any noise, at length, being very impatient, I
set my guns at the foot of my ladder, and clambered up to the top
of the hill, by my two stages, as usual; standing so, however, that
my head did not appear above the hill, so that they could not perceive
me by any means. Here I observed, by the help of my perspective
glass, that they were no less than thirty in number; that they had
a fire kindled, and that they had meat dressed. How they had
cooked it I knew not, or what it was; but they were all dancing.
in I know not how many barbarous gestures.nd figures, their own
way, round the fire.
While I was thus looking on them, I perceived, by my persper
tive, two miserable wretches dragged from the boats, where, it
seems, they were laid by, and were now brought out for the
slaughter. I perceived one of them immediately fall; being
knocked down, I suppose, with a club or wooden sword, for that
was their way; and two or three others were at work immediately,
cutting him open for their cookery, while the other victim was left
standing by himself, till they should be ready for him.
In that very
moment this poor wretch, seeing himself a little at liberty and
unbound, Nature inspired him with hopes of life, and he started
away from them, and ran with incredible swiftness along the sands,
directly towards me; I mean towards that part of the coast where
my habitation was. I was dreadfully frightened, I must acknow-
ledge, when I perceived him run my way and especially when, as
I thought, I saw him pursued by the whole body; and now I
expected that part of my dream was coming to pass, and that he
would certainly take shelter in my grove: but I could not depend,
by any means, upon my dream, that the other savages would not
pursue him thither and find him there. However, I kept my
station, and my spirits began to recover when I found that there
was not above three men that followed him; and still more was !
encouraged, when I found that he outstripped them exceedingly in
running, and gained ground on them; so that, if he could but hold
cut for half-an-hour, I saw easily he would fairly get away from
them all.
There was between them and my castle the creek, which I
mentioned often in the first part of my story, where I landed my
+
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
142
cargoes out of the ship; and this I saw plainly he must necessarily
swim over, or the poor wretch would be taken there; but when the
savage escaping came thither, he made nothing of it, though the
tide was then up; but plunging in, swam through in about thirty
strokes, or thereabouts, landed, and ran with exceeding strength
and swiftness, When the three persons came to the creek, I found
that two of them could swim, but the third could not, and that,
standing on the other side, he looked at the others, but went no
farther, and soon after went softly back again; which, as it
happened, was very well for him in the end. I observed that the
two who swam were yet more than twice as long swimming over
the creek as the fellow was that filed from them
It came very
warmly upon my thoughts, and, indeed, irresistibly, that now was
the time to get me a servant, and, perhaps, a companion or
assistant; and that I was plainly called by Providence to save this
poor creature's life. I immediately ran down the ladders with all
possible expedition, fetched my two guns, for they were both at the
foot of the ladders, as I observed before, and getting up again with
the same haste to the top of the hill, I crossed towards the sea;
and having a very short cut, and all down hill, placed myself in the
way between the pursuers and the pursued, hallooing aloud to him
that fled, who, looking back, was at first perhaps as much frightened
at me as at them; but I beckoned with my hand to him to come
back; and, in the meantime, I slowly advanced towards the two
that followed; then rushing at once upon the foremost, I knocked
him down with the stock of my piece. I was loath to fire, because
I would not have the rest hear; though, at that distance, it would
not have been easily heard, and being out of sight of the smoke,
too, they would not have known what to make of it. Having
knocked this fellow down, the other who pursued him stopped, as it
he had been frightened, and I advanced towards him: but as 1
came nearer, I perceived presently he had a bow and arrow, and
was fitting it to shoot at me: so I was then obliged to shoot at him
birst, which I did, and killed him at the first shot. The poor
savage who fled, but had stopped, though he saw both his enemies
fallen and killed, as he thought, yet was so frightened with_the
are and noise of my piece that he stood stock still, and neither
came forward nor went backward, though he seemed rather inclined
still to fly than to come on I hallooed again to him, and made
signs to come forward, which he easily understood, and came a
little way; then stopped again, and then a little farther, and
stopped again; and I could then perceive that he stood trembling,
as if he had been taken prisoner, and had just been to be killed, as
his two enemies were beckoned to him again to come to me,
and gave him all the signs of encouragement that I could think of;
and he came nearer and nearer, kneeling down every ten or twelve
steps, in token of acknowledgment for saving his life I smiled at
kim, and looked pleasantly, and beckoned to him to come stili


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LIFE AND Adventures of
:
nearer; at length he came close to me; and then he kneeled down
again, kissed the ground, and laid his head upon the ground, and,
taking me by the foot, set my foot upon his head this, it seems,
was in token of swearing to be my slave for ever. I took him up
and made much of him, and encouraged him al I could.
But
there was more work to do yet; for I perceived the savage whom I
had knocked down was not killed, but stunned with the blow, and
began to come to himself: so I pointed to him, and showed him
the savage, that he was not dead; upon this he spoke some words
to me, and though I could not understand them, yet I thought they
were pleasant to hear; for they were the first sound of a man's
voice that I had heard, my own excepted, for above twenty-five
years. But there was no time for such reflections now; the savage
who was knocked down recovered himself so far as to sit up upon
the ground, and I perceived that my savage began to be afraid;
but when I saw that, I presented my other piece at the man, as if
I would shoot him upon this my savage, for so I call him now,
made a motion to me to lend him my sword, which hung naked in
a belt by my side, which I di He no sooner had it, but he runs
to his enemy, and at one blow cut off his head so cleverly, no
executioner in Germany could have done it sooner or better; which
I thought very strange for one who, I had reason to believe, never
saw a sword in his life before, except their own wooden swords :
however, it seems, as I learned afterwards, they make their
wooden swords so sharp, so heavy, and the wood is so hard, that
they will even cut off heads with them, ay, and arms, and that at
one blow, too. When he had done this, he comes laughing to me
in sign of triumph, and brought me the sword again, and with
abundance of gestures which I did not understand, laid it down,
with the head of the savage that he had killed, just before me. But
that which astonished him most was to know how I killed the
other Indian so far off; so, pointing to him, he made signs to me
to let him go to him; and I bade him go, as well as I could.
When he came to him, he stood like one amazed, looking at him,
turning him first on one side, then on the other; looked at the
wound the bullet had made, which it seems was just in his breast,
where it had made a hole, and no great quantity of blood had
followed; but he had bled inwardly, for he was quite dead. He
took up his bow and arrows, and came back; so I turned to go
away, and beckoned him to follow me, making signs to him that
more might come after them. Upon this he made signs to me
that he should bury them with sand, that they might not be seen
by the rest, if they followed; and so I made signs to him again to
do so. He fell to work; and in an instant he had scraped a hole
in the sand with his hands big enough to bury the first in, and then
dragged him into it, and covered him; and did so by the other
also; I believe he had buried them both in a quarter of an hour.
Then, calling him away, I carried him, not to my castle, but quite
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
143
away to my cave, on the farther part of the island: so I did not let
my dream come to pass in that part, that he came into my grove
for shelter. Here I gave him bread and a bunch of raisins to eat,
and a draught of water, which I found he was indeed in great
distress for, from his running: and having refreshed him, I made
signs for him to go and lie down to sleep, showing him a place
where I had laid some rice-straw, and a blanket upon it, which I
used to sleep upon myself sometimes; so the poor creature lay
down, and went to sleep.
He was a comely, handsome fellow, perfectly well made, with
straight, strong limbs, not too large, tall, and well-shaped; and, as I
reckon, about twenty-six years of age. He had a very good coun-
tenance, not a fierce and surly aspect, but seemed to have some-
thing very manly in his face; and yet he had all the sweetress and
softness of a European in his countenance, too, especially when he
smiled. His hair was long and black, not curled like wool; his
forehead very high and large; and a great vivacity and sparkling
sharpness in his eyes. The colour of his skin was not quite black,
but very tawny; and yet not an ugly, yellow, nauseous tawny, as
the Brazilians and Virginians, and other natives of America are,
but of a bright kind of a dun olive-colour, that had in it something
very agreeable, though not very easy to describe. His face was
round and plump; his nose small, not flat, like the Negroes; a very
good mouth, thin lips, and his fine teeth well set, and as white as
ivory.
After he had slumbered, rather than slept, about half-an-hour, he
awoke again, and came out of the cave to me: for I had been
milking my goats which I had in the enclosure just by: when he
espied me he came running to me, laying himself down again upon
the ground, with all the possible signs of an humble, thankful
disposition, making a great many antic gestures to show it. At
last he lays his head flat upon the ground, close to my foot, and
sets my other foot upon his head, as he had done before; and after
this, made all the signs to me of subjection, servitude, and sub-
mission imaginable, to let me know how he would serve me so long
as he lived, I understood him in many things, and let him know I
was very well pleased with him. In a little time I began to speak
to him; and teach him to speak to me; and first, I let him know
his name should be FRIDAY, which was the day I saved his life: I
called him so for the memory of the time. I likewise taught him to
say Master; and then let him know that was to be my name : I
likewise taught him to say Yes and No, and to know the meaning
of them. I gave him some milk in an earthen pot, and let him see
me drink it before him, and sop my bread in it; and gave him a
cake of bread to do the like, which he quickly complied with, and
made signs that it was very good for him. I kept there with him
all that night; but as soon as it was day I beckoned to him to come
with me, and let him know I would give him some clothes ; at
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LIFE AND
life and adventures of
which he seemed very glad, for he was stark naked. As we went
by the place where he had buried the two men, he pointed exactly
to the place, and showed me the marks that he had made to find
them again, making signs to me that we should dig them up again
and eat them. At this I appeared very angry, expressed my
abhorrence of it, made as if I would vomit at the thoughts of it, and
beckoned with my hand to him to come away, which he did
immediately, with great submission. I then led him up to the top
of the hill, to see if his enemies were gone; and pulling out my
glass I looked, and saw plainly the place where they had been, but
no appearance of them or their canoes; so that it was plain they
were gone, and had left their two comrades behind them, without
any search after them.
But I was not content with this discovery; but having no more
courage, and consequently more curiosity, I took my man Friday
with me, giving him the sword in his hand, with the bow and
arrows at his back, which I found he could use very dexterously,
making him carry one gun for me, and I two for myself; and away
we marched to the place where these creatures had been for I
had a mind now to get some further intelligence of them. When I
came to the place my very blood ran chill in my veins, and my
heart sunk within me, at the horror of the spectacle; indeed, it
was a dreadful sight, at least it was so to me, though Friday made
nothing of it. The place was covered with human bones, the
ground dyed with their blood, and great pieces of flesh left here
and there, half-eaten, mangled, and scorched; and, in short, all
the tokens of the triumphant feast they had been making there, after
a victory over their enemies. I saw three skulls, five hands, and
the bones of three or four legs and feet, and abundance of other
parts of the bodies; and Friday, by his signs, made me understand
that they brought over four prisoners to feast upon; that three of
them were eaten up, and that he, pointing to himself, was the
fourth; that there had been a great battle between them and their
next king, of whose subjects, it seems, he had been one, and that
they had taken a great number of prisoners; all which were carried
to several places by those who had taken them in the fight, in
order to feast upon them, as was done here by these wretches upon
those they brought hither.
I caused Friday to gather all the skulls, bones, flesh, and what-
ever remained, and lay them together in a heap, and make a great
fire upon it, and burn them all to ashes. I found Friday had still a
bankering stomach after some of the flesh, and was still a cannibal
in his nature; but I showed so much abhorrence at the very
thoughts of it, and at the least appearance of it, that he durst not
discover it: for I had, by some means, let him know that I would
kill him if he offered it.
When he had done this, we came back to our castle; and there I
fell to work for my man Friday; and first of all, I gave him a pair
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
145
✔ linen drawers, which I had out of the poor gunner's chest I
mentioned, which I found in the wreck, and which, with a little
alteration, fitted him very well; and then I made him a jerkin of
goat's skin, as well as my skill would allow (for I was now grown a
tolerably good tailor); and I gave him a cap which I made of
hare's skin, very convenient, and fashionable enough; and thus he
was clothed, for the present, tolerably well, and was mighty well
pleased to see himself almost as well clothed as his master. It is
true he went awkwardly in these clothes at first-wearing the
drawers was very awkward to him, and the sleeves of the waistcoat
galled his shoulders and the inside of his arms; but a little easing
them where he complained they burt him, and using himself to
them, he took to them at length very well.
The next day, after I came home to my hutch with him, began
to consider where I should lodge him : and that I might do well for
him and yet be perfectly easy myself, I made a little tent for him in
the vacant place between my two fortifications, in the inside of the
last, and in the outside of the first. As there was a door or entrance
there into my cave, I made a formal framed door-case, and a door
to it, of boards, and set it up in the passage, a little within the
entrance; and, causing the door to open in the inside, I barred it
up in the night, taking in my ladders, too; so that Friday could no
way come at me in the inside of my innermost wall, without
making so much noise in getting over that it must needs awaken
me; for my first wall had now a complete roof over it of long poles,
covering all my tent, and leaning up to the side of the hill; which
was again laid across with smaller sticks, instead of laths, and then
thatched over a great thickness with the rice-straw, whick was
strong, like reeds; and at the hole or place which was left to go in
or out by the ladder I had placed a kind of trap-door, which, if it
had been attempted on the outside, would not have opened at all,
but would have fallen down and made a great noise-as to
weapons, I took them all into my side every night. But I needed
none of all this precaution; for never man had a more faithful,
loving, sincere servant than Friday was to me; without passions,
sullenness, or designs, perfectly obliged and engaged; his very
affections were tied to me, like those of a child to a father; and 1
dare say he would have sacrificed his life to save mine upon any
occasion whatsoever-the many testimonies he gave me of this put
it out of doubt, and soon convinced me that I needed to use no
precautions for my safety on his account.
This frequently gave me occasion to observe, and that with
wonder, that however it had pleased God in His providence, and
in the government of the works of His hands, to take from so great
a part of the world of His creatures the best uses to which their
faculties and the powers of their souls are adapted, yet that He has
bestowed upon them the same powers, the same reason, the same
affections; the same sentiments of kindness and obligation į
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LIFE AND ADVENTURes of
same passions, and resentments of wrongs, the same sense of
gratitude, sincerity, fidelity, and all the capacities of doing good
and receiving good that He has given to us; and that when He
pleases to offer them occasions of exerting these, they are as ready,
nay, more ready, to apply them to the right uses for which they
were bestowed than we are. This made me very melancholy
sometimes, in reflecting, as the several occasions presented, how
mean a use we make of all these, even though we have these
powers enlightened by the great lamp of instruction, the Spirit of
God, and by the knowledge of His word added to our under-
standing; and why it has pleased God to hide the like saving
knowledge from so many millions of souls, who, if I might judge by
this poor savage, would make a much better use of it than we did.
From hence I sometimes was led too far, to invade the sovereignty
of Providence, and, as it were, arraign the justice of so arbitrary a
disposition of things, that should hide that sight from some, and
reveal it to others, and yet expect a like duty from both ; but I
shut it up, and checked my thoughts with this conclusion: first,
That we did not know by what light and law these should be
condemned; but that as God was necessarily, and by the nature of
His being, infinitely holy and just, so it could not be, but if these
creatures were all sentenced to absence from Himself, it was on
account of sinning against that light which, as the Scripture says,
was a law to themselves, and, by such rules as their consciences
would acknowledge to be just, though the foundation was not
discovered to us; and secondly, That still as we all are the clay in
the hand of the potter, no vessel could say to him, "Why hast thou
formed me thus?”
But to return to my new companion :-I was greatly delighted
with him, and made it my business to teach him everything that was
proper to make him useful, handy, and helpful; but especially to
make him speak, and understand me when I spoke; and he was
the aptest scholar that ever was; and particularly was so merry, so
constantly diligent, and so pleased when he could but understand
me, or make me understand him, that it was very pleasant to me to
talk to him. Now my life began to be so easy that I began to say
to myself that could I but have been safe from more savages,
I cared not if I was never to remove from the place where
lived.

32
ROBINSON CRUSOE
147
CHAPTER XV.
at great pains to instruct Friday respecting my abhorrence of the
cannibal practices of the savages-He is amazed at the effects of the
gun, and considers it an intelligent being-Begins to talk English
tolerably-A dialogue-I instruct him in the knowledge of religion,
and find him very apt-He describes to me some white men who had
come to his country, and still lived there.

A
FTER I had been two or three days returned to my
castle, I thought hat, in order to bring Friday off
from his horrid way of feeding, and from the relish of
a cannibal's stomach, I ought to let him taste other
flesh; so I took him out with me one morning to the
woods. I went, indeed, intending to kill a kid out of my own
flock, and bring it home and dress it; but as I was going 1 saw a
she-goat lying down in the shade, and two young kids sitting by
ner. I catched hold of Friday;-" Hold,” said I, "stand still;"
and made signs to him not to stir : immediately I presented my
piece, shot, and killed one of the kids. The poor creature, who
had, at a distance, indeed, seen me kill the savage, his enemy, but
did not know, nor could imagine how it was done, was sensibly
surprised; trembled, and shook, and looked so amazed that I
thought he would have sunk down. He did not see the kid I shot
at, or perceive I had killed it, but ripped up his waistcoat to feel
whether he was not wounded; and, as I found presently, thought
I was resolved to kill him: for he came and kneeled down to me,
and embracing my knees, said a great many things I did not
understand; but I could easily see the meaning was to pray me
not to kill him.
I soon found a way to convince him that I would do him no
harm and taking him up by the hand, laughed at aim, and
pointing to the kid which I had killed, beckoned to him to run and
fetch it, which he did : and while he was wondering, and looking
to see how the creature was killed, I loaded my gun again. By-
and-by, I saw a great fowl, like a hawk, sitting upon a tree within
shot; so, to let Friday understand a little what I would do, I
called him to me again, pointed at the fowl, which was indeed a
parrot, though I thought it had been a hawk; I say, pointing to
the parrot, and to my gun, and to the ground under the parrot, to
let him see I would make it fall, I made him understand that I
would shoot and kill that bird; accordingly, I fired, and bade him
look, and immediately he saw the parrot fall. He stood like one
frightened again, notwithstanding all I had said to him; and I
found he was the more amazed, because he did not see me put any.
thing into the gun, but thought that there must be some wonderful
14
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
fund of death and destruction in that thing, able to kill Can, beast,
bird, or anything near or far off; and the astonishment this created
in him was such as could not wear off for a long time; and i
believe, if I would have let him, he would have worshipped me and
my gun. As for the gun itself, he would not so much as touch it
for several days after; but he would speak to it and talk to it, as if
it had answered him, when he was by himself; which, as I after-
wards learned of him, was to desire it not to kill him. Well, after
his astonishment was a little over at this, I pointed to him to run
and fetch the bird I had shot, which he did, but stayed some time;
for the parrot, not being quite dead, had fluttered away a good
distance from the place where she fell: however, he found her, took
ber up and brought her to me; and as I had perceived his
ignorance about the gun before, I took this advantage to charge
the gun again, and not to let him see me do it, that I might be
ready for any other mark that might present; but nothing more
offered at that time so I brought home the kid, and the same
evening I took the skin off, and cut it out as well as I could; and
having a pot fit for that purpose, I boiled or stewed some of the
flesh, and made some very good broth. After I had begun to eat
some I gave some to my man, who seemed very glad of it, and
liked it very well; but that which was strangest to him was to see
me eat salt with it. He made a sign to me that the salt was not
good to eat ; and putting a little into his own mouth, he seemed to
nauseate it, and would spit and sputter at it, washing his mouth
with fresh water after it: on the other hand, I took sume meat into
my mouth without salt, and I pretended to spit and sputter for want
of salt, as much as he had done at the salt; but it would not do ; he
would never care for salt with meat or in his broth; at least, not
for a great while, and then but a very little.
:
Having thus fed him with boiled meat and broth, I was resolved
to feast him the next day by roasting a piece of the kid: this I did by
banging it before the fire on a string, as I had seen many people
do in England, setting two poles up, one on each side of the fire,
and one across the top, and tying the string to the cross stick,
letting the meat turn continually. This Friday admired very much;
but when he came to taste the flesh, he took so many ways to tell
me how well he liked it, that I could not but understand him: and
at last he told me, as well as he could, he would never eat man's
Hesh any more, which I was very glad to hear.
The next day I set him to work beating some corn out, and sift-
ing it in the manner I used to do, as I observed before; and he
soon understood how to do it as well as I, especially after he had
seen what the meaning of it was, and that it was to make bread of ;
for after that I let him see me make my bread, and bake it too ;
and in a little time Friday was able to do all the work for me as
well as I could do it myself.
I began now to consider, that having two mouths in feed instead
*
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
140
of one, I must provide more ground for my harvest, and plant s
larger quantity of corn than I used to do; so I marked out a larger
piece of land, and began the fence in the same manner as before,
in which Friday worked not only very willingly and very hard, but
did it very cheerfully: and I told him what it was for; that it was
for corn to make more bread, because he was now with me, and
that I might have enough for him and myself too. He appeared
very sensible of that part, and let me know that he thought I had
much more labour upon me on his account than I had for myself;
and that he would work the harder for me if I would tell him
what to do-
0
This was the pleasantest year of all the life I led in this place
Friday began to talk pretty well, and understand the names of
almost everything I had occasion to call for, and of every place I
had to send him to, and talked a great deal to me; so that, in
short, I began now to have some use for my tongue again, which,
indeed, I had very little occasion for before. Besides the pleasure
of talking to him, I had a singular satisfaction in the fellow himself:
his simple, unfeigned honesty appeared to me more and more every
day, and I began really to love the creature; and on his side I
believe he loved me more than it was possible for him ever to love
anything before.
I had a mind once to try if he had any inclination for his own
country again; and having taught him English so well that he
could answer me almost any question, I asked him whether the
nation that he belonged to never conquered in battle? At which
he smiled, and said "Yes, yes, we always fight the better;" that
is, he meant always get the better in fight; and so we began the
following discourse :-
Master-You always fight the better; how came you to be taken
prisoner then, Friday?
Friday. My nation beat much for all that.
Master.-How beat? If your nation beat them, how came you
to be taken?
Friday. They more many than my nation, in the place where
me was; they take one, two, three, and me: my nation over-beat
them in the yonder place, where me no was; there my nation take
one, two, great thousand.
Master. But why did not your side recover you from the hands
of your enemies, then?
Friday. They run, one, two, three, and me, and make go in the
canoe; my nation have no canoe that time.
Master.-Well, Friday, and what does your nation do with the
men they take? Do they carry them away and eat them, as these
did?
Friday.-Yes, my nation eat mans too: eat all up
Master.-Where do they carry them?
Friday.-Go to other place, where they think.
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life and ADVENTURES OF
Master.-Do they come hither?
Friday.-Yes, yes, they come hither; come other else place.
Master.-Have you been here with them?
Friday. Yes, I have been here (points to the N.W. side of the
Island, which, it seems, was their side).
By this I understood that my man Friday had formerly been
among the savages who used to come on shore on the farther part
of the island, on the same man-eating occasions he was now
brought for; and some time after, when I took the courage to
carry him to that side, being the same I formerly mentioned, he
presently knew the place, and told me he was there once, when
they ate up twenty men, two women, and one child; he could not
tell twenty in English, but he numbered them by laying so many
stones in a row, and pointing to me to tell them over.
I have told this passage, because it introduces what follows:
that after this discourse I had with him, I asked him how far it
was from er island to the shore, and whether the canoes were not
often lost. He told me there was no danger, no canoes ever lost :
but that after a little way out to sea, there was a current and wind,
always one way in the morning, the other in the afternoon. This Í
understood to be no more than the sets of the tide, as going out of
coming in; but I afterwards understood it was occasioned by the
great draft and reflux of the mighty river Oroonoko, in the mouth
or gulf of which river, as I found afterwards, our island lay; and
that this land, which I perceived to be W. and N.W., was the great
island Trinidad, on the north point of the mouth of the river. I
asked Friday a thousand questions about the country, the
inhabitants, the sea, the coast, and what nations were near; he
told me all he knew with the greatest openness imaginable. I
asked him the names of the several nations of his sort of people,
but could get no other name than Caribs; from whence I easily
understood that these were the Caribbees, which our maps place on
the part of America which reaches from the mouth of the river
Oroonoko to Guiana, and onwards to St. Martha. He told me,
that up a great way beyond the moon, that was beyond the setting
of the moon, which must be west from their country, there dwelt
white bearded men, like me, and pointed to my great whiskers,
which I mentioned before; and that they had killed much mans,
that was his word: by all which I understood he meant the
Spaniards, whose cruelties in America had been spread over the
whole country, and were remembered by all the nations from father
to son.
I inquired if he could tell me how I might go froin this island,
and get among those white men-he told me, "Yes, yes, you may
go in two canoe." I could not understand what he meant, or make
him describe to me what he meant by two canoe, till at last, with
great difficulty, I found he meant it must be in a large boat, as big
*# two CanoÇa This part of Friday's discourse I began to rolish
ROBINSON crusoe.
131
very well; and from this time I entertained some hopes that, one
time or other, I might find an opportunity to make my escape
from this place, and that this poor savage might be a means to help
me.
During the long time that Friday had now been with me, and
that he began to speak to me, and understand me, I was not
wanting to lay a foundation of religious knowledge in his mind;
particularly I asked him one time, who made him.
The poor
creature did not understand me at all, but thought I had asked who
was his father-but I took it up by another handle, and asked him
who made the sea, the ground we walked on, and the hills and
woods. He told me, "It was one Benamuckee, that lived
beyond all;" he could describe nothing of this great person, but
that he was very old, “much older," he said, "than the sea or
land, than the moon or the stars." I asked him then, if this old
person had made all things, why did not all things worship him?
He looked very grave, and, with a perfect look of innocence, said,
"All things say O to him." I asked him if the people who die in
his country went away anywhere? He said, "Yes; they all went
to Benamuckee." Then I asked him whether those they eat up
went thither too? He said, "Yes.”
From these things, I began to instruct him in the knowledge of
the true God-I told him that the great Maker of all things lived
up there, pointing up towards heaven; that He governed the world
by the same power and providence by which He made it; that He
was omnipotent, and could do everything for us, give everything to
us—take everything from us; and thus, by degrees, I opened his
eyes. He listened with great attention, and received with pleasure
the notion of Jesus Christ being sent to redeem us; and of the
manner of making our prayers to God, and His being able to hear
us, even in heaven. He told me one day, that if our God could
hear us, up beyond the sun, he must needs be a greater God than
their Benamuckee, who lived but a little way off, and yet could not
hear till they went up to the great mountains where he dwelt to
speak to him. I asked him if ever he went thither to speak to
him f He said, "No; they never went that were young men ;
none went thither but the old men," whom he called their
Oowokakee; that is, as I made him explain to me, their religious,
or clergy; and that they went to say O (so he called saying
prayers), and then came back and told them what Benamuckee
said. By this I observed, that there is priestcraft even among the
most blinded, ignorant pagans in the world; and the policy of
making a secret of religion, in order to preserve the veneration of
the people to the clergy, not only to be found in the Roman, but,
perhaps, among all religions in the world, even among the most
brutish and barbarous savages.
I endeavoured to clear up this fraud to my man Friday; and told
him that the pretence of their old men going up to the mountsids
252
Life and AdventureS OF
1
to say O to their god Benamuckee was a cheat; and their bringing
word from thence what he said was much more so; that if they met
with any answer, or spake with any ene there, it must be with an
evil spirit; and then I entered into a long discourse with him about
the devil, the origin of him, his rebellion against God, his enmity to
man, the reason of it, his setting himself up in the dark parts of the
world to be worshipped instead of God, and as God, and the many
stratagems he made use of to delude mankind to their ruin; how
he had a secret access to our passions and to our affections,
and to adapt his snares to our inclinations, so as to cause us even
to be our own tempters, and run upon our destruction by our own
I found it was not so easy to imprint right notions in his mind
about the devil as it was about the being of a God-nature assisted
all my arguments to evidence to him even the necessity of a great
First Cause an overruling, governing Power-a secret directing
Providence; and of the equity and justice of paying homage to
Him that made us, and the like; but there appeared nothing of
this kind in the notion of an evil spirit; of his origin, his being, his
nature ; and, above all, of his inclínation to do evil, and to draw us
in to do so too-and the poor creature puzzled me once in such
manner, by a question merely natural and innocent, that I scarce
knew what to say to him. I had been talking a great deal to him
of the power of God, His omnipotence, His aversion to sin, His
being a consuming fire to the workers of iniquity; how, as He had
made us all, He could destroy us and all the world in a moment,
aud he listened with great seriousness to me all the while. After
this I had been telling him how the devil was God's enemy in the
hearts of men, and used all his malice and skill to defeat the good
designs of Providence, and to ruin the kingdom of Christ in the
world, and the like. Well," says Friday, "but you say God is so
strong, so great; is He not much strong, much might as the devil?"
Yes, yes, says I, "Friday; God is stronger than the devil-God
is above the devil, and therefore we pray to God to tread him down
under on feet, and enable us to resist his temptations and quench
his fiery darts." “But," says he, again, "if God much stronger,
much might as the wicked devil, why God no kill the devil, so
make him no more do wicked?" I was strangely surprised at this
question; and, after all, though I was now an old man, yet I was
but a young doctor, and ill qualified for a casuist or a solver of
difficulties; and at first I could not tell what to say; so I pretended
not to hear him, and asked him what he said-but he was too
earnest for an answer to forget his question, so that he repeated it
In the very same broken words as above. By this time I had
recovered myself a little, and I said, “God will at last punish him
severely; he is reserved for the judgment, and is to be cast into
the bottomless pit, to dwell with everlasting fire." This did not
satisfy Friday; but he returns upon me, repeating my words,
64
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
193
* Reserve at last!' me no understand-but why not kill the devil
now; not kill great ago?" "You may as well ask me," said I, “why
God does not kill you or me, when we do wicked things here that
offend Him-we are preserved to repent and be pardoned." He
mused some time on this-" Well, well," says he, mightily affec
tionately "that well-so you, I, devil, all wicked, all preserve,
repent, Gud pardon all." Here I was run down again by him to
the last degree-and it was a testimony to me, how the mere
notions of nature, though they will guide reasonable creatures to
the knowledge of a God, and of a worship or homage due to the
supreme being of God, as the consequence of our nature, yet
nothing but divine revelation can form the knowledge of Jesus
Christ, and of redemption purchased for us; of a Mediator of the
new covenant, and of an Intercessor at the footstool of God's
throne;
I say, nothing but a revelation from heaven can form these
in the soul; and that, therefore, the gospel of our Lord and Saviour
Jesus Christ, I mean the Word of God, and the Spirit of God,
promised for the guide and sanctifier of His people, are the
absolutely necessary instructors of the souls or men in the saving
knowledge of God and the means of salvation.
I therefore diverted the present discourse between me and my
man, rising up hastily, as upon some sudden occasion of going out';
then sending him for something a good way off, I seriously prayed
to God that he would enable me to instruct savingly this poor
savage; assisting, by His Spirit, the heart of the poor ignorant
creature to receive the light of the knowledge of God in Christ,
reconciling him to Himself, and would guide me so to speak to him
from the Word of God that his conscience might be convinced, his
eyes opened, and his soul saved. When he came again to me, I
entered into a long discourse with him upon the subject of the
redemption of man by the Saviour of the world, and of the doctrine
of the gospel preached from heaven-viz., of repentance towards
God, and faith in our blessed Lord Jesus. I then explained to hin
as well as I could why our blessed Redeemer took not on him the
nature of angels, but the seed of Abraham; and how, for that
reason, the fallen angels had no share in the redemption; that
he came only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, and the
like.

I had, God knows, more sincerity than knowledge in au the
methods I took for this poor creature's instruction, and must
acknowledge, what I believe all that act upon the same principle
will find, that in laying things open to him, I really informed and
instructed myself in many things that either I did not know, or had
not fully considered before, but which occurred naturally to my
mind upon searching into them, for the information of this poor
savage; and I had more affection in my inquiry after things upon
this occasion than ever I felt before: so that, whether this poor, wild
wretch was better for me or no, I had great reason to bê thankful
154
life and adventures of
4
that ever he came to me; my grief sat lighter upon me; my
habitation grew comfortable to me beyond measure: and when I
reflected that in this solitary life which I have been confined to, I
had not only been moved to look up to heaven myself, and to seek
the hand that had brought me here, but was now to be made an
instrument, under Providence, to save the life, and, for aught I
knew, the soul of a poor savage, and bring him to the true know-
ledge of religion, and of the Christian doctrine, that he might know
Christ Jesus, in whom is life eternal; I say, when I reflected upon
all these things, a secret joy ran through every part of my soul, and
I frequently rejoiced that ever I was brought to this place, which I
had so often thought the most dreadful of all afflictions that could
possibly have befallen me.
I continued in this thankful frame all the remainder of my time;
and the conversation which employed the hours between Friday
and me was such as madethe three years which we lived there
together perfectly and completely happy, if any such thing as
complete happiness can be formed in a sublunary state. This
savage was now a good Christian, a much better than I; though I
have reason to hope, and bless God for it, that we were equally
penitent, and comforted, restored penitents. We had here the
Word of God to read, and no farther off from His Spirit to instruct
than if we had been in England. I always applied myself, in
reading the Scripture, to let him know, as well as I could, the
meaning of what I read; and he again, by his serious inquiries and
questionings, made me, as I said before, a much better scholar in
the Scripture knowledge than I should ever have been by my own
mere private reading. Another thing I cannot refrain from observ-
ing here also, from experience in this retired part of my life-viz.,
how infinite and inexpressible a blessing it is that the knowledge
of God, and of the doctrine of salvation by Christ Jesus, is so
plainly laid down in the Word of God, so easy to be received and
understood, that, as the bare reading the Scripture made me
capable of understanding enough of my duty to carry me directly
on to the great work of sincere repentance for my sins, and laying
hold of a Saviour for life and salvation, to a stated reformation in
practice, and obedience to all God's commands, and this without
any teacher or instructor, I mean human; so the same plain
instruction sufficiently served to the enlightening th.s savage
creature, and bringing him to be such a Christian as I have krown
few equal to him in my life.
As to all the disputes, rangling, strife, and contention which
have happened in the world about religion, whether nicetics in
doctrines, or schemes of church government, they were all perfectly
useless to us, and for aught I can yet see, they have been so to the
rest of the world. We had the sure guide to heaven-viz., the
Word of God; and we had, blessed be God, comfortable views of
the Spirit of God teaching and instructing by His word, leading us
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
133
lato all truth, and making us both willing and obedient to the
instruction of His word. And I cannot see the least use that the
greatest knowledge of the disputed points of religion, which have
made such confusion in the world, would have been to us, if we
could have obtained it. But I must go on with the historical part
of things, and take every part in its order.
After Friday and I became more intimately acquainted, and that
he could understand almost all I said to him, and speak pretty
fluently, though in broken English, to me, I acquainted him with
my own history, or at least so much of it as related to my coming
to this place: how I had lived there, and how long; I let him into
the mystery, for such it was to him, of gunpowder and bullet, and
taught him how to shoot. I gave him a knife, which he was
wonderfully delighted with; and I made him a belt, with a frog
hanging to it, such as in England we wear hangers in; and in the
frog, instead of a hanger, I gave him a hatchet, which was not only
as good a weapon in some cases, but much more useful upon other
occasions.
I described to him the country of Europe, particularly England,
which I came from; how we lived, how we worshipped God, how
we behaved to one another, and how we traded in ships to all parts
of the world. I gave him an account of the wreck which I had
been on board of, and showed him, as near as I could, the place
where she lay ; but she was all beaten in pieces before, and gone.
I showed him the ruins of our boat, which we lost when we escaped,
and which I could not stir with my whole strength then; but was
now fallen almost all to pieces. Upon seeing this boat, Friday
stood musing a great while, and said nothing. I asked him what it
was he studied upon. At last says he, "Me see such boat li
come to place at my nation." I did not understand him a “gud
while; but, at last, when I had examined further into under-
stood by him, that a boat, such as that had been, came on shore
upon the country where he lived; that is, as he explained it, was
driven thither by stress of weather. I presently imagined that
some European ship must have been cast away upon their coast,
and the boat might get loose and drive ashore; but was so dull
that I never once thought of men making their escape from a wreck
thither, much less whence they might come: so I only inquires
after a description of the boat.
4
Friday described the boat to me well enough; but brought me
better to understand him when he added with some warmth, "We
save the white man's from drown." Then I presently asked if
there were any white mans, as he called them, in the boat. "Yes,"
he said; "the boat full of white mans." I asked him how many.
He told upon his fingers seventeen. I asked him then what
became of them. He told me, "They live, they dwell at my
nation.^
This pat new thoughts into my head; for I presently imagined
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES of
that these might be the men belonging to the ship that was cast
away in the sight of my island, as I now called it ; and who, after
the ship was struck on the rock, and they saw her inevitably lost,
had saved themselves in their boat, and were landed upon that
wild shore among the savages. Upon this I inquired of him more
critically what was become of them, He assured me they lived
still there; that they had been there about four years; that the
I asked
savages left them alone, and gave them victuals to live on.
him how it came to pass they did not kill them and eat them. He
said, "No, they make brother with them;" that is, as I understood
him, a truca; and then he added, "They no eat mans but when
make the war fight; that is to say, they never eat any men but
such as come to fight with them and are taken in battle.
→
ing,
It was after this some considerable time, that being upon the top
of the hill, at the east side of the island, from whence, as I have
said, I had, in a clear day, discovered the main or continent of
America, Friday, the weather being very serene, looks very
earnestly towards the mainland, and in a kind of surprise, falls a
jumping and dancing, and calls out to me, for I was at some
distance from him. I asked him what was the matter. "Oh, joy!"
says he ; Oh, glad! there see my country, there my nation "I
observed an extraordinary sense of pleasure appeared in his face,
and his eyes sparkled, and his countenance discovered a strange
eagerness, as if he had a mind to be in his own country again. This
observation of mine pu a great many thoughts into me, which
made me at first not so easy about my new man Friday as I was
before; and I made no doubt but that, if Friday could get back to
(6
is own nation again, he would not only forget all his religion but
all n obligation to me, and would be forward enough to give his
countryinen an account of me, and come back, perhaps with a
hundred or two of them, and make a feast upon me, at which he
might be as merry as he used to be with those of his enemies when
they were taken in wat But I wronged the poor honest creature
very much, for which I was very sorry afterwards, However, as
my jealousy increased, and held some weeks, I was a little more
circumspect, and not so familiar and kind to him as before; in
which I was certainly wrong too; the honest, grateful creature
having no thought about it but what consisted with the best prin-
ciples, both as a religious Christian and as a grateful friend, as
appeared afterwards to my full satisfaction.
While my jealousy of him lasted, you may be sure I was every
day pumping him to see if he would discover any of the new
thoughts which I suspected were in him; but I found everything
he said was so honest and so innocent, that I could find nothing to
nourish my suspicion; and in spite of all my uneasiness, he made
me at last entirely his own again; nor did he in the least perceive
that I was uneasy, and therefore I could not suspect him of
deceit
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
#57
One day, walking up the same hill, but the weather being hazy at
Bea, so that we could not see the continent, I called to bin, and
said, "Friday, do not you wish yourself in your own country, your
own nation} "Yes," he said, “I be much O glad to be at my
own nation.” "What would you do there?" said I.
"Would you
turn wild again, eat men's flesh again, and be a savage as you were
before?" He looked full of concern, and shaking his head, said
#
I
No, no, Friday tell them to live good; tell them to pray
God; tell them to eat corn-bread, cattle flesh, milk; no eat
man again." "Why, then," said I to him, "they wil kill you.”
He looked grave at that, and then said, "No, no, they no kill me,
they willing love learn." He meant by this, they would be willing
to learn. He added, they learned much of the bearded mans that
came in the boat. Then I asked him if he would go back to them.
He smiled at that, and told me that he could not swim so far.
told him I would make a canoe for him. He told me he would go
if I would go with him. "I go!" says I; “why, they will eat me
if I come there." No, no," says he, me make they no eat you ;
me make they much love you." He meant, he would tell them
how I had killed his enemies, and saved his life, and so he would
make them love me. Then he told me, as well as he could, how
kind they were to seventeen white men, or bearded men, as he
called them, who came on shore there in distress.
<s
66
From this time, I confess, I had a mind to venture over, and see
if I could possibly join with those bearded men, who I made no
doubt were Spaniards and Portuguese; not doubting but, if I could.
we might find some method to escape from thence, being upon the
continent, and a good company together, better than I could from
an island forty miles off the shore, alone and without help. So,
after some days, I took Friday to work again by way of discourse
and told him I would give him a boat to go back to his own nation;
and, accordingly, I carried him to my frigate, which lay on the
other side of the island, and having cleared it of water (for I always
kept it sunk in water), I brought it out, showed it him, and we both
went into it. I found he was a most dexterous fellow at managing
it, and would make it go almost as swift again as I could. So when
he was in, I said to him, "Well, now, Friday, shall we go to your
nation?" He looked very dull at my saying so; which it seems
was because he thought the boat was too small to go so far. I then
told him I had a bigger; so the next day I went to the place where
the first boat lay which I had made, but which I could not get into the
water. He said that was big enough; but then, as I had taken no
care of it, and it had lain two or three-and-twenty years there,
the sun had split and dried it, that it was rotten. Friday told me
such a boat would do very well, and would carry
vittle, drink, bread ;” this was his way of talking.
?
much enough
158
life and adventures of,
CHAPTER XVL
I determine to go over to the continent-Friday and I construct a boar
equal to carry twenty men-His dexterity in managing her-Friday
brings intelligence of three canoes of savages on shore-Resolve to go
down upon them-Friday and I fire upon the wretches, and save the
life of a poor Spaniard-List of the killed and wounded-Discover a
poor Indian bound in one of the canoes, who turns out to be Friday's
father.

LIEFDE
(6
In a
PON the whole, I was by this time so fixed upon my
design of going over with him to the continent that I
told him we would go and make one as big as that,
and he should go home in it. He answered not one
word, but looked very grave and sad. I asked him
what was the matter with him. He asked me again, "Why you
angry mad with Friday 1-what me done?" I asked him what he
meant I told him I was not angry with him at all. "No angry !”
says he, repeating the words several times; why send Friday
home away to my nation?" "Why," says I, "Friday, did not
you say you wished you were there?" "Yes, yes," says he,
"wish
we both there; no wish Friday there, no master there."
word, he would not think of going there without me. "I go there,
Friday?" says I
1;
"what shall I do there?" He turned very quick
upon me at this.
"Yo: do great deal much good," says he; “you
teach wild mans be good, sober, tame mans; you tell them know
God, pray God, and live new life." "Alas, Friday!" says I, "thou
knowest not what thou sayest; I am but an ignorant man myself"
"Yes, yes," says he, "you teachee me good, you teachee them
good." No, no, Friday," says I, you shall go without me;
leave me here to live by myself, as I did before." He looked con-
fused again at that word; and running to one of the hatchets which
he used to wear, he takes it up hastily, and gives it to me.
"What
must I do with this ?" says I to him. "You take kill Friday," says
he. "What must I kill you for?" said I again. He returns very
quick-"What you send Friday away for? Take kill Friday, no
send Friday away." This he spoke so earnestly that I saw tears
stand in his eyes. In a word, I so plainly discovered the utmost
affection in him to me, and a firm resolution in him, that I told him
then, and often after, that I would never send him away from me if
he was willing to stay with me.
(6
(C
Upon the whole, as I found by all his discourse a settled affection
to me, and that nothing could part him from me, so I found all the
foundation of his desire to go to his own country was laid in his
adent affection to the people, and his hopes of my doing them
pajd ; a thing which, as i had no notion of myself có I had not the
robinson crusoe.
159
But still I
least thought or intention, or desire of undertaking it.
found a strong inclination to attemptir g my escape, founded on the
supposition gathered from the discourse, that there were seventeen
bearded men there; and therefore, without any more delay, I went
to work with Friday to find out a great tree proper to fell, and
make a large periagua, or canoe, to undertake the voyage. There
were trees enough in the island to have built a little fleet, not of
periaguas or canoes, but even of good, large vessels; but the main
thing I looked at was, to get one so near the water that we might
launch it when it was made, to avoid the mistake I committed at
first. At last Friday pitched upon a tree; for I found he knew much
better than I what kind of wood was fittest for it; nor can I tell, to
this day, what wood to call the tree we cut down, except that it was
very like the tree we call fustic, or between that and the Nicaragua
wood, for it was much of the same colour and smell. Friday
wished to burn the hollow or cavity of this tree out, to make it for a
boat, but I showed him how to cut it with tools; which, after I had
showed him how to use, he did very handily; and in about a
month's hard labour, we finished it and made it very handsome;
especially, when, with our axes, which I showed him how to
handle, we cut and hewed the outside into the true shape of a boat,
After this, however, it cost us near a fortnight's time to get her
along, as it wee inch by inch, upon great rollers into the water;
but en she was in, she would have carried twenty men with great
ease.

When she was in the water, though she was so big, it amazed ine
to see with what dexterity and how swift my man Friday could
manage her, turn her, and paddle her along. So I asked him if he
would, and if we might venture over in her. "Yes," he said, “we
venture over in her very well, though great blow wind." However, I
had a farther design that he knew nothing of, and that was, to make
a mast and a sail, and to fit her with an anchor and cable. As to
a mast, that was easy enough to get; so I pitched upon a straight
young cedar-tree, which I found near the place, and which there
were great plenty of in the island, and I set Friday to work to cut it
down, and gave him directions how to shape and order it. But as
to the sail, that was my particular care. I knew I had old sails, or
rather pieces of old sails, enough; but as I had had them now six-
and-twenty years by me, and had not been very careful to preserve
them, not imagining that I should ever have this kind of use for
them, I did not doubt but they were all rotten; and, indeed, most
of them were so. However, I found two pieces which appeared
pretty good, and with these I went to work; and with a great deal
of pains, and awkward stitching, you may be sure, for want of
peedles, I at length made a three-cornered ugly thing, like what
we call in England a shoulder-of-mutton sail, to go with a boom
at bottom, and a little short sprit at the top, such as usually our
ships' long-boats sail with, and such as I best knew how to manage,
160
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
M
as it was such a one as I hal to the boat in which I made
£5cape from Barbary, as related' in the first part of my story
I was near two months perfoming this last work-viz, rigging
and fitting my mast and sails; or I finished them very complete,
making a small stay, and a sail, or foresail to it, to assist if we
should turn to windward; and, what was more than all, I fixed a
fudder to the stern of her to steer with. I was but a bungling ship-
wright, yet as I knew the usefulness, and even necessity of such a
thing, I applied myself with so much pains to do it, that at last 1
brought it to pass; though, considering the many dull contrivances
I had for it that failed, I think it cost me almost as much labour as
making the boat.
¿
After all this was done, I had my man Friday to teach as to what
belonged to the navigation of my boat; for, though he knew very
well how to paddle a canoe, he knew nothing of what belonged
to a sail and a rudder; and was the most amazed when he saw me
work the boat to and again in the sea by the rudder, and how the
sail gibbed, and filled this way or that way, as the course we sailed
changed; I say, when he saw this, he stood like one astonished
and amazed. However, with a little use, I made all these things
familiar to him, and he became an expert sailor, except that of the
compass I could make him understand very little. On the other
hand, as there was very little cloudy weather, and seldom or never
any fogs in those parts, there was the less occasion for a compass,
seeing the stars were always to be seen by night, and the shore by
day, except in the rainy seasons, and then nobody cared to stir
abroad either by land or sea.
I was now entered on the seven-and-twentieth year of my
captivity in this place; though the three last years that I had this
creature with me ought rather to be left out of the account, my
habitation being quite of another kind than in all the rest of the
time. I kept the anniversary of my landing here with the same
thankfulness to God for His mercies as at first: and if I had such
cause of acknowledgment at first, I had much more so now, having
such additional testimonies of the care of Providence over me, and
the great hopes I had of being effectually and speedily delivered;
for I had an invincible impression upon my thoughts that my
deliverance was at hand, and that I should not be another year in
this place. I went on, however, with my husbandry; digging,
planting, and fencing as usual. I gathered and cured my grapes,
and did every necessary thing as before.
The rainy season was in the meantime upon me, when I kept
more within doors than at other times. We had stowed our new
vessel as secure as we could, bringing her up into the creek, where,
as I said in the beginning, I landed my rafts from the ship; and
hauling her up to the shore at high-water mark, I made my man
Friday dig a little dock, just big enough to hold her, and just deep
enough to give her water enough to float in; and then, when the tide
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
161
was out, we made a strong dam across the end of it, to keep the
water out; and so she lay dry as to the tide from the sea and to
keep the rain off we laid a great many boughs of trees, so thick that
she was as well thatched as a house; and thus we waited for the
months of November and December, in which I designed to make
my adventure.
"
When the settled season began to come in, as the thought of my
design returned with the fair weather, I was preparing daily for the
voyage. And the first thing I did was to lay by a certain quantity
of provisions, being the stores for our voyage; and intended in a
week or a fortnight's time to open the dock, and launch out our boat.
I was busy one morning upon something of this kind, when I called
to Friday, and bid him to go to the seashore and see if he could
find a turtle or a tortoise, a thing which we generally got once a-
week, for the sake of the eggs as well as the flesh. Friday had not
been long gone when he came running back, and flew over my
outer wall or fence, like one that felt not the ground or the steps he
set his feet on; and before I had time to speak to him be cries out
to me, “Oh, master! Oh, master! Oh, sorrow! Oh, bad !”.
What's the matter, Friday?" says I. "Oh, yonder there," says
be, one, two, three canoes; one, two, three!" By this way of
speaking I concluded there were six; but on inquiry I found there
were but three. "Well, Friday," says I, "do not be frightened."
So I heartened him up as well as I could. However, I saw the
poor fellow was most terribly scared, for nothing ran in his head
but that they were come to look for him, and would cut him in
pieces and eat him; and the poor fellow trembled so that I scarcely
knew what to do with him. I comforted him as well as I could,
and told him I was in as much danger as he, and that they would
eat me as well as him. "But," says I, “Friday, we must resolve
to fight them. Can you fight, Friday?" "Me shoot," says he,
“but there come many great number." "No matter for that," said
I again;
our guns will fright them that we do not kill." So I
asked him whether, if I resolved to defend him, he would defend
me, and stand by me, and do just as I bid him. He said Me
die when you bid die, master." So I went and fetched a good dram
of rum and gave him; for I had been so good a husband of my rum
that I had a great deal left. When we had drunk it, I made him
take the two fowling-pieces, which we always carried, and loaded
them with large swan-shot, as big as small pistol-bullets. Then I
took four muskets, and loaded them with two slugs and five small
bullets each; and my two pistols I loaded with a brace of bullets
each. hung my great sword, as usual, naked by my side, and
gave Friday his hatchet. When I had thus prepared myself, I took
my perspective glass, and went up to the side of the hill, to see
what I could discover; and I found quickly by my glass that there
were one-and-twenty savages, three prisoners, and three canoes ;
and that their whole business seemed to be the triumphant banques
66
$
161
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
upon these three human bodies; a barbarous feast, indeed! but
nothing more than, as I had observed, was usual with them
observed also that they had landed, not where they had done when
Friday made his escape, but nearer to my creek, where the shore
was low, and where a thick wood came almost close down to the
sea. This, with the abhorrence of the inhuman errand these
wretches came about, filled me with such indignation that I came
down again to Friday, and told him I was resolved to go down to
them and kill them all; and asked him if he would stand by me.
He had now got over his fright, and his spirits being a little raised
with the dram I had given him, he was very cheerful, and told me,
as before, he would die when I bid die.
In this fit of fury I divided the arms which I had charged, as
before, between us; I gave Friday one pistol to stick in his girdle,
and three guns upon his shoulder, and I took one pistol and the
other three guns myself; and in this posture we marched out. I
took a small bottle of rum in my pocket, and gave Friday a large
bag with more powder and bullets; and as to orders, I charged
him to keep close behind me, and not to stir, or shoot, or do any-
thing till I bid him, and in the meantime not to speak a word. In
this posture I fetched a compass to my right hand of near a mile, as
well to get over the creek as to get into the wood, so that I could
come within shot of them before I should be discovered, which I
had seen by my glass it was easy to do.
While I was making this march, my former thoughts returning, I
began to abate my resolution :-I do not mean that I entertained
any
fear of their number, for as they were naked, unarmed wretches,
it is certain I was superior to them-nay, though I had been alone.
But it occurred to my thoughts, what call, what occasion, much
less what necessity,I was in to go and dip my hands in blood,
to attack people who had neither done or intended me any wrong?
who, as to me, were innocent, and whose barbarous customs were
their own disaster, being in them a token, indeed, of God's having
left them, with the other nations of that part of the world, to such
stupidity, and to such inhuman courses, but did not call me to take
apon me to be a judge of their actions, much less an executioner of
His justice-that whenever He thought fit He would take the cause
into His own hands, and by national vengeance punish them as a
people for national crimes, but that, in the meantime, it was none of
my business-that it was true Friday might justify it, because he
was a declared enemy, and in a state of war with those very
particular people, and it was lawful for him to attack them—but Í
could not say the same with regard to myself. These things were
so warmly pressed upon my thoughts all the way as I went, that I
resolved I would only go and place myself near them that I might
observe their barbarous feast, and that I would act then as God
should direct; but that unless something offered that was more a
call to me than yet I know of, I would not meddle with them.
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
163
With this resolution I entered the wood, and, with all possible
wariness and silence, Friday following close at my heels, I marched
till I came to the skirts of the wood on the side which was next to
them, only that one corner of the wood lay between me and them.
Here I called softly to Friday, and showing him a great tree which
was just at the corner of the wood, I bade him go to the tree, and
bring me word if he could see there plainly what they were doing.
He did so, and came immediately back to me, and told me they
might be plainly viewed there-that they were all about their fire,
eating the flesh of one of their prisoners, and that another lay
bound upon the sand a little from them, whom he said they would
kill next; and this fired the very soul within me. He told me it
was not one of their nation, but one of the bearded men he had
told me of, that came to their country in the boat. I was filled
with horror at the very naming of the white bearded man; and
going to the tree, I saw plainly by my glass a white man, who lay
upon the beach of the sea with his hands and his feet tied with flags,
or things like rushes, and that he was an European, and bad
clothes on.
There was another tree and a little thicket beyond it, about fifty
yards nearer to them than the place where I was, which by going
little way about, I saw I might come at undiscovered, and that then
I should be within half a shot of them; so I withheld my passion,
though I was indeed enraged to the highest degree; and going
back about twenty paces, I got behind some bushes, which held all
the way till I came to the other tree, and then came to a little
rising ground, which gave me a full view of them at the distance of
about eighty yards.
I had now not a moment to lose, for nineteen of the dreadful
wretches sat upon the ground, all close huddled together, and had
just sent the other two to butcher the poor Christian, and bring
him perhaps limb by limb to their fire, and they were stooping
down to untie the bands at his feet. I turned to Friday :-" Now,
Friday," said I, "do as I bid thee." Friday said he would.
"Then, Friday," says I, "do exactly as you see me do; fail in
nothing." So I set down one of the muskets and the fowling-piece
upon the ground, and Friday did the like by his, and with the other
musket I took my aim at the savages, bidding him to do the like;
"Yes."
then asking him if he was ready, he said,
$$ Then fire at
hem," said I; and at the same moment I fired also.
Friday took his aim so much better than I, that on the side that
shot he killed two of them, and wounded three more; and on
my side I killed one, and wounded two. They were, you may be
surè, in a dreadful consternation: and all of them that were not
hurt jumped upon their feet, but did not immediately know which
way to run, or which way to look, for they knew not from whence
their destruction came. Friday kept his eyes close upon me, that,
as I had bid him, he might observe what I did; so, as soon as th
f
164
life and advENTURES OF
first shot was made, I threw down the piece, and took up the
fowling-piece, and Friday did the like; he saw me cock, and
preserves," says he.
present; he did the same again. “Are you ready, Friday?" said
"Let fly, then," says I, "in the name of
God!" and with that I fired again among the amazed wretches,
and so did Friday; and as our pieces were now loaded with what
I call swan-shot, or small pistol-bullets, we found only two drop;
but so many were wounded that they ran about yelling and scream-
ing ke mad creatures, all bloody, and most of them miserably
wounded; whereof three more fell quickly after, though not quite
dead.
+
"Now, Friday," says I, laying down the discharged pieces, and
taking up the musket which was yet loaded, "follow me," which he
did with a great deal of courage; upon which I rushed out of the
wood and showed myself, and Friday close at my foot. As soon as
I perceived they saw me, I shouted as loud as I could, and bade
Friday do so too, and running as fast as I could, which, by-the-way,
was not very fast, being loaded with arms as I was, I made directly
towards the poor victim, who was, as I said, lying upon the beach
or shore, between the place where they sat and the sea. The two
butchers who were just going to work with him had left him at the
surprise of our first fire, and fled in a terrible fright to the sea-side,
and had jumped into a canoe, and three more of the rest made the
same way. I turned to Friday, and bade him step forwards and
fire at them; he understood me immediately, and running about
forty yards, to be nearer them, he shot at them; and I thought he
had killed them all, for I saw them all fall of a heap into the boat,
though I saw two of them up again quickly; however, he killed
two of them, and wounded the third, so that he lay down in the
bottom of the boat as if he had been dead.
While my man Friday fired at them, I pulled out my knife ano
cut the flags that bound the poor victim; and loosing his hands
and feet, I lifted him up, and asked him in the Portuguese tongue
what he was. He answered in Latin, Christianus; but was so
weak and faint that he could scarce stand or speak. I took my
bottle out of my pocket, and gave it him, making signs that he
should drink, which he did; and I gave him a piece of bread, which
he ate. Then I asked him what countryman he was: and he said,
Espagniole; and being a little recovered, let me know, by all the
signs he could possibly make, how much he was in my debt for his
deliverance Seignior," said I, with as much Spanish as I could
make up, 66
we will talk afterwards, but we must fight now: if you
have any strength left, take this pistol and sword, and lay about
you." He took them very thankfully; and no sooner had he the
arms in his hands, but, as if they had put new vigour into him, be
flew upon his murderers like a fury, and had cut two of them in
pieces in an instant; for the truth is, as the whole was a surprise to
them, so the poor creatures were so much frightened with the noise
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
165
of ou pieces that they fell down for mere amazement and fear, and
had no more power to attempt their own escape than their flesh
had to resist our shot. and that was the case of those five that
Friday shot at in the boat; for as three of them fell with the hurt
they received, so the other two fell with the fright.
I kept my piece in my hand still without firing, being willing to
keep my charge ready, because I had given the Spaniard my pistol
and sword: so I called to Friday, and bade him run up to the tree
from whence we first fired, and fetch the arms which lay there that
had been discharged, which he did with great swiftness; and then
giving him my musket, I sat down myself to load all the rest again,
and bade them come to me when they wanted. While I was
loading these pieces, there happened a fierce engagement between
the Spaniard and one of the savages, who made at him with one of
their great wooden swords, the weapon that was to have killed him
before, if I had not prevented it. The Spaniard, who was as bold
and brave as could be imagined, though weak, had fought the
Indian a good while, and had cut two great wounds on his head;
but the savage being a stout, lusty fellow, closing in with him, had
thrown him down, being faint, and was wringing my sword out of
his hand; when the Spaniard, though undermost, wisely quitting
the sword, drew the pistol from his girdle, shot the savage through
the body, and killed him upon the spot, before I, who was running
to help him, could come near him.
Friday, being now left to his liberty, pursued the flying wretches,
with no weapon in his hand but his hatchet and with that he
despatched those three who, as I said before, were wounded at first,
and fallen, and all the rest he could come up with: and the
Spaniard coming to me for a gun, I gave him one of the fowling-
pieces, with which he pursued two of the savages, and wounded
them both; but, as he was not able to run, they both got from him
into the wood, where Friday pursued them, and killed one of them,
but the other was too nimble for him; and though he was wounded,
yet had plunged himself into the sea, and swam with all his might
off to those two who were left in the canoe; which three in the
canoe, with one wounded, that we knew not whether he died or no,
were all that escaped our bands of one-and-twenty. The account
of the whole is as follows-three killed at our first shot from the
tree; two killed at the next shot; two killed by Friday in the boat ;
two killed by Friday of those at first wounded; one killed by Friday
in the wood; three killed by the Spaniard; four killed, being found
dropped here and there, of the wounds, or killed by Friday in his
chase of them; four escaped in the boat, whereof one wounded, if
not dead-twenty-one in all.
Those that were in the canoe worked hard to get out of gunshot,
and though Friday made two or three shots at them, I did not find
that he hit any of them. Friday would fain have had me take one
of their canoes, and pursue them; and, indeed, I was very anxious
166
life and adventures of
about their escape, lest carrying the news home to their people,
they should come back perhaps with two or three hundred of the
canoes and devour us by mere multitude; so I consented to pursue
them by sea, and running to one of their canoes, I jumped in and
bade Friday follow me; but when I was in the canoe I was sur-
prised to find another poor creature lie there, bound hand and foot,
as the Spaniard was, for the slaughter, and almost dead with fear,
not knowing what was the matter; for he had not been able to
look up over the side of the boat, he was tied so hard neck and
heels, and had been tied so long that he bad really but little
life in him. ·
I immediately cut the twisted flags or rushes which they had
bound him with, and would have helped him up; but he could not
stand or speak, but groaned most piteously, believing, it seems,
still, that he was only unbound in order to be killed. When Friday
came to him I bade him speak to him, and tell him of his deliver-
ance; and pulling out my bottle, made him give the poor wretch a
dram, which, with the news of his being delivered. revived him, and
he sat up in the boat. But when Friday came to hear him speak,
and look in his face, it would have moved any one to tears to have
seen how Friday kissed him, embraced him, hugged him, cried,
laughed, hallooed, jumped about, danced, sang; then cried again,
wrung his hands, beat his own face and head; and then sang and
jumped about again like a distracted creature. It was a good while
before I could make him speak to me or tell me what was the
matter; but when he came a little to himself he told me that it
was his father.
:
It is not easy for me to express how it moved me to see what
ecstasy and filial affection had worked in this poor savage at the
sight of his father, and of his being delivered from death; nor
indeed can I describe half the extravagances of his affection after
this for he went into the boat and out of the boat a great many
times when he went in to him he would sit down by him, open
his breast, and hold his father's head close to his bosom for many
minutes together, to nourish it; then he took his arms and ankles,
which were numbed and stiff with the binding, and chafed and
rubbed them with his hands; and I, perceiving what the case was,
gave him some rum out of my bottle to rub them with, which did
them a great deal of good
This affair put an end to our pursuit of the canoe with the other
savages, who were now almost out of sight; and it was happy for
us that we did not, for it blew so hard within two hours after, and
before they could be got a quarter of their way, and continued
blowing so hard all night, and that from the north-west, which was
against them, that I could not suppose their boat could livs, or that
they ever reached their own coast,
But to return to Friday; he was so busy about his father that I
could not find in my heart to take him off for some time; but after
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
167
I thought he could leave him a little, I called him to me, and he
came jumping and laughing, and pleased to the highest extreme :
then I asked him if he had given his father any bread. He shook
his head, and said, “None; ugly dog eat all up self." I then gave
him a cake of bread out of a little pouch I carried on purpose; I
also gave him a dram for himself; but he would not taste it, but
carried it to his father. I had in my pocket two or three bunches of
raisins, so I gave him a handful of them for his father. He had no
sooner given his father these raisins but I saw him come out of the
boat, and run away as if he had been bewitched, for he was the
swiftest fellow on his feet that ever I saw : I say, he ran at such a
rate that he was out of sight, as it were, in an instant; and though
I called, and hallooed out too after him, it was all one-away he
went; and in a quarter of an hour I saw him come back again,
though not so fast as he went; and as he came nearer I found his
pace slacker, because he had something in his hand. When he
came up to me I found he had been quite home for an earthen jug
or pot, to bring his father some fresh water, and that he had got
two more cakes or loaves of bread: the bread he gave me, but the
water he carried to his father; however, as I was very thirsty too,
I took a little of it. The water revived his father more than
all the rum or spirits I had given him, for he was fainting with
thirst.
When his father had drunk, I called to him to know if there was
any water left-he said, "Yes;" and I bade him give it to the poor
Spaniard, who was in as much want of it as his father; and I sent
one of the cakes, that Friday brought, to the Spaniard too, who was
indeed very weak, and was reposing himself upon a green place
under the shade of a tree; and whose limbs were also very stiff,
and very much swelled with the rude bandage he had been tied
with. When I saw that upon Friday's coming to him with the
water he sat up and drank, and took the bread and began to eat, I
went to him and gave him a handful of raisins-he looked up in my
face with all the tokens of gratitude and thankfulness that could
appear in any countenance; but was so weak, notwithstanding he
had so exerted himself in the fight, that he could not stand up upon
his feet-he tried to do it two or three times, but was really not
able, his ankles were so swelled and so painful to him; so I bade him
sit still, and caused Friday to rub his ankles, and bathe them with
rum, as he had done his father's.
I observed the poor affectionate creature, every two ininutes, or
perhaps less, all the while he was here, turn his head about to see
if his father was in the same place and posture as he left him
sitting; and at last he found he was not to be seen; at which he
started up, and, without speaking a word, flew with that swiftness
to him that one could scarce perceive his feet to touch the ground
as he went-but when he came, he only found he had laid himself
down to ease his limbs, so Friday came back to me presently; and
168
Life and Adventures of
then I spoke to the Spaniard to let Friday help him up if he could,
and lead him to the boat, and then he should carry him to our
dwelling, where I would take care of him. But Friday, a lasty,
strong fellow, took the Spaniard upon his back, and carried him
away to the boat, and set him down softly upon the side or gunnel
of the canoe, with his feet in the inside of it; and then lifting him
quite in, he set him close to his father; and presently stepping out
again, launched the boat off, and paddled it along the shore faster
than I could walk, though the wind blew pretty hard too; so he
brought them both safe into our creek, and leaving them in the
boat, ran away to fetch the other canoe. As he passed me I spoke
He told me,
to him, and asked him whither he went.
44 Go fetch
more boat;" so away he went like the wind, for sure never man or
horse ran like him; and he had the other canoe in the creek almost
as soon as I got to it by land; so he wafted me over, and then
went to help our new guests out of the boat, which he did; but
they were neither of them able to walk; so that poor Friday knew
not what to do.
To remedy this, I went to work in my thought, and calling to
Friday to bid them sit down on the bank while he came to me, I
soon made a kind of hand-barrow to lay them on, and Friday and i
carried them both up together upon it between us.
But when we got them to the outside of our wall, or fortification,
we were at a worse loss than before, for it was impossible to get
them over, and I was resolved not to break it down; so I set to
work again, and Friday and I, in about two hours' time, made a
very handsome tent, covered with old sails, and above that with
boughs of trees, being in the space without our outward fence, and
between that and the grove of young wood which I had planted;
and here we made them two beds of such things as I had-viz, of
good rice-straw, with blankets laid upon it to lie on, and another to
cover them, on each bed.
My island was now peopled, and I thought myself very rich in
subjects; and it was a merry reflection, which I frequently made,
how like a king I looked First of all, the whole country was my
own property, so that I had an undoubted right of dominion.
Secondly, my people were perfectly subjected-I was absolutely
lord and lawgiver-they all owed their lives to me, and were ready to
lay down their lives, if there had been occasion for it, for me. It
was remarkable, too, I had but three subjects, and they were of
three different religions-my man Friday was a Protestant, his
father was a Pagan and a cannibal, and the Spaniard was a Papist.
However, I allowed liberty of conscience throughout my dominions.
-But this is by the way.
s soon as I had secured my two weak, rescued prison, and
given them shelter, and a place to rest them upon, I began to think
of making some provision for them: and the first thing I did, i
ordered Friday to take a yearling goat, betwixt « kil and a goat,
ROBINSON CRUSOR
169
out of my particular flock, to be killed; when I cut off the hinder-
quarter, and chopping it into small pieces, I set Friday to work to
boiling and stewing, and made them a very good dish, I assure you,
of flesh and broth; and as I cooked it without doors, for I made në
fire within my inner wall, so I carried it all into the new tent, and
naving set a table there for them, I sat down, and ate my own
dinner also with them, and, as well as I could, cheered them and
encouraged them. Friday was my interpreter, especially to his
father, and, indeed, to the Spaniard too; for the Spaniard spoke
he language of the savages pretty well.
After we had dined, or rather supped, I ordered Friday to take
one of the canoes, and go and fetch our muskets and other fire-
arms, which, for want of time, we had left upon the place of battle
and the next day I ordered him to go and bury the dead bodies of
the savages, which lay open to the sun, and would presently be
offensive. I also ordered him to bury the horrid remains of their
barbarous feast, which I could not think of doing myself: nay, I
could not bear to see them if I went that way; all which he
punctually performed, and effaced the very appearance of the
savages being there; so that when I went again, I could scarce
know where it was, otherwise than by the corner of the wood
pointing to the place.
I then began to enter into a little conversation with my two new
subjects ; and, first, I set Friday to inquire of his father what he
thought of the escape of the savages in that canoe, and whether we
might expect a return of them, with a power too great for us to
resist. His first opinion was, that the savages in the boat never
could live out the storm which blew that night they went off, but
must, of necessity, be drowned, or driven south to those other
shores, where they were as sure to be devoured as they were to be
drowned if they were cast away; but, as to what they would do if
they came safe on shore, he said he knew not; but it was his
opinion that they were so dreadfully frightened with the manner of
their being attacked, the noise, and the fire, that he believed they
would tell the people they were all killed by thunder and lightning.
not by the hand of man; and that the two which appeared-viz..
Friday and I, were two heavenly spirits, or furies, come down to
destroy thein, and not men with weapons. This, he said, he knew ;
because he heard them all cry out so, in their language, one to
another for it was impossible for them to conceive that a man
could dart fire, and speak thunder, and kill at a distance, without
lifting up the hand, as was done now: and this old savage was in
the right; for, as I understood since, by other hands, the savages
never attempted to go over to the island afterwards, they were so
terrified with the accounts given by those four men (for it seems
they did escape the sea), that they believed whoever went to that
enchanted island would be destroyed with fire from the gods.
This, however, I knew not; and therefore was under continual
170
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
apprehensions for a good while, and kept always upon my guard,
with all my army: for, as there were now four of us, I would have
ventured upon a hundred of them, fairly in the open field, at any
time.
CHAPTER XVIL
I learn from the Spaniard that there were sixteen more of his country.
men among the savages-The Spaniard and Friday's father, well
armed, sail on a mission to the continent-I discover an English
ship lying at anchor off the island-Her boat comes on shore with
three prisoners-The crew straggle into the woods, their boat being
aground-Discover myself to the prisoners, who prove to be the
captain and mate of the vessel, and a passenger-Secure the
mutineers.
t

N
N a little time, however, no more canoes appearing, the
fear of their coming wore off; and I began to take
my former thoughts of a voyage to the main into
consideration; being likewise assured by Friday's
father that I might depend upon good usage from
their nation, on his account, if I would go. But my thoughts were
little suspended when I had a serious discourse with the Spaniard,
and when I understood that there were sixteen more of his country-
men and Portuguese, who having been cast away and made their
escape to that side, lived there at peace, indeed, with the savages,
but were very sore put to it for necessaries, and, indeed, for life.
I asked him all the particulars of their voyage, and found they were
a Spanish ship, bound from the Rio de la Plata to the Havanna,
being directed to leave their loading there, which was chiefly hides
and silver, and to bring back what European goods they could
meet with there; that they had five Portuguese seamen on board,
whom they took out of another wreck; that five of their own men
were drowned when first the ship was lost, and that these escaped
through infinite dangers and hazards, and arrived, almost starved,
on the cannibal coast, where they expected to have been devoured
every moment. He told me they had some arms with them, but
they were perfectly useless, for that they had neither powder nor
ball, the washing of the sea having spoiled all their powder but a
little, which they used at their first landing to provide themselves
with some food.
I asked him what he thought would become of them there, and
if they had formed any design of making their escape. He said
they had many consultations about it; but that having neither
vessel, nor tools to build one, nor provisions of any kind, their
councils always ended in tears and despair. I asked him how he
thought they would receive a proposal from me, which might tend
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
171
towards an escape; and whether, if they were all here, A might not
be done. I told him with freedom, I feared mostly their treachery
and ill-usage of me, if I put my life in their hands; for that
gratitude was no inherent virtue in the nature of man, nor did men
always square their dealings by the obligations they had received
so much as they did by the advantages they expected I told him
it would be very hard that I should be the instrument of their
deliverance, and that they should afterwards make me their
prisoner in New Spain, where an Englishman was certain to be
made a sacrifice, what necessity or what accident soever brought
him thither; and that I had rather be delivered up to the savages,
and be devoured alive, than fall into the merciless claws of the
priests, and be carried into the Inquisition. I added that, other-
wise, I was persuaded, if they were all here, we might, with so
many hands, build a barque large enough to carry us all away,
either to the Brazils southward, or to the islands or Spanish coast
northward; but that if, in requital, they should, when I had put
weapons into their hands, carry me by force among their own
people, I might be ill used for my kindness to them, and make my
case worse than it was before.
•
He answered, with a great deal of candour and ingenuousness,
that their condition was so miserable, and that they were so
sensible of it, that he believed they would abhor the thought of
using any man unkindly that should contribute to their deliverance;
and that, if I pleased, he would go to them, with the old man, and
discourse with them about it, and return again, and bring me their
answer; that he would make conditions with them upon their
solemn oath, that they should be absolutely under my direction as
their commander and captain; and they should swear upon the
holy sacraments and gospel to be true to me, and go to such
Christian country as I should agree to, and no other; and to be
directed wholly and absolutely by my orders till they were landed
safely in such country as I intended; and that he would bring a
contract from them, under their hands, for that purpose. Then he
told me he would first swear to me himself that he would never stir
from me as long as he lived till I gave him orders; and that he
would take my side to the last drop of his blood, if there should
happen the least breach of faith among his countrymen. He told
me they were all of them very civil, honest men, and they were
under the greatest distress imaginable, having neither weapons nor
clothes, nor any food, but at the mercy and discretion of the
savages; out of all hopes of ever returning to their own country ;
and that he was sure, if I would undertake their relief, they would
live and die by me.
1
Upon these assurances, I resolved to venture to relieve them, if
possible, and to send the old savage and this Spaniard over to
them to treat. But when we had got all things in readiness to go,
the Spaniard himself started an objection, which had so much
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
prudence in it on one hand, and so much sincerity on the other
hand, that I could not but be very well satisfied in it; and, by his
advice, put off the deliverance of his comrades for at least half a
year. The case was thus: he had been with us now about a month,
during which time I had let him see in what manner I had provided.
with the assistance of Providence, for my support, and he saw
evidently what stock of corn and rice I had laid up; which, though
it was more than sufficient for myself, yet it was not sufficient, with-
out good husbandry, for my family, now it was increased to four ;
but much less would it be sufficient if his countrymen, who were,
as he said, sixteen, still alive, should come over; and, least of all
would it be sufficient to victual our vessel, if we should build one,
for a voyage to any of the Christian colonies of America ; so he
told me he thought it would be more advisable to let him and the
other two dig and cultivate some more land, as much as I could
spare seed to sow, and that we should wait another harvest, that
we might have a supply of corn for his countrymen, when they
should come; for want might be a temptation to them to disagree,
or not to think themselves delivered, otherwise than out of one
difficulty into another. "You know," says he, "the children of
Israel, though they rejoiced at first for their being delivered out of
Egypt, yet rebelled even against God Himself, that delivered them,
when they came to want bread in the wilderness."
His caution was so seasonable, and his advice so good, that 1
could not but be very well pleased with his proposal, as well as I
was satisfied with his fidelity; so we fell to digging, all four of us,
as well as the wooden tools we were furnished with permitted; and,
in about a month's time, by the end of which it was seed-time, we
had got as much land cured and trimmed up as we sowed two-and-
twenty bushels of barley on, and sixteen jars of rice, which was, in
short, all the seed we had to spare : indeed, we left ourselves barely
sufficient for our own food for the six months that we had to expect
our crop; that is to say, reckoning from the time we set our seed
aside for sowing; for it is not to be supposed it is six months in the
ground in that country.
Having now society enough, and our numbers being sufficient to
put us out of fear of the savages, if they had come, unless their
number had been very great, we went freely all over the island,
whenever we found occasion; and as we had our escape or deliver-
ance upon our thoughts, it was impossible, at least for me, to have
the means of it out of mine. For this purpose I marked out
several trees, which I thought fit for our work,.and I set Friday and
his father to cut them down; and then I caused the Spaniard, to
whom I imparted my thoughts on that affair, to oversee and direct
their work showed them with what indefatigable pains I had
hewed a large tree into single planks, and I caused them to do the
like, till they made about a dozen large planks of good sak, near
two feet broad, thirty-five feet long, and from two inches to four
robinson Crusoe.
173
inches thick: what prodigious labour it took up any one wy
imagine.
At the same time I contrived to increase my little flock of tame
goats as much as I could; and for this purpose I made Friday and ·
the Spaniard go out one day, and myself with Friday the next day
(for we took our turns), and by this means we got about twenty
young kids to breed up with the rest; for whenever we shot the
dam, we saved the kids, and added them to our flock. But above
all, the season for curing the grapes coming on, I caused such a
prodigious quantity to be hung up in the sun, that, I believe, had
we been at Alicant, where the raisins of the sun are cured, we
could have filled sixty or eighty barrels ; and these, with our bread,
formed a great part of our food-very good living too, I assure you,
for they are exceedingly nourishing.
It was now harvest, and our crop in good order: it was not the
most plentiful increase I had seen in the island, but, however, it
was enough to answer our end; for from twenty-two bushels of
barley we brought in and thrashed out above two hundred and
twenty bushels; and the like in proportion of the rice; which was
store enough for our food to the next harvest, though all the sixteen
Spaniards had been on shore with me; or, if we had been ready
for a voyage, it would very plentifully have victualled our ship to
have carried us to any part of the world; that is to say, any part of
America. When we had thus housed and secured our magazine of
corn, we fell to work to make more wicker-ware-viz., great baskets,
in which we kept it; and the Spaniard was very handy and dex-
terous at this part, and often blained me that I did not make some
things for defence of this kind of work; but I saw no need of it.
And now, having a full supply of food for all the guests I
expected, I gave the Spaniard leave to go over to the main, to see
what he could do with those he had left behind him there. I gave
him a strict charge not to bring any man who would not first swear
in the presence of himself and the old savage that he would in no
way injure, fight with, or attack the person he should find in the
island, who was so kind as to send for them in order to their
deliverance; but that they would stand by him and defend him
against all such attempts, and wherever they went would be
entirely under and subjected to his command; and that this should
be put in writing, and signed in their hands. How they were to
have done this, when I knew they had neither pen nor ink, was a
question which we never asked. Under these instructions, the
Spaniard and the old savage, the father of Friday, went away in
one of the canoes which they might be said to have come in, or
rather were brought in, when they came as prisoners to be devoured
by the savages.gave each of them a musket, with a firelock oñ
it, and about eight charges of powder and ball, charging them to be
very good husbands of both, and not to use either of them but upon
urgent occasions,

194
life and adventures of
This was a cheerful work, being the first measures used by me is
view of my deliverance for now twenty-seven years and some days.
I gave them provisions of bread and of dried grapes, sufficient for
themselves for many days, and sufficient for all the Spaniards for
about eight days' time; and wishing them a good voyage, I saw
them go, agreeing with them about a signal they should hang out
at their return, by which I should know them again when they came
back, at a distance, before they came on shore. They went away
with a fair gale on the day that the moon was at full, by my account
in the month of October; but as for an exact reckoning of days, after
I had once lost it I could never recover it again; nor had I kept even
the number of years so punctually as to be sure I was right; though,
as it proved when I afterwards examined my account, I found I had
kept a true reckoning of years.
It was no less than eight days I had waited for them, when a
strange and unforeseen accident intervened, of which the like has
not, perhaps, been heard of in history. I was fast asleep in my
hutch one morning, when my man Friday came running in to me,
and called aloud, "Master, master, they are come, they are come!"
I jumped up, and regardless of danger I went as soon as I could
get my clothes on, through my little grove, which, by the way, was
by this time grown to be a very thick wood; I say, regardless of
danger I went without my arms, which was not my custom to do;
but I was surprised when, turning my eyes to the sea, I presently
saw a boat at about a league and a half distance, standing in for the
shore, with a shoulder-of-mutton sail, as they call it, and the wind
blowing pretty fair to bring them in: also I observed, presently,
that they did not come from that side which the shore lay on, but
from the southernmost end of the island. Upon this I called Friday
in, and bade him lie close, for these were not the people we looked
for, and that we might not know yet whether they were friends or
enemies. In the next place I went in to fetch my perspective glass
to see what I could make of them; and having taken the ladder
out, I climbed up to the top of the hill, as I used to do when I was
apprehensive of anything, and to take my view the plainer without
being discovered. I had scarce set my foot upon the hill when my
eye plainly discovered a ship lying at anchor, at about two leagues
and a half distance from me, S.S.E., but not above a league and a
half from the shore. By my observation it appeared plainly to be
an English ship, and the boat appeared to be an English long-
boat.
I cannot express the confusion I was in, though the joy of seeing
a ship, and one that I had reason to believe was manned by my
own countrymen, and consequently friends, was such as I cannot
describe; but yet I had some secret doubts hung about me-I
cannot tell from whence they came-bidding me keep upon my
guard. In the first place, it occurred to me to consider what
business an English ship could have in that part of the world, since
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
175
it was not the way to or from any part of the world where the
English had any traffic; and I knew there had been no storms to
drive them in there in distress; and that if they were really English
it was most probable that they were here upon no good design;
and that I had better continue as I was than fall into the hands of
thieves and murderers.
Let no man despise the secret hints and notices of danger which
sometimes are given him when he may think there is no possibility
of its being real. That such hints and notices are given us I
believe few that have made any observations of things can deny;
that they are certain discoveries of an invisible world, and a con-
verse of spirits, we cannot doubt; and if the tendency of them
seems to be to warn us of danger, why should we not suppose they
are from some friendly agent (whether supreme, or inferior and
subordinate, is not the question), and that they are given for our
good?
The present question abundantly confirms me in the justice of
this reasoning; for had I not been made cautious by this secret
admonition, come it from whence it will, I had been done inevit-
ably, and in a far worse condition than before, as you will see
presently. I had not kept myself long in this posture till I saw the
boat draw near the shore, as if they looked for a creek to thrust in
at, for the convenience of landing; however, as they did not come
quite far enough, they did not see the little inlet where I formerly
landed my rafts, but ran their boat on shore upon the beach, at
about half-a-mile from me, which was very happy for me; for other-
wise they would have landed just at my door, as I may say, and
would soon have beaten me out of my castle, and perhaps have
plundered me of all I had. When they were on shore I was fully
satisfied they were Englishmen, at least most of them; one or two
I thought were Dutch, but it did not prove so; there were in all
eleven men, whereof three of them I found were unarmed, and, as I
thought, bound; and when the first ur or five of thein were
jumped on shore, they took those three out of the boat as
prisoners one of the three I could perceive using the most
passionate gestures of entreaty, affliction, and despair, even to a
kind of extravagance; the other two, I could perceive, lifted up
their hands sometimes, and appeared concerned indeed, but not to
such a degree as the first. I was perfectly confounded at the sight,
and knew not what the meaning of it should be. Friday called out
to me in English, as well as he could, "Oh, master† yon see
English mans eat prisoner as well as savage mans. "Why,
Friday," says I, "do you think they are going to eat them, then ?*
..
M
Yes," says Friday, “they will eat them." "No, no," says I,
"Friday; I am afraid they will murder them, indeed; but you may
be sure they will not eat them.”
64
All this while I had no thought of what the matter really was,
Palalood trembling with the honor of the sight, expecting erup
176
LIFE AND Adventures of
moment when the three prisoners should be killed; nay, ence I
saw one of the villains lift up his arm with a great cutlass, as the
seamen call it, or sword, to strike one of the poor men; and 1
expected to see him fall every moment; at which all the blood in
my body seemed to run chill in my veins. I wished heartily now
for the Spaniard, and the savage that had gone with him, or that I
had any way to have come undiscovered within shot of then, that I
might have secured the three men, for I saw no fire-arms they had
among them; but it fell out to my mind another way After I had
observed the outrageous usage of the three men by the insolent
seamen, I observed the fellows run scattering about the island, as if
they wanted to see the country. I observed that the three other men
had liberty to go also where they pleased; but they sat down all
three upon the ground, very pensive, and looked like men in
despair. This put me in mind of the first time when I came on
shore, and began to look about me; how I gave myself over for
lost; how wildly I looked round me; what dreadful apprehensions
I had ; and how I lodged in the tree all night, for fear of being
devoured by wild beasts. As I knew nothing that night of the
supply I was to receive by the providential driving of the ship
nearer the land by the storms and tide, by which I have since been
so long nourished and supported; so these three poor desolate men
knew nothing how certain of deliverance and supply they were, how
near it was to them, and how effectually and really they were in a
condition of safety, at the same time that they thought themselves
lost and their case desperate. So little do we see before us in the
world, and so much reason have we to depend cheerfully upon the
great Maker of the world, that He does not leave His creatures so
absolutely destitute, but that in the worst circumstances they have
always something to be thankful for, and sometimes are nearer
deliverance than they imagine; nay, are even brought to their
deliverance by the means by which they seem to be brought to
their destruction.
It was just at high-water when these people came on shore; and
while they rambled about to see what kind of a place they were in,
they had carelessly stayed till the tide was spent, and the water
was ebbed considerably away, leaving their boat aground. They
had left two men in the boat, who, as I found afterwards, having
drunk a little too much brandy, fell asleep; however, one of them
waking a little sooner than the other, and finding the boat too fast
ground for him to stir it, hallooed out for the rest, who were
straggling about: upon which they all soon came to the boat: but
it was past all their strength to launch her, the boat being very
heavy, and the shore on that side being a soft oozy sand, almost
like a quicksand. In this condition, like true seamen, who are,
perhaps, the least of all mankind given to forethought, they gave it
over, and away tb ty strolled about the country again; and I heard
One of them say aloud to another, calling them off from the
ROBINSON crusoe.
177
boat, "Why, let her alone, Jack, can't you? she'll float next tide;
by which I was fully confirmed in the main inquiry of what
countrymen they were. All this while I kept myself very close, not
once daring to stir out of my castle any farther than to my place
of observation near the top of the hill and very glad I was to
think how well it was fortified. I knew it was no less than ten
hours before the boat could float again, and by that time it would
be dark, and I might be at more liberty to see their motions, and
to hear their discourse, if they had any. In the meantime, I fitted
myself up for a battle as before, though with more caution, know-
ng I had to do with another kind of enemy than I had at first. Î
ordered Friday also, whom I had made an excellent marksman
with his gun, to load himself with arms. I took myself two
fowling-pieces, and I gave him three muskets. My figure, indeed,
was very fierce; I had my formidable goat-skin coat on, with the
great cap I have mentioned, a naked sword by my side, twû
pistols in my belt, and a gun upon each shoulder.
It was my design, as I said above, not to have made any attempt
till it was dark; but about two o'clock, being the heat of the day, 1
found that they were all gone straggling into the woods, and, as I
thought, laid down to sleep. The three poor distressed men, too
anxious for their condition to get any sleep, had, however, sat down
under the shelter of a great tree, at about a quarter of a mile from
me, and, as I thought, out of sight of any of the rest. Upon this I
resolved to discover myself to them, and learn something of their
condition; immediately I marched as above, my man Friday at a
good distance behind me, as formidable for his arms as I, but nor
making quite so staring a spectre-like figure as I did. I came as
near them undiscovered as I could, and then, before any of them
saw me, I called aloud to them in Spanish, What are ye, gentle-
men?" They started up at the noise, but were ten times more
confounded when they saw me, and the uncouth figure that I made.
They made no answer at all, but I thought I perceived them just
going to fly from me, when I spoke to them in English-" Gentle
men," said I, not be
a friend near when you did not expect itaps you may have
"He must be sent
directly from heaven then," said one of them very gravely to me,
and pulling off his bat at the same time to me ; for our condition
is past the help of man.” "All help is from heaven, sir,” said I—
at
**
but can you put a stranger in the way to help you? for you seem
to be in some great distress. I saw you when you landed; and
when you seemed to make application to the brutes that came with
you, I saw one of them lift up his sword to kill
you."
The poor man, with tears running down his face, and trembling,
looked like one astonished, returned, "Am I talking to God or
mans it a real man or an angel ?"-" Be in no fear about that,
air," said I ; "if God had sent an angel to relieve you, he would
have come better clothed, and armed after another manner than
*
ܟܢ܀
178
Life and ADVENTURES OF
you see me pray lay aside your fears; I am a man, an English-
man, and disposed to assist you; you see I have one servant only;
we have arms and ammunition; tell us freely, can we serve you?
What is your case?' "Our case, sir," said he, "is too long to tell
you while our murderers are so near us; but, in short, sir, I was
commander of that ship-my men have mutinied against me; they
have been hardly prevailed on not to murder me, and, at last, have
set me on shore in this desolate place, with these two men with me
-one my mate, the other a passenger-where we expected to perish,
believing the place to be uninhabited, and know not yet what to
think of it." "Where are these brutes, your enemies?" said I;
“do you know where they are gone?" "There they lie, sir," said
he, pointing to a thicket of trees; (C
my heart trembles for fear they
have seen us and heard you speak; if they have, they will certainly
murder us all." "Have they any fire-arms?" said I. He answered,
“They had only two pieces, one of which they left in the boat."
Well, then," said I, "leave the rest to me; I see they are all
asleep; it is an easy thing to kill them all; but shall we rather take
them prisoners?" He told me there were two desperate villains
among them that it was scarce safe to show any mercy to; but if
they were secured, he believed all the rest would return to their
duty. I asked him which they were. He told me he could not at
that distance distinguish them, but he would obey my orders in
anything I would direct. Well," says I, "let us retreat out of
their view or hearing, lest they awake, and we will resolve further."
So they willingly went back with me, till the woods covered us from
them.
་
*
K
شاد
"Look you, sir,” said I, "if I venture upon your deliverance, are
you willing to make two conditions with me?" He anticipated my
proposals by telling me that both he and the ship, if recovered,
should be wholly directed and commanded by me in everything;
and if the ship was not recovered, he would live and die with me
in what part of the world soever I would send him; and the two
other men said the same. "Well," says I "my conditions are but
two; first-that while you stay in this island with me, you will not
pretend to any authority here; and if I put arms in your hands, you
will, upon all occasions, give them up to me, and do no prejudice
to me or mine upon this island, and in the meantime be governed
by my orders; secondly-that if the ship is or may be recovered,
you will carry me and my man to England passage free."
He gave me all the assurances that the invention or faitn of man
could devise that he would comply with these most reasonable
demands, and besides would owe his life to me, and acknowledge it
upon all occasions as long as he lived. "Well, then," said I,
"There are three muskets for you, with powder and ball; tell me
next what you think is proper to be done." He showed all the
testimonies of his gratitude that he was able, but offered to be
wholly guided by me. I told him I thought it was very hard
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
179
venturing anything; but the best method I could think of was to
fire on them at once as they lay, and if any were not killed at the first
volley, and offered to submit, we might save them, and so put it
wholly upon God's providence to direct the shot. He said, very
modestly, that he was loath to kill them if he could help it; but
that those two were incorrigible villains, and had been the authors
of all the mutiny in the ship, and if they escaped, we should be un-
done still, for they would go on board and bring the whole ship's
company, and destroy us all. "Well, then," says I, "necessity
legitimates my advice, for it is the only way to save our lives."
However, seeing him still cautious of shedding blood, I told him
they should go themselves, and manage as they found convenient.
In the middle of this discourse we heard some of them awake,
and soon after we saw two of them on their feet. I asked him if
either of them were the heads of the mutiny? He said,
"No."
"Well, then,” said I, "you may let them escape; and Providence
seems to have awakened them on purpose to save themselves.
Now," says I, "if the rest escape you, it is your fault." Animated
with this, he took the musket I had given him in his hand, and a
pistol in his belt, and his two comrades with him, with each a piece
in his hand; the two men who were with him going first made some
noise, at which one of the seamen who was awake turned about,
and seeing them coming, cried out to the rest; but was too late
then, for the moment he cried out they fired-I mean the two men,
the captain wisely reserving his own piece. They had so well
aimed their shot at the men they knew, that one of them was
killed on the spot, and the other very much wounded; but not being
dead, he started up on his feet, and called eagerly for help to the
other; but the captain stepping to him, told him it was too late to
cry for help, he should call upon God to forgive his villainy, and
with that word knocked him down with the stock of his musket, so
that he never spoke more; there were three more in the company,
and one of them was slightly wounded. By this time I was come;
and when they saw their danger, and that it was in vain to resist,
they begged for mercy. The captain told them he would spare
their lives if they would give him an assurance of their abhorrence
of the treachery they had been guilty of, and would swear to be
faithful to him in recovering the ship, and afterwards in carrying her
back to Jamaica, from whence they came. They gave him all the
protestations of their sincerity that could be desired; and he was
willing to believe them, and spare their lives, which I was not
against, only that I obliged him to keep them bound hand and
foot while they were on the island.
While this was doing, I sent Friday with the captain's máte to
the boat, with orders to secure, her, and bring away the oars and
sails, which they did; and by-and-by three straggling men, that
were (happily for them) parted from the rest, came back upon
hearing the guns fired; and seeing the captain, who was before
180
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
their prisoner, now their conqueror, they submitted to be bound
also; and so our victory was complete.
It now remained that the captain and I should inquire into one
another's circumstances, I began first, and told him my whole
history, which he heard with an attention even to amazement~and
particularly at the wonderful manner of my being furnished with
provisions and ammunition; and, indeed, as my story is a whole
collection of wonders, it affected him deeply. But when he
reflected from thence upon himself, and how I seemed to have been
preserved there on purpose to save his life, the tears ran down his
face, and he could not speak a word more. After this communica-
tion was at an end, I carried him and his two men into my
apartment, leading them in just where I came out-viz., at the top
of the house, where I refreshed him with such provisions as I had,
and showed them all the contrivances I had made during my long,
long inhabiting that place.
All I showed them, all said to them, was perfectly amazing
but above all, the captain admired my fortification, and how
perfectly I had concealed my retreat with a grove of trees, which
having been now planted nearly twenty years, and the trees growing
much faster than in England, was become a little wood, so thick
that it was impassable in any part of it but at that one side where I
had reserved my little winding passage into it. I told him this was
my castle and my residence, but that I had a seat in the country, as
most princes have, whither I could retreat upon occasion, and i
would show him that too another time; but at present our business
was to consider how to recover the ship. He agreed with me as to
that, but told me he was perfectly at a loss what measures to take,
for that there were still six-and-twenty hands on board, who, having
entered into a cursed conspiracy, by which they had all forfeited
their lives to the law, would be hardened in it now by desperation,
and would carry it on, knowing that if they were subdued they
would be brought to the gallows as soon as they came to England,
or to any of the English colonies, and that, therefore, there would
be no attacking them with so small a number as we were.
I mused for some time on what he had said, and found it was a
very rational conclusion, and that, therefore, something was to be
resolved on speedily, as well to draw the men on board into some
snare for their surprise as to prevent their landing upon us, and
destroying us. Upon this, it presently occurred to me that in a
little while the ship's crew, wondering what was become of their
comrades and of the boat, would certainly come on shore in their
other boat to look for them, and that then, perhaps, they might
come armed, and be too strong for us: this he allowed to be
rational. Upon this, I told him the first thing we had to do was to
stave the boat which lay upon the beach, so that they might not
carry her off, and taking everything out of her, leave her so far
useless as not to be fit to swim Accordingly, we went on board,

ROBINSON CRUSOE.
181
took the arms which were left on board out of her, and whatever
else we found there which was a bottle of brandy, and another of
rum, a few biscuit-cakes, a horn of powder, and a great lump of
sugar in a piece of canvas (the sugar was five or six pounds): all
which was very welcome to me, especially the brandy and sugar, of
which I had had none left for many years.
When we had carried all these things on shore (the oars, mast,
sail, and rudder of the boat were carried away before), we knocked
a great hole in her bottom, that if they had come strong enough to
master us, yet they could not carry off the boat. Indeed, it was not
much in my thoughts that we could be able to recover the ship;
but my view was, that if they went away without the boat, I did
not much question to make her again fit to carry us to the Leeward
Islands, and call upon our friends the Spaniards in my way, for 1
bad them still in my thoughts
CHAPTER XVIIL
The ship makes signals for her boat-On receiving no answer, she sends
another boat on shore-Methods by which we secure this boat's crew,
and recover the ship.

W
HILE we were thus preparing our designs, and had
first, by main strength, heaved the boat upon the
beach, so high that the tide would not float her off at
high-water mark, and besides, had broke a hole in
her bottom too big to be quickly stopped, and were
set down musing what we should do, we heard the ship fire a gun.
and make a waft with her ensign as a signal for the boat to come
on board-but no boat stirred; and they fired several times,
making other signals for the boat. At last, when all their signals
and firing proved fruitless, and they found the boat did not stir, we
saw them, by the help of my glasses, hoist another boat out and
row towards the snore; and we found, as they approached, that
there were no less than ten men in her, and that they had fire-arms
with them.
As the ship lay almost two leagues from the shore, we had a full
view of them as they came, and a plain sight even of their faces;
because the tide having set them a little to the east of the other
boat, they rowed up under shore, to come to the same place where
the other had landed, and where the boat lay; by this means, I
say, we had a full view of them, and the captain knew the persons
and characters of all the men in the boat, of whom, he said, there
were three very honest fellows, who, he was sure, were led into this
sonspiracy by the rest, being overpowered and frightened; but that
182
life and adventures of
3
as for the boatswain, who it seems was the chief officer among
them, and all the rest, they were as outrageous as any of the ship's
crew, and were no doubt made desperate in their new enterprise ;
and terribly apprehensive he was that they would be too powerful
for us.
I smiled at him, and told him that men in our circum-
stances were past the operation of fear; that seeing almost every
condition that could be was better than that which we were
supposed to be in, we ought to expect that the consequence,
whether death or life, would be sure to be a deliverance. I asked
him what he thought of the circumstances of my life, and whether a
deliverance were not worth venturing for? "And where, sir," said
I, is your belief of my being preserved here on purpose to save
your life, which elevated you a little while ago? For my part,'
said I,
"there seems to be but one thing amiss in all the prospect
of it." 'What is that?" says he. (C
Why," said I, "it is, that as
you say there are three or four honest fellows among them which
should be spared, had they been all of the wicked part of the crew
I should have thought God's providence had singled them out to
deliver them into your hands; for depend upon it, every man that
comes ashore is our own, and shall die or live as they behave to
us."
As I spoke this with a raised voice and cheerful countenance,
I found it greatly encouraged him; so we set vigorously to our
business.
(C
We had, upon the first appearance of the boats coming from the
ship, considered of separating our prisoners; and we had, indeed,
secured them effectually. Two of them, of whom the captain was
less assured than ordinary, I sent with Friday, and one of the three
delivered man, to my cave, where they were remote enouf, and
out of danger of being heard or discovered, or of finding their way
out of the woods if they could have delivered themselves-here
they left them bound, but gave them provisions; and promised
them, if they continued there quietly, to give them their liberty in a
day or two; but that if they attempted their escape they should be
put to death without mercy. They promised faithfully to bear their
confinement with patience, and were very thankful that they had
such good usage as to have provisions and light left them; for
Friday gave them candles (such as we made ourselves) for their
comfort; and they did not know but that he stood sentinel over
them at the entrance.
The other prisoners had better usage; two of them were kept
pinioned, indeed, because the captain was not able to trust them;
but the other two were taken into my service, upon the captain's
recommendation, and upon their solemnly engaging to live and die
with us; so with them and the three honest men we were seven
men, well armed; and I made no doubt we should be able to deal
well enough with the ten that were coming, considering that the
captain had said there were three or four honest men among them
kito, da zoon as they got to the place where their other boat lay,
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
183
ney ran their boat into the beach and came all on shore, hauling
the boat up after them, which I was glad to see, for I was afraid
they would rather have left the boat at an anchor some distance
from the shore, with some hands in her to guard her, and so we
should not be able to seize the boat. Being on shore, the first thing
they did, they ran all to their other boat; and it was easy to see they
were under a great surprise to find her stripped, as above, of all
that was in her, and a great hole in her bottom. After they had
mused a while upon this, they set up two or three great shouts,
hallooing with all their might, to try if they could make their com-
panions hear; but all was to no purpose-then they came all close
in a ring, and fired a volley of their small arms, which, indeed, we
heard, and the echoes made the woods ring-but it was all one;
those in the cave, we were sure, could not hear; and those in our
keeping, though they heard it well enough, yet durst give no answer
to them. They were so astonished at the surprise of this, that, as
they told us afterwards, they resolved to go all on board again to
their ship, and let them know that the men were all murdered, and
the long-boat staved; accordingly, they immediately launched their
boat again, and got all of them on board.
The captain was terribly amazed, and even confounded, at this,
believing they would go on board the ship again and set sail,
giving their comrades over for lost, and so he should still lose the
ship, which he was in hopes we should have recovered; but he was
quickly as much frightened the other way.
They had not been long put off with the boat, when we perceived
them all coming on shore again; but with this new measure in
their conduct, which it seems they consulted together upon-
viz., to leave three men in the boat, and the rest to go on
shore, and go up into the country to look for their fellows.
This was a great disappointment to us, for now we were at a loss
what to do, as our seizing those seven men on shore would be no
advantage to us if we let the boat escape; because they would row
away to the ship, and then the rest of them would be sure to weigh
and set sail, and so our recovering the ship would be lost. How-
ever, we had no remedy but to wait and see what the issue of things
might present. The seven men came on shore, and the three who
remained in the boat put her off to a good distance from the shore,
and came to an anchor to wait for them; so that it was impossible
for us to come at them in the boat. Those that came on shore
kept close together, marching towards the top of the little hill
under which my habitation lay; and we could see them plainly,
though they could not perceive us. We should have been very glad
if they would have come nearer us, so that we might have fired at
them, or that they would have gone farther off, that we might come
abroad. But when they were come to the brow of the hill where
they could see a great way into the valleys and woods, which lay
towards the north-east part, and where the island lay lowest, they
P
184
ufe and adventures of
shouted and hallooed till they were weary; and not caring, k
seems, to venture far from the shore, nor far from one another,
they sat down together under a tree to consider it. Had they
thought fit to have gone to sleep there, as the other part of them
had done, they had done the job for us; but they were too full of
apprehensions of danger to venture to go to sleep, though they
could not tell what the danger was they had to fear.
✓
The captain made a very just proposal to me upon this consulta-
tion of theirs-viz., that perhaps they would all fire a volley again,
to endeavour to make their fellows hear, and that we should all
sally upon them just at the juncture when their pieces were all dis-
charged, and they would certainly yield, and we should have them
without bloodshed. I liked this proposal, provided it was done
while we were near enough to come up to them before they could
load their pieces again. But this event did not happen; and we
lay still a long time, very irresolute what course to take. At length
I told them there would be nothing done, in my opinion, till night;
and then, if they did not return to the boat, perhaps we might find
a way to get between them and the shore, and so might use some
stratagem with them in the boat to get them on shore. We waited
a great while, though very impatient for their removing; and were
very uneasy, when, after long consultation, we saw them all start
up, and march down towards the sea; it seems they had such
dreadful pprehensions of the danger of the place that they
resolved to go on board the ship again, give their companions over
for lost, and so go on with their intended voyage with the ship.
As soon as I perceived them go towards the shore, I imagined it
to be as it really was, that they had given over their search, and
were going back again; and the captain, as soon as I told him my
thoughts, was ready to sink at the apprehensions of it but I
presently thought of a stratagem to fetch them back again, and
which answered my end to a tittle. I ordered Friday and the
captain's mate to go over the little creek westward, towards the
place where the savages came on shore, when Friday was rescued,
and so soon as they came to a little rising ground, at about half a
mile distance, I hid them halloo out, as loud as they could, and
wait till they found the seamen heard them; that as soon as ever
they heard the seamen answer them, they should return it again;
and then, keeping out of sight, take a round, always answering
when the others hallooed, to draw them as far into the island and
among the way as possible, and then wheel about again to me by
such ways as directed them.
They were just going into the boat when Friday and the mate
hallooed; and they presently heard them, and, answering, ran
along the shore westward, towards the voice they heard, when they
were stopped by the creek, where, the water being up, they could not
get over, and called for the boat to come up and set them over; as,
indeed, Í expected. When they had set themselves over, I observed
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
283
that the boat being gone a good way into the creek, and, as it were,
in a harbour within the land, they took one of the three men out of
her, to go along with them, and left only two in the boat, having
fastened her to the stump of a little tree on the shore. This was
what I wished for; and immediately leaving Friday and the
captain's mate to their business, I took the rest with me; and,
crossing the creek out of their sight, we surprised the two men
before they were aware- one of them lying on the shore, and the
other being in the boat. The fellow on shore was between sleeping
and waking, and going to start up; the captain, who was foremost,
ran in upon him, and knocked him down; and then called out to
him in the boat to yield, or he was a dead man. They needed very
few arguments to persuade a single man to yield, when he saw five
men upon him and his comrade knocked down besides, this was, it
seems, one of the three who were not so hearty in the mutiny as the
rest of the crew, and therefore was easily persuaded not only to yield,
but afterwards to join very sincerely with us. In the meantime,
Friday and the captain's mate so well managed their business with
the rest that they drew them, by hallooing and answering, from one
hill to another, and from one wood to another, till they not only
heartily tired them, but left them where they were, very sure they
could not reach back to the boat before it was dark; and, indeed,
they were heartily tired themselves also, by the time they came
back to us.
We had nothing now to do but to watch for them in the dark, and
to fall upon them, so as to make sure work with them. It was
several hours after Friday came back to me before they came back
to their boat; and we could hear the foremost of them, long before
they came quite up, calling to those behind to come along and
could also hear them answer, and complain how lame and tired
they were, and not able to come any faster: which was very
welcome news to us. At length they came up to the boat: but it
is impossible to express their confusion when they found the boat
fast aground in the creek, the tide ebbed out, and their two men
gone. We could hear them call one to another in a most lamentable
manner, telling one another they were got into an enchanted
island; that either there were inhabitants in it, and they should all
be murdered, or else there were devils and spirits in it, and they
should be all carried away and devoured. They hallooed again,
and called their two comrades by their names a great many times;
but no answer ✨ After some time, we could see them, by the little
light there was, run about, wringing their hands like men in despair,
and sometimes they would go and sit down in the boat to rest
themselves: then come ashore again, and walk about again, and so
the same thing over again. My men would fain have had me give
them leave to fall upon them at once in the dark; but I was willing
to take them at some advantage, so as to spare them, and kill as few
of them as I could; and especially I was unwilling to hazard the
186
life and adventures of
killing of any of our men, knowing the others were very well armed.
I resolved to wait, to see if they did not separate; and therefore, to
make sure of them, I drew my ambuscade nearer, and ordered
Friday and the captain to creep upon their hands and feet, as close
to the ground as they could, that they might not be discovered, and
get as near them as they could possibly before they offered to fire.
They had not been long in that posture when the boatswain,
who was he principal ringleader of the mutiny, and had now
shown himself the most dejected and dispirited of all the rest, came
walking towards them, with two more of the crew; the captain was
so eager at having this principal rogue so much in his power, that
he could hardly have patience to let him come so near as to be sure
of him, for they only heard his tongue before: but when they came
nearer, the captain and Friday, starting up on their feet, let fly at
them. The boatswain was killed upon the spot: the next man was
shot in the body, and fell just by him, though he did not die till an
hour or two after; and the third ran for it. At the noise of the
fire I immediately advanced with my whole army, which was now
eight men-viz., myself, generalissimo; Friday, my lieutenant-
general; the captain and his two men, and the three prisoners of
war whom we had trusted with arms. We came upon them,
indeed, in the dark, so that they could not see our number; and Í
made the man they had left in the boat, who was now one of us, to
call them by name, to try if I could bring them to a parley, and so
perhaps might reduce them to terms; which fell out just as we
desired for, indeed, it was easy to think, as their condition then
was, they would be very willing to capitulate. So he calls out as
loud as he could to one of them, "Tom Smith! Tom Smith !
Tom Smith answered immediately, "Is that Robinson?" for it
seems he knew the voice. The other answered, "Ay, ay; for God's
sake, Tom Smith, throw down your arms and yield, or you are all
dead men this moment." "Who must we yield to? Where are
they?" says Smith again "Here they are," says he; "here's our
captain and fifty men with him, have been hunting you these two
hours; the boatswain is killed; Will Fry is wounded, and I am a
prisoner; and if you do not yield you are all lost."
"Will they
give us quarter, then?" says Tom Smith, "and we will yield."
I'll go and ask, if you promise to yield," said Robinson: so he
asked the captain, and the captain himself then calls out, “You,
Smith, you know my voice; if you lay down your arms immediately
and submit, you shall have your lives, all but Will Atkins.”
>>
Upon this Will Atkins cried out, "For God's sake, captain, give
me quarter; what have I done? They have all been as bad as I:"
which, by the way, was not true; for it seems this Will Atkins
was the first man that laid hold of the captain when they first
mutinied, and used him barbarously in tying his hands and giving
him injurious language. However, the captain told him he must
lay down his arms at discretion, and trust to the governor's mercy :
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
by which he meant me, for they all called me governor. In a word,
they all laid down their arms, and begged their lives; and I sent
the man that had parleyed with them, and two more, who bound
them all; and then my great army of fifty men, which, with those
three, were in all but eight, came up and seized upon them, and
upon their boat; only that I kept myself and one more out of sight
for reasons of state.
:
Our next work was to repair the boat, and think of seizing the
ship and as for the captain, now he had leisure to parley with
them, he expostulated with them upon the villainy of their practices
with him, and upon the further wickedness of their design, and how
certainly it must bring them to misery and distress in the end, and
perhaps to the gallows. They all appeared very penitent, and
begged hard for their lives. As for that, he told them they were
not his prisoners, but the commander's of the island; that they
thought they had set him on shore in a barren, uninhabited island';
but it had pleased God so to direct them that it was inhabited, and
that the governor was an Englishman; that he might hang them
all there, if he pleased; but as he had given them all quarter, he
supposed he would send them to England, to be dealt with there as
justice required, except Atkins, whom he was commanded by the
governor to advise to prepare for death, for that he would be hanged
in the morning.
Though this was all but a fiction of his own, yet it had its
desired effect; Atkins fell upon his knees, to beg the captain to
intercede with the governor for his life; and all the rest begged of
him, for God's sake, that they might not be sent to England.
*
It now occurred to me that the time of our deliverance was
come, and that it would be a most easy thing to bring these fellows
in to be hearty in getting possession of the ship; so I retired in the
dark from them, that they might not see what kind of a governor
they had, and called the captain to me; when I called, at a good
distance, one of the men was ordered to speak again, and say to the
captain, “Captain, the commander calls for you; and presently
the captain replied, "Tell his Excellency I am just coming." This
more perfectly amazed them, and they all believed that the com-
mander was just by, with his fifty men. Upon the captain coming
to me, I told him my project for seizing the ship, which he liked
wonderfully well, and resolved to put it in execution the next
morning, But, in order to execute it with more art, and to be secure
of success, I told him we must divide the prisoners, and that he
should go and take Atkins, and two more of the worst of them, and
send them pinioned to the cave where the others lay This was
committed to Friday and the two men who came cn store with the
captain. They conveyed them to the cave as to a prison; and it
was, indued, a dismal place, especially to men in their condition,
The others I ordered to my bower, as I called it, of which I have
given a full description ; and as it was fenced in, and they pinioned,
188
life and adventures of
the place was secure enough, considering they were apon their
behaviour.
To these in the morning I sent the captain, who was to enter into
a parley with them; in a word, to try them, and tell me whether he
thought they might be trusted or not to go on board and surprise
the ship.. He talked to them of the injury...done him, of the
condition they were brought to, and that though the governor had
given them quarter for their lives as to the present action, yet that
if they were sent to England, they would all be hanged in chains;
but that if they would join in so just an attempt as to recover the
ship, he would have the governor's engagement for their pardon.
¡
Anyone may guess how readily such a proposal would be
accepted by men in their condition; they fell down on their knees
to the captain, and promised, with the deepest imprecations, that
they would be faithful to him to the last drop, and that they should
owe their lives to him, and would go with him all over the world;
that they would own him as a father to them as long as they lived.
44
Well," says the captain, "I must go and tell the governor what
you say, and see what I can do to bring him, to consent to it." So
he brought me an account of the temper he found them in, and that
he verily believed they would be faithful. However, that we might
be very secure, I told him he should go back again and choose out
those five, and tell them, that they might see he did not want men,
that he would take out those five to be his assistants, and that the
governor would keep the other two, and the three that were sent
prisoners to the castle (my cave), as hostages for the fidelity of
those five; and that if they proved unfaithful in the execution, the
five hostages should be hanged in chains alive on the shore. This
looked severe, and convinced them that the governor was in
earnest; however, they had no way left them but to accept it; and
it was now the business of the prisoners, as much as of the captain,
to persuade the other five to do their duty.
Our strength was now thus ordered for the expedition: first, the
captain, his mate, and passenger; second, the two prisoners of the
first gang, to whom, having their character from the captain, I had
given their liberty, and trusted them with arms; third, the other
two that I had kept till now in my bower, pinioned, but, on the
captain's notion, had now released; fourth, these five released at
last; so that there were twelve in all, besides five we kept prisoners
in the cave for hostages,
I asked the captain if he was willing to venture with these nands
on board the ship; but as for me and my man Friday, I did not
think it was proper for us to stir, having seven men left behind;
and it was employment enough for us to keep them asunder, and
supply them with victuals As to the five in the cave, I resolved to
keep them fast, but Frid went in twice a-day to them, to supply
them with necessaries; and I made the other two carry provisions
to a certain distance, where Friday was to take them,
"L
ROBINSON CRUSOE,
189
When I showed myself to the two hostages, it was with the
Captain, who told them I was the person the governor had ordered
to look after them; and that it was the governor's pleasure they
should not stir anywhere but by my direction; that if they did,
they would be fetched into the castle, and be laid in irons: so that
as we never suffered them to see me as governor, I now appeared
as another person, and spoke of the governor, the garrison, the
castle, and the like, upon all occasions.
The captain now had no difficulty before him, but to furnish his
two boats, stop the breach of one, and man them. He made his
passenger captain one, with four of the men; and himself,
his mate, and five more, went in the other; and they contrived
their business very well, for they came up to the ship about
midnight. As soon as they came within call of the ship, he made
Robinson hail them, and tell them they had brought off the men
and the boat, but that it was a long time before they had found them,
and the like, holding them in a chat till they came to the ship's
side; when the captain and the mate entering first with their arms,
immediately knocked down the second mate and carpenter with
the butt-end of their muskets, being very faithfully seconded by
their men; they secured all the rest that were upon the main and
quarter-decks, and began to fasten the hatches, to keep them down
that were below; when the other boat and their men, entering at
the forechains, secured the forecastle of the ship, and the scuttle
which went down into the cook-room, making three men they found
there prisoners. When this was done, and all safe upon deck, the
captain ordered the mate, with three men, break into the round-
house, where the new rebel captain lay, who, having taken the
alarm, had got up, and with two men and a boy had got fire-arms
in their hands; and when the mate, with a crow, split open the
door, the new captain and men fired boldly among them, and
wounded the mate with a musket ball, which broke his arm, and
wounded two more of the men, but killed nobody. The mate,
calling for help, rushed, however, into the round-house, wounded as
he was, and, with his pistol, shot the new captain through the head,
the bullet entering at his mouth, and came out again behind one of
his ears, so that he never spoke a word more upon which the rest
yielded, and the ship was taken effectually, without any more lives
lost.
As soon as the ship was thus secured, the captain ordered seven
guns to be fired, which was the signal agreed upon with me to give
me notice of his success, which, you may be sure, I was very glad
to hear, having sat watching upon the shore for it till near two
o'clock in the morning. Having thus heard the signal plainly, I
laid me down; and it having been a day of great fatigue to me, I
slept very sound, till I was surprised with the noise of a gun; and
presently starting up, I heard a man call me by the name of
"Governor Governor!" and presently I knew the captain's voice ;
190
life and adventures of
when, climbing up to the top of the hill, there he stood, and,
pointing to the ship, he embraced me in his arms, "My dear
friend and deliverer," says he, "there's your ship; for she is all
yours, and so are we, and all that belong to her." I cast my eyes
to the ship, and there she rode, within little more than half a mile
of the shore; for they had weighed her anchor as soon as they
were masters of her, and, the weather being fair, had brought her
to an anchor just against the mouth of the little creek; and the
tide being up, the captain had brought the pinnace in near the place
where I had first landed my rafts, and so landed just at my door.
I was at first ready to sink down with the surprise; for I saw
my deliverance, indeed, visibly put into my hands, all things easy,
and a large ship just ready to carry me away whither I pleased to
go. At first, for some time, I was not able to answer him one
word; but as he had taken me in his arms, I held fast by him, or I
should have fallen to the grour.d. perceived the surprise, and
【
immediately pulled a bottle out of his pocket and gave me a dram
of cordial, which he had brought on purpose for me. After I had
drunk it, I sat down upon the ground; and though it brought me
to myself, yet it was a good while before I could speak a word to
him. All this time the poor man was in as great an ecstasy as I,
only not under any surprise as I was; and he said a thousand kind
and tender things to me, to compose and bring me to myself; but
such was the flood of joy in my breast, that it put all my spirits
into confusion: at last it broke out into tears; and, in a little
while after, I recovered my speech. I then took my turn, and
embraced him as my deliverer, and we rejoiced together. I told
him I looked upon him as a man sent by Heaven to deliver me, and
that the whole transaction seemed to be a chain of wonders; that
such things as these were the testimonies we had of a secret hand of
Providence governing the world, and an evidence that the eye of an
infinite Power could search into the remotest corner of the world,
and send help to the miserable whenever he pleased. I forgot not
to lift up my heart in thankfulness to Heaven; and what heart
could forbear to bless Him, who had not only in a miraculous
nanner provided for me in such a wilderness, and in such a
desolate condition, but from whom every deliverance must always
be acknowledged to proceed.
When we had talked a while, the captain told me he had brought
me some hule refreshment, such as the ship afforded, and such as
the wretches that had been so long his masters had not plundered
him of. Upon this, he called aloud to the boat, and bade his men
bring the things ashore that were for the governor; and, indeed, it
was a present as if I had been one that was not to be carried away
with them, but as if I had been to dwell upon the island still.
First, he had brought me a case of bottles full of excellent cordial
waters, six large bottles of Madeira wine (the bottles held two
quarts each), two painds of excellent good tobacco, twelve good
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
191
pieces of the ship's beef, and six pieces of pork, with a bag of peas,
and about a hundredweight of biscuit; he also brought me a box
of sugar, a box of flour, a bag full of lemons, and two bottles of lime-
juice, and abundance of other things. But besides these, and what
was a thousand times more seful to me, he brought me six new
clean shirts, six very good neckcloths, two pair of gloves, one pair
of shoes, a hat, and one pair of stockings, with a very good suit of
clothes of his own, which had been worn but very little in a word,
he clothed me from head to foot. It was a very kind and agreeable
present, as any one may imagine, to one in my circumstances, but
never was anything in the world of that kind so unpleasant,
awkward, and uneasy as it was to me to wear such clothes at first.
(4
"}
After these ceremonies were past, and after all his good things
were brought into my little apartment, we began to consult what was
to be done with the prisoners we had; for it was worth considering
whether we might venture to take them with us or no, especially
two of them, whom he knew to be incorrigible and refractory to the
last degree; and the captain said he knew they were such rogues
that there was no obliging them, and if he did carry them away, it
must be in irons, as malefactors, to be delivered over to justice at
the first English colony he could come to; and I found that the
captain himself was very anxious about it. Upon this, I told him
that, if he desired it, I would undertake to bring the two men he
spoke of to make it their own request that he should leave them
upon the island. “1 should be very glad of that," says the captain,
"with all my heart." Well," says I, "I will send for them up,
and talk with them for you." So I caused Friday and the two
hostages, for they were now discharged, their comrades having per-
formed their promise; I say, I caused them to go to the cave, and
bring up the five men, pinioned as they were, to the bower, and
keep them there till I came. After some time, I came thither
dressed in my new habit; and now I was called governor again.
Being all met, and the captain with me, I caused the men to be
brought before me, and I told them I had got a full account of their
villainous behaviour to the captain, and how they had run away
with the ship, and were preparing to commit further robberies, but
that Providence had ensnared them in their own ways, and that
they were fallen into the pit which they had dug for others. I let
them know that by my direction the ship had been seized; that she
lay now in the road; and they might see by-and-by that their new
captain had received the reward of his villainy, and that they would
see him hanging at the yard-arm; that, as to them, I wanted to
know what they had to say why should not execute them as
pirates taken in the fact, as by my commission they could not doubt
but I had authority so to do.
One of them answered in the name of the rest, that they had
nothing to say but this, that when they were taken the captain
promised them their lives, and they humbly implored my mercy.
►
1
194
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
But I told them I knew not what mercy to show them; for as for
myself, I had resolved to quit the island with all my men, and had
taken passage with the captain to go to England; and as for the
captain, he could not carry them to England other than as prisoners
in irons, to be tried for mutiny and running away with the ship:
the consequence of which, they must needs know, would be the
gallows; so that I could not tell what was best for them, unless
they had a mind to take their fate in the island. If they desired
that, as I had liberty to leave the island, I had some inclination to
give them their lives, if they thought they could shift on shore.
They seemed very thankful for it, and said they would much rather
venture to stay there than be carried to England to be hanged. So
I left it on that issue.
However, the captain seemed to make some difficulty of it, as if
he durst not leave them there. Upon this I seemed a little angry
with the captain, and told him that they were my prisoners, not his;
and that seeing I had offered them so much favour, I would be as
good as my word; and that if he did not think fit to consent to it I
would set them at liberty, as I found them: and if he did not like it
he might take them again if he could catch them. Upon this they
appeared very thankful, and I accordingly set them at liberty, and
bade them retire in the woods, to the place whence they came,
and I would leave them some fire-arms, some ammunition, and some
directions how they should live very well if they thought fit. Upon
this I prepared to go on board the ship; but told the captain I
would stay that night to prepare my things, and desired him to go
on board in the meantime, and keep all right in the ship, and send
the boat on shore next day for me; ordering him, at all events, to
cause the new captain, who was killed, to be hanged at the yard-
arm, that these men might see him.
When the captain was gone I sent for the men up to me to my
apartment, and entered seriously into discourse with them on their
circumstances. I told them I thought they had made a right
choice; that if the captain had carried them away they would
certainly be hanged. I showed them the new captain hanging at
the yard-arm of the ship, and told them they had nothing less to
expect.
When they had all declared their willingness to stay, I then told
them I would let them into the story of my living there, and put
them into the way of making it easy to them. Accordingly, I gave
them the whole history of the place, and of my coming to it;
showed them my fortifications, the way I made my bread, planted
my corn, cured my grapes; and, in a word, all that was necessary
to make them easy. I told them the story also of the seventeen
Spaniards that were to be expected, for whom I left a letter, and
made them promise to treat them in common with themselves.
Here it may be noted that the captain, who had ink on board, was
greatly surprised that I never hit upon a way of making ink of char-
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
191
coal and water, or of something else, as I had done things much
more difficult.
I left them my firearms-viz., five muskets, three fowling-pieces,
and three swords. I had above a barrel-and-a-half of powder left
for after the first year or two I used but little, and wasted none. I
gave them a description of the way I managed the goats, and
directions to milk and fatten them, and to make both butter and
cheese. In a word, I gave them every part of my own story; and
told them I should prevail with the captain to leave them two bar-
rels of gunpowder more, and some garden-seeds, which I told them I
would have been very glad of. Also, I gave them the bag of peas
which the captain had brought me to eat, and hade them be sure
to sow and increase them.
CHAPTER XIX
I take leave of the island, and after a long voyage arrive in England-
Go down into Yorkshire, and find the greater part of my family
dead-Resolve to go to Lisbon for information respecting my planta-
tion at the Brazils-Mest an old friend there, by whose means I
become rich-Set out for England overland-Much annoyed by
wolves on the road.


AVING done all this, I left them the next day, and
went on board the ship. We prepared immediately
to sail, but did not weigh that night. The next
morning early, two of the five men came swimming
to the ship's side, and making the most lamentable
complaint of the other three, begged to be taken into the ship for
God's sake, for they should be murdered, and begged the captain
to take them on board, though he hanged them immediately.
Upon this the captain pretended to have no power without me;
but after some difficulty, and after their solemn promises of amend-
ment, they were taken on board, and were, some time after, soundly
whipped and pickled; after which they proved very honest and
quiet fellows.
Some time after this, the boat was ordered on shore, the tide
being up, with the things promised to the men; to which the
captain, at my intercession, caused their chests and clothes to be
added, which they took, and were very thankful for. I also
encouraged them, by telling them that if it lay in my power to
send any vessel to take them in, I would not forget them.
When I took leave of this island, I carried on board, for reliques,
the great goat-skin cap I had made, my umbrella, and one of my
parrots; also, I forgot not to take the money I formerly mentioned,
which had lain by me so long useless that it was grown rusty or
ternished, and could hardly pass for silver till it had been a little

194
life and adventures of
rubbed and handled, as also the money I found in the wreck of the
Spanish ship. And thus I left the island, the 19th of December, as
I found by the ship's account, in the year 1686, after I had been
upon it eight-and-twenty years, two months, and nineteen days;
being delivered from this second captivity the same day of the
month that I first made my escape in the long-boat from among
the Moors of Sallee. In this vessel, after a long voyage, I arrived
in England the 11th of June, in the year 1687, having been thirty-
five years absent.
When I came to England I was as perfect a stranger to all the
world as if I had never been known there. My benefactor and
faithful steward, whom I had left my money in trust with, was
alive, but had had great misfortunes in the world; was become a
widow the second time, and very low in the world. I made her
very easy as to what she owed me, assuring her I would give her
no trouble; but, on the contrary, in gratitude for her former care
and faithfulness to me, I relieved her as my little stock would
afford; which at that time would, indeed, allow me to do but little
for her; but I assured her I would never forget her former kindness
to me; nor did I forget her when I had sufficient to help her, as
shall be observed in its proper place. I went down afterwards
into Yorkshire; but my father was dead, and my mother and
all the family extinct, except that I found two sisters, and two of
the children of one of my brothers; and as I had been long ago
given over for dead, there had been no provision made for me; so
that, in a word, I found nothing to relieve or assist me; and that
the little money I had would not do much for me as to settling
in the world
I met with one piece of gratitude indeed, which I did not expect ;
and this was, that the master of the ship, whom I had so happily
delivered, and by the same means saved the ship and cargo, having
given a very handsome account to the owners of the manner how
I had saved the lives of the men and the ship, they invited me to
meet them and some other merchants concerned, and all together
made me a very handsome compliment upon the subject, and
present of almost £200 sterling.
But after making several reflections upon the circumstances of
my life, and how little way this would go towards settling me in the
world, I resolved to go to Lisbon, and see if I might not come at
some information of the state of my plantation in the Brazils, and
of what was become of my partner, who, I had reason to suppose,
had some years past given me over for dead With this view I
took shipping for Lisbon, where I arrived in April following, my
man Friday accompanying me very honestly in all these ramblings,
and proving a most faithful servant upon all occasions. When I
came to Lisbon, I found out, by inquiry, and to my particular
satisfaction, my old friend, the captain of the ship who first took
me up at sea off the shore of Africa. He was now grown old, and
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
•
had left off going to sea, having put his son, who was far from
a young man, into his ship, and who still used the Brazil trade.
The old man did not know me; and indeed, I hardly knew him.
But I soon brought him to my remembrance, and as soon brought
myself to his remembrance, when I told him who I was.
After some passionate expressions of the old acquaintance
between us, I inquired, you may be sure, after my plantation and
my partner. The old man told me he had not been in the Brazils
for about nine years; but that he could assure me, that when he
came away my pa ttner was living; but the trustees, whom I had
joined with him to take cognizance of my part, were both dead:
that, however, he believed I would have a very good account of the
improvement of the plantation; for that, upon the general belief of
my being cast away and drowned, my trustees had given in the
account of the produce of my part of the plantation to the pro-
curator-fiscal, who had appropriated it, in case I never came to
claim it, one-third to the king, and two-thirds to the monastery of
St. Augustine, to be expended for the benefit of the poor, and for
the conversion of the Indians to the Catholic faith: but that, if I
appeared, or any one for me, to claim the inheritance, it would be
restored; only that the improvement, or annual production, being
distributed to charitable uses, could not be restored: but he
assured me that the steward of the king's revenue from lands, and
the providore, or steward of the monastery, had taken great care all
along that the incumbent, that is to say, my partner, gave every
year a faithful account of the produce, of which they had duly
received my moiety I asked him if he knew to what height of
Improvement he had brought the plantation, and whether he
thought it might be worth looking after; or whether, on my going
thither, I should meet with any obstruction to my possessing my
just right in the moiety. He told me he could not tell exactly to
what degree the plantation was improved; but this he knew, that
my partner was grown exceeding rich upon the enjoying his part of
it; and that, to the best of his remembrance, he had heard that the
king's third of my part, which was, it seems, granted away to some
other monastery or religious house, amounted to above two hundred
moidores a-year; that as to my being restored to a quiet possession
of it, there was no question to be made of that, my partner being
alive to witness my title, and my name being also enrolled in the
register of the sountry; also he told me that the survivors of my
two trustees were very fair, honest people, and very wealthy; and
he believed I would not only have their assistance for putting me in
possession, but would find a very considerable sum of money in
their hands for my account, being the produce of the farm while
their fathers held the trust, and before it was given up, as above ;
which, as he remembered, was for about twelve years.
I showed myself a little concerned and uneasy at this account,
and inquired of the old captain how it came to pass that the trustees
196
life and adventures of
should thus dispose of my effects, when he knew that I had made
my will, and had made him, the Portuguese captain, my universal
heir, etc.
He told me that was true; but that as there was no proof of my
being dead, he could not act as executor until some certain account
should come of my death; and, besides, he was not willing to
intermeddle with a thing so remote: that it was true he had
registered my will, and put in his claim; and could he have given
any account of my being dead or alive, he would have acted by
procuration, and taken possession of the ingenio (so they call the
sugar-house), and have given his son, who was now at the Brazils,
orders to do it. "But," says the old man, “I have one piece of
news to tell you, which perhaps may not be so acceptable to you as
the rest; and that is, believing you were lost, and all the world
believing so also, your partner and trustees did offer to account
with me, in your name, for the first six or eight years' profits, which
I received. There being at that tme great disbursements for
increasing the works, building an ingenio, and buying slaves, it did
not amount to near so much as afterwards it produced; however,"
says the old man, "I shall give you a true account of what I have
received in all, and how I have disposed of it."
:
After a few days' further conference with this ancient friend, he
brought me an account of the first six years' income of my planta-
tion, signed by my partner and the merchant-trustees, being always
delivered in goods-viz., tobacco in roll, and sugar in chests,
besides rum, molasses, etc., which is the consequence of a sugar-
work; and I found by this account, that every year the income
considerably increased; but, as above, the disbursements being
large, the sum at first was small however, the old man let me see
that he was debtor to me four hundred and seventy moidores of
gold, besides sixty chests of sugar, and fifteen double rolls of
tobacco, which were lost in his ship; he having been shipwrecked
coming home to Lisbon, about eleven years after my leaving the
place. The good man then began to complain of his misfortunes,
and how he had been obliged to make use of my money to recover
his losses, and buy him a share in a new ship. However, my old
friend,” says he, “you shall not want a supply in your necessity;
and as soon as my son returns you shall be fully satisfied." Upon
this he pulls out an old pouch, and gives me one hundred and sixty
Portugal moidores in gold; and giving the writings of his title to
the ship, which his son was gone to the Brazils in, of which he was
quarter-part owner, and his son another, he puts them both into my
hands for security of the rest.
CC
A
I was too much moved with the honesty and kindness of the poor
man to be able to bear this; and remembering what he had done
for me, how he had taken me up at sea, and how generously he had
used me on all occasions, and particularly how sincere a friend he
was now to me, I could hardly refrain weeping at what he had sais
ROBINSON crusoe.
197
to me; therefore I asked him if his circumstances adm ted him te
spare so much money at that time, and if it would not straiten him.
He told me he could not say but it might straiten him a little; but,
however, it was my money, and I might want it more than he.
1
Everything the good man said was full of affection, and I could
hardly refrain from tears while he spoke; in short, took one
hundred of the moidores, and called for a pen and ink to give him
a receipt for them: then I returned him the rest, and told him if
ever I had possession of the plantation I would return the other to
him also (as, indeed, I afterwards did); and that as to the bill of
sale of his part in his son's ship, I would not take it by any means;
but that if I wanted the money, I found he was honest enough to
pay me; and if I did not, but came to receive what he gave
me reason to expect, I would never have a penny more from
him.
When this was past, the old man asked me if he should put me
into a method to make my claim to my plantation. I told him I
thought to go over to it myself. He said I might do so if I pleased,
but that if I did not, there were ways enough to secure my right,
and immediately to appropriate the profits to my use: and as there
were ships in the river of Lisbon just ready to go away to Brazil, he
made me enter my name in a public register, with his affidavit,
affirming, upon oath, that I was alive, and that I was the same
person who took up the land for the planting the said plantation at
first. This being regularly attested by a notary, and a procuration
affixed, he directed me to send it, with a letter of his writing, to a
merchant of his acquaintance at the place; and then proposed my
staying with him till an account came of the return.
Never was anything more honourable than the proceedings upon
this procuration; for in less than seven months I received a large
packet from the survivors of my trustees, the merchants, for whose
account I went to sea, in which were the following particular letters
and papers enclosed :-
S
First, there was the account-rrent of the produce of my farm or
plantation, from the year when their fathers had balanced with my
old Portugal captain, being for six years; the balance appeared
to be one thousand one hundred and seventy-four moidores in my
favour.
Secondly, there was the account of four years more, while they
kept the effects in their hands, before the government claimed the
administration, as being the effects of a person not to be found,
which they called civil death; and the balance of this, the value of
the plantation increasing, amounted to nineteen thousand four
hundred and forty-six crusadoes, being about three thousand two
hundred and forty moidores.
Thirdly, there was the Prior of St. Augustine's account, who had
received the profits for above fourteen years; but not being able to
account for what was disposed of by the hospital, very honestly
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LIFE AND ADVENTUREs of
declared he had eight hundred and seventy-two moidores not dis-
tributed, which he acknowledged to my account: as to the king's
part, that refunded nothing.
There was a letter of my partner's, congratulating me very
affectionately upon my being alive, giving me an account how the
estate was improved, and what it produced a-year; with the par-
ticulars of the number of squares or acres that it contained, how
planted, how many slaves there were upon it: and making two-
and-twenty crosses for blessings, told me he had said so many Ave
Marias to thank the Blessed Virgin that I was alive; inviting me
very passionately to come over and take possession of my own,
and in the meantime to give him orders to whom he should deliver
my effects if I did not come myself; concluding with a hearty
tender of his friendship, and that of his family; and sent me as a
present seven fine leopards' skins, which he had, it seems, received
from Africa, by some other ship that he had sent thither, and
which, it seems, had made a better voyage than I. He sent me
also five chests of excellent sweetmeats, and a hundred pieces of
gold uncoined, not quite so large as moidores. By the same fleet
my two merchant-trustees shipped me one thousand two hundred
chests of sugar, eight hundred rolls of tobacco, and the rest of the
whole account in gold.
I might well say now, indeed, that the latter end of Job was
better than the beginning. It is impossible to express the flutter-
ings of my very heart when I found all my wealth about me; for as
the Brazil ships come all in fleets, the same ships which brought
my letters brought my goods: and the effects were safe in
the river before the letters came to my hand. In a word, I
turned pale, and grew sick; and, had not the old man run
and fetched me a cordial, I believe the sudden surprise of joy had
overset nature, and I had died upon the spot: nay, after that I
continued very ill, and was so some hours, till a physican being
sent for, and something of the real cause of my illness being known,
he ordered me to be let blood; after which I had relief, and grew
well but I verily believe, if I had not been eased by a vent given
in that manner to the spirits, I should have died.
I was now master, all on a sudden, of above five thousand pounds
sterling in money, and had an estate, as I might well call it, in the
Brazils, of above a thousand pounds a-year, as sure as an estate of
lands in England: and, in a word, I was in a condition which I
scarce knew how to understand, or how to compose myself for the
enjoyment of it. The first thing I did was to recompense my
original benefactor, my good old captain, who had been first
charitable to me in my distress, kind to me in my beginning, and
honest to me at the end I showed him all that was sent to me ; I
told him that, next to the providence of heaven, which disposed all
things, it was owing to him; and that it now lay on me to reward
him, which I would do a hundred-fold: so I first returned to him
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199
the hundred moidores I had received of him; then I sent for a
notary, and caused him to draw up a general release or discharge
from the four hundred and seventy moidores, which he had
acknowledged he owed me, in the fullest and firmest manner
possible. After which, I caused a procuration to be drawn,
empowering him to be the receiver of the annual profits of my
plantation and appointing my partner to account with him, and
make the returns, by the usual fleets, to him in my name; and by a
clause in the end, made a grant of one hundred moidores a-year to
him during his life, out of the effects, and fifty moidores a-year to
his son after him, for his life: and thus I requited my old man.
:
I had now to consider which way to steer my course next, and
what to do with the estate that Providence had thus put into my
hands; and, indeed, I had more care upon my head now than I had
in my state of life in the island, where I wanted nothing but what I
had, and had nothing but what I wanted; whereas I had now a
great charge upon me, and my business was how to secure it. I
had not a cave now to hide my money in, or a place where it might
lie without lock or key, till it grew mouldy and tarnished before
anybody would meddle with it; on the contrary, I knew not where
to put it, or whom to trust with it. My old patron, the captain,
indeed, was honest, and that was the only refuge I had. In the
next place, my interest in the Brazils seemed to summon me
thither; but now I could not tell how to think of going thither till
I had settled my affairs, and left my effects in some safe hands
behind me At first I thought of my old friend the widow, who I
knew was honest, and would be just to me; but then she was in
years, and but poor, and, for aught I knew, might be in debt; so
that, in a word, I had no way but to go back to England myself
and take my effects with me.
It was some months, however, before I resolved upon this; and,
therefore, as I had rewarded the old captain fully, and to his satis-
faction, who had been my former benefactor, so I began to think of
the poor widow, whose husband had been my first benefactor, and
she, while it was in her power, my faithful steward and instructor.
So, the first thing I did, I got a merchant in Lisbon to write to his
correspondent in London, not only to pay a bill, but to go find her
oût, and carry her, in money, a hundred pounds from me, and to
talk with her, and comfort her in her poverty, by telling her she
should, if lived, have a further supply: at the same time I sent
my two sisters in the country a hundred pounds each, they being,
though not in want, yet not in very good circumstances; one
having been married and left a widow; and the other having a
husband not so kind to her as he should be. But among all my
relations or acquaintances I could not yet pitch upon one to whom
I durst commit the gross of my stock, that I might go away to the
Brazils, and leave things safe behind me; and this greatly
perplexed me
900
life and adventures of
I had once a mind to have gone to the Brazils and have settled
myself there, for I was, as it were, naturalised to the place; but I
had some little scruple in my mind about religion, which insensibly
drew me back. However, it was not religion that kept me from
going there for the present; and as I had made no scruple of being
openly of the religion of the country all the while I was among
them, so neither did I yet; only that, now and then, having of late
thought more of it than formerly, when I began o think of living.
and dying among them, I began to regret having professed myself
a Papist, and thought it might not be the best religion to die with.
But, as I have sa this was not the main thing that kept me
from going to the Brazils, but that really I did not know with whom
to leave my effects behind me; so I resolved at last to go to
England, where, if I arrived, I concluded that I should make some
acquaintance, or find some relations, that would be faithful to me ;
and, accordingly, I prepared to go to England with all my wealth.
In order to prepare things for my going home, I first (the Brazil
fleet being just going away) resolved to give answers suitable to the
just and faithful account of things I had from thence; and, first, to
the Prior of St. Augustine I wrote a letter full of thanks for his just
dealings, and the offer of the eight hundred and seventy-two
moidores which were undisposed of, which I desired might be
given, five hundred to the monastery, and three hundred and
seventy-two to the poor, as the prior should direct; desiring the
good padre's prayers for me, and the like. I wrote next a letter of
thanks to my two trustees, with all the acknowledgment that so
much justice and honesty called for-as for sending them any
present, they were far above having any occasion of it. Lastly, I
wrote to my partner, acknowledging his industry in the improving
the plantation, and his integrity in increasing the stock of the
works; giving him instructions for his future government of my
part, according to the powers I had left with my old patron, to
whom I desired him to send whatever became due to me, till he
should hear from me more particularly; assuring him that it was
my intention not only to come to him, but to settle myself there for
the remainder of my life To this I added a very handsome present
of some Italian silks for his wife and two daughters, for such the
captain's son informed me he had; with two pieces of fine English
broad cloth, the best I could get in Lisbon, five pieces of black
baize, and some Flanders lace of a good value.

Having thus settled my affairs, sold my cargo, and turned all my
effects into good bills of exchange, my next difficulty was which
way to go to England: I had been accustomed enough to the sea,
and yet I had a strange aversic to go to England by sea at that
time; and though I could give no reason for it, yet the difficulty
Increased upon me so much, that though I had once shipped my
baggage in order to go, yet I altered my mind, and that not once
but two or three times
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
201
It is true I had been very unfortunate by sea, and this might be
one of the reasons; but let no man slight the strong impulses of
his own thoughts in cases of such moment: two of the ships which
I had singled out to go in, I mean more particularly singled out
than any other, having put my things on board one of them, and in
the other having agreed with the captain; say two of these ships
miscarried-one was taker by the Algerine, and the other was lost
on the Start, near Torbay, and all the people drowned except three ;
so that in either of those vessels I had been inade miserable.

Having been thus harassed in my thoughts, my old pilot, to
whom I communicated everything, pressed me earnestly not to go.
by sea, but either to go by land to the Groyne, and cross over the
Bay of Biscay to Rochelle, from whence it was but an easy and safe
journey by land to Paris, and so to Calais and Dover; or to go up
to Madrid, and so all the way by land through France. In a word,
I was so prepossessed against my going by sea at all, except from
Calais to Dover, that I resolved to travel all the way by land;
which, as I was not in haste, and did not value the charge, was by
much the pleasanter way: and to make it more so, my old captain
brought an English gentleman, the son of a merchant in Lisbon,
who was willing to travel with me; after which we picked up two
more English merchants also, and two young Portuguese gentle-
men, the last going to Paris only; so that in all there were six of
us and five servants; the two merchants and the two Portuguese
contenting themselves with one servant between two, to save the
charge; and as for me, I got an English sailor to travel with me
as a servant, besides my man Friday, who was too much a stranger
to be capable of supplying the place of a servant on the road.
In this manner set out from Lisbon; and our company being
very well mounted and armed, we made a little troop, whereof they
did me the honour to call me captain, as well because I was the
oldest man, as because I had two servants, and, indeed, was the
origin of the whole journey.
As I have troubled you with none of my sea journals, so I shall
trouble you now with none of my land journal; but some adven-
tures that happened to us in this tedious and difficult journey I
must not omit.
When we came to Madrid, we, being all of us strangers to Spain,
were willing to stay some time to see the court of Spain, and what
was worth observing; but it being the latter part of the summer,
we hastened away, and set out from Madrid about the middle of
October; but when we came to the edge of Navarre, we were
alarmed, at several towns on the way, with an account that so much
snow was falling on the French side of the mountains, that several
travellers were obliged to come back to Fampeluna, after having
attempted at an extreme hazard to pass on.
When we came to Pampeluna itself, we found it so indeed; and
so me, that had been always used to a hot climate, and to sountries
202
life and adventures of
where I could scarce bear any clothes on, the cold was insufferable :
nor, indeed, was it more painful than surprising to come but ten days
before out of Old Castile, where the weather was not only warm
but very hot, and immediately to feel a wind from the Pyrenean
Mountains so very keen, so severely cold, as to be intolerable, and
to endanger benumbing and perishing of our fingers and toes.
Poor Friday was really frightened when he saw the mountains all
covered with snow, and felt cold weather, which he had never seen
or felt before in his life. To mend the matter, when we came to
Pampeluna it continued snowing with so much violence and so
long, that the people said winter was come before its time; and the
roads, which were difficult before, were now quite impassable; for,
in a word, the snow lay in some places too thick for us to travel,
and being not hard frozen, as is the case in the northern countries,
there was no going without being in danger of being buried alive
every step. We stayed no less than twenty days at Pampeluna ;
when (seeing the winter coming on, and no likelihood of its being
hetter, for it was the severest winter all over Europe that had been
known in the memory of man) I proposed that we should go away
to Fontarabia, and there take shipping for Bordeaux, which was a
very little voyage. But, while I was considering this, there came in
four French gentlemen, who, having been stopped on the French
side of the passes, as we were on the Spanish, had found out a guide,
who, traversing the country near the head of Languedoc, had
brought them over the mountains by such ways that they were not
much incommoded with the snow; for where they met with snow
in any quantity, they said it was frozen hard enough to bear them
and their horses We sent for this guide, who told us he would
undertake to carry us the same way, with no hazard from the snow,
provided we were armed sufficiently to protect ourselves from wild
beasts; for, he said, in these great snows it was frequent for some
wolves to show themselves at the foot of the mountains, being made
ravenous for want of food, the ground being covered with snow.
We told him we were well enough prepared for such creatures as
they were, if he would insure us from a kind of two-legged wolves,
which, we were told, we were in most danger from, especially on
the French side of the mountains. He satisfied us that there was
no danger of that kind in the way that we were to go; so we readily
agreed to follow him, as did also twelve other gentlemen with their
servants, some French, some Spanish, who, as I said, had attempted
to go, and were obliged to come back again.
Accordingly, we set out from Pampeluna with our guide on the
15th of November; and, indeed, I was surprised, when, instead of
going forward, he came directly back with us on the same road that
we came from Madrid, about twenty miles, when, having passed
two rivers, and come into the plain country, we found ourselves in
a warm climate again, where the country was pleasant, and no snow
to be seen ; but, on a sudden, turning to his left, he approached
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203
the mountains another way; and though it is true the hills and pre-
cipices looked dreadful, yet he made so many tours, such meanders,
and led us by such winding ways, that we insensibly passed the
height of the mountains without being much encumbered with the
snow; and all on a sudden he showed us the pleasant and fruitful
provinces of Languedoc and Gascony, a green and flourishing,
though at a great distance, and we had some rough way to pass still
We were a little uneasy, however, when we found it snowed one
whole day and a night so fast that we could not travel; but he bid
us be easy; we should soon be past it all: we found, indeed, that
we began to descend every day, and to come more north than
before; and so, depending upon our guide, we went on.
It was about two hours before night when, our guide being
something before us, and not just in sight, out rushed three
monstrous wolves, and after them a bear, from a hollow way
adjoining to a thick wood: two of the wolves made at the guide,
and had he been far before us, he would have been devoured before
we could have helped him; one of them fastened upon his horse,
and the other attacked the man with such violence, that he had not
time, or presence of mind enough, to draw his pistol, but hallooed
and cried out to us most lustily. My man Friday being next me, I
bade him ride up and see what was the matter. As soon as Friday
came in sight of the man, he hallooed out as loud as the other,
"O master! O master 1" but like a bold fellow, rode directly up to
the poor man, and with his pistol shot the wolf in the head that
attacked him.
It was happy for the poor man that it was my man Friday; for,
having been used to such creatures in his country, he had no fear
upon him, but went close up to him and shot him; whereas, any
other of us would have fired at a farther distance, and have perhaps
either missed the wolf or endangered shooting the man
But it was enough to have terrified a bolder man than I; and,
indeed, it alarmed all our company, when, with the noise of
Friday's pistol, we heard on both sides the most dismal howling of
wolves; and the noise, redoubled by the echo of the mountains,
appeared to us as if there had been a prodigious number of them;
and perhaps there was not such a few as that we had no cause of
apprehension: however, as Friday had killed this wolf, the other
that had fastened upon the horse left him immediately, and fled,
without doing him any damage, having happily fastened upon his
head, where the bosses of the bridle had stuck in his teeth. But
the man was most hurt; for the raging creature had bit him twi-e,
once in the arm, and the other time a little above his knee; and
though he had made some defence, he was just tumbling down by
the disorder of his horse, when Friday came up and shot the wolf.
It is easy to suppose that at the noise of Friday's pistol we all
mended our pace, and rode up as fast as the way, which was very
difficult, would give us leave, to see what was the matter.
As soon
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES of
as we came clear of the trees, which blinded us before, we saw
clearly what had been the case, and how Friday had disengaged
the poor guide, though we did not presently discern what kind of
creature it was he had lled.
CHAPTER xx
Strange battle between Friday and a bear-Terrible engagement with
whole army of wolves-Arrive in England safely, and settle my affairs
there-I marry, and have a family.

B
UT never was a fight managed so hardily, and in such
a surprising manner as that which followed between
Friday and the bear, which gave us all, though at first
we were surprised and afraid for him, the greatest
diversion imaginable. As the bear is a heavy, clumsy
creature, and does not gallop as the wolf does, who is swift and
light, so he has two particular qualities, which generally are the
rule of his actions; first, as to men, who are not his proper prey
(he does not usually attempt them, except they first attack him,
unless he be excessively hungry, which it is probable might now
be the case, the ground being covered with snow), if you do not
meddle with him, he will not meddle with you; but then you must
take care to be very civil to him, and give him the road, for he is
a very nice gentleman; he will not go a step out of his way for a
prince; nay, if you're really afraid, your best way is to look
another way and keep going on; for sometimes if you stop, and
stand still, and look steadfastly at him, he takes it for an affront;
but if you throw or toss anything at him, though it were but a bit of
stick as big as your finger, he thinks himself abused, and sets all
other business aside to pursue his revenge, and will have satisfac-
tion in point of honour-that is his first quality: the next is, if he
be once affronted, he will never leave you, night or day, till he bas
his revenge, but follows at a good round rate till he overtakes you.
1
My man Friday had delivered our guide, and when we came up
to him he was helping him off his horse, for the nan was both hurt
and frightened, when on a sudden we spied the bear come out of
the wood; and a monstrous one it was, the biggest by far that ever
I saw
We were all a little surprised when we saw him; but when
Friday saw him, it was easy to see joy and courage in the fellow's
countenance; “O, 0, 0!” says Friday, three times, pointing to
him; "O, master! you give me te leave, me shakee te hand with
him; me makee you good laugh."
I was surprised to see the fellow so well pleased; "You fool,"
says I, "he will eat you up."- "Eatee me up eatee me up!" says
Friday, twice over again ; me eaten him up ; me maken you goòd
45
+
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
205
taugh; you all stay here, me show you good laugh." So down he
sits, and gets off his boots in a moment, and puts on a pair of
pumps (as we call the flat shoes they wear, and which he had in
his pocket), gives my other servant his horse, and with his gun
away he flew, swift like the wind.
((
me
The bear was walking softly on, and offered to meddle with
nobody, till Friday coming pretty near, calls to him, as if the bear
could understand him, "Hark ye, hark ye," says Friday,
speakee with you." We followed at a distance, for now being
down on the Gascony side of the mountains, we were entered a
vast forest, where the country was plain and pretty open, though it
had many trees in it scattered here and there. Friday, who had,
as we say, the heels of the bear, came up with him quickly, and
took up a great stone, and threw it at him, and hit him just on the
head, but did him no more harm than if he had thrown it against a
wall; but it answered Friday's end, for the rogue was so void of
fear that he did it purely to make the bear follow him, and show us
some laugh, as he called it. As soon as the bear felt the blow, and
saw him, he turns about and comes after him, taking very long
strides, and shuffling on at a strange rate, so as would have put a
horse to a middling gallop; away runs Friday, and takes his
course as if he ran towards us for help; so we all resolved to
fire at once upon the bear, and deliver my man; though I was
angry at him for bringing the bear back upon us, when he was
going about his own business another way; and especially I was
angry that he had turned the bear upon us, and then ran away;
and I called out, "You dog! is this your making us laugh?
Come away, and take your horse, that we may shoot the creature."
He heard me, and cried out, "No shoot, no shoot; stand still, and
you get much laugh :" and as the nimble creature ran two feet
for the bear's one, he turned on a sudden on one side of us, and
seeing a great oak-tree fit for his purpose, he beckoned to us to
follow; and doubling his pace, he got nimbly up the tree, laying
his gun down upon the ground, at about five or six yards from the
bottom of the tree The bear soon came to the tree, and we followed
at a distance: the first thing he did he stopped at the gun, smelled
at it, but let it lie, and up he scrambles into the tree, climbing like
a cat, though so monstrous heavy. I was amazed at the folly, as I
thought it, of my man, and could not for my life see anything to
laugh at, till seeing the bear get up the tree, we all rode near to him.
When we came to the tree, there was Friday got out to the small
end of a large branch, and the bear got about half-way to him. As
soon as the bear got out to that part where the limb of the tree was
weaker-" Ha!" says he to us, 66
now you see me teachee the bear
dance:" so he began jumping and shaking the bough, at which
the bear began to totter, but stood still, and began to look behind
him, to see how he should get back; then, indeed, we did laugh
heartily. But Friday had not done with him by a great deal ¿

206
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
when seeing him stand still, he called out to him again, as if he had
supposed the bear could speak English, "What, you come no
farther? pray you come farther "
so he left jumping and shaking
the tree; and the bear, just as if he understood what he said, did
come a little further; then he began jumping again, and the bear
stopped again. We thought now was a good time to knock him in
the head, and called to Friday to stand still and we should shoot
the bear: but he cried out earnestly, Oh, pray! Oh, pray! no
shoot, me shoot by and then :" he would have said by-and-by.
However, to shorten the story, Friday danced so much, and the
bear stood so ticklish, that we had laughing enough, but still could
not imagine what the fellow would do: for first we thought he
depended upon shaking the bear off; and we found the bear was
too cunning for that too; for he would not go out far enough to be
thrown down, but clung fast with his great broad claws and feet, so
that we could not imagine what would be the end of it, and what
the jest would be at last. But Friday put us out of doubt quickly :
for seeing the bear cling fast to the bough, and that he would not
be persuaded to come any farther, "Well, well," says Friday,
(( you
no come farther, me go; you no come to me, me come to you;" and
upon this he went out to the smaller end of the bough, where it
would bend with his weight, and gently let himself down by it,
sliding down the bough till he came near enough to jump down on
his feet, and away he ran to his gun, took it up, and stood still.
"Well," said I to him, "Friday, what will you do now? Why
don't you shoot him?" "No shoot," says Friday, “ no yet; me
shoot now, me no kill; me stay, give you one more laugh:" and,
indeed, so he did; for when the bear saw his enemy gone, he came
back from the bough where he stood, but did it very cautiously,
looking behind him every step, and coming backward till he got
into the body of the tree; then, with the same hinder end foremost,
he came down the tree, grasping it with his claws, and moving one
foot at a time, very leisurely. At this juncture, and just before he
could set his hind foot on the ground, Friday stepped up close to
him, clapped the muzzle of his piece into his ear, and shot him
dead. Then the rogue turned about to see if we did not laugh ;
and when he saw we were pleased by our looks, he began to laugh
very loud.
So we kill bear in my country," says Friday.
you kill them?" says I; "why, you have no guns."-"No," says
he, no gun, but shoot great much long arrow." This was a good
diversion to us; but we were still in a wild place, and our guide
very much hurt, and what to do we hardly knew; the howling of
wolves ran much in my head; and, indeed, except the noise I once
heard on the shore of Africa, of which I have said something
already, I never heard anything that filled me with so much
horror.
"L
n
"So
These things, and the approach of night, called us off, or else, as
Friday would have had us, we should certainly have taken the skin
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
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P
of this monstrous creature off, which was worth saving; bat we had
near three leagues to go, and our guide hastened us; so we left
him, and went forward on our journey.
The ground was still covered with snow, though not so deep and
dangerous as on the mountains; and the ravenous creatures, as we
heard afterwards, were come down into the forest and plain country,
pressed by hunger, to seek for food, and had done a great deal of
mischief in the villages, where they surprised the country people,
killed a great many of their sheep and horses, and some people, too.
We had one dangerous place to pass, and our guide told us if there
were more wolves in the country we should find them there; and
this was a small plain, surrounded with woods on every side, and a
long, narrow defile, or lane, which we were to pass to get through
the wood, and then we should come to the village where we were to
lodge. It was within half-an-hour of sunset when we entered the
wood, and a little after sunset when we came into the plain: we
met with nothing in the first wood, except that in a little plain
within the wood, which was not above two furlongs over, we saw
five great wolves cross the road, full speed, one after another, as if
they had been in chase of some prey, and had it in view; they
took no notice of us, and were gone out of sight in a few moments.
Upon this, our guide, who, by the way, was but a faint-hearted
fellow, bid us keep in ready posture, for he believed there were
more wolves a-coming We kept our arms ready, and our eyes
about us; but we say no more wolves till we came through that
wood, which was gear half a league, and entered the plain. As
soon as we came into the plain, we had occasion enough to look
about us: the first object we met with was a dead horse; that is to
say, a poor horse which the wolves had killed, and at least a dozen
of them at work, we could not say eating him, but picking his bones
rather; for they had eaten up all the flesh before. We did not
think fit to disturb them at their feast, neither did they take much
notice of us. Friday would have let fly at them, but I would not
suffer him by any means; for I found we were like to have more
business upon our hands than we were aware of. We had not
gone half over the plain when we began to hear the wolves howl
in the wood on our left in a frightful manner, and presently after we
saw about a hundred coming on directly towards us, all in a body,
and most of them in a line, as regularly as an army drawn up by
experienced officers. I scarce knew in what manner to receive
them, but found to draw ourselves in a close line was the only way y
so we formed in a moment; but that we might not have too much
interval, I ordered that only every other man should fire, and that
the others, who had not fired, should stand ready to give them a
second volley immediately, if they continued to advance upon us ;
and then that those that had fired at first should not pretend to
load their fuses again, but stand ready, every one with a pistol, for
we were all armed with a fusee and a pair of pistols each man; so
4
208
life and adventures of
we were, by this method, able to fire six volleys, half of us at a
time: however, at present we had no necessity; for upon firing the
first volley, the enemy made a full stop, being terrified as well with
the noise as with the fire. Four of them being shot in the head,
dropped; several others were wounded, and went bleeding off, as
we could see by the snow. I found they stopped, but did not
immediately retreat; whereupon, remembering that had been
told that the fiercest creatures were terrified at the voice of a man,
I caused all the company to halloo as loud as they could; and I
found the notion not altogether mistaken; for upon our shout they
began to retire and turn about. then ordered a second volley to
be fired in their rear, which put them to the gallop, and away
they went to the woods. This gave us leisure to charge our pieces
again; and that we might lose no time, we kept going; but we had
but little more than loaded our fusees, and put ourselves in
readiness, when we heard a terrible noise in the same wood on our
left, only that it was farther onward, the same way we were to go.
:
The night was coming on, and the light began to be dusky, which
made it worse on our side; but the noise increasing, we could
easily perceive that it was the howling and yelling of those hellish
creatures; and, on a sudden, we perceived three troops of wolves,
one on our left, one behind us, and one in our front, so that we
seemed to be surrounded with them however, as they did not fall
upon us, we kept our way forward, as fast as we could make our
horses_go, which, the way being very rough, was only a good hard
trot. In this manner, we came in view of the entrance of a wood,
through which we were to pass, at the farther side of the plain; but
we were greatly surprised, when coming nearer the lane or pass, we
naw a confused number of wolves standing just at the entrance.
On a sudden, at another opening of the wood, we heard the noise
of a gun, and looking that way, out rushed a horse, with a saddle
and a bridle on him, flying like the wind, and sixteen or seventeen
wolves after him, full speed: the horse had the advantage of them ;
but as we supposed that he could not hold it at that rate, we
doubted not but they would get up with him at last; no question
but they did.
P
But here we had a most horrible sight; tor riding up to the
entrance where the horse came out, we found the carcases
of another horse and of two men, devoured by the ravenous
creatures; and one of the men was no doubt the same whom we
heard fire the gun, for there lay a gun just by him fired off; but as
to the man, his head and the upper part of his body was eaten up.
This filled us with horror, and e knew not what course to take;
but the creatures resolved us soon, for they gathered about us
presently, in hopes of prey; and I verily believe there were three
hundred of them. it happened, very much to our advantage, that
at the entrance into the wood, but a little way from it, there lay
some large timber-trees, which had been cut down the summer
robinson crusoe.
909
before, and I suppose lay there for carriage. I drew my little troop
in among those trees, and placing ourselves in line behind one
long tree, I advised them all to alight, and keeping that tree before
us for a breastwork, to stand in a triangle, or three fronts, enclosing
our horses in the centre. We did so, and was well we did; for
never was a more furious charge than the ereatures made upon us
in this place They came on with a growling kind of noise, and
mounted the piece of timber, which, as I said, was our breastwork,
as if they were only rushing upon their prey; and this fury of
theirs, it seems, was principally occasioned by their seeing our
horses behind us. I ordered our men to fire as before, every other
man; and they took their aim so sure that they killed several of
the wolves at the first volley; but there was a necessity to keep a
continual firing, for they came on like devils, those behind pushing
on those before.
When we had fired a second volley of our fusees, we thought
they stopped a little, and I hoped they would have gone off, but it
was but a moment, for others came forward again; so we fired two
volleys of our pistols; and I believe in these four firings we had
killed seventeen or eighteen of them, and lamed twice as many, yet
they came on again, I was loath to spend our shot too hastily; so
I called my servant, not my man Friday, for he was better
employed, for, with the greatest dexterity imaginable, he had
charged my fusee and his own while we were engaged-but, as I
said, I called my other man, and giving him a horn of powder, I
bade him lay a train all along the piece of timber, and let it be a
large train. He did so, and had but just time to get away, when
the wolves came up to it, and some got upon it, when I, snapping
an uncharged pistol close to the powder, set it on fire; those that
were upon the timber were scorched with it, and six or seven of
them fell; or rather jumped in among us with the force and fright
of the fire; we despatched these in an instant, and the rest were so
frightened with the light, which the night-for it was now very
near dark-made more terrible, that they drew back a little; upon
which I ordered our last pistols to be fired off in one volley, and
after that we gave a shout; upon this the wolves turned tail, and
we sallied immediately upon near twenty lame ones that we found
struggling on the ground, and fell to cutting them with our
swords, which answered our expectation, for he crying and howling
they made was better understood by their fellows; so that they all
filed and left us.
We had, first and last, killed about threescore of them, and had
it been daylight we had killed many more. The field of battle
being thus cleared, we made forward again, for we had still near à
league to gd We heard the ravenous creatures howl and yell in
the woods as we went several times, and sometimes we fancied we
saw some of them; but the snow dazzling our eyes, we were not
certain. In about an hour more we came to the town where we
810
life and adventures of
1.
}
were to lodge, which we found in a terrible fright and all in arms ;
for, it seems, the night before the wolves and some bears had
broken into the village, and put them in such terror, that they
were obliged to keep guard night and day, but especially in the
night, to preserve their cattle, and indeed their people.
The next morning our guide was so ill, and his limbs swelled so
much with the rankling of his two wounds, that he could go no
farther; so we were obliged to take a new guide here, and go to
Toulouse, where we found a warm climate, a fruitful, pleasant
country, and no snow, no wolves, nor anything like them; but
when we told our story at Toulouse, they told us it was nothing but
what was ordinary in the great forest at the foot of the mountains,
especially when the snow lay on the ground; but they inquired much
what kind of guide we had got who would venture to bring us that
way in such a severe season, and told us it was surprising we were
not all devoured When we told them how we placed ourselves
and the horses in the middle, they blamed us exceedingly, and told
us it was fifty to one but we had been all destroyed, for it was the
sight of the horses which made the wolves so furious, seeing their
prey, and that at other times they are really afraid of a gun-but
being excessively hungry, and raging on that account, the eagerness
to come t the horses had made them senseless of danger-and
that if we had not by the continual fire, and at last by the stratagem
of the train of powder, mastered them, it had been great odds but
that we had been torn to pieces; whereas, had we been content to
have sat still on horseback, and fired as horsemen, they would not
have taken the horses so much for their own, when men were on
their backs, as otherwise; and withal, they told us that at last, if
we had stood all together, and left our horses, they would have been
so eager to have devoured them, that we might have come off safe,
especially having our fire-arms in our hands, being so many in num-
ber. For my part, I was never so sensible of danger in my life
-for, seeing above three hundred devils come roaring and open-
mouthed to devour us, and having nothing to shelter us or retreat
to, I gave myself over for lost; and, as it was, I believe I shall
never care to cross those mountains again; I think I would much
rather go a thousand leagues by sea, though I was sure to meet
with a storm once a-week.
I have nothing uncommon to take notice of in my passage
through France-nothing but what other travellers have given an
account of with much more advantage than I can. I travelled from
Toulouse to Paris, and without any considerable stay came to
Calais, and landed safe at Dover the 14th of January, after having
had a severe cold season to travel in.
I was now come to the centre of my travels, and had in a little
time all my new-discovered estate safe about me, the bills of
exchange which I brought with me having been currently paid.
My principal guide and privy-counsellor was my good ancient
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
211
widow, who, in gratitude for the money I had sent her, thought no
pains too much nor care too great to employ for me; and I trusted
her so entirely that I was perfectly easy as to the security of my
effects; and, indeed, I was very happy from the beginning, and row
to the end, in the unspotted integrity of this good gentlewoman.
And now, having resolved to dispose of my plantation in the
Brazils, I wrote to my old friend at Lisbon, who having offered it
to the two merchants, the survivors of my trustees, who lived in the
Brazils, they accepted the offer, and remitted thirty-three thousand
pieces of eight to a correspondent of theirs at Lisbon to pay for it.
In return, I signed the instrument of sale in the form which they
sent from Lisbon, and sent it to my old man, who sent me the bills
of exchange for thirty-two thousand eight hundred pieces of eight
for the estate, reserving the payment of one hundred moidores
a-year to him (the old man) during his life, and fifty moidores after-
wards to his son for his life, which I had promised them, and which
the plantation was to make good as a rent-charge. And thus I
have given the first part of a life of fortune and adventure-a life of
Providence's chequer-work, and of a variety which the world will
seldom be able to show the like of; beginning foolishly, but closing
much more happily than any part of it ever gave me leave so much
as to hope for.
Any one would think that in this state of complicated good
ortune I was past running any more hazards-and so, indeed, I
had been, if other circumstances had concurred; but I was inured
to a wandering life, had no family, nor many relations; nor, how-
ever rich, had I contracted fresh acquaintance; and though I had
sold my estate in the Brazils, yet I could not keep that country out
of my head, and had a great mind to be upon the wing again;
especially I could not resist the strong inclination I had to see my
island, and to know if the poor Spaniards were in being there. My
true friend, the widow, earnestly dissuaded me from it, and so far
prevailed with me, that for almost seven years she prevented my
running abroad, during which time I took my two nephews, the
children of one of my brothers, into my care; the eldest, having
something of his own, I bred up as a gentleman, and gave him a
settlement of some addition to his estate after my decease. The
other placed with the captain of a ship; and after £ve years,
finding him a sensible, bold, enterprising young fellow, I put him
into a good ship, and sent him to sea; and this young fellow after-
wards drew me in, as old as I was, to further adventures myself.
In the meantime, I in part settled myself here; for, first of all, I
married, and that not either to my disadvantage or dissatisfaction,
and had three children, two sons and one daughter; but my wife
dying, and my nephew coming home with good success from
voyage to Spain, my inclination to go abroad, and his importunity,
prevailed, and engaged me to go in his ship as a private trader to
the East Indies; this was in the year 1694
+
7
813
ADVENTUREs of robINSON CRUSOE.
In this voyage I visited my new colony in the island-saw my
successors the Spaniards-had the old story of their lives and of
the villains I left there-how at first they insulted the poor
Spaniards-how they afterwards agreed, disagreed, united, separ
ated, and how at last the Spaniards were obliged to use violence
with them-hor they were subjected to the Spaniards-how
honestly the Spaniards used them; a history, if it were entered
into, as full of variety and wonderful accidents as my own part-
particularly, also, as to their battles with the Caribbeans, who
landed several times upon the island, and as to the improvement
they made upon the island itself-and how five of them made an
attempt upon the mainland, and brought away eleven men and five
women prisoners, by which, at my coming, I found about twenty
young children on the island.
.
Here I stayed about twenty days-left them supplies of all neces
sary things, and particularly of arms, powder, shot, clothes, tools,
and two workmen, which I had brought from England with me
viz., a carpenter and a smith.
Besides this, I shared the lands into parts with them, reserved to
myself the property of the whole, but gave them such parts
respectively as they agreed on; and having settled all things with
them, and engaged them not to leave the place, I left them there.
From thence I touched at the Brazils, from whence I sent a bark,
which I bought there, with more people to the island; and in it,
besides other supplies, I sent seven women, being such as I found
proper for service, for wives to such as would take them. As to
the Englishmen, promised to send them some women from
England, with a good cargo of necessaries, if they would apply
themselves to planting-which I afterwards could not perform.
The fellows proved very honest and diligent after they were
I sent
mastered and had their properties set apart for them.
them, also, from the Brazils, five cows, three of them being big with
calf, some sheep, and some hogs, which when I came again were
considerably increased.
But all these things, with an account how three hundred Carib-
bees came and invaded them, and ruined their plantations, and how
they fought with that whole number twice, and were at first
defeated, and one of them killed; but, at last, a storm destroying
their enemies' canoes, they famished or destroyed almost all the
rest, and renewed and recovered the possession of their plantation,
and still lived upon the island.
All these things, with some very surprising incidents in some new
adventures of my own, for ten years more, I shall give a farther
account of in the Second Part of my Story.
PART II.
A
etusi

PART IL
CHAPTER XXL
Reflections Unsettled state of mind, and conversation with my wife
thereon-Purchase a farm in the county of Bedford-Lose my wife-I
determine to revisit my island, and for that purpose settle all my
affairs in England-Description of the cargo I carried out with no
Bave the crew of a vessel burnt at sea.

HAT homely proverb, used on many occasions fa
England-viz., "That what is bred in the bone will
not go out of the flesh," was never more verified
than in the story of my Life. Any one would think
that after thirty-five years' affliction, and a variety
of unhappy circumstances, which few men, if any,
ever went through before, and after near seven
years of peace and enjoyment in the fulness of all things; grown
old, and when, if ever, it might be allowed me to have had experi-
ence of every state of middle life, and to know which was most
adapted to make a man completely happy; I say, after all this, any
one would have thought that the native propensity to rambling,
which I gave an account of in my first setting out in the world to
have been so predominant in my thoughts, should be worn out,
and I might, at sixty-one years of age, have been a little inclined
to stay at home, and have done venturing life and fortune any
more.
Nay, farther, the common motive of foreign adventures was
taken away in me, for I had no fortune to make; I had nothing te
seek: if I had gained ten thousand pounds I had been no richer ;
*
life and adventures of
216
for I had already sufficient for me, and for those I had to leave it
to; and what I had was visibly increasing; for, having no great
family, I could not spend the income of what I had, unless I would
set up for an expensive way of living, such a great family,
servants, equipage, gaiety, and the like, which were things I had no
notion of, or inclination to; so that I had nothing, indeed, to do
but to sit still, and fully enjoy what I had got, and see it increase
daily upon my hands. Yet all these things had no effect upon me,
or at least not enough to resist the strong inclination I had to go
abroad again, which hung about me like a chronic distemper. In
particular, the desire of seeing my new plantation in the island, and
the colony I left there, ran in my head continually. I dreamed of
it all night, and my imagination ran upon it all day it was upper-
most in all my thoughts; and my fancy worked so steadily and
strongly upon it, that I talked of it in my sleep; in short, nothing
could remove it out of my mind: it even broke so violently into all
my discourses that it made my conversation tiresome, for I could
talk of nothing else; all my discourse ran into it, even to imper-
Sinence; and I saw it myself.
I have often heard persons of good judgment say, that all
the stir that people make in the world about ghosts and apparitions
is owing to the strength of imagination, and the powerful operation
of fancy in their minds; that there is no such thing as a spirit
appearing, or a ghost walking; that people's poring affectionately
upon the past conversation of their deceased friends so realises it
to them, that they are capable of fancying, upon some extraordinary
circumstances, that they see them, talk to them, and are answered
by them, when, in truth, there is nothing but shadow and vapour in
the thing, and they really know nothing of the matter.
For my part, I know not to this hour whether there are any such
things as real apparitions, spectres, or walking of people after they
are dead; or whether there is anything in the stories they tell us of
that kind more than the product of vapours, sick minds, and
wandering fancies: but this I know, that my imagination worked
up to such a height, and brought me into such excess of vapours, or
what else I may call it, that I actually supposed myself often upon
the spot, at my old castle, behind the trees; saw my old Spaniard,
Friday's father, and the reprobate sailors I left upon the island;
nay, I fancied I talked with them, and looked at them steadily,
though I was broad awake, as at persons just before me; and this
I did till I often frightened myself with the images my fancy
represented to me. One time, in my sleep, I had the villainy of the
three pirate sailors so lively related to me by the first Spaniard and
Friday's father, that it was surprising they told me how they
barbarously attempted to murder all the Spaniards, and that they
set fire to the provisions they had laid up, on purpose to distress
and starve them; things that I had never heard of, and that,
indeed, were never all of them true in fact: but it was 60 warm in
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
217
my imagination, and so realised to me, that, to the hour I saw them,
I could not be persuaded but that it was or would be true; also
how I resented it, when the Spaniard complained to me; and how
I brought them to justice, tried them, and ordered them all three to
be hanged. What there was really in this shall be seen in its place :
for however I came to form such ´hings in my dream, and what
secret converse of spirits injected it, yet there was, I say, much of it
true. I own that this dream had nothing in it literally and
specifically true; but the general part was so true-the base,
villainous behaviour of these three hardened rogues was such, and
had been so much worse than all I can describe, that the dream
had too much similitude of the fact; and as I would afterwards
have punished them severely, so, if I had hanged them all, I had
been much in the right, and even should have been justified both
by the laws of God and man.
But to return to my story: In this kind of temper I lived some
years; I had no enjoyment of my life, no pleasant hours, no agree-
able diversion, but what had something or other of this in it; se
that my wife, who saw my mind wholly bent upon it, told me very
seriously one night, that she believed there was some secret, power-
ful impulse of Providence upon me, which had determined me to go
thither again; and that she found nothing hindered me going but
my being engaged to a wife and children. She told me that it was
true she could not think of parting with me: but as she was assured
that if she was dead it would be the first thing I would do ; so, as
it seemed to her that the thing was determined above, she would
not be the only obstruction; for, if I thought fit and resolved to go
Here she found me very intent upon her words, and that I
looked very earnestly at her, so that it a little disordered her, and she
stopped I asked her why she did not go on, and say out what she
was going to say? But I perceived that her heart was too full, and
some tears stood in her eyes.] "Speak out, my dear," said I;
are you willing I should go?"-"No," says she, very affection-
ately, "I am far from willing; but if you are resolved to go," sayı
she, "rather than I would be the only hindrance, I will go with
you: for though I think it a most preposterous thing for one of
your years, and in your condition, yet, if it must be," said she, again
weeping, I would not leave you; for if it be of heaven you must
do it, there is no resisting it; and if heaven make it your duty to
go, He will also make it mine to go with you, or otherwise dispose
of me, that I may not obstruct it."
(
This affectionate behaviour of my wife's brought me a little out of
the vapours, and I began to consider what I was doing; I corrected
my wandering fancy, and began to argue with myself sedately what
business I had after threescore years, and after such a life of tedious
sufferings and disasters, and closed in so happy and easy a manner;
I say, what business had I to rush into new hazards, and put myssli
upon adventures fit only for youth and poverty to run into!

218
LIFE AND ADVENTURes of
With those thoughts I considered my new engagement; that I
had a wife, one child born, and my wife then great with child of
another; that I had all the world could give me, and had no need
to seek hazard for gain; that I was declining in years, and ought to
think rather of leaving what I had gained than of seeking to
increase it; that as to what my wife had said of its being an impulse
from heaven, and that it should be my duty to go, I had no notion
of that; so, after many of these cogitations, I struggled with the
power of my imagination, reasoned myself out of it, as I believe
In a word, I
people may always do in like cases if they will
conquered it; composed myself with such arguments as occurred
to my thoughts, and which my present condition furnished me
plentifully with; and particularly, as the most effectual method, I
resolved to divert myself with other things, and to engage in some
business that might effectually tie me up from any more excursions
of this kind; for I found that thing return upon me chiefly when I
was idle, and had nothing to do, nor anything of moment im-
mediately before me. To this purpose, I bought a little farm in the
I had a
county of Bedford, and resolved to remove myself thither
little convenient house upon it, and the land about it, I found, was
capable of great improvement; and it was many ways suited to my
inclination, which delighted in cultivating, managing, planting,
and improving of land; and particularly, being an inland country,
I was removed from conversing among sailors and things relating
to the remote parts of the world. I went down to my farm, settled
my family, bought ploughs, harrows, a cart, waggon-horses, cows,
and sheep, and, setting seriously to work, became in one half-year
a mere country gentleman. My thoughts were entirely taken up in
managing my servants, cultivating the ground, enclosing, planting,
etc.; and I lived, as I thought, the most agreeable life that nature
was capable of directing, or that a man always bred to misfortunes
was capable of retreating to.
I farmed upon my own land; i had no rent to pay, was limited
by no articles; I could pull up or cut down as I pleased; what I
planted was for myself, and what I improved was for my family;
and having thus left off the thoughts of wandering, I had not the
least discomfort in any part of life as to this world. Now I
thought, indeed, that I enjoyed the middle state of life which my
father so earnestly recommended to me, and lived a kind of
heavenly life, something like what is described by the poet, upon
the subject of a country life :-
"Free from vices, free from care,
Age has no pain, and youth no snare.
But in the middle of all this felicity, one blow from unseen
Providence unhinged me at once; and not only made a breach
apon me inevitable and incurable, but drove me, by its conse
quences, into a deep relapse of the wandering disposition, which, as
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
219
I may say, being born in my very blood, soon recovered its hold of
me; and, like the returns of a violent distemper, came on with an
irresistible force upon me. This blow was the loss of my wife. It
is not my business here to write an elegy upon my wife, give a
character of her particular virtues, and make my court to the sex by
the flattery of a funeral sermon. She was, in a few words, the stay
of all my affairs; the centre of all my enterprises; the engine that,
by her prudence, reduced me to that happy compass I was in, from
the most extravagant and ruinous project that filled my head, and
did more to guide my rambling genius than a mother's tears, a
father's instructions, a friend's counsel, or all my own reasoning
powers could da was happy in listening to her, and in being
moved by her entreaties; and to the last degree lesolate and
dislocated in the world by the loss of her.
When she was gone, the world looked awkwardly round me.
was as much a stranger in it, in my thoughts, as I was in the
Brazils, when I first went on shore there; and as much alone,
ne
except for the assistance of servants, as I was in my island. I
knew neither what to think nor what to do. I saw the world busy
around me : one part labouring for bread, another part squandering
in vile excesses or empty pleasures, but equally miserable because
the end they proposed still fled from them; for the men of pleasure
every day surfeited of their vice, and heaped up work for sorrow
and repentance; and the men of labour spent their strength in
daily struggling for bread to maintain the vital strength they
laboured with: so living in a daily circulation of sorrow, living but
to work, and working but to live, as if daily bread were the only end
of wearisome life, and a wearisome life the only occasion of daily
bread.
This put me in mind of the life I lived in my kingdom, the
Island; where I suffered no more corn to grow, because I did not
want it; and bred no more goats, because I had no more use for
them; where the money lay in the drawer till it grew mouldy, and
had scarce the favour to be looked upon in twenty years. All these
things, had I improved them as I ought to have done, and as
reason and religion had dictated to me, would have taught me to
search farther than human enjoyments for a full felicity; and that
there was something which certainly was the reason and end of
life superior to all these things, and which was either to be
possessed, or at least hoped for, on this side of the grave
But my sage counsellor was gone; I was like a ship without a
pilot, that could only run afore the wind. My thoughts ran all
away again into the old affair; my head was quite turned with the
whimsies of foreign adventures; and all the pleasant, innocent
amusements of my farm, my garuen, my cattle, and my family,
which before entirely possessed me, were nothing to me, had no
relish, and were like music to one that has no ear, or food to one
that has no taste. In a word, I resolved to leave off housekeeping,
g
life and adventures of
let my farm, and return to London; and in a few months after I
did so.
When I came to London, I was still as uneasy as I was before;
I had no relish for the place, no employment in it, nothing to do
but to saunter about like an idle person, of whom it may be said he
is perfectly useless in God's creation, and it is not one farthing's
matter to the rest of his ind whether he be dead or alive. This
also was the thing which, of all circumstances of life, was the most
my aversion, who had been all my days used to an active life; and
I would often say to myself, "A state of idleness is the very dregs
of life;" and, indeed, I thought I was much more suitably
employed when I was twenty-six days making a deal board.
It was now the beginning of the year 1693, when my nephew,
whom, as I have observed before, I had brought up to the sea, and
had made him commander of a ship, was come home from a
short voyage to Bilboa, being the first he had made. He came to
me, and told me that some merchants of his acquaintance had been
proposing to him to go a voyage for them to the East Indies, and
to China, as private traders. And now, uncle," says he, "if you
will go to sea with me, I will engage to land you upon your old
habitation in the island; for we are to touch at the Brazils.
Nothing can be a greater demonstration of a future state, and of
the existence of an invisible world, than the concurrence of second
causes with the idea of things which we form in our minds,
perfectly reserved, and not communicated to any in the world.
part
My nephew knew nothing how far my distemper of wandering
was returned upon me, and I knew nothing of what he had in his
thought to say, when that very morning, before he came to me, I
had, in a great deal of confusion of thought, and revolving every
of my circumstances in my mind, come to this resolution, that
would go to Lisbon, and consult with my old sea-captain; and if
it was rational and practicable, I would go and see the island again,
and what was become of my people there. I had pleased myself
with the thoughts of peopling the place, and carrying inhabitants
from hence, getting a patent for the possession, and I know not
what; when, in the middle of all this, in comes my nephew, as I
have said, with his project of carrying me thither in his way to the
East Indies.
I paused a while at his words, and looking steadily at him,
"What devil," said I, "sent you on this unlucky errand?" My
nephew stared as if he had been frightened at first; but perceiving
that I was not much displeased at the proposal, he recovered
himself. I hope it may not be an unlucky proposal, sir," says he.
*I dare say you would be pleased to see your new colony there,
where you once reigned with more felicity than most of your
brother monarchs in the world." In a word, the scheme hit so
exactly with my temper, that is to say, the prepossession I was
under, and of which I have said so much, that I told him, in a few
robinson crusor.
231
(t
words, if he agreed with the merchants, I would go with him; ba
I told him I would not promise to go any further than my wa
island. "Why, sir," says he, "you don't want to be left there
again, I hope?" But," said 1, " can you not take me up again
on your returns He told me it would not be possible to do so;
that the merchants would never allow him to come that way with a
laden ship of such value, it being a month's sail out of his way, and
might be three or four. "Besides, sir, if I should miscarry," said
he, "and not return at all, then you would be just reduced to the
condition you were in before."
I
This was very rational; but we both found out a remedy for it;
which was, to carry a framed sloop on board the ship, which being
taken in pieces, might, by the help of some carpenters, whom we
agreed to carry with us, be set up again in the island, and finished
fit to go to sea in a few days. I was not long resolving; for
indeed, the importunities of my nephew joined so effectually with
my inclination, that nothing could oppose me; on the other hand,
my wife being dead, none concerned themselves so much for me as
to persuade me one way or the other, except my ancient good friend
the widow, who earnestly struggled with me to consider my years,
my easy circumstances, and the neediess hazards of a long voyage;
and above all, my young children. But it was all to no purpose;
had an irresistible desire for the voyage; and I told her I thought
there was something so uncommon in the impressions I had upon
my mind, that it would be a kind of resisting Providence if I should
attempt to stay at home; after which she ceased her expostulations,
and joined with me, not only in making provision for my voyage,
but also in settling my family affairs for my absence, and providing
for the education of my children. In order to do this, I made my
will, and settled the estate I had in such a manner for my children,
and placed in such hands, that I was perfectly easy and satisfied
they would have justice done them, whatever might befall me; and
for their education, I left it wholly to the widow, with a sufficient
maintenance to herself for her care: all which she richly deserved ;
for no mother could have taken more care in their education, or
understood it better; and as she lived till I came home, I also
lived to thank her for it.
My nephew was ready to sail about the beginning of January
1694-5; and I, with my man Friday, went on board, in the Downs,
the 8th; having, besides that sloop which I mentioned above, a
very considerable cargo of all kinds of necessary things for my
colony; which, if I did not find in good condition, I resolved to
leave so.
First, I carried with me some servants whom I purposed to place
there as inhabitants, or at least to set on work there upon my
account, while I stayed, and either to leave them there or carry
them forward, as they should appear willing; particularly, I carried
two carpenters, a smith, and a very handy, ingenious fellow, who
#ja
life and adventures of
was a cooper by trade, and was also a general mechanic; for
was dexterous at making wheels and hand-mills to grind corn, was
a good turner and a good pot-maker; he also made anything that
was proper to make of earth or of wood in a word, we called him
our Jack-of-all-trades. With these I carried a tailor, who had
offered himself to go a passenger to the East Indies with my
nephew, but afterwards consented to stay on our new plantation,
and who proved a most necessary handy fellow as could be desired
in many other businesses besides that of his trade; for, as I
observed formerly, necessity arms us for all employments.
My cargo, as near as I can recollect, for I have not kept account
of the particulars, consisted of a sufficient quantity of linen, and
some English thin stuffs, for clothing the Spaniards that I expected
to find there; and enough of them, as by my calculation, might
comfortably supply them for seven years; if I remember right,
the materials I carried for clothing them, with gloves, hats, shoes,
stockings, and all such things as they could want for wearing,
amounted to above two hundred pounds, including some beds,
bedding, and household stuff, particularly kitchen utensils, with
pots, kettles, pewter, brass, etc.; and near a hundred pounds more
in iron work, nails, tools of every kind, staples, hooks, hinges, and
every necessary thing I could think of.
I carried also a hundred spare arms, muskets, and fusees ;
besides some pistols, a considerable quantity of shot of all sizes,
three or four tons of lead, and two pieces of brass cannon; and,
because I knew not what time and what extremities I was providing
for, I carried a hundred barrels of powder, besides swords, cutlasses,
and the iron part of some pikes and halberts. In short, we had a
large magazine of all sorts of store; and I made my nephew carry
two small quarter deck guns more than he wanted for his ship, to
leave behind if there was occasion; so that when we came there
we might build a fort and man it against all sorts of enemies.
Indeed, I at first thought there would be need enough for all, and
much more, if we hoped to maintain our possession of the island ;
as shall be seen in the course of that story.
I had not such bad luck in this voyage as I had been used to
meet with; and, therefore, shall have the less occasion to interrupt
the reader, who, perhaps, may be impatient to hear how matters
went with my colony; yet some odd accidents, cross winds, and
bad weather happened on this first setting out, which made the
voyage longer than I expected it at first; and I, who had never
made but one voyage, my first voyage to Guinea, in which I might
be said to come back again, as the voyage was at first designed,
began to think the same ill fate attended me, and that I was born
to be never contented with being on shore, and yet to be always
unfortunate at sea. Contrary winds first put us to the northward,
and we were obliged to put in at Galway, in Ireland, where we
lay wind-bound two-and-twenty days; but we had this satisfaction
ROBINSON CRUSoe.
#J
with the disaster, that provisions were here exceeding cheap, and
in the utmost plenty; so that while we lay here we never touched
the ship's stores, but rather added to them. Here, also, I took in
several live hogs, and two cows with their calves, which I resolved,
if I had a good passage, to put on shore in my island; but we found
occasion to dispose otherwise of them.
We set out on the 5th of February from Ireland, and had a very
fair gale of wind for some days As I remember, it might be about
the 20th of February in the evening late, when the mate, having the
watch, came into the round-house, and told us he saw a flash of
fire, and heard a gun fired; and while he was telling us of it, a boy
came in, and told us the boatswain heard another. This made
us all run out upon the quarter-deck, where for a while we heard
nothing; but in a few minutes we saw a very great light, and
found that there was some very terrible fire at a distance; imme-
diately we had recourse to our reckonings, in which we all agreed
that there could be no land that way in which the fire showed itself,
no, not for five hundred leagues, for it appeared at W.N.W. Upon
this, we concluded it must be some ship on fire at sea; and as, by
our hearing the noise of guns just before, we concluded that it
could not be far off, we stood directly towards it, and were presently
satisfied we should discover it, because the further we sailed, the
greater the light appeared; though the weather being hazy, we
could not perceive anything but the light for a while. In about half-
an-hour's sailing, the wind being fair for us, though not much of it,
and the weather clearing up a little, we could plainly discern that it
was a great ship on fire in the middle of the sea.
I was most sensibly touched with this disaster, though not at all
acquainted with the persons engaged in it; I presently recollected
my former circumstances, and what condition I was in when taken
up by the Portuguese captain; and how much more deplorable the
circumstances of the poor creatures belonging to that ship must be,
if they had no other ship in company with them. Upon this I
immediately ordered that five guns should be fired, one soon after
another, that, if possible, we might give notice to them that there
was help for them at hand, and that they might endeavour
themselves in their boat; for though we could see the flames' of the
ship, yet they, it being night, could see nothing of us.
• save
We lay by some time upon this, only driving as the burning ship
drove, waiting for daylight; when, on a sudden, to our great terror,
though we had reason to expect it, the ship blew up in the air; and
in a few minutes all the fire was out, that is to say, the rest of the
ship sunk This was a terrible, and indeed an afflicting sight, for
the sake of the poor men, who, I concluded, must be either all
destroyed in the ship, or be in the utmost distress in their boat, in
the middle of the ocean; which, at present, as it was dark, I could
not see. However, to direct them as well as I could, I caused
Byhts to be hung out in all parts of the ship where we could, and
224
LIFE AND Adventures oF
which we had lanterns for, and kept firing guns all the night long :
letting them know by this that there was a ship not far off.
About eight o'clock in the morning we discovered the ship's boats
by the help of our perspective glasses, and found there were two of
them, both thronged with people, and deep in the water. We
perceived they rowed, the wind being against them; that they saw
our ship, and did their utmost to make us see them. We imme-
diately spread our ancient, to let them know we saw them, and
bung a waft out, as a signal for them to come on board, and then
made more sail, standing directly to them. In little more than
half-an-hour we came up with them; and took them all in, being
no less than sixty-four men, women, and children; for there were
a great many passengers.
Upon inquiry we found it was a French merchant ship of three
hundred tons, home-bound from Quebec. The master gave us a
long account of the distress of his ship; how the fire began in the
steerage by the negligence of the steersman, which, on his crying
out for help, was, as everybody thought, entirely put out; but they
soon found that some sparks of the first fire had got into some part
of the ship so difficult to come at that they could not effectually
quench it; and afterwards getting in between the timbers, and
within the ceiling of the ship, it proceeded into the hold, and
mastered all the skill and all the application they were able to
exert.
They had no more to do then but to get into their boats, which,
to their great comfort, were pretty large; being their long-boat,
and a great shallop, besides a small skiff, which was of no great
service to them, other than to get some fresh water and provisions
into her, after they had secured their lives from the fire. They had,
indeed, small hopes of their lives by getting into these boats at that
distance from any land; only, as they said, that they thus escaped
from the fire, and there was a possibility that some ship might
happen to be at sea, and might take them in. They had sails, oars,
and a compass; and had as much provision and water as, with
sparing it so as to be next door to starving, might support them about
twelve days, in which, if they had no bad weather and no contrary
winds, the captain said he hoped he might get to the banks of New-
foundland, and might perhaps take some fish, to sustain them till
they might go on shore. But there were so many chances against
them in all these cases, such as storms, to overset and founder
them; rains and cold, to benumb and perish their limbs; contrary
winds, to keep them out and starve them; that it must have been
next to miraculous if they had escaped.
In the midst of their consternation, every one being hopeless and
ready to despair, the captain, with tears in his eyes, told me they
were on a sudden surprised with the joy of hearing a gun fire, and
after that four more : these were the five guns which I caused to be
fired at first seeing the light. This revived their hearts, and gave
ROBINSON CRUsob.
them the notice, which, as above, I desired it should, that there
was a ship at hand for their help. It was upon the hearing of these
guns that they took down their masts and sails: the sound coming
from the windward, they resolved to lie by till morning. Some time
after this, hearing no more guns, they fired three muskets, one a
considerable while after another; but these, the wind being
contrary, we never heard. Some time after that again they were
still more agreeably surprised with seeing our lights, and hearing
the guns, which, as I have said, I caused to be fired all the rest of.
the night This set them to work with their oars, to keep their
boats ahead, at least that we might the sooner come up with them;
and at last, to their inexpressible joy, they found we saw them.
It is impossible for me to express the several gestures, the strange
ecstasies, the variety of postures which these poor delivered people
ran into, to express the joy of their souls at so unexpected a deliver-
ance. Grief and fear are easily described: sighs, tears, groans,
and a very few motions of the head and hands, make up the sum
of its variety; but an excess of joy, a surprise of joy, has a thousand
extravagances in it. There were some in tears; some raging and
tearing themselves, as if they had been in the greatest agonies of
sorrow; some stark raving and downright lunatic; some ran about
the ship stamping with their feet, others wringing their hands ;
some were dancing, some singing, some laughing, more crying,
many quite dumb, not able to speak a word; others sick and
vomiting; several swooning and ready to faint; and a few werè
crossing themselves and giving God thanks.
I would not wrong them either; there might be many that were
thankful afterwards; but the passion was too strong for them at
first, and they were not able to master it: they were thrown into
ecstacies, and a kind of frenzy, and it was but a very few that were
composed and serious in their joy. Perhaps, also, the case may
have some addition to it from the particular circumstance of that
nation they belonged to: I mean the French, whose temper is
allowed to be more volatile, more passionate, and more sprightly,
and their spirits more fluid than in other nations. I am not
philosopher enough to determine the cause; but nothing I had ever
seen before came up to it The ecstacies poor Friday, my trusty
savage, was in when he found his father in the boat came the
nearest to it; and the surprise of the master and his two com-
panions, whom I delivered from the villains that set them on shore
in the island, came a little way towards it; but nothing was to
compare to this, either that I saw in Friday, or anywhere else in
my life.
It is further observable, that these extravagances did not show
themselves in that different manner I have mentioned, in different
persons only; but all the variety would appear, in a short
succession of moments in one and the same person. A man that
we saw this minute dumb, and, as it ware, stupid and confounded,
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
would the next minute be dancing and hallooing like an antic; and
the next inoment be tearing his hair, or pulling his clothes to
pieces, and stamping them under his feet like a madman; in a few
moments after that we would have him all in tears, then sick,
swooning, and, had not immediate help ben had, he would in
few moments have been dead. Thus it was, not with one or two,
or ten or twenty, but with the greatest part of them; and, if Í
remember right, our surgeon was obliged to let blood of about
thirty persons.
ance
There were two priests among them: one an old man, and the
other a young man; and that which was strangest was, the oldest
man was the worst. As soon as he set his foot on board our ship,
and saw himself safe, he dropped down stone dead to all appear-
Not the least sign of life could be perceived in him; our
surgeon immediately applied proper remedies to recover him, and
was the only man in the ship that believed he was not dead. At
length he opened a vein in his arm, having first chafed and rubbed
the part, so as to warm it as much as possible. Upon this the
blood, which only dropped at first, flowing freely, in three minutes
after the man opened his eyes; a quarter of an hour after that he
spoke, grew better, and after the blood was stopped, he walked
about, told us he was perfectly well, and took a dram of cordial
which the surgeon gave him. About a quarter of an hour after this
they came running into the cabin to the surgeon, who was bleeding
a Frenchwoman that had fainted, and told him the priest was gone
stark mad. It seems he had begun to revolve the change of his
circumstances in his mind, and again this put him into an ecstasy
of joy. His spirits whirled about faster than the vessels could
convey them, the blood grew hot and feverish, and the man was as
fit for Bedlam as any creature that ever was in it. The surgeon
would not bleed him again in that condition, but gave him some-
thing to doze and put him to sleep; which, after some time,
operated upon him, and he awoke next morning perfectly composed
and well. The younger priest behaved with great command of his
passions, and was really an example of a serious, well-governed
mind. At his first coming on board the ship he threw himself flat
on his face, prostrating himself in thankfulness for his deliverance,
in which I unhappily and unseasonably disturbed him, really think-
ing he had been in a swoon; but he spoke calmly, thanked me,
told me he was giving God thanks for his deliverance, begged me
to leave him a few moments, and that, next to his Maker, he would
give me thanks also. I was heartily sorry that I disturbed
him, and not only left him, but kept others from interrupting
him also. He continued in that posture about three minutes,
or little more, after I left him, then came to me, as he had
said he would, and, with a great deal of seriousness and affection,
but with tears in his eyes, thanked me, that had, under God, given
him and so many miserable creatures their lives. I told him I had
Fiven
ROBINSON Èrusoe.
237
no need to tell him to thank God for it, rather than me, for I had
seen that he had done that already; but I added that it was
nothing but what reason and humanity dictated to all men, and
that we had as much reason as he to give thanks to God, who had
blessed us so far as to make us the instruments of His mercy to so
many of His creatures. After this the young priest applied
himself to his countrymen, and laboured to compose them: he per-
suaded, entreated, argued, reasoned with them, and did his utmost
to keep them within the exercise of their reason; and with some
be had success, though others were for a time out of all government
of themselves.
I cannot help committing this to writing, as perhaps it may be
useful to those into whose hands it may fall, for guiding themselves
in the extravagances of their passions; for if an excess of joy can
carry men out to such a length beyond the reach of their reason,
what will not the extravagances of anger, rage, and a provoked
mind, carry us to? And, indeed, here I saw reason for keeping an
exceeding watch over our passions of every kind, as well those of
joy and satisfaction as those of sorrow and anger.
We were somewhat disordered by these extravagances among
our new guests for the first day; but after they had retired to
lodgings provided for them as well as our ship would allow, and had
slept heartily-as most of them did, being fatigued and frightened—
they were quite another sort of people the next day. Nothing of
good manners, or civil acknowledgments for the kindness shown
them, was wanting; the French, it is known, are naturally apt
enough to exceed that way The captain and one of the priests
came to me the next day, and desired to speak with me and my
nephew; the commander began to consult with us what should be
done with them; and first, they told us we had saved their lives, so
all they had was little enough for a return to us for that kindness
received. The captain said they had saved some money and some
things of value in their boats, caught hastily out of the flames, and
If we would accept it they were ordered to make an offer of it all to
us; they only desired to be set on shore somewhere in our way,
where, if possible, they might get a passage to France. My nephew
wished to accept their money at first word, and to consider what to
do with them afterwards; but I overruled him in that part, for I
knew what it was to be set on shore in a strange country; and if
the Portuguese captain that took me up at sea had served me so,
the Portuguese captain my deliverance, I
and taken all I had for my deliverance, I must have been starved,
or have been as much a slave at the Brazils as I had been at Bar-
bary, the mere being sold to a Mahometan excepted; and perhaps
a Portuguese is not a much better master than a Turk, if not in
some cases much worse.

I therefore told the French captain that we had taken them up in
their distress, it was true, but that it was our duty to do so, as
ware follow-creatures ; and we would desire to be so delivered if wa
$28
life and adventures of
were in the like or any other extremity; that we had done nothing
for them but what we believed they would have done for us if we
had been in their case and they in ours; but that we took them up
to save them, not to plunder them, and it would be a most
barbarous thing to take that little from them which they had saved
out of the fire, and then set them on shore and leave them; that
this would be first to save them from death, and then kill them our-
selves: save them from drowning, and abandon them to starving;
and therefore I would not let the least thing be taken from them.
As to setting them on shore, I told them, indeed, that was an
exceeding difficulty to us, for that the ship was bound to the East
Indies; and though we were driven out of our course to the west-
ward a very great way, and perhaps were directed by heaven on
purpose for their deliverance, yet it was impossible for us wilfully
to change our voyage on their particular account; nor could my
nephew, the captain, answer it to the freighters, with whom he was
under charter to pursue his voyage by way of Brazil; and all I knew
we could do for them was to put ourselves in the way of meeting
with other ships homeward bound from the West Indies, and get
them a passage, if possible, to England or France.
The first part of the proposal was so generous and kind they
could not but be very thankful for it; but they were in very great
consternation, especially the passengers, at the notion of being
carried away to the East Indies; they then entreated me that as Ĩ
was driven s› far to the westward before I met with them, I would
at least kee›on the same course to the banks of Newfoundland,
where it was probable I might meet with some ship or sloop that
they might lire to carry them back to Canada.
I thought this was but a reasonable request on their part, and
therefore I inclined to agree to it; for indeed I considered that
to carry this whole company to the East Indies would not only be
an intolerable severity upon the poor people, but would be ruining
our whole voyage by devouring all our provisions; so I thought it
no breach of charter-party, but what an unforeseen accident made
absolutely necessary to us, and in which no one could say we were
to blame; for the laws of God and nature would have forbid that
we should refuse to take up two boats full of people in such a
distressed condition; and the nature of the thing, as well re-
specting ourselves as the poor people, obliged us to set them on
shore somewhere or other for their deliverance. So I consented
that we would carry them to Newfoundland, if wind and weather
would permit : and if not, I would carry them to Martinico, in the
West Indies, «
The wind continued fresh easterly, but the weather pretty good;
and as the winds had continued in the points between N.E. and
S.E. a long time, we missed several opportunities of sending them
to France; for we met several ships bound to Europe, whereof two
were French, from St. Christopher's, but they had been so long
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
*:99
It was
beating up against the wind that they durst take in no passengers,
for fear of wanting provisions for the voyage, as well for themselves
as for those they should take in; so we were obliged to go on.
about a week after this that we made the Banks of Newfoundland;
where, to shorten my story, we put all our French people on board
a bark, which they hired at sea there, to put them on shore, and
afterwards to carry them to France, if they could get provisions to
victual themselves with. When I say all the French went on
shore, I should remember that the young priest I spoke of, hearing
we were bound to the East Indies, desired to go the voyage with
us, and to be set on shore on the coast of Coromandel; which I
readily agreed to, for I wonderfully liked the man, and had very
good reason, as will appear afterwards; also four of the seamen
entered themselves on our ship, and proved very useful fellows.
From hence we directed our course for the Test Indies, steering
away S. and S. by E. for about twenty days together, sometimes
little or no wind at all; when we met with another subject for our
humanity to work upon, almost as deplorable as that before.
CHAPTER XXIL
Steer for the West Indies-Distressing account of a Bristol ship, the crow
of which we save, in a state of starvation-Arrive at my island-
Friday's joy on discovering it-Affecting interview betwixt him and
his father on landing-Narrative of the occurrences on the island
during my absence.

T was in the latitude of 27 degrees 5 minutes north,
on the 19th day of March 1694-5, when we spied a
sail, our course S.E. and by S. We soon perceived it
was a large vessel, and that she bore up to us, but
-could not at first know what to make of her, till, after
coming a little nearer, we found she had lost her maintopmast,
foremast, and bowsprit; and presently she fired a gun as a signal
of distress. The weather was pretty good, wind at Ñ.N.W. a fresh
gale, and we soon came to speak with her. We found her a ship
of Bristol, bound home from Barbadoes, but had been blown out of
the road at Barbadoes a few days before she was ready to sail, by
a terrible hurricane, while the captain and chief mate were both
gone on shore; so that, besides the terror of the storm, they were
In an indifferent case for good mariners to bring the ship home.
They had been already nine weeks at sea, and had met with
another terrible storm, after the hurricane was over, which had blown
them quite out of their knowledge to the westward, and in which they
lost their masts. They told us they expected to have seen the
Bahama Islands, but were then driven away again to the south-
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
east, by a strong gale of wind at N.N.W., the same that biew now:
and having no sails to work the ship with but a main course, and
kind of square sail upon a jury foremast, which they had set up,
they could not lie near the wind, but were endeavouring to stand
away for the Canaries.
But that which was worst of all was, that they were almost
starved for want of provisions, besides the fatigues they had under-
gone; their bread and flesh were quite gone-they had not one
ounce left in the ship, and had had none for eleven days. The
only relief they had was their water was not all spent, and they
had about half a barrel of flour left, they had sugar enough; some
succades, or sweetmeats, they had at first, but these were all
devoured; and they had seven casks of rum. There was a youth,
and his mother, and a maid-servant on board, who were passengers,
and thinking the ship was ready to sail, unhappily came on board
the evening before the hurricane began,; and having no provisions
of their own left, they were in a more deplorable condition than the
rest for the seamen, being reduced to such an extreme necessity
themselves, had no compassion, we may be sure, for the poor
passengers; and they were, indeed, in such a condition that their
misery is very hard to describe.
*(
I had perhaps not known this part, if my curiosity had not led
me (the weather being fair, and the wind abated) to go on board
the ship. The second mate, who upon this occasion com-
manded the ship, had been on board our ship, and he told me
they had three passengers in the great cabin that were in a
deplorable condition. Nay," says he, “I believe they are dead,
for I have heard nothing of them for above two days; and I was
afraid to inquire after them,” said he, “for I had nothing to relieve
them with." We immediately applied ourselves to give them what
relief we could spare; and, indeed, I had so far overruled things
with my nephew, that I would have victualled them, though we had
gone away to Virginia, or any other part of the coast of America,
to have supplied ourselves; but there was no necessity for that.
But now they were in a new danger; for they were afraid of
eating too much, even of that little we gave them. The mate, or
commander, brought six men with him in his boat; but these poor
wretches looked like skeletons, and were so weak that they could
hardly sit to their oars. The mate himself was very ill, and half-
starved; for he declared he had reserved nothing from the men,
and went share and share alike with them in every bit they ate.
cautioned him to eat sparingly, and set meat before him im-
mediately, but he had not eaten three mouthfuls before he began to
be sick and out of order; so he stopped a while, and our surgeon
mixed him up something with some broth, which he said would be
to him both food and physic; and after he had taken it he grew
better. In the meantime I forgot not the men, I ordered victuals
to be given them, and the poor creatures rather devoured than ats
ROBINSON CRUSOË.
zji
R: they were so exceedingly hungry that they were in a manner
ravenous, and had no command of themselves; and two of them
ate with so much greediness that they were in danger of their lives
the next morning The sight of these people's distress was very
moving to me, and brought to mind what I had a terrible prospect
of at my first coming on shore in my island, where I had not the
least mouthful of food, or any prospect of procuring any; besides
the hourly apprehensions I had of being made the food of other
creatures. But all the while the mate was thus relating to me the
miserable condition of the ship's company, I could not put out of
my thought the story he had told me of the three poor creatures in
the great cabin-viz., the mother, her son, and the maid-servant,
whom he had heard nothing of for two or three days, and whom,
he seemed to confess, they had wholly neglected, their own
extremities being so great; by which I understood that they had
really given them no food at all, and that therefore they must be
perished, and be all lying dead, perhaps, on the floor or deck of the
cabin.
As I therefore kept the mate, whom we then called captain, or
board with his men, to refresh them, so I also forgot not the
starving crew that were left on board, but ordered my own boat to
go on board the ship, and, with my mate and twelve men, to carry
them a sack of bread, and four or five pieces of beef to boil. Our
surgeon charged the men to cause the meat to be boiled while they
stayed, and to keep guard in the cook-room, to prevent the men
taking it to eat raw, or taking it out of the pot before it was well
boiled, and then to give every man but a very little at a time: and
by this caution he preserved the men, who would otherwise have
killed themselves with that very food that was given them on
purpose to save their lives.
At the same time I ordered the mate to go into the great cabin,
and see what condition the poor passengers were in; and if they
were alive, to comfort them, and give them what refreshment was
proper and the surgeon gave him a large pitcher, with some of the
prepared broth which he had given the mate that was on board,
and which he did not question would restore them gradually. Í
was not satisfied with this: but, as I said above, having a great
mind to see the scene of misery which I knew the ship itself would
present me with, in a more lively manner than I could have it by
report, I took the captain of the ship, as we now called him, with
me, and went myself, a little after, in their boat.
I found the poor men on board almost in a tumult to get the
victuals out of the hoiler before it was ready; but my mate
observed his orders, and kept a good guard at the cook-room door,
and the man he placed there, after using all possible persuasion to
have patience, kept them off by force; however, he caused some
biscuit cakes to be dipped in the pot, and softened with the liquor
of the meat, which they called brewis, and gave them every one
232
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
some to stay their stomachs, and told them it was for their own
safety that he was, liged to give them but little at a time. But it
was all in vain; and had I not come on board, and their own
commander and officers with me, and with good words, and some
threats also of giving them no more, I believe they would have
broken into the cook-room by force, and torn the meat out of the
furnace for words are indeed of very small force to a hungry belly ;
however, we pacified them, and fed them gradually and cautiously
at first, and the next time gave them more, and at last filled their
bellies, and the men did well enough.
But the misery of the poor passengers in the cabin was of another
mature, and far beyond the rest; for as, first, the ship's company
had so little for themselves, it was but too true that they had at first
kept them very low, and at last totally neglected them: so that for
six or seven days it might be said they had really no food at all,
and for several days before very little. The poor mother, who, as
the men reported, was a women of sense and good breeding, had
spared all she could so affectionately for her son, that at last she
entirely sank under it; and when the mate of our ship went in, she
sat upon the floor on deck, with her back up against the sides,
between two chairs, which were lashed fast, and her head sunk
between her shoulders like a corpse, though not quite dead. My
mate said all he could to revive and encourage her, and with a
spoon put some broth into her mouth. She opened her lips, and
lifted up one hand, but could not speak yet she understood what
he said, and made signs to him, intimating that it was too late for
her, but pointed to her child, as if she would have said they should
take care of him. However, the mate, who was exceedingly moved
at the sight, endeavoured to get some of the broth into her mouth
and, as he said, got two or three spoonfuls down-though
question whether he could be sure of it or not: but it was too late,
and she died the same night.
The youth, who was preserved at the price of his most affection-
ate mother's life, was not so far gone; yet he lay in a cabin bed, as
one stretched out, with hardly any life left in him. He had a piece
of an old glove in his mouth, having eaten up the rest of it;
however, being young, and having more strength than his mother,
the mate got something down his throat, and he began sensibly
to revive; though by giving him, some time after, but two or
three spoonfuls extraordinary, he was very sick, and brought it
up again.
But the next care was the poor maid: śne lay all along upon the
deck, hard by her mistress, and just like one that had fallen down
in a fit of apoplexy, and struggled for life. Her limbs were
distorted; one of her hands was clasped round the frame of the
chair, and she gripped it so hard that we could not easily make her
let it go; her other arm lay over her head, and her feet lay both
together, set fast against the frame of the cabin table; in short,
#
ROBINSOn crusoe.
233
A
she lay just like one in the agonies of death, and yet she was alive,
too. The poor creature was not only starved with hunger, and
terrified with the thoughts of death, but, as the men told us after-
wards, was broken-hearted for her mistress, whom she saw dying
for two or three days before, and whom she loved most tenderly,
We knew not what to do with this poor girl; for when our surgeon,
who was a man of very great knowledge and experience, had, with
great application, recovered her as to life, he had her upon his
hands still; for she was little less than distracted for a considerable
time after.
Whoever shall read these memorandums must be desired to
consider that visits at sea are not like a journey into the country,
where sometimes people stay a week or a fortnight at a place. Our
business was to relieve this distressed ship's crew, but not lie by
for them; and though they were willing to steer the same course
with us for some days, yet we could carry no sail to keep pace with
a ship that had no masts. However, as their captain begged of us
to help him to set up a main-topmast, and a kind of a topmast to
his jury-foremast, we did, as it were, lie by him for three or four
days; and then, having given him five barrels of beef, a barrel
of pork, two hogsheads of biscuit, and a proportion of peas, flour,
and what other things we could spare; and taking three casks of
sugar, some rum, and some pieces of eight from them for satis-
faction, we left them, taking on board with us, at their own earnest
request, the youth and the maid, and all their goods.
The young lad was about seventeen years of age, a pretty,
well-bred, modest, and sensible youth, greatly dejected with the
loss of his mother, and also at having lost his father but a few
months before, at Barbadoes. He begged of the surgeon to speak
to me to take him out of the ship; for he said the cruel fellows had
murdered his mother: and, indeed, so they had, that is to say,
passively; for they might have spared a small sustenance to the
poor helpless widow, though it had been but just enough to keep
her alive; but hunger knows no friend, no relation, no justice, no
right, and therefore is remorseless, and capable of no compassion
The surgeon told him how far we were going, and that it would
carry him away from all his friends, and put him, perhaps, in as
bad circumstances almost as those we found him in-that is to say,
starving in the world. He said it mattered not whither he went,
he was but delivered from the terrible crew that he was among;
that the captain (by which he meant me, for he could know nothing
of my nephew) had saved his life, and he was sure would not hurt
him; and as for the maid, he was sure, if she came to herself, she
would be very thankful for it, let us carry them where we would.
The surgeon represented the case so affectionately to me that I
yielded, and we took them both on board, with all their goods,
except eleven hogsheads of sugar, which could not be removed or
comë at ; and as the youth had a bill of lading for them, I made
234
life and adventures of
bis commander sign a writing, obliging himself to go, as soon as he
came to Bristol, to one Mr. Rogers, a merchant there, to whom the
youth said he was related, and to deliver a letter which I wrate to
him, and all the goods he had belonging to the deceased widow
which, I suppose, was not done, for I could never learn that the
ship came to Bristel, but was, as is most probable, lost at sea;
being in so disabled a condition, and so far from any land, that I
am of opinion the first storm she met with afterwards she might
founder, for she was leaky, and had damage in her hold when we
met with her.
I was now in the latitude of 19° 32′, and had hitherto a tolerable
voyage as to weather, though at first the winds had been contrary,
I shall trouble nobody with the little incidents of wind, weather, cur-
rents, etc., on the rest of our voyage; but to shorten my story, shall
observe that I came to my old habitation, the island, on the roth of
April 1695. It was with no small difficulty that I found the place; for
as I came to it and went to it before on the south and east side of the
island, coming from the Brazils, so now, coming in between the main
and the island, and having no chart for the coast, nor any landmark,
I did not know it when I saw it, or know whether I saw it or not.
We beat about a great while, and went on shore on several lands
in the mouth of the great river Oronooque, but none for my
purpose; only this I learned by my coasting the shore, that I was
under one great mistake before-viz, that the continent which I
thought I saw from the island I lived in was really no continent,
but a long island, or rather a ridge of islands, reaching from one to
the other side of the extended mouth of that great river; and that
the savages who came to my island were not properly those which
we call Caribbees, but islanders, and other barbarians of the same
kind, who inhabited nearer to our side than the rest.
In short, I visited several of these islands to no purpose;
some I found were inhabited, and some were not; on one of them
I found some Spaniards, and thought they had lived there; but
speaking with them, found they had a sloop lying in a small creek
hard by, and came thither to make salt, and to catch some pearl-
mussels if they could; but that they belonged to the Isle de
Trinidad, which lay farther north, in the latitude of 10 and 11
degrees.
Thus coasting from one island to another, sometimes with the
ship, sometimes with the Frenchman's shallop, which we had found
a convenient boat, and therefore kept her with their very good will,
at length I came fair on the south side of my island, and presently
knew the very countenance of the place: so I brought the ship
safe to an anchor, broadside with the little creek where my old
habitation was As soon as I saw the place I called for Friday,
and asked him if he knew where he was? He looked about a little,
and presently clapping his hands, cried, "Oh, yes, Oh, there, Oh,
yes, Ok, there !" pointing to our old habitation, and fell dancing
7
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
235
and capering like a mad fellow; and I had much ado to keep him
from jumping into the sea, to swim ashore to the place.
(6
"Well, Friday," says I, "do you think we shall find anybody
here or no? and do you think we shall see your father?" The
fellow stood mute as a stock a good while; but when I named his
father, the poor, affectionate creature looked dejected, and I could
see the tears run down his face very plentifully. "What is the
matter, Friday? are you troubled because you may see your father?”
"No, no," says he, shaking his head, no see him more: no,
never more see him again." Why so, Friday? how do you know
that?”—“ Oh, no, Oh, no,” says Friday, "he long ago die, long
ago; he much old man." “Well, well, Friday, you don't know;
but shall we see any one else, then?” The fellow, it seems, had
better eyes than I, and he points to the hill just above my old
house; and though we lay half-a-league off, he cries out, "We
see, we see, yes, yes, we see much man there, and there, and there."
I looked, but I saw nobody-no, not with a perspective glass,
which was, I suppose, because I could not hit the place: for the
fellow was right, as I found upon inquiry the next day; and there
were five or six men all together, who stood to look at the ship,
not knowing what to think of us.
As soon as Friday told me he saw people, I caused the English
ancient to be spread, and fired three guns, to give them notice we
were friends; and in about a quarter of an hour after we perceived
a smoke arise from the side of the creek; so I immediately ordered
the boat out, taking Friday with me, and hanging out a white flag,
I went directly on shore, taking with me the young friar I
mentioned, to whom I had told the story of my living there, and the
manner of it, and every particular, both of myself and those I left
there, and who was on that account extremely desirous to go with
me. We had, besides, about sixteen men well armed, if we had
found any new guests there which we did not know of; but we had
no need of weapons.
As we went on shore upon the tide of flood, near high water,
we rowed directly into the creek; and the first man I fixed my eye
upon was the Spaniard whose life I had saved, and whom I knew
by his face perfectly well: as to his habit, I shall describe it
afterwards ordered nobody to go on shore at first but myself;
but there was no keeping Friday in the boat, for the affectionate
creature had spied his father at a distance, a good way off the
Spaniards, where, indeed, I saw nothing of him; and if they had
not let him go ashore, he would have jumped into the sea.
He was
no sooner on shore, but he flew away to his father like an arrow
out of a bow. It would have made any man shed tears, in spite of
the firmest resolution, to have seen the first transports of this poor
fellow's joy when he came to his father: how he embraced him,
kissed him, stroked his face, took him up in his arms, set him down
upon a tree, and lay down by him; then stood and looked at him,

236
life and ADVENTURES OF
i
as any one would look at a strange picture, for a quarter of an hour
together; then lay down on the ground, and stroked his legs, and
kissed them, and then got up again and stared at him; one would
have thought the fellow bewitched. But it would have made a dog
laugh the next day to see how his passion ran out another way: in
the morning he walked along the shore with his father several
hours, always leading him by the hand, as if he had been a lady;
and every now and then he would come to the boat to fetch some-
thing or other for him, either a lump of sugar, a dram, a biscuit, or
something or other that was good. In the afternoon his frolics ran
another way; for then he would set the old man down upon the
ground, and dance about him, and make a thousand antic gestures ;
and all the while he did this he would be talking to him, and
telling him one story or another of his travels, and of what had
happened to him abroad, to divert him. In short, if the same filial
affection was to be found in Christians to their parents in our part
of the world, one would be tempted to say there would hardly
have been any need of the fifth commandment.
But this is a digression: I return to my landing. It would be
needless to take notice of all the ceremonies and civilities that the
Spaniards received me with. The first Spaniard, whom, as I said,
I knew very well, was he whose life I had saved. He came
towards the boat, attended by one more, carrying a flag of truce
also; and he not only did not know me at first, but he had no
thoughts, no notion of its being me that was come, till I spoke to
him. "Senhor," said I, in Portuguese, "do you not know me?" At
which he spoke not a word, but giving his musket to the man that
was with him, threw his arms abroad, saying something in Spanish
that I did not perfectly hear, came forward and embraced me,
telling me he was inexcusable not to know that face again that he
had once seen, as of an angel from heaven sent to save his life;
he said abundance of very handsome things, as a well-bred
Spaniard always knows how, and then, beckoning to the person
that attended him, bade him go and call out his comrades. He
then asked me if I would walk to my old habitation, where he
would give me possession of my own house again, and where I should
see they had made but mean improvements. I walked along with
him, but, alas! I could no more find the place than if I had never
been there; for they had planted so many trees, and placed them in
such a position, so thick and close to one another, and in ten years'
time they were grown so big, that the place was inaccessible, except
by such windings and blind ways as they themselves only, who
matle them, could find.
I asked them what put them upon all these fortifications; he
told me I would say there was need enough of it when they had
given me an account how they had passed their time since their
arriving in the island, especially after they had the misfortune to
find that I was gone. He told me he could not but have some
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
237
pleasure in my good fortune, when he heard that I was gone in a good
ship, and to my satisfaction; and that he had oftentimes a strong
persuasion the ne time or other he should see me again, but
nothing that ever befell him in his life, he said, was so surprising
and afflicting to him at first as the disappointment he was under
when he came back to the island and found I was not there.
"
As to the three barbarians (so he called them) that were left
behind, and of whom, he said, he had a long story to tell me, the
Spaniards all thought themselves much better among the savages,
only that their number was so small: "And," says he, “had
they been strong enough, we had been all long ago in purgatory;
and with that he crossed himself on the breast. "But, sir,” says
he, I hope you will not be displeased when I shall tell you how,
forced by necessity, we were obliged, for our own preservation, to
disarm them, and make them our subjects, as they would not be
content with being moderately our masters, but would be our
murderers." I answered I was afraid of it when I left them there,
and nothing troubled me at my parting from the island but that
they were not come back, that I might have put them in possession
of everything first, and left the others in a state of subjection, as
they deserved; but if they had reduced them to it I was very glad,
and should be very far from finding any fault with it; for I knew
they were a parcel of refractory, ungoverned villains, and were
fit for any manner of mischief.
While I was thus saying this, the man came whom he had sent
back, and with him eleven more. In the dress they were in it was
impossible to guess what nation they were of; but he made all
clear, both to them and to me. First, he turned to me, and pointing
to them, said, "These, sir, are some of the gentlemen who owe
their lives to you ;" and then turning to them, and pointing to me,
he let them know who I was; upon which they all came up, one
by one, not as if they had been sailors, and ordinary fellows, and
the like, but really as if they had been ambassadors or noblemen,
and I a monarch or great conqueror: their behaviour was, to the
last degree, obliging and courteous, and yet mixed with a manly,
majestic gravity, which very well became them; and, in short, they
had so much more manners than I, that I scarce knew how to
receive their civilities, much less how to return them in kind.
The history of their coming to, and conduct in, the island, after
my going away, is so very remarkable, and has so many incidents,
which the former part of my relation will help to understand, and
which will, in most of the particulars, refer to the account I have
already given, that I cannot but commit them, with great delight,
to the reading of those that come after me.
In order to do this as intelligibly as I can, I must go back to the
circumstances in which I left the island, and the persons on it, of
whom I am to speak And first, it is necessary to repeat that I
had sent away Friday's father and the Spaniard (the two whose
238
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
lives I had rescued from the savages) in a large canoe to the main,
as I then thought it, to fetch over the Spaniard's companions that
he left behind him, in order to save them from the like calamity
that he had been in, and in order to succour them for the present;
and that, if possible, we might together find some way for our
deliverance afterwards When I sent them away I had no visible
appearance of, or the least room to hope for, my own deliverance,
any more than I had twenty years before-inuch less had any
foreknowledge of what afterwards happened, I mean, of an English
ship coming on shore there to fetch me off; and it could not be but
a very great surprise to them, when they came back, not only to
find that I was gone, but to find three strangers left on the spot,
possessed of all that I had left behind me, which would otherwise
have been their own.
The first thing, however, which I inquired into, that I might
begin where I left off, was of their own part; and I desired the
Spaniard would give me a particular account of his voyage back to
his countrymen with the boat, when I sent him to fetch them over.
He told me there was little variety in that part, for nothing remark-
able happened to them on the way, having had very calm weather
and a smooth sea As for his countrymen, it could not be doubted,
he said, but that they were overjoyed to see him (it seems he was
the principal man among them, the captain of the vessel they had
been shipwrecked in having been dead some time): they were, he
said, the more surprised to see him, because they knew that he was
fallen into the hands of the savages, who, they were satisfied, would
devour him as they did all the rest of their prisoners; that when he
told them the story of his deliverance, and in what manner he was
furnished for carrying them away, it was like a dream to them, and
their astonishment, he said, was somewhat like that of Joseph's
brethren when he told them who he was, and the story of his
exaltation in Pharaoh's court; but when he showed them the arms,
the powder, the ball, the provisions, that he brought them for their
journey or voyage, they were restored to themselves, took a just
share of the joy of their deliverance, and immediately prepared to
come away with him.?
Their first business was to get canoes; and in this they were
obliged not to stick so much upon the honesty of it, but to trespass
upon their friendly savages, and to borrow two large canoes, or
periaguas, on pretence of going out a-fishing, or for pleasure. In
these they came away the next morning. It seems they wanted no
time to get themselves ready; for they had neither clothes, nor
provisions, nor anything in the world but what they had on them,
and a few roots to eat, of which they used to make their bread.
They were in all three weeks absent; and in that time, unluckily
for them, I had the occasion offered for my escape, as I mentioned
In the other part, and to get off from the island, leaving three of the
most impudent, hardened, ungoverned, disagreeable villains behind
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
239
A
*
me that any man could desire to meet with-to the poor Spaniards'
great grief and disappointment.
The only just thing the rogues did was, that when the Spaniards
came ashore, they gave my letter to them, and gave them provi-
sions, and other relief, as I had ordered them to do; also they
gave them the long paper of directions which I had left with them,
containing the particular methods which I took for managing every
part of my life there; the way I baked my bread, bred up tame
goats, and planteɑ my corn; how I cured my grapes, made my
pots, and, in a word, everything I did. All this being written down,
they gave to the Spaniards (two of them understood English well
enough): nor did they refuse to accommodate the Spaniards with
anything else, for they agreed very well for some time. They gave
them an equal admission into the house or cave, and they began to
live very sociably; and the head Spaniard, who had seen pretty
much of my methods, together with Friday's father, managed all
their affairs; but as for the Englishmen, they did nothing but
ramble about the island, shoot parrots, and catch tortoises; and
when they came home at night, the Spaniards provided their
suppers for them.
The Spaniards would have been satisfied with this had the others
but let them alone, which, however, they could not find in their
hearts to do long: but, like the dog in the manger, they would not
eat themselves, neither would they let the others eat. The
differences, nevertheless, were at first but trivial, and such as are
not worth relating, but at last it broke out into open war: and it
began with all the rudeness and insolence that can be imagined-
without reason, without provocation, contrary to nature, and, indeed,
to common sense; and though, it is true, the first relation of it
came from the Spaniards themselves, whom I may call the accusers,
yet when I came to examine the fellows they could not deny a word
of it.
But before I come to the particulars of this part, I must supply a
defect in my former relation; and this was, I forgot to set down
among the rest, that just as we were weighing the anchor to set
sail, there happened a little quarrel on board of our ship, which I
was once afraid would have turned to a second mutiny; nor was it
appeased till the captain, rousing up his courage, and taking us all
to his assistance, parted them by force, and making two of the most
refractory fellows prisoners, he laid them in irons: and as they had
been active in the former disorders, and let fall some ugly,
dangerous words the second time, he threatened to carry them in
irons to England, and have them hanged there for mutiny and
running away with the ship. This, it seems, though the captain did
not intend to do it, frightened some other men in the ship; and
some of them had put it into the head of the rest that the captain
only gave them good words for the present, till they should come to
some English port, and that then they should be all put into gadi,
940
life and adventures of
and tried for their lives. The mate got intelligence of this, and
acquainted us with it, upon which it was desired that I, who still
passed for a great man among them, should go down with the mate
and satisfy the men, and tell them that they might be assured, if
they behaved well the rest of the voyage, all they had done for the
time past should be pardoned. So I went, and after passing my
honour's word to them they appeared easy, and the more so when
I caused the two men that were in irons to be released and
forgiven.
But this mutiny had brought us to an anchor for that night; the
wind also falling calm next morning, we found that our two men,
who had been laid in irons, had stolen each of them a musket and
some other weapons (what powder or shot they had we knew not),
and had taken the ship's pinnace, which was not yet hauled up, and
run away with her to their companions in roguery on shore. As
soon as we found this, I ordered the long-boat on shore, with
twelve men and the mate, and away they went to seek the rogues ;
but they could neither find them nor any of the rest, for they all
fled into the woods when they saw the boat coming on shore. The
mate was once resolved, in justice to their roguery, to have destroyed
their plantations, burned all their household stuff and furniture,
and left them to shift without it; but having no orders, he let it all
alone, left everything as he found it, and bringing the pinnace away,
came on board without them. These two men made their number
five; but the other three villains were so much more wicked than
they, that after they had been two or three days together they
turned the two new-comers out of doors to shift for themselves, and
would have nothing to do with them; nor could they for a good
while be persuaded to give them any food: as for the Spaniards,
they were not yet come.
When the Spaniards came first on shore, the business began to
go forward: the Spaniards would have persuaded the three English
brutes to have taken in their countrymen again, that, as they said,
they might be all one family; but they would not hear of it, so the
two poor fellows lived by themselves; and finding nothing but
industry and application would make them live comfortably, they
pitched their tents on the north shore of the island, but a little more
to the west, to be out of danger of the savages, who always landed
on the east parts of the island Here they built them two huts, one
to lodge in and the other to lay up their magazines and stores in
and the Spaniards having given them some corn for seed, and some
of the peas which I had left them, they dug, planted, and enclosed,
after the pattern I had set for them all, and began to live pretty
well. Their first crop of corn was on the ground; and though it
was but a little bit of land which they had dug up at first, having
had but a little time, yet it was enough to relieve them, and find
them with bread and other eatables; and one of the fellows being
the cook's mate of the ship, was very ready at making soup,
;
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
241
puddings, and such other preparations as the rice and the milk, and
such little flesh as they got, furnished him to do.
They were going on in this little thriving position when the three
unnatural rogues, their own countrymen, too, in mere humour, and
to insult them, came and bullied them, and told them the island
was theirs that the governor, meaning me, had given them the
possession of it, and nobody else had any right to it; and that they
should build no houses upon their ground unless they would pay
rent for them. The two men, thinking they were jesting at first,
asked them to come in and sit down, and see what fine houses they
were that they had built, and to tell them what rent they demanded;
and one of them merrily said if they were the ground-landlords, he
hoped if they built tenements upon their land, and made improve-
ments, they would, according to the custom of landlords, grant a
long lease: and desired they would get a scrivener to draw the
writings. One of the three, cursing and raging, told them they
should see they were not in jest; and going to a little place at a
distance, where the honest men had made a fire to dress their
victuals, he takes a firebrand, and claps it to the outside of their
hut, and set it on fire: indeed, it would have been all burned down
in a few minutes if one of the two had not run to the fellow, thrust
him away, and trod the fire out with his feet, and that not without
some difficulty, too.
The fellow was in such a rage at the honest man's thrusting him
away, that he returned upon him, with a pole he had in his hand,
and had not the man avoided the blow very nimbly, and run into
the hut, he had ended his days at once. His comrade, seeing the
danger they were both in, ran in after him, and immediately they
rame both out with their muskets, and the man that was first struck
at with the pole knocked the fellow down that began the quarrel
with the stock of his musket, and that before the other two could
come to help him; and then, seeing the rest come at them, they
stood together, and presenting the other ends of the pieces to
them, bade them stand off.
S
The others had fire-arms with them, too; but one of the two
honest men, bolder than his comrade, and made desperate by his
danger, told them if they offered to move hand or foot they were
dead men, and boldly commanded them to lay down their arms.
They did not, indeed, lay down their arms, but seeing him so
resolute, it brought them to a parley, and they consented to take
their wounded man with them and be gone: and, indeed, it seems
the fellow was wounded sufficiently with the blow. However, they
were much in the wrong, since they had the advantage, that they
did not disarm them effectually, as they might have done, and have
gone immediately to the Spaniards, and given them an account
how the rogues had treated them; for the three villains studied
nothing but revenge, and every day gave them some intimation
that they did so.

$43
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
CHAPTER XXIII.
Narrative continued-Insolence of three of the Englishmen to the
Spaniards-They are disarmed and brought to order-A great body
of savages land upou the island-They turn out to be two adverse
nations, met there by chance-A bloody battle betwixt them-
Several of the vanquished party secured by the Spaniarda
Co

B
UT not to crowd this part with an account of the lesser
part of the rogueries with which they plagued them
continually, night and day, it forced the two men to
such a desperation that they resolved to fight them
all three, the first time they had a fair opportunity.
In order to do this they resolved to go to the castle (as they called
my old dwelling), where the three rogues and the Spaniards all
lived together at that time, intending to have a fair battle, and the
Spaniards should stand by to see fair play: so they got up in the
morning before day, and came to the place, and called the English- ·
men by their names, telling a Spaniard that answered that they
wanted to speak with them.
It happened that the day before two of the Spaniards, having
been in the woods, had seen one of the two Englishmen, whom, for
distinction, called the honest men, and he had made a sad
complain to the Spaniards of the barbarous usage they had met
with from their three countrymen, and how they had ruined their
plantation, and destroyed their corn, that they had laboured so hard
to bring forward, and killed the milch-goat and their three kids,
which was all they had provided for their sustenance, and that if he
and his friends, meaning the Spaniards, did not assist them again,
they should be starved. When the Spaniards came home at night,
and they were all at supper, one of them took the freedom to
reprove the three Englishmen, though in very gentle and mannerly
terms, and asked them how they could be so cruel, they being
harmless, inoffensive fellows: that they were putting themselves in
a way to subsist by their labour, and that it had cost them a
great deal of pains to bring things to such perfection as they were
then in.
One of the Englishmen returned very briskly, “What had they
to do there? that they came on shore without leave; and that they
should not plant or build upon the island; it was none of their
ground." Why," says the Spaniard, very calmly, “Seignior
Inglese, they must not starve." The Englishman replied, like a
rough tarpauling, They might starve; they should not plant nor
build in that place. "But what must they do then, seignior?" said
the Spaniard. Another of the brutes returned, “Do? they should
a
"}
ROBINSON crusoe.
843
"
<<
be servants, and work for them." But how can you expect that of
them?" says the Spaniard; "they are not bought with your
money; you have no right to make them servants." The English-
man answered, “The island was theirs; the governor had given it
to them, and no man had anything to do there but themselves;
and with that he swore that he would go and burn all their new
huts; they should build none upon their land. Why, seignior,"
says the Spaniard, "by the same rule, we must be your servants,
too." Ay," returned the bold dog, "and so you shall, too, before
we have done with you;" mixing two or three oaths in the proper
intervals of his speech. The Spaniard only smiled at that, and
made him no answer. However, this little discourse had heated
them; and starting up, one says to the other (I think it was he they
called Will Atkins),´ Come, Jack, let's go and have t'other brush
with them; we'll demolish their castle, I'll warrant you; they shall
plant no colony in our dominions."
Upon this they were all trooping away, with every man a gun, a
pistol, and a sword, and muttered some insolent things among
themselves of what they would do to the Spaniards, too, when
opportunity offered; but the Spaniards, it seems, did not so
perfectly understand them as to know all the particulars, only that
in general they threatened them hard for taking the two English-
men's part. Whither they went, or how they bestowed their time
that evening, the Spaniards said they did not know; but it seems
they wandered about the country part of the night, and then lying
down in the place which I used to call my bower, they were weary
and overslept themselver The case was this: they had resolved
to stay till midnight, and so take the two poor men when they were
asleep, and as they acknowledged afterwards, intended to set fire to
their huts while they were in them, and either burn them there or
murder them as they came out. As malice seldom sleeps very
sound, it was very strange they should not have been kept awake.
However, as the two men had also a design upon them, as I have
said, though a much fairer one than that of burning and murdering,
it happened, and very luckily for them all, that they were up and
gone abroad before the bloody-minded rogues came to their huts.

When they came there, and found the men gone, Atkins, who, it
seems, was the forwardest man, called out to his comrade, “Ha,
Jack, here's the nest, but the birds are flown." They mused a
while, to think what should be the occasion of their being gone
abroad so soon, and suggested presently that the Spaniards had
given them notice of it; and with that they shook hands, and swore
to one another that they would be revenged of the Spaniards. As
soon as they had made the bloody bargain they fell to work with
the poor men's habitation; they did not set fire, indeed, to any
thing, but they pulled down both their houses, not leaving the least
stick standing, or scarce any sign on the ground where they stood;
they tore all their household stuff in pieces, and threw everything
244
life and adventures of
about in such a manner, that the poor men afterwards found some
of their things a mile off. When they had done this, they
pulled up all the young trees which the poor men had planted;
broke down an enclosure they had made to secure their cattle and
their corn, and, in a word, sacked and plundered everything as
completely as a horde of Tartars would have done.
The two men were at this juncture gone to find them out, and
had resolved to fight them wherever they had been, though they
were but two to three; so that, had they met, there certainly would
have been blood shed among them, for they were all very stout,
resolute fellows, to give them their due.
But Providence took more care to keep them asunder than they
themselves could do to meet; for, as if they had dogged one
another, when the three were gone thither, the two were here; and
afterwards, when the two went back to find them, the three were
come to the old habitation again: we shall see their different
conduct presently. When the three came back like furious
creatures, flushed with the rage which the work they had been
about had put them into, they came up to the Spaniards, and told
them what they had done, by way of scoff and bravado; and one of
them stepping up to one of the Spaniards, as if they had been a
couple of boys at play, takes hold of his hat as it was upon his
head, and giving it a twirl about, fleering in his face, says to him,
"And you, Seignior Jack Spaniard, shall have the same sauce if you
do not mend your manners." The Spaniard, who, though a quiet
civil man, was as brave a man as could be, and, withal, a strong,
well-made man, looked at him for a good while, and then, having
no weapon in his hand, stepped gravely up to him, and, with one
blow of his fist, knocked him down, as an ox is felled with a pole-
axe; at which one of the rogues, as insolent as the first, fired his
pistol at the Spaniard immediately; he missed his body, indeed,
for the bullets went through his hair, but one of them touched the
tip of his ear, and he bled pretty much. The blood made the
Spaniard believe he was more hurt than he really was, and that put
him into some heat, for before he acted all in a perfect calm; but
now resolving to go through with his work, he stooped, and taking
the fellow's musket whom he had knocked down, was just going to
shoot the man who had fired at him, when the rest of the Spaniards,
being in the cave, came out, and calling to him not to shoot, they
stepped in, secured the other two, and took their arms from them.
When they were thus disarmed, and found they had made all the
Spaniards their enemies, as well as their own countrymen, they
began to cool, and giving the Spaniards better words, would have
their arms again; but the Spaniards, considering the feud that was
between them and the other two Englishmen, and that it would be
the best method they could take to keep them from killing one
another, told them they would do them no harm; and if they would
Live peaceably, they would be very willing to assist and associate
ROBINSON crusoe.
245
with them as they did before; but that they could not think of
giving them their arms again, while they appeared so resolved to
do mischief with them to their own countrymen, and had even
threatened them all to make them their servants.
The rogues were now quite deaf to all reason, and being refused
their arms, they raved away like madmen, threatening what they
would do, though they had no fire-arms. But the Spaniards,
despising their threatening, told them they should take care how
they offered any injury to their plantation or cattle; for if they did
they would shoot them as they would ravenous beasts, wherever
they found them; and if they fell into their hands alive, they should
certainly be hanged. However, this was far from cooling them, but
away they went, raging and swearing like furies. As soon as they
were gone, the two men came back, in passion and rage enough
also, though of another kind; for having been at their plantation,
and finding it all demolished and destroyed, as above mentioned, it
will easily be supposed they had provocation enough. They could
scarce have room to tell their tale, the Spaniards were so eager
to tell them theirs; and it was strange enough to find that three
men should thus bully nineteen, and receive no punishment at
all.
The Spaniards, indeed, despised them, and especially, having
thus disarmed them, made light of their threatenings; but the two
Englishmen resolved to have their remedy against them, what
pains soever it cost to find them out. But the Spaniards interposed
here too, and told them that as they had disarmed them, they
could not consent that they (the two) should pursue them with fire-
arms, and perhaps kill them. But," said the grave Spaniard, who
was their governor, 64 we will endeavour to make them do you
justice, if you will leave it to us: for there is no doubt but they will
come to us again, when their passion is over, being not able to
subsist without our assistance. We promise you to make no peace
with them without having full satisfaction for you; and, upon this
condition, we hope you will promise to use no violence with them,
other than in your own defence." The two Englishmen yielded to
this very awkwardly, and with great reluctance; but the Spaniards
protested that they did it only to keep them from bloodshed, and to
make them all easy at last. For," said they, we are not so
many of us; here is room enough for us all, and it is a great pity
that we should not be all good friends." At length they did consent,
and waited for the issue of the thing, living for some days with the
Spaniards; for their own habitation was destroyed.
CC
**
In about five days' time the vagrants, tired with wandering, and
almost starved with hunger, having chiefly lived on turtles' eggs all
that while, came back to the grove; and finding my Spaniard, who,
as I have said, was the governor, and two more with him, walking
by the side of the creek, they came up in a very submissive, humble
manner, and begged to be received again into the society. The
245
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
of
Spaniards used them civilly, but told them they had acted so
unnaturally to their countrymen, and so very grossly to themselves,
that they could not come to any conclusion without consulting the
two Englishmen and the rest; but, hongver, they would go to them
and discourse about it, and they chouler know in half-an-hour. It
may be guessed that they were very hard put to it; for, as they
were to wait this half-hour for an answer, they begged they would
send them out some bread in the meantime, which they did, sending
at the same time a large piece of goat's flesh and a boiled parrot,
which they ate very eagerly.
After half-an-hour's consultation they were called in, and a long
debate ensued, their two countrymen charging them with the ruin
of all their labour, and a design to murder them; all which they
owned before, and therefore could not deny now. Upon the whole,
the Spaniards acted the moderators between them; and as they
had obliged the two Englishmen not to hurt the three while they
were naked and unarmed, so they now obliged the three to go and
rebuild their fellows' two huts, one to be of the same and the other
of larger dimensions than they were before; to fence their ground
again, plant trees in the room of those pulled up, dig up the land
again for planting corn, and in a word, to restore everything to the
same state as they found it, that is, as near as they could.
Well, they submitted to all this; and as they had plenty of pro-
visions given them all the while, they grew very orderly, and the
whole society began to live pleasantly and agreeably together again ;
only that these three fellows could never be persuaded to work—1
mean for hemselves-except now and then a little, just as they
pleased; however, the Spaniards told them plainly that if they
would but live sociably and friendly together, and study the good
of the whole plantation, they would be content to work for them,.
and let them walk about and be as idle as they pleased; and thus,
having lived pretty well together for a month or two, the Spaniards
let them have arms again, and gave them liberty to go abroad with
them as before.
It was not above a week after they had these arms, and went
abroad, before the ungrateful creatures began to be as insolent and
troublesome as ever however, an accident happened presently
upon this, which endangered the safety of them all, and they were
obliged to lay by all private resentments, and look to the preserva-
tion of their lives.
It happened one night that the governor, the Spaniard whose
life I had saved, who was now the governor of the rest, found
himself very uneasy in the night, and could by no means get any
sleep: he was perfectly well in body, only found his thoughts
tumultuous; his mind ran upon men fighting and killing one
another; but he was broad awake, and could not by any means
get any sleep; in short, he lay a great while, but growing more and
more uneasy, be resolved to rise. As they lay, being so many of
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
247
them, on goat-skins laid thick upon such couches and pads as they
ade for themselves, so they had little to do, when they were willing
to rise, but to get upon their feet, and perhaps put on a coat,
such as it was, and their pumps, and they were ready for going any
way that their thoughts guided them. Being thus got up, he looked
out; but being dark, he could see little or nothing, and besides, the
trees which I had planted, and which were now grown tall, inter-
cepted his sight, so that he could only look up, and see that it was
a starlight night, and hearing no noise, he returned and lay down
again; but to no pupose; he could not compose himself to anything
like rest; but his thoughts were to the last degree uneasy, and he
knew not for what. Having made some noise with rising and
walking about, going out and coming in, another of them waked,
and asked who it was that was up. The governor told him how it
had been with him. (C
Say you so?" says the other Spaniard;
such things are not to be slighted, I assure you; there is certainly
some mischief working near us; " and presently he asked him,
"Where are the Englishmen ?"-"They are all in their huts," says
he, "safe enough." It seems the Spaniards had kept possession of
the main apartment, and had made a place for the three English-
men, who, since their last mutiny, were always quartered by
themselves, and could not come at the rest. Well," says the
Spaniard, "there is something in it, I am persuaded, from my own
experience. I am satisfied that our spirits embodied have a
converse with and receive intelligence from the spirits unembodied,
and inhabiting the invisible world; and this friendly notice is
given for our advantage, if we knew how to make use of it. Come,
let us go and look abroad; and if we find nothing at all in it to
justify the trouble, I'll tell you a story to the purpose, that shall
convince you of the justice of my proposing it.”
(
They went out presently to go up to the top of the bill, where I
used to go; but they being strong, and a good company, nor alone,
as I was, used none of my cautions to go up by the ladder, and
pulling it up after them, to go up a second stage to the top, but were
going round through the grove unwarily, when they were surprised
with seeing a light as of fire, a very little way from them, and
hearing the voices of men, not of one or two, but of a great number.
Among the precautions I used to take on the savages landing on
the island, it was my constant care to prevent them making the
least discovery of there being any inhabitant upon the place and
when by any occasion they came to know it, they felt it so
effectually that they that got away were scarce able to give any
account of it; for we disappeared as soon as possible; nor did
ever any that had seen me escape to tell any one else, except it was
the three savages in our last encounter who jumped into the boat;
of whom, I mentioned, I was afraid they should go home and
bring more help Whether it was the consequence of the escape
of those men thao great a number came now together, or whether
248
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
they came ignorantly, and by accident, on their usual bloody errand,
the Spaniards could not understand; but whatever it was, it was
their business either to have concealed themselves or not to have
seen them at all, much less to have let the savages have seen there
were any inhabitants in the place; or to have fallen upon them so
effectually as not a man of them should have escaped, which could
only have been by getting in between them and their boats; but
this presence of mind was wanting to them, which was the ruin of
their tranquillity for a great while.
We need not doubt but that the governor and the man with him,
surprised with this sight, ran back immediately and raised their
fellows, giving them an account of the imminent danger they were
all in, and they again as readily took the alarm; but it was im-
possible to persuade them to stay close within where they were,
but they must all run out to see how things stood. While it was
dark, indeed, they were safe, and they had opportunity enough, for
some hours, to view the savages by the light of three fires they had
made at a distance from one another; what they were doing they
knew not, neither did they know what to do themselves. For,
first, the enemy were too many; and, secondly, they did not keep
together, but were divided into several parties, and were on shore
in several places.
The Spaniards were in no small consternation at this sight; and,
as they found that the fellows went straggling all over the shore,
they made no doubt but, first or last, some of them would chop
in upon their habitation, or upon some other place where they
would see the token of inhabitants; and they were in great
perplexity also for fear of their flock of goats, which, if they should
be destroyed, would have been little less than starving them. So
the first thing they resolved upon was to despatch three men away
before it was light, two Spaniards and one Englishman, to drive
away all the goats to the great valley where the cave was, and, if
need were, to drive them into the very cave itself. Could they
have seen the savages all together in one body, and at a distance
from their canoes, they were resolved, if there had been a hundred
of them, to attack them; but that could not be done, for they were
some of them two miles off from the other; and, as it appeared
afterwards, were of two different nations.
After having mused a great while on the course they should take,
they resolved, at last, while it was still dark, to send the old savage,
Friday's father, out as a spy, to learn, if possible, something con-
cerning them-as what they came for, what they intended to do,
and the like. The old man readily undertook it; and stripping
himself quite naked, as most of the savages were, away he went.
After he had been gone an hour or two, he brings word that he had
been among them undiscovered-that he found they were two
parties, and of two several nations, who had war with one another,
and had a great battle in their own country; and that both sides
robinson Crusoe.
249
having had several prisoners taken in the fight, they were, by mere
chance, landed all on the same island, for the devouring their
prisoners and making merry; but their coming so by chance to the
same place had spoiled all their mirth-that they were in a great
rage at one another, and were so near that he believed they would
fight again as soon as daylight began to appear; but he did not
perceive that they had any notion of anybody being on the island
but themselves. He had hardly made an end of telling his story,
when they could perceive, by the unusual noise they made, that the
two little armies were engaged in a bloody fight Friday's father
used all the arguments he could to persuade our people to lie close,
and not be seen; he told them their safety consisted in it, and that
they had nothing to do but lie still, and the savages would kill one
another to their hands, and then the rest would go away; and it
was so to a tittle. But it was impossible to prevail, especially upon
the Englishmen; their curiosity was so importunate that they
must run out and see the battle; however, they used some caution,
too: they did not go openly, just by their own dwelling, but weni
farther into the woods, and placed themselves to advantage, where
they might securely see them manage the fight, and, as they
thought, not be seen by them; but the savages did see them, as we
shall find hereafter.
The battle was very fierce; and, if I might believe the English-
men, one of them said he could perceive that some of them were
men of great bravery, of invincible spirits, and of great policy in
guiding the fight. The battle, they said, held two hours before they
could guess which party would be teaten; but then that party
which was nearest our people's habitation began to appear weakest,
and after some time more, some of them began to fly; and this put
our men again into a great consternation, lest any one of those that
fled should run into the grove before their dwelling for shelter, and
thereby involuntarily discover the place; and that, by consequence,
the pursuers would also do the like in search of them. Upon this,
they resolved that they would stand armed within the wall, and
whoever came into the grove, they resolved to sally out over the
wall and kill them, so that, if possible, not one should return to give
an account of it; they ordered also that it should be done with their
swords, or by knocking them down with the stocks of their
muskets, but not by shooting them, for fear of raising an alarm by
the noise.
As they expected it fell out; three of the routed army fled for life,
and crossing the creek, ran directly into the place, not in the least
knowing whither they went, but running as into a thick wood for
shelter. The scout they kept to look abroad gave notice of this
within, with this comforting addition, that the conquerors had not
pursued them, or seen which way they were gone; upon this, the
Spanish governor, a man of humanity, would not suffer them to kill
the three fugitives, but sending three men out by the top of the hill,
ago
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
ordered them to go round, come in behind them, and surprise and
take them prisoners; which was done. The residue of the conquered
people fled to their canoes, and got off to sea; the victors retired,
made no pursuit, or very little, but drawing themselves into a body
together, gave two great screaming shouts, most likely by way of
triumph-and so the fight ended: the same day, about three o'clock
in the afternoon, they also marched to their canoes. And thus the
Spaniards had the island again free to themselves, their fright was
over, and they saw no savages for several years after
1
After they were all gone, the Spaniards came out of their den,
and viewing the field of battle, they found about two-and-thirty men
dead on the spot; some were killed with long arrows, which were
found sticking in their bodies; but most of them were killed with
great wooden swords, sixteen or seventeen of which they found in
the field of battle, and as many bows, with a great many arrows.
These swords were strange, unwieldly things, and they must be
very strong men that used them; most of those that were killed
with them had their heads mashed to pieces, as we may say, or, as
we call it in English, their brains knocked out, and several their
arms and legs broken; so that it is evident they fight with in-
expressible rage and fury. We found not one man that was not
stone dead; for either they stay by their enemy till they have
killed him, or "ey carry all the wounded men that are not quite
dead away with them.
This deliverance tamed our ill-disposed Englishmen for a great
while; the sight had filled them with horror, and the consequences
appeared terrible to the last degree, especially upon supposing that
some time or other they should fall into the hands of those
creatures, who would not only kill them as enemies, but for food,
as we kill our cattle; and they professed to me that the thoughts
of being eaten up like beef and mutton, though it was supposed it
was not to be till they were dead, had something in it so horrible
that it nauseated their very stomachs, made them sick when they
thought of it, and filled their minds with such unusual terror, that
they were not themselves for some weeks after. This, as I said,
tamed even the three English brutes I have been speaking of; and
for a great while after they were tractable, and went about the
common business of the whole society well enough-planted, sowed,
reaped, and began to be all naturalised to the country. But some
time after this they fell into such simple measures again as brought
them into a great deal of trouble.
•
They had taken three prisoners, as I observed; and these three
being stout young fellows, they made them servants, and taught
them to work for them, and as slaves they did well enough; but
they did not take their measures as I did by my man Friday-viz.,
to begin with them upon the principle of having saved their lives,
and then instruct them in the rational principles of life; much less
did they think of teaching them religion, or attempt civilising and
robinson crusoe.
251
reducing them by kind usage and affectionate arguments. As they
gave them their food every day, so they gave them their work too,
and kept them fully employed in drudgery enough; but they failed
in this by it, that they never had them to assist them and fight for
them as I had my man Friday, who was as true to me as the very
flesh upon my bones.
But to come to the family part. Being all now good friends-
for common danger, as I said above, had effectually reconciled
them-they began to consider their general circumstances; and the
first thing that came under consideration was whether, seeing the
savages particularly haunted that side of the island, and that there
were more remote and retired parts of it equally adapted to their
way of living, and manifestly to their advantage, they should not
rather move their habitation, and plant in some more proper place
for their safety, and especially for the security of their cattle and
corn.
K
Upon tnis, after long debate, it was concluded that they would
not remove their habitation; because that, some time or other, they
thought they might hear from their governor again, meaning me;
and if I should send any one to seek them, I should be sure to
direct them to that side, where, if they should find the place
deinolished, they would conclude the savages had killed us all, and
we were gone, and so our supply would go too. But, as to their
corn and cattle, they agreed to remove them into the valley where
my cave was, where the land was as proper for both, and where,
indeed, there was land enough. However, upon second thoughts,
they altered one part of their resolution too, and resolved only to
remove part of their cattle thither, and plant part of their corn
there; so that if one part was destroyed, the other might be
save And one part of prudence they luckily used; they never
trusted those three savages which they had taken prisoners
with knowing anything of the plantation they had made in that
valley, or of any cattle they had there, much less of the cave
at that place, which they kept, in case of necessity, as a safe
retreat; and thither they carried also the two barrels of powder
which I had sent them at my coming away They resolved,
however, not to change their habitation; yet, as I had carefully
covered it first with a wall or fortification, and then with a grove of
trees, and as they were now fully convinced their safety consisted
entirely in their being concealed, they set to work to cover and
conceal the place yet more effectually than before. For this
purpose, as I planted trees, or rather thrust in stakes, which in time
all grew up to be trees, for some good distance before the entrance
into my apartments, they went on in the same manner, and filled
up the rest of that whole space of ground from the trees I had set
quite down to the side of the creek, where I landed my floats, and
even into the very ooze where the tide flowed, not so much as
leaving any place to land, or any sign that there had been any
1
252
life and adventures of
landing thereabouts-these stakes also being of a wood very
forward to grow, they took care to have them generally much larger
and taller than those which I had planted. As they grew apace,
they planted them so very thick and close together, that when they
had been three or four years grown there was no piercing with the
eye any considerable way into the plantation. As for that part
which I had planted, the trees were grown as thick as a man's
thigh, and among them they had placed so many other short ones,
and so thick, that it stood like a palisado a quarter of a mile thick,
and it was next to impossible to penetrate it, for a little dog could
hardly get between the trees, they stood so close.
But this was not all; for they did the same by all the ground to
the right hand and to the left, and round even to the side of the hill,
leaving no way, not so much as for themselves, to come out but by
the ladder placed up to the side of the hill, and then lifted up, and
placed again from the first stage up to the top: so that when the
ladder was taken down, nothing but what had wings or witchcraft to
assist it could come at them. This was excellently well contrived :
nor was it less than what they afterwards found occasion for,
which served to convince me, that as man prudence has the
authority of Providence to justify it, so it has doubtless the direc-
tion of Providence to set it to work; and if we listened carefully to
the voice of it, I am persuaded we might prevent many of the
disasters which our lives are now, by our own negligence, subjected
to.
&
They lived two years after this in perfect retirement, and had no
more visits from the savages. They had, indeed, an alarm given
them one morning, which put them into a great consternation; for
some of the Spaniards being out early one morning on the west side
or end of the island (which was that end where I never went, for
fear of being discovered), they were surprised with seeing about
twenty canoes of Indians just coming on shore. They made the
best of their way home in hurry enough; and giving the alarm to
their comrades, they kept close all that day and the next, going out
only at night to make their observation; but they had the good
luck to be undiscovered, for wherever the savages went, they did
not land that time on the island, but pursued some other design.

ROBINSON CRUSOE.
953
CHAPTER XXIV.
Fresh broils betwixt the turbulent Englishmen and the Spaniards-
The English make a voyage to the mainland, and return in twenty-
two days-Particulars of their voyage-Description of the men
and women they brought with them-The colony discovered by
an unlucky accident to the savages, who invade the island, but are
defeated.
!
NÓ.
ND now they had another broil with the three English-
men; one of whom, a most turbulent fellow, being in a
rage at one of the three captive slaves, because the
fellow had not done something right which he bade him
do, and seemed a little untractable in his showing him,
drew a hatchet out of a frog-belt which he wore by his side, and
fell upon the poor savage, not to correct him, but to kill him. One
of the Spaniards, who was by, seeing him give the fellow a bar-
barous cut with the hatchet, which he aimed at his head, but stuck
into his shoulder, so that he thought he had cut the poor creature's
arm off, ran to him, and, entreating him not to murder the poor
man, placed himself between him and the savage, to prevent the
mischief The fellow, being enraged the more at this, struck at the
Spaniard with his hatchet, and swore he would serve him as he
intended to serve the savage; which the Spaniard perceiving,
avoided the blow, and with a shovel, which he had in his hand (for
they were all working in the field about their corn land), knocked
the brute down Another of the Englishmen, running up at the
same time to help his comrade, knocked the Spaniard down; and
then two Spaniards more came in to help their man, and a third
Englishman fell in upon them. They had none of them any fire-
arms or any other weapons but hatchets and other tools, except
this third Englishman; he had one of my rusty cutlasses, with
which he made at the two last Spaniards, and wounded them both.
This fray set the whole family in an uproar, and more help coming in
they took the three Englishmen prisoners. The next question was,
what should be done with them? They had been so often mutin-
ous, and were so very furious, so desperate, and so idle withal, they
knew not what course to take with them, for they were mischievous
to the highest degree, and cared not what hurt they did to any man;
so that, in short, it was not safe to live with them.

The Spaniard who was governor told them, in so many words, that
if they had been of his own country he would have hanged them ;
for all laws and all governors were to preserve society, and those
who were dangerous to the society ought to be expelled out of it;
but as they were Englishmen, and that it was to the generous
kindness of an Englishman that they all owed their preservation
254
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
1
*
and deliverance, he would use them with all possibie lenity, and
would leave them to the judgment of the other two English-
men, who were their countrymen. One of the two honest English-
men stood up, and said they desired it might not be left to them.--
"For," says he, "I am sure we ought to sentence them to the
gallows;" and with that he gives an account how Will Atkins, one of
the three, had proposed to have all the five Englishmen join together,
and murder all the Spaniards when they were in their sleep
When the Spanish governor heard this, he calls to Will tkins,
How, Seignior Atkins, would you murder us all? What have
you to say to that?" The hardened villain was so far from denying
it, that he said it was true, and swore they would do it still before
they had done with them. "Well, but Seignior Atkins," says the
Spaniard, "what have we done to you that you will kill us?
What would you get by killing us? And what must we do to
prevent you killing us? Must we kill you, or you kill us? Why
will you put us to the necessity of this, Seignior Atkins? says the
Spaniard very calmly, and smiling. Seignior Atkins was in such a
rage at the Spaniard's making a jest of it, that, had he not been
held by three men, and withal had no weapon near him, it was
thought he would have attempted to kill the Spaniard in the middle
of all the company. This hair-brain carriage obliged them to con-
sider seriously wha was to be done. The two Englishmen, and
the Spaniard who saved the poor savage, were of the opinion that they
should hang one of the three for an example to the rest, and that
particularly it should be he that had twice attempted to commit
murder with his hatchet; indeed, there was some reason to believe
he had done it, for the poor savage was in such a miserable con-
dition with the wound he had received that it was thought he
could not live. But the governor Spaniard still said No; it was an
Englishman that had saved all their lives, and he would never
consent to put an Englishman to death, though he had murdered
half of them; nay, he said if he had been killed himself by an
Englishman, and had time left to speak, it should be that they
should pardon him.
*
This was so positively insisted on by the governor Spaniara, that
there was no gainsaying it; and as merciful counsels are most apt
to prevail where they are so earnestly pressed, so they all came
into it; but then it was to be considered what should be done to
keep them from doing the mischief they designed; for all agreed,
governor and all, that means were to be used for preserving the
society from danger. After a long debate, it was agreed that they
should be disarmed, and not permitted to have either gun, powder,
shot, sword, or any weapon; that they should be turned out of the
society, and left to live where they would, and how they would, by
themselves; but that none of the rest, either Spaniards or English,
should hold any kind of converse with them, or have anything to
de with them; that they should be forbid to come within a certain
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
255
•
distance of the place where the rest dwelt; and if they offered to
commit any disorder, so as to spoil, burn, kill, or destroy any of the
corn, plantings, buildings, fences, or cattle belonging to the society,
they should die without mercy, and would shoot them wherever they
could find them./
The humane governor, musing upon the sentence, considered a
little upon it; and turning to the two honest Englishmen, said,
“Hold; you must reflect that it will be long ere they can raise
corn and cattle of their own, and they must not starve; we must
therefore allow them provisions." So he caused to be added, that
they should have a proportion of corn given them to last them
eight months, and for seed to sow, by which time they might be
supposed to raise some of their own that they should have six
milch-goats, four he-goats, and six kids given them, as well for
present subsistence as for a store; and that they should have tools
given them for their work in the fields, but they should have none
of these tools or provisions unless they would swear solemnly that
they would not hurt or injure any of the Spaniards with them, or of
their fellow-Englishmen.
Thus they dismissed them the society, and turned them out to
shift for themselves. They went away sullen and refractory, as
neither content to go away nor to stay: but, as there was no
remedy, they went, pretending to go and choose a place where
they would settle themselves; and some provisions were given
them, but no weapons. About four or five days after, they came
again for some victuals, and gave the governor an account where
they had pitched their tents, and marked themselves out a habita-
tion and plantation; and it was a very convenient place indeed,
on the remotest part of the island, N.E., much about the place
where I providentially landed in my first voyage, when I was
driven out to sea in my foolish attempt to sail round the island.
Here they built themselves two handsome huts, and contrived
them in a manner like my first habitation, being close under the
side of a hill, having some trees already growing on three sides of
it, so that by planting others it would be very easily covered from
the sight, unless narrowly searched for They desired some dried
goat-skins for beds and covering, which were given them; and
upon giving their words that they would not disturb the rest, or in-
jure any of their plantations, they gave them hatchets, and what other
tools they could spare; some peas, barley, and rice, for sowing; and,
in a word, anything they wanted, except arms and ammunition.
They lived in this separate condition about six months, and had
got in their first harvest, though the quantity was but small, the
parcel of land they had planted being but little. Indeed, having all
their plantation to form, they had a great deal of work upon their
hands; and when they came to make boards and pots, and such
things, they were quite out of their element, and could make
nothing of it; therefore when the rainy season came on, for
t
256
life and adveNTURES OF
您
​1
want of a cave in the earth, they could not keep their greia day ad
it was in great danger of spoiling. This humbled them much
they came and begged the Spaniards to help them, which they very
readily did; and in four days worked a great hole in the side of the
hill for them, big enough to secure their corn and other things from
the rain but it was a poor place at best compared to mine, and
especially as mine was then, for the Spaniards had greatly enlarged
it, and made several new apartments in it.
About three quarters of a year after this separation, new frolic
took these rogues, which, together with the former villainy they had
committed, brought mischief enough upon them, and had very near
been the ruin of the whole colony. The three new associates began,
it seems, to be weary of the laborious life they led, and that without
hope of bettering their circumstances: and a whim took them that
they would make a voyage to the continent, from whence the
savages came, and would try if they could seize upon some prisoners
among the natives there, and bring them home, so as to make them
do the laborious part of the work for them.
The project was not so preposterous, if they had gone no further.
But they did nothing, and proposed nothing, but had either
mischief in the design, or mischief in the event. And if I may give
my opinion, they seemed to be under a blast from heaven: for if
we will not allow a visible curse to pursue visible crimes, how shall
we reconcile the events of things with the divine justice? It was
certainly an apparent vengeance on their crime of mutiny and
piracy that brought them to the state they were in; and they
showed not the least remorse for the crime, but added new villainies
to it, such as the piece of monstrous cruelty of wounding a poor
slave because he did not, or perhaps could not, understand to do
what he was directed, and to wound him in such a manner as made
him a cripple all his life, and in a place where no surgeon or
medicine could be had for his cure; and, what was still worse, the
intentional murder, for such to be sure it was, as was afterwards the
formed design they all laid to murder the Spaniards in cold blood,
and in their sleep.
The three fellows came down to the Spaniards one morning, and
in very humble terms desired to be admitted to speak with them.
The Spaniards very readily heard what they had to say, which was
this: that they were tired of living in the manner they did, and
that they were not handy enough to make the necessaries they
wanted, and that having no help, they found they should be starved;
but if the Spaniards would give them leave to take one of the canoes
which they came over in, and give them arms and ammunition pro-
portioned to their defence, they would go over to the main, and seek
their fortunes, and so deliver them from the trouble of supplying
them with any other provisions.
The Spaniards were glad enough to get rid of them, but very
honestly represented to them the certain destruction they were run-
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
257
ning into; told them they had suffered such hardships upon that
very spot, that they could, without any spirit of prophecy, tell them
they would be starved or murdered, and bade them consider of it.
The men replied audaciously, they should be starved if they stayed
here, for they could not work, and would not work, and they could
but be starved abroad; and if they were murdered, there was an
end of them; they had no wives or children to cry after them; and,
in short, insisted importunately upon their demand, declaring they
would go, whether they gave them any arms or not.
I
The Spaniards told them, with great kindness, that If they were
resolved to go they should not go like naked men, and be in no
condition to defend themselves; and that though they could ill
spare firearms, not having enough for themselves, yet they would
let them have two muskets, a pistol, and a cutlass, and each man a
hatchet, which they thought was sufficient for them. In a word,
they accepted the offer; and having baked bread enough to serve
them a month given them, and as much goats' flesh as they could
eat while it was sweet, with a great basket of dried grapes, a pot of
fresh water, and a young kid alive, they boldly set out in the canoe
for a voyage over the sea, where it was at least forty miles broad.
The boat, indeed, was a large one, and would very well have carried
fifteen or twenty men, and therefore was rather too big for them to
manage; but as they had a fair breeze and flood-tide with them,
they did well enough. They had made a mast of a long pole, and
a sail of four large goat-skins dried, which they had sewed or laced
together; and away they went merrily together. The Spaniards
called after them "Bon voyaje," and no man ever thought of
seeing them any more.
4
a
The Spaniards were often saying to one another, and to the two
honest Englishmen who remained behind, how quietly and com-
fortably they lived, now these three turbulent fellows were gone.
As for their coming again, that was the remotest thing from their
thoughts that could be imagined; when, behold, after two-and-
twenty days' absence, one of the Englishmen being abroad upon his
planting work sees three strange men coming towards him at a
distance, with guns upon their shoulders.
Away runs the Englishman, frightened and amazed, as if he was
bewitched, to the governor Spaniard, and tells him they were all
undone, for there were strangers upon the island, but he could not
tell who they were. The Spaniard, pausing a while, says to him,
"How do you mean-you cannot tell who? They are the savages,
to be sure." No, no," says the Englishman, "they are men in
clothes, with arms "Nay, then," says the Spaniard, "why are
you so concerned If they are not savages they must be friends ;
for there is no Christian nation upon earth but will do us good
rather than harm." While they were debating thus, came up the
three Englishmen, and standing without the wood, which was new
planted, halloped to them. They presently knew their voices, and
258
Life and ADVENTUres of
so all the wonder ceased. But now the admiration was turned upon
another question :-What could be the matter, and what made them
come back again? ·
?
It was not long before they brought the men in, and inquiring
where they had been, and what they had been doing, they gave
them a full account of their voyage in a few words :-That they
reached the land in less than two days, but finding the people
alarmed at their coming, and preparing with bows and arrows to
fight them, they durst not go on shore, but sailed on to the north-
ward six or seven hours, till they came to a great opening, by which
they perceived that the land they saw from our island was not the
main, but an island: that upon entering that opening of the sea
they saw another island on the right hand north, and several more
west; and being resolved to land somewhere, they put over to one
of the islands which lay west, and went boldly on shorey that they
found the people very courteous and friendly to them; and they
gave them several roots and some dried fish, and appeared very
Sociable; and that the women, as well as the men, were very
forward to supply them with anything they could get for them to eat,
and brought it to them a great way, on their heads. They continued
here four days, and inquired, as well as they could of them by signs,
what nations were this way, and that way, and were told of several
fierce and terrible people that lived almost every way, who, as they
made known by signs to them, used to eat men; but, as for them-
selves, they said they never ate men or women, except only such as
they took in the wars; and then they owned they made a great
feast, and ate their prisoners.
The Englishmen inquired when they had had a feast of that
kind; and they told them about two moons ago, pointing to the
moon and to two fingers; and that their great king had two
hundred prisoners now, which he had taken in his war, and they
were feeding them to make them fat for the next feast. The
Englishmen seemed mighty desirous of seeing those prisoners; but
the others mistaking them, thought they were desirous to have
some of them to carry away for their own eating.
So they
beckoned to them, pointing to the setting of the sun, and then to
the rising; which was to signify that the next morning at sunrising
they would bring some for them; and, accordingly, the next
morning they brought down five women and eleven men, and gave
them to the Englishmen to carry with them on their voyage, just as
we would bring so many cows and oxen down to a seaport town to
victual a ship
As brutish and barbarous as these fellows were at home, their
stomachs turned at this sight, and they did not know what to do.
To refuse the prisoners would have been the highest affront to the
savage gentry that could be offered them, and what to do with them
they knew not. However, after some debate, they resolved to
accept of them ; and, in return, they gave the savages that brought
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
2$9
them one of their hatchets, an old key, a knife, and six or seven of
their bullets; which, though they did not understand their use,
they seemed particularly pleased with; and then tying the poor
creatures' hands behind them they dragged the prisoners into the
boat for our men.
The Englishmen were obliged to come away as soon as they had
them, or else they that gave them this noble present would certainly
have expected that they should have gone to work with them, have
killed two or three of them the next morning, and, perhaps, have
invited the donors to dinner. But having taken their leave, with all
the respect and thanks that could well pass between people, where,
on either side, they understood not one word they could say, they put
off with their boat, and came back towards the first island; where,
when they arrived, they set eight of their prisoners at liberty, there
being too many of them for their occasion. In their voyage they
endeavoured to have some communication with their prisoners;
but it was impossible to make them understand anything. Nothing
they could say to them, or give them, or do for them, but was
looked upon as going to murder them. They first of all unbound
them; but the poor creatures screamed at that, especially the
women, as if they had just felt the knife at their throats; for they
immediately concluded they were unbound on purpose to be killed.
If they gave them anything to eat, it was the same thing; they
then concluded it was for fear they should sink in flesh, and so not
be fat enough to kill. If they looked at one of them more par-
ticularly, the party presently concluded it was to see whether he or
she was fattest, and fittest to kill first; nay, after they had brought
them quite over, and began to use them kindly, and treat them
well, still they expected every day to make a dinner or supper for
their new masters,
When the three wanderers had given this unaccountable history
or journal of their voyage, the Spaniard asked them where their
new family was; and being told that they had brought them on
shore, and put them into one of their buts, and were come up to
beg some victuals for them, they (the Spaniards) and the other two
Englishmen, that is to say, the whole colony, resolved to go all
down to the place and see them; and did so, and Friday's father
with them. When they came into the hut, there they sat, all
bound; for when they had brought them on shore they bound, their
hands that they might not take the boat and make their escape;
there, I say, they sat, all of them stark naked. First, there were
three comely fellows, well shaped, with straight limbs, about thirty
to thirty-five years of age; and five women, whereof two might be
from thirty to forty, two more about fou.`or five-and-twonty; and
the fifth, a tall, comely maiden, about seventeen · The VELIGA were
well-favoured, agreeable persons, both in shape and fees, only
taway; and two of them, had they been perfect white, would have
passed for very handsome women, even in London, having pleasant
260
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
...d.
countenances, and of a very modest behaviour; especially when
they came afterwards to be clothed and dressed, though that dress
was very indifferent, it must be confessed.
The sight, you may be sure, was something uncouth to our
Spaniards, who were, to give them a just character, men of the
most calm, sedate tempers, and perfect good humour, that ever I
met with and, in particular, of the utmost modesty: I say, the sight
was very uncouth, to see three naked men and five naked women,
all together bound, and in the most miserable circumstances that
human nature could be supposed to be-viz., to be expecting every
moment to be dragged out and have their brains knocked out, and
then to be eaten up like a calf that is killed for a dainty.
The first thing they did was to cause the old Indian, Friday's
father, to go in, and see first if he knew any of them, and then if he
understood any of their speech. As soon as the old man came in,
he looked seriously at them, but knew none of them; neither could
any of them understand a word he said, or a sign he could make,
except one of the women. However, this was enough to answer the
end, which was to satisfy them that the men into whose hands they
were fallen were Christians; that they abhorred eating men or
women; and that they might be sure they would not be killed. As
soon as they were assured of this, they discovered such a joy, and
by such awkward gestures, several ways, as is hard to describe; for
it seems they were of several nations. The woman who was their
interpreter was bid, in the next place, to ask them if they were
willing to be servants, and to work for the men who had brought
them away, to save their lives; at which they all fell a dancing;
and presently one fell to taking up this, and another that, anything
that lay next, to carry on their shoulders, to intimate they were
willing to work.
The governor, who found that the having women among them
would presently be attended with some inconvenience, and might
occasion some strife, and perhaps biood, asked the three men what
they intended to do with these women, and how they intended to
use them, whether as servants or as wives? One of the English-
men answered very boldly and readily that they would use them as
both; to which the governor said: "I'am not going to restrain you
from it-you are your own masters as to that; but this I think is
but just, for avoiding disorders and quarrels among you, and I
desire it of you for that reason only-viz., that you will all engage,
that if any of you take any of these women as a wife, he shall take
but one; and that having taken one, none else shall touch her;
for though we cannot marry any one of you, yet it is but reasonable
that, while you stay here, the wonan any of you takes shall be
maintained by the man that takes her, and should be his wife-I
mean," says he, "while he continues here, and that none else shall
have anything to do with her. All this appeared so just, that every
one agreed to it without any difficulty.
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
261
Then the Englishmen asked the Spaniards if they designed to
take any of them? But every one of them answered "No." Some
of them said they had wives in Spain, and the others did not like
women that were not Christians; and all together declared that
they would not touch one of them, which was an instance of such
virtue as I have not met with in all my travels On the other hand,
the five Englishmen took them every one a wife-that is to say, a
temporary wife; and so they set up a new form of living; for the
Spaniards and Friday's father lived in my old habitation, which
they had enlarged exceedingly within. The three servants which
were taken in the last battle of the savages lived with them; and
these carried on the main part of the colony, supplied all the rest
with food, and assisted them in anything as they could, or as they
found necessity required.
1
But the wonder of the story was, how five such refractory, ill-
matched fellows should agree about these women, and that some
two of them should not choose the same woman, especially seeing
two or three of them were, without comparison, more agreeable than
the others; but they took a good way enough to prevent quarrelling
among themselves, for they set the five women by themselves in
one of their huts, and they went all into the other hut, and drew
lots among them who should choose first.
Him that drew to choose first went away by himself to the hut
where the poor naked creatures were, and fetched out her he chose;
and it was worth observing, that he that chose first took her that
was reckoned the homeliest and oldest of the five, which made
mirth enough amongst the rest; and even the Spaniards laughed
at it; but the fellow considered better than any of them, that it was
application and business they were to expect assistance in, as much
as in anything else; and she proved the best wife of all the parcel.
When the poor vomen saw themselves set in a row thus,
and fetched out ne by one, the terrors of their condition
returned upon them again, and they firmly believed they were
now going to be devoured. Accordingly, when the English sailor
came in and fetched out one of them, the rest set up a most lament-
able cry, and hung about her, and took their leave of her with such
agonies and affection as would have grieved the hardest heart in
the world: nor was it possible for the Englishmen to satisfy them
that they were not to be immediately murdered, till they fetched
the old man, Friday's father, who immediately let them know that
the five men, who were to fetch them out one by one, had chosen
them for their wives. When they had done, and the fright the
women were in was a little over, the men went to work, and the
Spaniards came and helped them: and in a few hours they had
built them every one a new hut or tent for their lodging apart; for
those they had already were crowded with their tools, household
stuff, and provisions. The three wicked ones had pitched farthest
off, and the two honest ones nearer, but both on the north shore of
#62
LIFE AND ADVENTUREs of
the island, so that they continued separated as before; and thus
my island was peopled in three places, and, as I might say, three
towns were begun to be built. C
And here it is very well worth observing that, as it often happens
in the world (what the wise ends of God's providence are, in such a
disposition of things, I cannot say), the two honest fellows had the
two worst wives; and the three reprobates, that were scarce worth
hanging, that were fit for nothing, and neither seemed born to do
themselves good nor any one else, had three clever, diligent,
careful, and ingenious wives; not that the first two were bad wives
as to their temper or humour, for all the five were most willing,
quiet, passive, and subjected creatures, rather like slaves than
wives; but my meaning is, they were not alike capable, ingenious,
or industrious, or alike cleanly and neat. Another observation Í
must make, to the honour of a diligent application on one hand,
and to the disgrace of a slothful, negligent, idle temper on the
other, that when I came to the place, and viewed the several
improvements, plantings, and management of the several little
colonies, the two men had so far outgone the three, that there was
no comparison They had, indeed, both of them as much ground
laid out for corn as they wanted, and the reason was, because,
according to my rule, nature dictated that it was to no purpose to
sow more corn than they wanted; but the difference of the cultiva-
tion, of the planting, of the fences, and, indeed, of everything else,
was easy to be seen at first view.
J
The two men had innumerable young trees planted about their
huts, so that, when you came to the place, nothing was to be seen
but a wood; and though they had twice had their plantation
demolished, once by their own countrymen, and once by the
enemy, as shall be shown in its place, yet they had restored all
again, and everything was thriving and flourishing about them s
they had grapes planted in order, and managed like a vineyard,
though they had themselves never seen anything of that kind, and,
by their good ordering their vines, their grapes were as good again
as any of the others. They had also found themselves out a retreat
in the thickest part of the woods, where, though there was not a
natural cave, as I had found, yet they made one with incessant
labour of their hands, and where, when the mischief which followed
happened, they secured their wives and children so as they could
never be found; they having, by sticking innumerable stakes and
poles of the wood which, as I said, grew so readily, made the grove
impassable, except in some places, when they climbed up to get
over the outside part, and then went on by ways of their own
leaving.
As to the three reprobates, as I justly call them, `tnough they
were much civilised by their settlement compared to what they
were before, and were not so quarrelsome, having not the same
opportunity; yet one of the certain companions of a profligate
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
263
mind never left them, and that was their idleness. It is true, they
planted corn and made fences; but Solomon's words were never
better verified than in them, "I went by the vineyard of the
slothful,. and it was all overgrown with thorns:" for when the
Spaniards came to view their crop they could not see it in some
places for weeds, the hedge had several gaps in it, where the wild
goats had got in and eaten up the corn; perhaps here and there a
dead bush was crammed in, to stop them out for the present, but it
was only shutting the stable-door after the steed was stolen.
Whereas, when they looked on the colony of the other two, there
was the very face of industry and success upon all they did; there
was not a weed to be seen in all their corn, or a gap in any of
their hedges; and they, on the other hand, verified Solomon's
words in another place, “That the diligent hand maketh rich;" for
everything grew and thrived, and they had plenty within and
without; they had more tame cattle than the others, more utensils
and necessaries within doors, and yet more pleasure and diversion
too.
It is true, the wives of the three were very handy and cleanly
within doors; and having learned the English ways of dressing and
cooking from one of the other Englishmen, who, as I said, was a
cook's mate on board the ship, they dressed their husbands' victuals
very nicely and well; whereas the others could not be brought to
understand it; but then the husband, who, as I say, had been cook's
mate, did it himself. But as for the husbands of the three wives,
they loitered about, fetched turtles' eggs, and caught fish and birds:
in a word, anything but labour; and they fared accordingly. The
diligent lived well and comfortably, and the slothful hard and
beggarly and so, I believe, generally speaking, it is all over the
world.
But I now come to a scene different from all that had happened
before, either to them or to me; and the origin of the story was
this:-Early one morning there came on shore five or six canoes of
Indians or savages, call them which you please, and there is no
room to doubt they came upon the old errand of feeding upon their
slaves; but that part was now so familiar to the Spaniards, and to
our men too, that they did not concern themselves about it, as I
did: but having been made sensible, by their experience, that their
only business was to lie concealed, and that if they were not seen
by any of the savages they would go off again quietly, when their
business was done, having, as yet, not the least notion of there
being any inhabitants in the island; I say, having been made
sensible of this, they had nothing to do but to give notice to all the
three plantations to keep within doors, and not show themselves,
only placing a scout in a proper place, to give notice when the boats
went to sea again.
This was, without doubt, very right; but a disaster spoiled all
these measures, and made it known among the savages that there

264
life and adventURES OF
were inhabitants there; which was, in the end, the desolation of
almost the whole colony. After the canoes with the savages were
gone off, the Spaniards peeped abroad again; and some of them
had the curiosity to go to the place where they had been, to see
what they had been doing. Here, to their great surprise, they found
three savages left behind, and lying fast asleep upon the ground.
It was supposed they had either been so gorged with their
inhuman feast, that, like beasts, they were fallen asleep, and would
not stir when the others went, or they had wandered into the woods,
and did not come back in time to be taken in.
The Spaniards were greatly surprised at this sight, and perfectly
at a loss what to do The Spaniard governor, as it happened, was
with them, and his advice was asked, but he professed he knew not
what to do. As for slaves, they had enough already; and as to
killing them, there were none of them inclined to do that: the
Spaniard governor told me they could not think of shedding
innocent blood; for as to them, the poor creatures had done them
no wrong, invaded none of their property, and they thought they
had no just quarrel against them, to take away their lives. And
here I must, in justice to these Spaniards, observe, that let the
accounts of Spanish cruelty in Mexico and Peru be what they will,
I never met with seventeen men of any nation whatsoever, in any
foreign country, who were so universally modest, temperate,
virtuous, so very good-humoured, and so courteous, as these
Spaniards and as to cruelty, they had nothing of it in their
very nature: no inhumanity, no barbarity, no outrageous passions ;
and yet all of them men of great courage and spirit. Their temper
and calmness had appeared in their bearing the insufferable usage
of the three Englishmen; and their justice and humanity appeared
now in the case of the savages as above. After some consultation
they resolved upon this: that they would lie still a while longer,
till, if possible, these three men might be gone. But then the
governor recollected that the three savages had no boat; and if
they were left to rove about the island, they would certainly dis-
cover that there were inhabitants in it; and so they should be
undone that way Upon this, they went back again, and there lay
the fellows fast asleep still, and so they resolved to awaken them,
and take them prisoners; and they did so. The poor fellows were
strangely frightened when they were seized upon and bound; and
afraid, like the women, that they should be murdered and eaten :
for it seems those people think all the world does as they do, in
eating men's flesh; but they were soon made easy as to that, and
away they carried them.
It was very happy for them that they did not carry them home to
the castle, I mean to my palace under the hill; but they carried
them first to the bower, where was the chief of their country work,
such as the keeping the goats, the planting the corn, etc.; and
afterward they carried them to the habitation of the two English-
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
265
men.
Here they were set to work, though it was not much they
had for them to do; and whether it was by negligence in guarding
them, or that they thought the fellows could not mend themselves,
I know not, but one of them ran away, and, taking to the woods,
they could never hear of him any more They had good reason to
believe he got home again soon after in some other boats or canoes
of savages who came on shore three or four weeks afterwards, and
who, carrying on their revels as usual, went off in two days' time.
This thought terrified them exceedingly; for they concluded, and
that not without good cause indeed, that if this fellow came
home safe among his comrades, he would certainly give them an
account that there were people in the island, and also how few and
weak they were; for this savage, as observed before, had never
been told, and it was very happy he had not, how many there were,
or where they lived; nor had he ever seen or heard the fire of any
of their guns, much less had they shown him any of their other
Tetired places: such as the cave in the valley, or the new retreat
which the two Englishmen had made, and the like.
The first testimony they had that this fellow had given intelli-
gence of them was, that about two months after this, six canoes of
savages, with about seven, eight, or ten men in a canoe, came
rowing along the north side of the island, where they never used to
come before, and landed, about an hour after sunrise, at a con-
venient place, about a mile from the habitation of the two English-
men, where this escaped man had been kept. As the chief
Spaniard said, had they been all there, the damage would not have
been so much, for not a man of them would have escaped; but the
case differed now very much, for two men to fifty was too much
odds. The two men had the happiness to discover them about a
league off, so that it was above an hour before they landed; and as
they landed a mile from their huts, it was some time before they
could come at them. Now, having great reason to believe that
they were betrayed, the first thing they did was to bind the
two slaves which were left, and cause two of the three men whom
they brought with the women (who, it seems, proved very faithful
to them), to lead them, with their two wives, and whatever they
could carry away with them, to their retired places in the woods,
which I have spoken of above, and there to bind the two fellows
hand and foot, till they heard farther. In the next place, seeing the
savages were all come on shore, and that they had bent their
course directly that way, they opened the fences where the milch
cows were kept, and drove them all out; leaving their goats to
straggle in the woods, whither they pleased, that the savages might
think they were all bred wild; but the rogue who came with them
was too cunning for that, and gave them an account of it all, for
they went directly to the place.
When the two poor frightened men had secured their wives and
goods, they sent the other slave they had of the three who came
266
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
with the women, and who was at their place by accident, away to
the Spaniards with all speed, to give them the alarm, and desire
speedy help, and, in the meantime, they took their arms and what
ammunition they had, and retreated towards the place in the wood
where their wives were sent; keeping at a distance, yet so that
they might see, if possible, which way the savages took They had
not gone far, but that from a rising ground they could see the little
army of their enemies come on directly to their habitation, and, in
a moment more, could see all their huts and household stuff
flaming up together, to their great grief and mortification; for this
was a great loss to them, irretrievable, indeed, for some time.
They kept their station for a while, till they found the savages, like
wild beasts, spread themselves all over the place, rummaging every
way, and every place they could think of, in search of prey; and in
particular for the people, of whom now it plainly appeared they had
intelligence.
The two Englishmen seeing this, thinking themselves noť´secure
where they stood, because it was likely some of the wild people
might come that way, and they might come too many together,
thought it proper to make another retreat about half a mile farther;
believing, as it afterwards happened, that the further they strolled,
the fewer would be together. Their next halt was at the entrance
into a very thick-grown part of the woods, and where an old trunk
of a tree stood, which was hollow and very large; and in this tree
they both took their standing, resolving to see there what might
offer. They had not stood there long before two of the savages
appeared running directly that way, as if they already had notice
where they stood, and were coming up to attack thera; and a little
way farther they espied three more coming after them, and five
more beyond them, all coming the same way; besides which,
they saw seven or eight more at a distance, running another way;
for, in a word, they ran every way, like sportsmen beating for their
game.
The poor men were now in great perplexity whether they should
stand and keep their posture or fly; but after a very short debate
with themselves, they considered that if the savages ranged the
country thus before help came, they might perhaps find their
retreat in the woods, and then all would be lost; so they resolved
to stand them there, and if they were too many to deal with, then
they would get up to the top of the tree, from whence they doubted
not to defend themselves, fire excepted, as long as their ammunition
lasted, though all the savages that were landed, which was near
fifty, were to attack them.
Having resolved upon this, they next considered whether they
should fire at the first two, or wait for the three, and so take the
middle party, by which the two and the five that followed would be
separated; at length they resolved to let the first two pass by,
unless they should spy them in the tree, and come to attack them
ROBINSON crusoe.
267
The first two savages confirmed them also in this resolution, by
turning a little from them towards another part of the wood; but
the three, and the five after them, came forward directly to the
tree, as if they had known the Englishmen were there. Seeing
them come so straight towards them, they resolved to take them in
a line as they came: and as they resolved to fire but one at a time,
perhaps the first shot might hit them all three; for which purpose
the man who was to fire put three or four small bullets into his
piece; and having a fair loop-hole, as it were, from a broken hole
in the tree, he took a sure aim, without being seen, waiting till they
were within about thirty yards of the tree, so that he could not
miss.
While they were thus waiting, and the savages came on, they
plainly saw that one of the three was the runaway savage that
had escaped from them; and they both knew him distinctly, and
resolved that, if possible, he should not escape, though they should
both fire; so the other stood ready with his piece, that if he did
not drop at the first shot, he should be sure to have a second. But
the first was too good a marksman to miss his aim; for as the
savages kept near one another, a little behind in a line, he fired,
and hit two of them directly; the foremost was killed outright,
being shot in the head; the second, which was the runaway Indian,
was shot through the body, and fell, but was not quite dead; and
the third had a little scratch in the shoulder, perhaps by the same
ball that went through the body of the second; and being dread-
fully frightened though not so much hurt, sat down upon the
ground, screaming and yelling in a hideous manner.
The five that were behind, more frightened with the noise than
sensible of the danger, stood still at first; for the woods made the
sound a thousand times bigger than it really was, the echoes
rattling from one side to another, and the fowls rising from all
parts, screaming, and every sort making a different noise, according
to their kind; just as it was when I fired the first gun that perhaps
was ever shot off in the island.
However, all being silent again, and they not knowing what the
matter was, came on unconcerned, till they came to the place where
their companions lay in a condition miserable enough. Here the
poor ignorant creatures, not sensible that they were within reach of
the same mischief, stood all together over the wounded man,
talking, and, as may be supposed, inquiring of him how he came to
be hurt; and who, it is very rational to believe, told them that a
flash of fire first, and immediately after that thunder from their
gods, had killed those two and wounded him. This, I say, is
rational; for nothing is more certain than that, as they saw no man
near them, so they had never heard a gun in all their lives, nor so
much as heard of a gun; neither knew they anything of killing and
wounding at a distance with fire and bullets: if they had, one might
reasonably believe they would not have stood so unconcerned to

268
life and adventures of
view the fate of their fellows, without some apprehensions of their
own.
Our two men, as they confessed to me, were grieved to be obliged
to kill so many poor creatures, who had no notion of their danger;
yet, having them all thus in their power, and the first having loaded
his piece again, resolved to let fly both together among them; and
singling out, by agreement, which to aim at, they shot together, and
killed, or very much wounded, four of them; the fifth, frightened
even to death, though not hurt, fell with the rest; so that our men,
seeing them all fall together, thought they had killed them all.
The belief that the savages were all killed made our two men
come boldy out from the tree before they had charged their guns,
which was a wrong step; and they were under some surprise when
they came to the place, and found no less than four of them alive,
and of them two very little hurt, and one not at all. This obliged
them to fall upon them with the stocks of their muskets; and first
they made sure of the runaway savage, that had been the cause of
all the mischief, and of another that was hurt in the knee, and put
them out of their pain; then the man that was not hurt at all came
and kneeled down to them, with his two hands held up, and made
piteous moans to them, by gestures and signs, for his life, but could
not say one word to them that they could understand. However,
they made signs to him to sit down at the foot of a tree hard by;
and one of the Englishmen, with a piece of rope-yarn, which he had
by great chance in his pocket, tied his two hands behind him, and
there they left him; and with what speed they could made after the
other two, which were gone before, fearing they, or any more of them,
should find the way to their covered place in the woods, where
their wives, and the few goods they had left, lay. They came once
in sight of the two men, but it was at a great distance; however,
they had the satisfaction to see them cross over a valley towards
the sea, quite the contrary way from that which led to their retreat,
which they were afraid of; and being satisfied with that, they went
back to the tree where they left their prisoner, who, as they
supposed, was delivered by his comrades, for he was gone, and the
two pieces of rope-yarn with which they had bound him lay just at
the foot of the tree. 1
They were now in`as great concern as before, not knowing what
course to take, or how near the enemy might be, or in what
number; so they resolved to go away to the place where their
wives were, to see if all was well there, and to make them easy.
These where in fright enough, to be sure; for though the savages
were their own countrymen, yet they were most terribly afraid
of them, and perhaps the more for the knowledge they had of them.
When they came there, they found the savages had been in the
wood, and very near that place, but had not found it; for it was
indeed inaccessible, from the trees standing so thick, unless the
persons seeking it had been directed by those that knew it, which
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
269
these did not; they found, therefore, everything very safe, only the
women in a terrible fright. While they were here they had the
comfort to have seven of the Spaniards come to their assistance;
the other ten, with their servants, and Friday's father, were gone in
a body to defend their bower, and the corn and cattle that were
kept there, in case the savages should have roved over to that side
of the country, but they did not spread so far. With the seven
Spaniards came one of the three savages, who, as I said, were their
prisoners formerly; and with them also came the savage whom the
Englishman had left bound hand and foot at the tree; for it seems
they came that way, saw the slaughter of the seven men, and
unbound the eighth, and brought him along with them; where,
however, they were obliged to bind him again, as they had the two
others who were left when the third ran away.
The prisoners now began to be a burden to them; and they were
so afraid of their escaping, that they were once resolving to kill
them all, believing they were under an absolute necessity to do so
for their own preservation. However, the chief of the Spaniards
would not consent to it, but ordered, for the present, that they
should be sent out of the way to my old cave in the valley, and be
kept there, with two Spaniards to guard them, and have food for
their subsistence, which was done; and they were bound there
hand and foot for that night.
When the Spaniards came, the two Englishmen were so en-
couraged, that they could not satisfy themselves to stay any longer
there; but taking five of the Spaniards, and themselves, with four
muskets and a pistol among them, and two stout quarter-staves,
away they went in quest of the savages. And first they came to
the tree where the men lay that had been killed; but it was easy to
see that some more of the savages had been there, for they had
attempted to carry their dead men away, and had dragged two of
them a good way, but had given it over. From thence they
advanced to the first rising ground, where they had stood and seen
their camp destroyed, and where they had the mortification still to
see some of the smoke; but neither could they here see any of the
savages They then resolved, though with all possible caution, to go
forward towards their ruined plantation; but, a little before they
came thither, coming in sight of the sea-shore, they saw plainly the
savages all embarked again in their canoes, in order to be gone.
They seemed sorry at first that there was no way to come at them,
to give them a parting blow; but, upon the whole, they were very
well satisfied to be rid of them.
3
The poor Englishmen being now twice ruined, and all their
improvements destroyed, the rest all agreed to come and help them
to rebuild, and assist them with needful supplies. Their three
countrymen, who were not yet noted for having the least inclination
to do any good, yet as soon as they heard of it (for they, living remote
eastward, knew nothing of the matter till all was over), came and
270
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
of
offered their help and assistance, and did, very friendly, work for
several days to restore their habitation and make necessaries
for them. And thus in a little time they were set upon their legs
again.
?
About two days after this they had the farther satisfaction of
seeing three of the savages' canoes come driving on shore, and, at
some distance from them, two drowned men, by which they had
reason to believe that they had met with a storm at sea, which had
overset some of them; for it had blown very hard the night after
they went off. However, as some might miscarry, so, on the other
hand, enough of them escaped to inform the rest, as well of what
they had done as of what had happened to them; and to whet
them on to another enterprise of the same nature, which they, it
seems, resolved to attempt, with sufficient force to carry all before
them; for except what the first man had told them of inhabitants,
they could say little of it of their own knowledge, for they never
saw one man; and the fellow being killed that had affirmed it, they
had no other witness to confirm it to them.
CHAPTER XXV.
The island is invaded by a formidable fleet of savages-A terrible engage
ment, in which the cannibals are utterly routed-Thirty-seven
wretches, the survivors, are saved, and employed by my people as
servants-Description of Will Atkins' ingenious contrivances for his
accommodation.
T
T was five or six months after this before they heard
any more of the savages, in which time our men were
in hopes they had either forgot their former bad luck,
or given over hopes of better; when, on a sudden, they
were invaded with a most formidable fleet of no less
than eight-and-twenty canoes, full of savages, armed with bows and
arrows, great clubs, wooden swords, and such like engines of war;
and they brought such numbers with them, that, in short, it put all
our people into the utmost consternation.
As they came on shore in the evening, and at the easternmost
side of the island, our men had that night to consult and consider
what to do. In the first place, knowing that their being entirely
concealed was their only safety before and would be much more so
now, while the number of their enemies would be so great, they
resolved, first of all, to take down the huts which were built for the
two Englishmen, and drive away their goats to the old cave;
because they supposed the savages would go directly thither, as
soon as it was day, to play the old game over again, though they
did not now land within two leagues of it. In the next place they

ROBINSON CRUSOE.
271
drove away all the flocks of goats they had at the old bower, as I
called it, which belonged to the Spaniards; and, in short, left as
little appearance of inhabitants anywhere as was possible; and the
next morning early they posted themselves, with all their force, at
the plantation of the two men, to wait for their coming. As they
guessed, so it happened: these new invaders, leaving their canoes
at the east end of the island, came ranging along the shore, directly
towards the place, to the number of two hundred and fifty, as near
as our men could judge. Our army was but small indeed; but,
that which was worse, they had not arms for all their number. The
whole account, it seems, stood thus. first, as to men, seventeen
Spaniards five Englishmen, old Friday, the three slaves taken
with the women, who proved very faithful, and three other slaves,
who lived with the Spaniards. To arm these, they had eleven
muskets, five pistols, three fowling-pieces, five muskets or fowling-
pieces which were taken by mne from the mutinous seamen whom I
reduced, two swords, and three old halberts.
To their slaves they did not give either musket or fusee; but
they had each a halbert, or a long staff, like a quarter-staff, with a
great spike of iron fastened into each end of it, and by his side a
hatchet; also every one of our men had a hatchet. Two of the
women could not be prevailed upon but they would come into the
fight, and they had bows and arrows, which the Spaniards had
taken from the savages when the first action happened, which I
have spoken of, where the Indians fought with one another; and
the women had hatchets too.
The chief Spaniard, whom I aescribed so often, commanded the
whole; and Will Atkins, who, though a dreadful fellow for
wickedness, was a most daring, bold fellow, commanded under
him. The savages came forward like lions; and our men, which
was the worst of their fate, had no advantage in their situation;
only that Will Atkins, who now proved a most useful fellow, with
six men, was planted just behind a small thicket of bushes as an
advanced guard, with orders to let the first of them pass by and
then fire into the middle of them, and as soon as he had fired, to
make his retreat as nimbly as he could round a part of the wood,
and so come in behind the Spaniards, where they stood, having a
thicket of trees before them.
When the savages came on, they ran straggling about every way
in heaps, out of all manner of order, and Will Atkins iet about fifty
of them pass by him; then seeing the rest come in a very thick
throng, he orders three of his men to fire, having loaded their
muskets with six or seven bullets apiece, about as big as large
pistol bullets. How many they killed or wounded they knew not,
but the consternation and surprise was inexpressible among the
savages; they were frightened to the last degree to hear such a
dreadful noise, and see their men killed, and others hurt, but see
obody that did it; when, in the middle of their fright, Will
372
life and adventures of
Atkins and his other three let fly again among the thickest of
them; and in less than a minute, the first three being loaded again,
gave them a third volley.
Had Will Atkins and his men retired immediately, as soon as
they had fired, as they were ordered to do, or had the rest of the
body been at hand, to have poured in their shot continually, the
savages had been effectually routed; for the terror that was among
them came principally from this, that they were killed by the gods
with thunder and lightning, and could see nobody that hurt them.
But Will Atkins, staying to load again, discovered the cheat: some
of the savages who were at a distance spying them, came upon
them behind; and though Atkins and his men fired at them also,
two or three times, and killed above twenty, retiring as fast as they
could, yet they wounded Atkins himself, and killed one of his fellow
Englishmen with their arrows, as they did afterwards one Spaniard,
and one of the Indian slaves who came with the women. This
slave was a most gallant fellow, and fought most desperately,
killing five of them with his own hand, having no weapon but one
of the armed staves and a hatchet.
Our men being thus hard laid at, Atkins wounded, and two other
men killed, retreated to a rising ground in the wood; and the
Spaniards, after firing three volleys upon them, retreated also; for
their number was so great, and they were so desperate, that though
above fifty of them were killed, and more than as many wounded,
yet they came on in the teeth of our men, fearless of danger, and
shot their arrows like a cloud; and it was observed that their
wounded men, who were not quite disabled, were made outrageous
by their wounds, and fought like madmen.
When our men retreated, they left the Spaniard and the English-
man that were killed behind them: and the savages, when they
came up to them, killed them over again in a wretched manner,
breaking their arms, legs, and heads, with their clubs and wooden
swords, like true savages; but finding our men were gone, they did
not seem inclined to pursue them, but drew themselves up in a ring,
which is, it seems, their custom, and shouted twice, in token of
their victory; after which, they had the mortification to see several
of their wounded men fall, dying with the mere loss of blood.
The Spaniard governor having drawn his little body up together
upon a rising ground, Atkins, though he was wounded, would have
had them march and charge again all together at once: but the
Spaniard replied "Seignior Atkins, you see how their wounded
men fight; let them alone till morning; all the wounded men will
be stiff and sore with their wounds, and faint with the loss of blood
and so we shall have the fewer to engage." This advice was good:
but Will Atkins replied merrily, "That is true, seignior, and so
shall I too; and that is the reason I would go on while I am
warm.”—“Well, Seignior Atkins," says the Spaniard, "you have
behaved gallantly, and done your part; we will fight for you if you
·
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
273
»
cannot come on; but I think it best to stay till morning so they
waited.
But as it was a clear, moonlight night, and they found the savages
in great disorder about their dead and wounded men, and a grea,
noise and hurry among them where they lay, they afterwards re-
solved to fall upon them in the night, especially if they could come
to give them but one volley before they were discovered, which they
had a fair opportunity to do; for one of the Englishmen in whose
quarter it was where the fight began, led them round between the
woods and the seaside westward, and then turning short south, they
came so near where the thickest of them lay, that before they were
seen or heard eight of them fired in among them, and did dreadful
execution upon them; in half a minute more eight others fired after
them, pouring in their small shot in such a quantity that abundance
were killed and wounded; and all this while they were not able to
see who hurt them, or which way to fly.
'}
The Spaniards charged again with the utmost expedition, and
then divided themselves into three bodies, and resolved to fall in
among them all together. They had in each body eight persons,
that is to say, twenty-two men and the two women, who, by the
way, fought desperately. They divided the fire-arms equally in each
party, as well as the halberts and staves. They would have had
the women kept back, but they said they were resolved to die with
their husbands. Having thus formed their little army, they marched
out from among the trees, and came up to the teeth of the enemy,
shouting and hallooing as loud as they could; the savages stood all
together, but were in the utmost confusion, hearing the noise of our
men shouting from three quarters together. They would have
fought if they had seen us; for as soon as we came near enough to
be seen, some arrows were shot, and poor old Friday was wounded,
though not dangerously. But our men gave them no time, but
running up to them, fired among them three ways, and then fell in
with the butt ends of their muskets, their swords, armed staves, and
hatchets, and laid about them so well that, in a word, they set up a
dismal screaming and howling, flying to save their lives which way
soever they could.
Our men were tired with the execution, and killed or mortally
wounded in the two fights about one hundred and eighty of them;
the rest, being frightened out of their wits, scoured through the
woods and over the hills, with all the speed that fear and nimble
feet could help them to ; and as we did not trouble ourselves much
to pursue them, they got all together to the seaside, where they
landed, and where their canoes lay. But their disaster was not at
an end yet; for it blew a terrible storm of wind that evening from
the sea, so that it was impossible for them to go off; nay, the storm
continuing all night, when the tide came up their canoes were most
of them driven by the surge of the sea so high upon the shore that
It required infinite toil to get them off; and some of them were
:
A
life and adventures of
274
even dashed to pieces against the beach. Our men, though glad of
their victory, yet got little rest that night; but having refreshed
themselves as well as they could, they resolved to march to that
part of the island where the savages were fled, and see what posture
they were in. This necessarily led them over the place where the
fight had been, and where they found several of the poor creatures
not quite dead, and yet past recovering life; a sight disagreeable
enough to generous minds, for a truly great man, though obliged by
the law of battle to destroy his enemy, takes no delight in his
misery. However, there was no need to give any orders in this
case; for their own savages, who were their servants, despatched
these poor creatures with their hatchets.
At length they came in view of the place where the more miser-
able remains of the savages' army lay, where there appeared about
a hundred still; their posture was generally sitting upon the ground,
with their knees up towards their mouth, and the head put between
the two hands, leaning down upon the knee When our men came
within two musket shots of them, the Spaniard governor ordered
two muskets to be fired without ball, to alarm them; this he did,
that by their countenance he might know what to expect, whether
they were still in heart to fight, or were so heartily beaten as to be
discouraged, and so he might manage accordingly. This stratagem
took for as soon as the savages heard the first gun, and saw the
flash of the second, they started up upon their feet in the greatest
consternation imaginable, and as our men advanced swiftly towards
them, they all ran screaming and yelling away, with a kind of
howling noise, which our men did not understand, and had never
heard before; and thus they ran up the hills into the country.
At first our men had much rather the weather had been calm,
and they had all gone away to sea: but they did not then con-
sider that this might probably have been the occasion of their
coming again in such multitudes as not to be resisted, or, at least,
to come so many and so often as would quite desolate the island,
and starve them. Will Atkins, therefore, who, notwithstanding his
wound, kept always with them, proved the best counsellor in this
case: his advice was, to take the advantage that offered, and step
in between them and their boats, and so deprive them of the
capacity of ever returning any more to plague the island They
consulted long about this; and some were against it to fear of
making the wretches fly to the woods and live there desperate, and
so they should have them to hunt like wild beasts, be afraid to stir
out about their business, and have their plantations continually
rifled, all their tame goats destroyed, and, in short, be reduced
to a life of continual distress.
Will Atkins told them they had better have to do with a hundred
men than with a hundred nations; that, as they must destroy their
boats, so they must destroy the men, or be all of them destroyed
themselves. In a word, he shewed them the necessity of it se
RUBINSON CRUSOE.
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:
plainly that they all came into it; so they went to work immediately
with the boats, and getting some dry wood together from a dead
tree, they tried to set some of them on fire, but they were so wet
that they would not burn; however, the fire so burned the upper
part that it soon made them unfit for use at sea.
When the Indians saw what they were about, some of them came
running out of the woods, and coming as near as they could to our
men, kneeled down and cried, "Oa, Oa, Waramokoa," and some
other words of their language, which none of the others understood
anything of; but as they made pitiful gestures and strange noises,
it was easy to understand they begged to have their boats spared,
and that they would be gone, and never come there again. But
our men were now satisfied that they had no way to preserve them-
selves, or to save their colony, but effectually to prevent any of
these people from ever going home again; depending upon this,
that if even so much as one of them got back into their country to
tell the story, the colony was undone; so that, letting them know
that they should not have any mercy, they fell to work with their
canoes, and destroyed every one that the storm had not destroyed
before; at the sight of which, the savages raised a hideous cry in
the woods, which our people heard plain enough, after which they
ran about the island l'ke distracted men, so that, in a word, our men
did not really know what at first to do with them. Nor did the
Spaniards, with all their prudence, consider that while they made
those people thus desperate, they ought to have kept a good guard
at the same time upon their plantations; for though it is true they
had driven away their cattle, and the Indians did not find out their
main retreat, I mean my old castle at the hill, nor the cave in the
valley, yet they found out my plantation at the bower, and pulled it
all to pieces, and all the fences and planting about it; trod all the
corn under foot, tore up the vines and grapes, being just then
almost ripe, and did our men inestimable damage, though to them-
selves not one farthing's worth of service.
Though our men were able to fight them upon all occasions, yet
they were in no condition to pursue them, or hunt them up and
down; for as they were too nimble of foot for our people when
they found them single, so our men durst not go abroad single, for
fear of being surrounded with their numbers. The best was they
had no weapons; for though they had bows, they had no arrows
left, nor any materials to make any; nor had they any edge-tool
among them
The extremity and distress they were reduced to
was great, and indeed deplorable; but, at the same time, our men
were also brought to very bad circumstances by them, for though
their retreats were preserved, yet their provision was destroyed, and
their harvest spoiled, and what to do, or which way to turn them-
selves, they knew not. The only refuge they had now was the stock
of cattle they had in the valley by the cave, and some little corn
which grew there, and the plantation of the three Englishmen. Will
276
life and adventures of
Atkins and his comrades were now reduced to two; one of them
being killed by an arrow, which struck him on the side of his head,
just under the temple, so that he never spoke more; and it was
very remarkable that this was the same barbarous fellow that cut
the poor savage slave with his hatchet, and who afterwards intended
to have murdered the Spaniards.
I looked upon their case to have been worse at this time than
mine was at any time, after I first discovered the grains of barley
and rice, and got into the manner of planting and raising my corn,
and my tame cattle; for now they had, as I may say, a hundred
wolves upon the island, which would devour everything they could
come at, yet could be hardly come at themselves.
When they saw what their circumstances were, the first thing
they concluded was, that they would, if possible, drive the savages
up to the farther part of the island, south-west, that if any more
came on shore they might not find one another; then, that they
would daily hunt and harass them, and kill as many of them as
they could come at, till they had reduced their number; and if they
could at last tame them, and bring them to anything, they would
give them corn, and teach them how to plant, and live upon their
daily labour In order to do this, they so followed them, and so
terrified them with their guns, that in a few days, if any of them
fired a gun at an Indian, if he did not hit him, yet he would fall
down for fear. So dreadfully frightened were they that they kept
out of sight farther and farther; till, at last, our men followed them,
and almost every day killing or wounding some of them, they kept
up in the woods or hollow places so much, that it reduced them to
the utmost misery for want of food; and many were afterwards
found dead in the woods, without any hurt, absolutely starved to
death.
When our men found this, it made their hearts relent, and pity
moved them, especially the generous-minded Spaniard governor;
and he proposed, if possible, to take one of them alive, and bring
him to understand what they meant, so far as to be able to act as
interpreter, and go among them and see if they might be brought
to some conditions that might be depended upon, to save their lives
and do us no harm.
It was some while before any of them could be taken; but being
weak and half-starved, one of them was at last surprised and made
a prisoner. He was sullen at first, and would neither eat nor
drink; but finding himself kindly used, and victuals given to him,
and no violence offered him, he at last grew tractable, and came to
himself. They often brought old Friday to talk to him, who
always told him how kind the others would be to them all; that
they would not only save their lives, but give them part of the
island to live in, provided they would give satisfaction that they
would keep in their own bounds, and not come beyond it to injure
or prejudice others; and that they should have corn given them to
7
ROBINSON crusoe.
277
C
plant and make it grow for their bread, and some bread given them
for their present subsistence; and old Friday bade the fellow go
and talk with the rest of his countrymen, and see what they said to
it; assuring them that, if they did not agree immediately, they
should be all destroyed.
The
The poor wretches, thoroughly humbled, and reduced in number
to about thirty-seven, closed with the proposal at the first offer,
and begged to have some food given them; upon which twelve
Spaniards and two Englishmen, well armed, with three Indian
slaves and old Friday, marched to the place where they were.
three Indian slaves carried them a large quantity of bread, some
rice boiled up to cakes and dried in the sun, and three live goats;
and they were ordered to go to the side of a hill, where they sat
down, ate their provisions very thankfully, and were the most
faithful fellows to their words that could be thought of; for, except
when they came to beg victuals and directions, they never came
out of their bounds; and there they lived when I came to the
island, and I went to see them. They had taught them both
to plant corn, make bread, breed tame goats, and milk them: they
wanted nothing but wives in order for them soon to become a
nation. They were confined to a neck of land, surrounded with
high rocks behind them, and lying plain towards the sea before
them, on the south-east corner of the island. They had land
enough, and it was very good and fruitful; about a mile and a-half
broad, and three or four miles in length. Our men taught them
to make wooden spades, such as I made for myself, and gave
among them twelve hatchets and three or four knives; and there
they lived, the most subjected, innocent creatures that ever were
heard of.
After this the colony enjoyeà a perfect tranquillity with respect
to the savages, till I came to revisit them, which was about two
years after; not but that, now and then, some canoes of savages
came on shore for their triumphal, unnatural feasts; but as they
were of several nations, and perhaps had never heard of those that
came before, or the reason of it, they did not make any search or
inquiry after their countrymen ; and if they had, it would have been
very hard to have found them out.
Thus, I think,.I have given a full account of all that happened to
them till my return, at least that was worth notice. The Indians
were wonderfully civilised by them, and they frequently went among
them; but they forbid, on pain of death, any one of the Indians
coming to them, because they would not have their settlemen
betrayed again. One thing was very remarkable-viz., that thes
taught the savages to make wicker-work, or baskets, but they soon
outdid their masters: for they made abundance of ingenious things
in wicker-work, particularly baskets, sieves, bird-cages, cupboards,
etc.; as also chairs, stools, beds, couches, being very ingenious at
such work when they were once put in the way of it.
$78
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
My coming was a particular relief to these people, because wa
furnished them with knives, scissors, spades, shovels, pickaxes, and
all things of that kind which they could want. With the help of
those tools they were so very handy that they came at last to build
up their huts or houses very handsomely, raddling or working it up
like basket-work all the way round. This piece of ingenuity, although
it looked very odd, was an exceeding good fence, as well against
heat as against all sorts of vermin; and our men were so taken with
it that they got the Indians to come and do the like for them; so
that when I came to see the two Englishmen's colonies, they looked
at a distance as if they all lived like bees in a hive.
As for Will Atkins, who was now become a very industrious,
useful, and sober fellow, he had made himself such a tent of basket-
work as I believe was never seen; it was one hundred and twenty
paces round on the outside, as I measured by my steps; the walls
were as close worked as a basket, in panels or squares of thirty-two
in number, and very strong, standing about seven feet high; in the
middle was another not above twenty-two paces round, but built
stronger, being octagon in its form, and in the eight corners stood
eight very strong posts; round the top of which he laid strong
pieces, knit together with wooden pins, from which he raised a
pyramid for a handsome roof of eight rafters, joined together very
well, though he had no nails, and only a few iron spikes, which he
made himself, too, out of the old iron that I had left there. Indeed,
this fellow showed abundance of ingenuity in several things which
he had no knowledge of: he made him a forge, with a pair of
wooden bellows to blow the fire; he made himself charcoal for his
work; and he formed out of the iron crows a middling good anvil
to hammer upon in this manner he made many things, but especi
ally hooks, staples, and spikes, bolts and hinges. But to return te
the house after he had pitched the roof of his innermost tent, he
worked it up between the rafters with basket-work, so firm, and
thatched that over again so ingeniously with rice-straw, and over
that a large leaf of a tree, which covered the top, that his house was
as dry as if it had been tiled or slated. He owned, indeed, that the
savages had made the basket-work for him. The outer circuit was
covered as a lean-to all round this inner apartment, and long rafters
lay from the thirty-two angles to the top posts of the inner house,
being about twenty feet distant, so that there was a space like
a walk within the outer wicker-wall, and without the inner, near
twenty feet wide.
The inner place he partitioned off with the same wicker-work,
but much fairer, and divided into six apartments, so that he had six
rooms on a floor, and out of every one of these there was a door :
first into the entry, or coming into the main tent, another door into
the main tent, and another door into the space or walk that was
round it; so that walk was also divided into six equal parts, which
served not only for a retreat, but to store up any necessaries which
:
ROBINSON crusoe.
279
.
the family had occasion for. These six spaces not taking up the
whole circumference, what other apartments the outer circle had
were thus ordered :-As soon as you were in at the door of the outer
circle you had a short passage straight before you to the door of the
inner house; but on either side was a wicker partition and a door
in it, by which you went first into a large room or storehouse,
twenty feet wide and about thirty feet long, and through that into
another not quite so long; so that in the outer circle were ten
handsome rooms, six of which were only to be come at through the
apartments of the inner tent, and served as closets or retiring rooms
to the respective chambers of the inner circle; and four large ware-
houses, or barns, or what you please to call them, which went through
one another, two on either hand of the passage, that led through
the outer door to the inner tent. Such a piece of basket-work, I
believe, was never seen in the world, nor a house or tent so neatly
contrived, much less so built. In this great bee-hive lived the
three families, that is to say, Will Atkins and his companion; the
third was killed, but his wife remained with three children, and the
other two were not at all backward to give the widow her full share
of everything, I mean as to their corn, milk, grapes, etc., and when
they killed a kid, or found a turtle on the shore; so that they all
lived well enough; though it was true they were not so industrious
as the other two, as has been observed already.
+
One thing, however, cannot be omitted, viz., that as for religion,
I do not know that there was anything of that kind among them ;
they often, indeed, put one another in mind that there was a God,
by the very common method of seaman, swearing by His name
nor were their poor ignorant savage wives much better for having
been married to Christians, as we must call them; for as they knew
very little of God themselves, so they were utterly incapable of
entering into any discourse with their wives about a God, or to talk
anything to them concerning religion.
4
The utmost of all the improvement which I can say the wives
had made from them was, that they had taught them to speak
English pretty well; and most of their children, who were near
twenty in all, were taught to speak English too, from their first
learning to speak, though they at first spoke it in a very broken
manner, like their mothers. None of these children were above
six years old when I came thither, for it was not much above seven
years since they had fetched these five savage ladies over; they
had all children, more or less: the mothers were all a good sort of
well-governed, quiet, laborious women, modest and decent, helpful
to one another, mighty observant, and subject to their masters (I
cannot call them busbands), and lacked nothing but to be well
instructed in the Christian religion, and to be legally married; both
of which were happily brought about afterwards by my means, or
Et least in consequence of my coming among thems
#
380
life and adventures of
CHAPTER XXVI.
I hold conversations with the Spaniards, and learn the history of their
situation among the savages from which I relieved them-I inform
the colony for what purpose I am come, and what I mean to do for
them-Distribution of the stores I brought with me-The priest I
Raved at sea solemnises the marriages of the sailors and female
Indians who had hitherto lived together as man and wife.

AVING thus given an account of the colony in
general, and pretty much of my runagate English-
men, I must say something of the Spaniards, who
were the main body of the family, and in whose story
there are some incidents also remarkable enough.
I had a great many discourses with them about their circum-
stances when they were among the savages. They told me readily
that they had no instances to give of their application or ingenuity
in that country; that they were a poor, miserable, dejected handful
of people; that even if means had been put into their hands, yet
they had so abandoned themselves to despair, and were so sunk
under the weight of their misfortune, that they thought of nothing
but starving. One of them, a grave and sensible man, tola me he
was convinced they were in the wrong; that it was not the part of
wise men to give themselves up to their misery, but always to take
hold of the helps which reason offered, as well for present support
as for future deliverance: he told me that grief was the most sense-
less, insignificant passion in the world, for that it regarded only
things past, which were generally impossible to be recalled or to be
remedied, but had no views of things to come, and had no share in
anything that looked like deliverance, but rather added to the
affliction than proposed a remedy; and upon this he repeated a
Spanish proverb, which, though I cannot repeat in the same words
that he spoke it in, yet I remember I made it into an English
proverb of my own, thus :-
"In trouble to be troubled,
Is to have your trouble doubled."
}
He then ran on in remarks upon all the little improvements 1
had made in my solitude: my unwearied application, as he called
it; and how I had made a condition, which in its circumstances
was at first much worse than theirs, a thousand times more happy
than theirs was, even now when they were all together. He
told me it was remarkable that Englishmen had a greater
presence of mind in their distress than any people that ever
met with ; that their unhappy nation and the Portuguese were
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
981
the worst men in the world to struggle with misfortunes; for
that their first step in dangers, after the common efforts were over,
was to despair, lie down under it, and die, without rousing their
thoughts up to proper remedies for escape.
I told him their case and mine differed exceedingly; that they
were cast upon the shore without necessaries, without supply of
food, or present sustenance till they could provide for it; that, it
was true, I had this further disadvantage and discomfort, that I was
alone; but then the supplies I had providentially thrown into my
hands, by the unexpected driving of the ship on shore, was such a
help as would have encouraged any creature in the world to have
applied himself as I had done "Seignior," says the Spaniard,
"had we poor Spaniards been in our case, we should never have
got half those things out of the ship, as you did: nay," says he,
Of
we should never have found means to have got a raft to carry
them, or to have got the raft on shore without boat or sail; and
how much less should we have done if any of us had been alone!"
Well, I desired him to abate his compliments, and go on with the
history of their coming on shore, where they landed. He told me
they unhappily landed at a place where there were people without
provisions; whereas, had they had the common sense to put off to
sea again, and gone to another island a little further, they had
found provisions, though without people: there being an island
that way, as they had been told, where there were provisions,
though no people that is to say, that the Spaniards of Trinidad
had frequently been there, and had filled the island with goats and
hogs at several times, where they had bred in such multitudes, and
where turtle and sea-fowls were in such plenty, that they could have
been in no want of flesh, though they had found no bread, whereas,
here they were only sustained with a few roots and herbs, which
they understood not, and which had no substance in them, and
which the inhabitants gave them sparingly enough; and they could
treat them no better, unless they would turn cannibals and eat
men's flesh,

They gave me an account how many ways they strove to civilise
the savages they were with, and to teach them rational customs in
the ordinary way of living, but in vain; and how they retorted upon
them as unjust that they who came there for assistance and
support should attempt to set up for instructors to those that gave
them food; intimating, it seems, that none should set up for the
instructors of others but those who could live without them. They
gave me dismal accounts of the extremities they were driven to; how
sometimes they were many days without any food at all, the island
they were upon being inhabited by a sort of savages that lived more
indolent, and for that reason were less supplied with the necessaries
of life, than they had reason to believe others were in the same part
of the world and yet they found that these savages were less
ravenous and voracious than those who had better supplies of food.
:
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life and adventures of
Also, they added, they could not but see with what demonstrations
of wisdom and goodness the governing providence of God directs
the events of things in this world, which, they said, appeared in
their circumstances: for if, pressed by the hardships they were
under, and the barrenness of the country where they were, they had
searched after a better to live in, they had then been out of the way
of the relief that happened to them by my means.
They then gave me an account how the savages whom they lived
amongst expected them to go out with them into their wars; and,
it was true, that as they had fire-arms with them, had they not had
the disaster to lose their ammunition, they could have been service-
able not only to their friends, but have made themselves terrible
both to friends and enemies; but being without powder and shot,
and yet in a condition that they could not in reason decline to go
out with their landlords to their wars; so when they came into the
field of battle they were in a worse condition than the savages
themselves, for they had neither bows nor arrows, nor could they
use those the savages gave them So they could do nothing but
stand still and be wounded with arrows, till they came up to the
teeth of their enemy; and then, indeed, the three halberds they
had were of use to them; and they would often drive a whole little
army before them with those halberds, and sharpened sticks put
into the muzzles of their muskets. But, for all this, they were
sometimes surrounded with multitudes, and in great danger from
their arrows, till at last they found the way to make themselves
large targets of wood, which they covered with skins of wild beasts,
whose names they knew not, and these covered them from the
arrows of the savages: that, notwithstanding these, they were
sometimes in great danger; and five of them were once knocked
down together with the clubs of the savages, which was the time
when one of them was taken prisoner-that is to say, the Spaniard
whom I relieved. At first they thought he had been killed; but
when they afterwards heard he was taken prisoner, they were
under the greatest grief imaginable, and would willingly have all
ventured their lives to have rescued him.
They told me that when they were so knocked down, the rest of
their company rescued them, and stood over them fighting till they
were come to themselves, all but him whom they thought had been
dead; and then they made their way with their halberds and
pieces, standing close together in a line, through a body of above a
thousand savages, beating down all that came in their way, got the
victory over their enemies, but to their great sorrow, because it was
with the loss of their friend, whom the other party finding alive,
carried off with some others, is I gave an account before. They
described, most affectionately, how they were surprised with joy at
the return of their friend and companion in misery, who they
thought had been devoured by wild beasts of the worst kind-wild
men; and yet, how more and more they were surprised with the
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
283
account he gave them of his errand, and that there was a Christian
in any place near, much more one that was able, and had humanity
enough, to contribute to their deliverance.
They described how they were astonished at the sight of the
relief I sent them, and at the appearance of loaves of bread-things
they had not seen since their coming to that miserable place; how
often they crossed it and blessed it as bread sent from heaven; and
what a reviving cordial it was to their spirits to taste it, as also
the other things I had sent for their supply; and, after all, they
would have told me something of the joy they were in at the
sight of a boat and pilots, to carry them away to the person and
place from whence all these new comforts came. But it was im-
possible to express it by words, for their excessive joy naturally
driving them to unbecoming extravagances, they had no way to
describe them but by telling me they bordered upon lunacy, having
no way to give vent to their passions suitable to the sense that was
upon them; that in some it worked one way and in some another;
and that some of them, through a surprise of joy, would burst into
tears, others be stark mad, and others immediately faint. This
discourse extremely affected me, and called to my mind Friday's
ecstasy when he met his father, and the poor people's ecstasy when
I took them up at sea after their ship was on fire; the joy of the
mate of the ship when he found himself delivered in the place
where he expected to perish; and my own joy, when, after twenty-
eight years' captivity, I found a good ship ready to carry me to my
own country. All these things made me more sensible of the rela-
tion of these poor men, and more affected with it.
Having thus given a view of the state of things as I found them,
I must relate the heads of what I did for these people, and the
condition in which I left them. It was their opinion, and mine too,
that they would be troubled no more with the savages, or if they were,
they would be able to cut them off, if they were twice as many as
before; so they had no concern about that. Then I entered into
serious discourse with the Spaniard, whom I call governor, about
their stay in the island: for as I was not come to carry any of
them off, so it would not be just to carry off some and leave
others, who, perhaps, would be unwilling to stay if their strength
was diminished. On the other hand, I told them I came to
establish them there, not to remove them; and then I let them
know that I had brought with me relief of sundry kinds for them;
that I had been at a great charge to supply them with all things
necessary, as well for their convenience as their defence; and that
I had such and such particular persons with me, as well to increase
and recruit their number, as by the particular necessary employ-
ments which they were bred to, being artificers, to assist them in
those things in which at present they were in want.
They were all together when I talked thus to them; and before
I delivered to them the stores I had brought, I asked them, one by
284
life and adventures of
one, if they had entirely forgot and buried the first animosities that
had been among them, and would shake hands with one another,
and engage in a strict friendship and union of interest, that so there
might be no more misunderstandings and jealousies.
Will Atkins, with abundance of frankness and good humour, said
they had met with affliction enough to make them all sober, and
enemies enough to make them all friends; that, for his part, he
would live and die with them, and was so far from designing any-
thing against the Spaniards, that he owned they had done nothing
to him but what his own mad humour made necessary, and what
he would have done, and perhaps worse, in their case; and that he
would ask them pardon, if I desired it, for the foolish and brutish
things he had done to them, and was very willing and desirous of
living in terms of entire friendship and union with them, and would
do anything that lay in his power to convince them of it; and as
for going to England, he cared not if he did not go thither these
twenty years
The Spaniards said they had, indeed, at first disarmed and
excluded Will Atkins and his two countrymen for their ill conduct,
as they had let me know, and they appealed to me for the necessity
they were under to do so; but that Will Atkins had behaved him-
self so bravely in the great fight they had with the savages, and on
several occasions since, and had showed himself so faithful to, and
concerned for, the general interest of them all, that they had
forgotten all that was passed, and thought he merited as much to
be trusted with arms and supplied with necessaries as any of them;
that they had testified their satisfaction in him by committing the
command to him next to the governor himself; and as they had
entire confidence in him and all his countrymen, so they acknow-
ledged they had merited that confidence by all the methods that
honest men could merit to be valued and trusted; and they most
heartily embraced the occasion of giving me this assurance, that
they would never have any interest separate from one another.
Upon these frank and open declarations of friendship, we
appointed the next day to dine all together; and, indeed, we made
a splendid feast. I caused the ship's cook and his mate to come on
shore and dress our dinner, and the old cook's mate we had on
shore assisted. We brought on shore six pieces of good beef and
four pieces of pork, out of the ship's provisions, with our punch-
bowl, and materials to fill it; and, in particular, I gave them ten
bottles of French claret, and ten bottles of English beer; things
that neither the Spaniards nor the English had tasted for many
years, and which it may be supposed they were very glad of. The
Spaniards added to our feast five whole kids, which the cooks
roasted; and three of them were sent, covered up close, on board
the ship to the seamen, that they might feast on fresh meat from
on shore, as we did with their salt meat from on board.
After this feast, at which we were very innocently merry, I
robinson crusoe.
289
brought my cargo of goods; wherein, that there might be no dispute
about dividing, I showed them that there was a sufficiency for them
all, desiring that they might all take an equal quantity, when made
up, of the goods that were for wearing. As, first, distributed
linen sufficient to make every one of them four shirts, and, at the
Spaniard's request, afterwards made them up six; these were
exceeding comfortable to them, having been what they had long
since forgot the use of, or what it was to wear them. I allotted the
thin English stuffs, which I mentioned before, to make every one a
light coat, like a frock, which I judged fittest for the heat of the
season, cool and loose; and ordered that whenever they decayed,
they should make more, as they thought fit; the like for pumps,
shoes, stockings, hats, etc. I cannot express what pleasure sat
upon the countenances of all these poor men when they saw the
care I had taken of them, and how well I had furnished them.
They told me I was a father to them; and that having such a
correspondent as I was in so remote a part of the world, it would
make them forget that they were left in a desolate place; and they
all voluntarily engaged to me not to leave the place without my
consent,
Then I presented to them the people I had brought with me, par-
ticularly the tailor, the smith, and the two carpenters, all of them most
necessary people; but, above all, my general artificer, than whom
they could not name anything that was more useful to them; and
the tailor, to show his concern for them, went to work immediately,
and, with my leave, made them every one a shirt, the first thing he
did; and, what was still more, he taught the women not only how
to sew and stitch, and use the needle, but made them assist to
make the shirts for their husbands, and for all the rest. As to the
carpenters, I scarce need mention how useful they were; for they
took to pieces all my clumsy, unhandy things, and made clever
convenient tables, stools, bedsteads, cupboards, lockers, shelves, and
everything they wanted of that kind. But to let them see how
nature made artificers at first, I carried the carpenters to see Will
Atkins' basket-house, as I called it; and they both owned they
never saw an instance of such natural ingenuity before, nor any-
thing so regular and so handily built, at least of its kind; and one
of them, when he saw it, after musing a good while, turning about
to me, "I am sure," says he, "that man has no need of us; you
need do nothing but give him tools.”
U
Then I brought them out all my store of tools, an gave every
man a digging-spade, a shovel, and a rake, for we had no harrows
or ploughs; and to every separate place a pickaxe, a crow, a broad
axe, and a saw; always appointing, that as often as any were
broken or worn out, they should be supplied without grudging out
of the general stores that I left behin Nails, staples, hinges,
L
hammers, chisels, knives, scissors, and all sorts of ironwork, they
had without reserve, as they required; for no man would take more
$85
life and adventures of
4.
than he wanted, and he must be a fool that would waste or spoil
them on any account whatever; and for the use of the smith I left
two tons of unwrought iron for a supply.
My magazine of powder and arms which I brought them was
such, even to profusion, that they could not but rejoice at them; for
now they could march as I used to do, with a musket upon each
shoulder, if there was occasion; and were able to fight a thousand
savages, if they had but some little advantages of situation, which
also they could not miss, if they had occasion.
(*
I carried on shore with me the young man whose mother was
starved to death, and the maid also; she was a sober, well-
educated, religious young woman, and behaved so inoffensively
that every one gave her a good word; she had, indeed, an unhappy
life with us, there being no woman in the ship but herself, but she
bore it wi patience. After a while, seeing things so well ordered,
and in so fine a way of thriving upon my island, and considering
that they had neither business nor acquaintance in the East Indies,
or reason for taking so long a voyage, both of them came to me
and desired I would give them leave to remain on the island, and
be entered among my family, as they called it. I agreed to this
readily; and they had a little plot of ground allotted to them,
where they had three tents or houses set up, surrounded with
a basket-work, palisadoed like Atkins', adjoining to his plantation.
Their tents were contrived so that they had each of them a room
apart to lodge in, and a middle tent like a great storehouse to lay
their goods in, and to eat and to drink in. And now the other two
Englishmen removed their habitation to the same place; and so
the island was divided into three colonies, and no more-viz., the
Spaniards, with old Friday and the first servants, at my habitation
under the hill, which was, in a word, the capital city, and where
they had so enlarged and extended their works, as well under as on
the outside of the hill, that they lived, though perfectly concealed,
yet full at large. Never was there such a little city in a wood, and
so hid, in any part of the world; for I verily believe that a thousand
men right have ranged the island a month, and, if they had not
known there was such a thing, and looked on purpose for it, they
would not have found it Indeed, the trees stood so thick and so
close, and grew so fast oven one into another, that nothing but
cutting them down first could discover the place, except the only
two narrow entrances where they went in and out could be found,
which was not very easy; one of them was close down at the
water's edge, on the side of the creek, and it was afterwards above
two hundred yards to the place; and the other was up a ladder at
twice, as I have already described it; and they had also a large
wood, thickly planted, on the top of the hill, containing above an
acre, which grew apace, and concealed the place from all discovery
there, with only one narrow place between two trees, not easily to
be discovered, to enter on that side.
ROBINSON crusoe.
287
The other colony was that of Will Atkins, where there were four
families of Englishmen, I mean those I had left there, with their
wives and children; three savages that were slaves, the widow and
the children of the Englishman that was killed, the young man and
the maid, and, by the way, we made a wife of her before we went
away. There were besides the two carpenters and the tailor, whom I
brought with me for them: also the smith, who was a very necessary
man to them, especially as a gunsmith, to take care of their arms;
and my other man, whom I called Jack-of-all-trades, who was in
himself as good almost as twenty men; for he was not only a very
ingenious fellow, but a very merry fellow, and before I went away
we married him to the honest maid that came with the youth in the
ship I mentioned before. i
•
And now I speak of marrying, it brings me naturally to say
something of the French ecclesiastic that I had brought with
me out of the ship's crew whom I took up at sea. It is true this
man was a Roman, and perhaps it may give offence to some here-
after if I leave anything extraordinary upon record of a man whom,
before I begin, I must (to set him out in just colours) represent in
terms very much to his disadvantage, in the account of Protestants;
as, first, that he was a l'apist; secondly, a Popish priest; and,
thirdly, a French Popish priest. But justice demands of me to
give him a due character; and I must say, he was a grave, sober,
pious, and most religious person; exact in his life, extensive in his
charity, and exemplary in almost everything he did. What then
can any one say against being very sensible of the value of such a
man, notwithstanding his profession? though it may be my opinion
perhaps, as well as the opinion of others who shall read this, that
he was mistaken.
The first hour that I began to converse with him after he had
agreed to go with me to the East Indies, I found reason to delight
exceedingly in his conversation; and he first began with me about
religion in the most obliging manner imaginable. "Sir," says he,
64 'you have not only under God (and at that he crossed his breast)
saved my life, but you have admitted me to go this voyage in your
ship, and by your obliging civility have taken me into your family,
giving me an opportunity of free conversation. Now, sir, you see
by my habit what my profession is, and I guess by your nation
what yours is; I may think it is my duty, and doubtless it is so, to
use my utmost endeavours, on all occasions, to bring all the souls I
can to the knowledge of the truth, and to embrace the catholic
doctrine; but as I am here under your permission, and in your
family, I am bound, in justice to your kindness as well as in decency
and good manners, to be under your government; and therefore I
shall not, without your leave, enter into any debate on the points of
religion in which we may not agree, further than you shall give me
leave."
I told hẩm his carriage was so modest that I could not but
LIFE AND ADVENTURES UK
acknowledge it that it was true we were such people as they ca
heretics, but that he was not the first catholic I had conversed with
without falling into inconveniences, or carrying the questions to any
height in debate; that he should not find himself the worse used
for being of a different opinion from us, and if we did not converse
without any dislike on either side, it should be his fault, not ours.
He replied that he thought all our conversation might be easily
separated from disputes; that it was not his business to cap
principles with every man he conversed with; and that he rather
desired me to converse with him as a gentleman than as a
religionist; and that, if I would give him leave at any time to
discourse upon religious subjects, he would readily comply with it,
and that he did not doubt but I would allow him also to defend his
own opinions as well as he could; but that without my leave he
would not break in upon me with any such thing He told me
further, that he would not cease to do all that became him, in his office
as a priest, as well as a private Christian, to procure the good of the
ship, and the safety of all that was in her; and though, perhaps, we
would not join with him, and he could not pray with us, he hoped
he might pray for us, which he would do upon all occasions. In
this manner we conversed; and as he was of the most obliging,
gentlemanlike behaviour, so he was, if I may be allowed to say so,
a man of good sense, and, as I believe, of great learning.
He gave me a most diverting account of his life, and of the many
extraordinary events of it; of many adventures which had befallen
him in the few years that he had been abroad in the world; and
particularly, it was very remarkable, that in the voyage he was now
engaged in he had the misfortune, to be five times shipped and
unshipped, and never to go to the place whither any of the ships he
was in were at first designed That his first intent was to have
gone to Martinico, and that he went on board a ship bound thither
at St. Malo; but being forced into Lisbon by bad weather, the
ship received some damage by running aground in the mouth of the
river Tagus, and was obliged to unload her cargo there; but find-
ing a Portuguese ship there bound for the Madeiras, and ready to
sail, and supposing he should meet with a ship there bound to
Martinico, he went on board, in order to sail to the Madeiras; but
the master of the Portuguese ship being but an indifferent mariner,
had been out of his reckoning, and they drove to Fayal; where,
however, he happened to find a very good market for his cargo,
which was corn, and therefore resolved not to go to the Madeiras,
but to load salt at the Isle of May, and to go away to Newfound-
land,He had no remedy in this exigence but to go with the ship,
and had a pretty good voyage as far as the Banks (so they call the
place where they catch the fish), where, meeting with a French ship
bound from France to Quebec, and from thence to Martinico, to
carry provisions, he thought he should have an opportunity to com-
plate his first design; but when he came to Quebec, the master of
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
the ship died, and the vessel proceeded no further; so the next
voyage he shipped himself for France, in the ship that was burned
when we took them up at sea, and then shipped with us for the
East Indies, as I have already said. Thus he had been disappointed
in five voyages; all, as I may call it, in one voyage, besides what I
shall have occasion to mention further of him.
But I shall not make digression into other men's stories which
have no relation to my own; so I return to what concerns our
affairs in the island He came to me one morning. 'for he lodged
among us all the while we were upon the island), and it happened
to be just when I was going to visit the Englishmen's colony, at the
furthest part of the island; I say, he came to me, and told me,
with a very grave countenance, that he had for two or three days
desired an opportunity of some discourse with me, which he hoped
would not be displeasing to me, because he thought it might in
some measure correspond with my general design, which was the
prosperity of my new colony, and perhaps might put it, at least
more than he yet thought it was, in the way of God's blessing.
I looked a little surprised at the last part of his discourse, and
turning a little short, "How, sir," said I, "can it be said that we
are not in the way of God's blessing, after such visible assistances
and deliverances as we have seen here, and of which I have given
you a large account 1"-" If you had pleased, sir," said he, with a
world of modesty, and yet great readiness," to have heard me, you
would have found no room to have been displeased, much less to
think so hard of me, that I should suggest that you have not had
wonderful assistances and deliverances; and I hope, on your behalf,
that you are in the way of God's blessing, and your design is exceed-
ing good, and will prosper. But, sir, though it were more so than is
even possible to you, yet there may be some among you that are
not equally right in their actions and you know that in the story
of the children of Israel, one Achan in the camp removed God's
blessing from them, and turned His hand so against them, that six-
and-thirty of them, though not concerned in the crime, were
the objects of divine vengeance, and bore the weight of that
punishment."
I was sensibly touched with this discourse, and told him his
inference was so just, and the whole design seemed so sincere, and
was really so religious in its own nature, that I was very sorry I had
interrupted him, and begged him to go on; and, in the meantime,
because it seemed that what we had both to say might take up
some time, I told him I was going to the Englishmen's plantations,
and asked him to go with me, and we might discourse of it by the
way. He told me he would the more willingly wait on me thither,
because there partly the thing was acted which he desired to speak
to me about; so we walked on, and I pressed him to be free and
>
plain with me in what he had to say.
"Why, then, sir," said he, "be pleased to give me legye to lay
290
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
down a few propositions, as the foundation of what I have to say,
that we may not differ in the general principles, though we may be
of some differing opinions in the practice of particulars. First, sir,
though we differ in some of the doctrinal articles of religion (and it
is very unhappy it is so, especially in the case before us, as I shall
show afterwards), yet there are some general principles in which we
both agree that there is a God; and that this God having given us
some stated general rules for our service and obedience, we ought not
willingly and knowingly to offend Him, either by neglecting to do
what He has commanded, or by doing what He has expressly for-
bidden. And let our different religions be what they will, this
general principle is readily owned by us all, that the blessing of God
does not ordinarily follow presumptuous sinning against His com-
mand; and every good Christian will be affectionately concerned to
prevent any that are under his care living in a total neglect of God
and His commands. It is not your men being Protestants, what-
ever my opinion may be of such, that discharges me from being
concerned for their souls, and from endeavouring, if it lies before
me, that they should live in as little distance from enmity with
their Maker as possible, especially if you give me leave to meddle
so far in your circuit."
I could not yet imagine what he aimed at, and told him I granted
all he had said, and thanked him that he would so far concern
himself for us: and begged he would explain the particulars of
what he had observed, that like Joshua, to take his own parable, I
might put away the accursed thing from us.
66 Why, then, sir," says he, "I will take the liberty you give me;
and there are three things, which, if I am right, must stand in the
way of God's blessing upon your endeavours here, and which I
should rejoice, for your sake and their own, to see removed. And,
sir, I promise myself that you will fully agree with me in them all,
as soon as I name them; especially because I shall convince you
that every one of them may, with great ease, and very much to your
satisfaction, be remedied. First, sir," says he," you have here
four Englishmen, who have fetched women from among the
savages, and have taken them as their wives, and have had many
children by them all, and yet are not married to them after any
stated legal manner, as the laws of God and man require. To
this, sir, I know, you will object that there was no clergyman or
priest of any kind to perform the ceremony; nor any pen and ink,
or paper, to write down a contract of marriage, and have it signed
between them, And I know also, sir, what the Spaniard governor
has told you, I mean of the agreement that he obliged them to
make when they took those women-viz., that they should choose
them out by consent, and keep separately to thein; which, by the
way, is nothing of a marriage, no agreement with the women as
wives, but only an agreement among themselves, to keep them
from quarrelling. But, sir, the essence of the sacrament of matri-
Add
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
mony (so he called it, being a Roman) consists not only in the
mutual consent of the parties to take one another as man and wife,
but in the formal and legal obligation that there is in the contract
to compel the man and woman, at all times, to own and acknow-
ledge each other; obliging the man to abstain from all other
women, to engage in no other contract while these subsist; and, on
all occasions, as ability allows, to provide honestly for them and
their children; and to oblige the women to the same or like con-
ditions, on their side. Now, sir," says he "these men may, when
they please, or when occasion presents, abandon these women,
disown their children, leave them to perish, and take other women,
and marry them while these are living ;" and here he added, with
some warmth, "How, sir, is God honoured in this unlawful liberty?
And how shall a blessing succeed your endeavours in this place,
however good in themselves, and however sincere in your design,
while these men, who at present are your subjects, under your
absolute government and dominion, are allowed by you to live in
open adultery?"
I confess I was struck with the thing itself, but much more with
the convincing arguments he supported it with; but I thought to
have got off my young priest by telling him that all that part was
done when I was not there: and that they had lived so many years
with them now, that if it was adultery, it was past remedy; nothing
could be done in it now.
66
Sir," says he, "asking your pardon for such freedom, you are
right in this, that, it being done in your absence, you could not be
charged with that part of the crime; but, I beseech you, flatter not
yourself that you are not, therefore, under an obligation to do your
utmost now to put an end to it. You should legally and effectually
marry them; and as, sir, my way of marrying may not be easy to
reconcile them to, though it will be effectual, even by your own
laws, so your way may be as well before God, and as valid among
men. I mean by a written contract, signed by both man and
woman, and by all the witnesses present, which all the laws of
Europe would decree to be valid.”
Po
I was amazed to see so much true piety, and so much sincerity of
zeal, besides the unusual impartiality in his discourse as to his own
party or church, and such true warmth for preserving people that
he had no knowledge of or relation to from transgressing the laws
of God But recollecting what he had said of marrying them by a
written contract, which I knew he would stand to, I returned it
back upon him, and told him I granted all that he had said to be
just, and on his part very kind; that I would discourse with the
men upon the point now, when I came to them; and i knew ng
reason why they should scruple to let him marry thein all, which
I knew well enough would be granted to be as authentic and
valid in England es if they were married by one of our own
clergymen.
292
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
I then pressed him to tell me what was the second complaint
which he had to make, acknowledging that I was very much his
debtor for the first, and thanked him heartily for it. He told me
he would use the same freedom and plainness in the second, and
hoped I would take it as well; and this was, that, notwithstanding
these English subjects of mine, as he called them, had lived with
these women almost seven years, had taught them to speak English,
and even to read it, and that they were, as he perceived, women of
tolerable understanding, and capable of instruction, yet they had
not, to this hour, taught them anything of the Christian religion-
no, not so much as to know there was a God, or a worship, or in
what manner God was to be served, or that their own idolatry, and
worshipping they knew not whom, was false and absurd. This, he
said, was an unaccountable neglect, and what God would certainly
call them to account for, and perhaps at last take the work out of
their hands He spoke this very affectionately and warmly.
*
"I am persuaded," says he, "had those men lived in the savage
country whence their wives came, the savages would have taken
more pains to have brought them to be idolaters, and to worship
the devil, than any of these men, so far as I can see, have taken
with them to teach the knowledge of the true God. Now, sir," said
he, “though I do not acknowledge your religion, or you mine, yet
we would be glad to see the devil's servants and the subjects of his
kingdom taught to know the general principles of the Christian
religion; that they might, at least, hear of God and a Redeemer,
and of the resurrection, and of a future state-things which we all
believe; that they might, at least, be so much nearer coming into
the bosom of the true church than they are now in the public pro-
fession of idolatry and devil-worship."
66
I could hold no longer: I took him in my arms, and embraced
him eagerly. "How far," said I to him, "have I been from under-
standing the most essential part of a Christian-viz., to love the
interest of the Christian church, and the good of other men's
souls! scarce have known what belongs to the being a Christian."
Oh, sir ! do not say so," replied he; "this thing is not your
fault."-"No," said I; "but why did I never lay it to heart as well
as you ?”—“ It is not too late yet,” said he ; "be not too forward to
condemn yourself."-" But what can be done now?" said I : “ you
see I am going away."-"Will you give me leave to talk with these
poor men about it ?"-"Yes, with all my heart," said I: "and will
oblige them to give heed to what you say too."-"As to that," said
he, we must leave them to the mercy of Christ; but it is your
business to assist them, encourage them, and instruct them; and
if you give me leave, and God His blessing, I do not doubt but the
poor ignorant souls shall be brought home to the great circle of
Christianity, if not into the particular faith we all embrace, and that
even while you stay here.' Upon this I said, “I shall not only give
you leave, but give you a thousand thanks for it."
"6
"}}
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
293
I now pressed him for the third article in which we were to
blama Why, really," says he, "it is of the same nature. It is
about your poor savages, who are, as I may say, your conquered
subjects. It is a maxim, sir, that is, or ought to be received among
all Christians, of what church or pretended church soever, that the
Christian knowledge ought to be propagated by all possible means
and on all possible occasions. It is on this principle that our
church sends missionaries into Persia, India, and China; and
that our clergy, even of the superior sort, willingly engage in the
most hazardous voyages, and the most dangerous residence amongst
murderers and barbarians, to teach them the knowledge of the true
God, and to bring them over to embrace the Christian faith. Now,
sir, you have such an opportunity here to have six or seven-and-
thirty poor savages brought over from a state of idolatry to the
knowledge of God, their Maker and Redeemer, that I wonder how
you can pass such an occasion of doing good, which is really worth
the expense of a man's whole life."
I was now struck dumb indeed, and had not one word to say. I
had here the spirit of true Christian zeal for God and religion before
me. As for me, I had not so much as entertained a thought of this
in my heart before, and I believe I should not have thought of it
for I looked upon these savages as slaves, and people whom, had
we not had any work for them to do, we would have used as such,
or would have been glad to have transported them to any part of
the world; for our business was to get rid of them, and we would
all have been satisfied if they had been sent to any country, so
they had never seen their own. I was confounded at his discourse,
and knew not what answer to make him,
$4
He looked earnestly at me, seeing my confusion-“Sir,” says he,
"I shall be very sorry if what I have said gives you any offence."
No, no,” said I, "I am offended with nobody but myself; but I
am perfectly confounded, not only to think that I should never
take any notice of this before, but with reflecting what notice I am
able to take of it now. You know, sir," said I, "what circum-
stances I am in; I am bound to the East Indies in a ship freighted
by merchants, and to whom it would be an insufferable piece of
injustice to detain their ship here, the men lying all this while at
victuals and wages on the owners' account It's true, I agreed to
be allowed twelve days here, and if I stay more, I must pay three
pounds sterling per diem demurrage; nor can I stay upon demur-
rage above eight days more, and I have been here thirteen already ;
so that I am perfectly unable to engage in this work, unless I would
suffer myself to be left behind here again; in which case, if this
single ship should miscarry in any part of her voyage, I should be
just in the same condition that I was left in here at first, and from
which I have been so wonderfully delivered." He owned the case
was very hard upon me as to my voyage; but laid it home upon
my conscience whether the blessing of saving thirty-seven souls
.

394
LIFE AND ADVENTUREs of
was not worth venturing all I had in the world for. I was not so sen-
sible of that as he was. I replied to him thus: "Why, sir, it is a
valuable thing, indeed, to be an instrument in God's hand to corvert
thirty-seven heathens to the knowledge of Christ: but as you are an
ecclesiastic, and are given over to the work, so it seems so naturally
to fall in the way of your profession; how is it, then, that you do
not rather offer yourself to undertake it than to press me to do it?"
Upon this he faced about just before me, as be walked along, and
putting me to a full stop, made me a very low bow. "I most
heartily thank God and you, sir," said he, "for giving me so
evident a call to so blessed a work; and if you think yourself dis-
charged from it, and desire me to undertake it, I will most readily
do it, and think it a happy reward for all the hazards and difficulties
of such a broken, disappointed voyage as I have met with, that I
am dropped at last into so glorious a work.”
!
(6
I discovered a kind of rapture in his face while he spoke this to
me; his eyes sparkled like fire; his face glowed, and his colour
came and went; in a word, he was fired with the joy of being em-
barked in such a work. I paused a considerable while before I
could tell what to say to him; for I was really surprised to
find a man of such sincerity, and who seemed possessed of
a zeal beyond the ordinary rate of men. But after I had con-
sidered it a while, I asked him seriously if he was in earnest,
and that he would venture, on the single consideration of an
attempt to convert those poor people, to be locked up in an
unplanted island for perhaps his life, and at last might not know
whether he should be able to do them good or not? He turned
short upon me, and asked me what I called a venture ?
Pray,
sir," said he, "what do you think I consented to go in your ship to
the East Indies for?"-"Nay," said I, "that I know not, unless it
was to preach to the Indians.' "Doubtless it was," said he; "and
do you think, if I can convert these thirty-seven men to the faith of
Jesus Christ, it is not worth my time, though I should never be
fetched off the island again ?-nay, is it not infinitely of more worth
to save so many souls than my life is, or the life of twenty more of
the same profession î Yes, sir," says he, "I would give God
thanks all my days if I could be made the happy instrument of
saving the souls of those poor men, though I were never to get
my foot off this island or see my native country any more.
But
since you will honour me with putting me into this work, for which
I will pray for you all the days of my life, I have one humble
petition to you besides."-"What is that?" said I.-"Why," says
he, "it is, that you will leave your man Friday with me, to be my
interpreter to them, and to assist me; for without some help Í
cannot speak to them, or they to me."
I
I was sensibly touched at his requesting Friday, because I could
not think of parting with him, and that for many reasons: he had
been the companion of my travels; he was not only faithful to me
کی
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
995
but sincerely affectionate to the last degree; and I had resolved to
do something considerable for him if he outlived me, as it was
probable he would. Then I knew that, as I had bred Friday up to be
a Protestant, it would quite confound him to bring him to embrace
another religion; and he would never, while his eyes were open,
believe that his old master was a heretic, and would be damned;
and this might in the end ruin the poor fellow's principles, and so
turn him back again to his first idolatry. However, a sudden
thought relieved me in this strait, and it was this: I told him I
could not say that I was willing to part with Friday on any account
whatever, though a work that to him was of more value than his life
ought to be of much more value than the keeping or parting with a
servant. On the other hand, I was persuaded that Friday would by
no means agree to part with me; and I could not force him to it
without his consent, without manifest injustice; because I had pro-
mised I would never send him away, and he had promised and
engaged that he would never leave me, unless I sent him away.
He seemed very much concerned at it, for he had no rational
access to these poor people, seeing he did not understand one word
of their language, nor they one of his. To remove this difficulty, I
told him Friday's father had learned Spanish, which I found he
also understood, and he should serve him as an interpreter. So he
was much better satisfied, and nothing could persuade him but he
would stay and endeavour to convert them; but Providence gave
another very happy turn to all this.
I come back now to the first part of his objections. When we came
to the Englishmen, I sent for them all together, and after some account
given them of what I had done for them-viz., what necessary
things I had provided for them, and how they were distributed,
which they were very sensible of, and very thankful for, I began to
talk to them of the scandalous life they led, and gave them a full
account of the notice the clergyman had taken of it; and arguing
how unchristian and irreligious a life it was, I first asked them if they
were married men or bachelors? They soon explained their con-
dition to me, and showed that two of them were widowers, and the
other three were single men, or bachelors. I asked them with what
conscience they could take these women, and call them their wives,
and have so many children by them, and not be lawfully married to
them? They all gave me the answer I expected-viz., that there
was nobody to marry them; that they agreed before the governor
to keep them as their wives, and to maintain them and own them as
their wives; and they thought, as things stood with them, they
were as legally married as if they had been married by a parson
and with all the formalities in the world.
I told them that no doubt the_were married in the sight of God,
and were bound in conscience to keep them as their wives; but
that the laws of men being otherwise, they might desert the poor
women and children hereafter; and that their wives, being poor
296
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LIFE AND adventURES OF
desolate woman, friendless and moneyless, would have no way to
help themselves. therefore told them that unless I was assured
of their honest intent, I could do nothing for them, but would take
care that what I did should be for the women and children without
them; and that, unless they would give me some assurances that
they would marry the women, I could not think it was convenient
*hey should continue together as man and wife; for that it was
both scandalous to men and offensive to God, who they could not
think would bless them if they went on thus,
All this went on as I expected; and they told me, especially
Will Atkins, who now seemed to speak for the rest, that they loved
their wives as well as if they had been born in their own native country,
and would not leave them on any account whatever; and they did
verily believe that their wives were as virtuous and as modest, and
did, to the utmost of their skill, as much for them and for their
children, as any women could possibly do; and they would not
part with them on any account. Will Atkins, for his own particular,
added, that if any man would take him away, and offer to carry him
home to England, and make him captain of the best man-of-war in
the navy, he would not go with him if he might not carry his wife
and children with him; and if there was a clergyman ia the ship,
he would be married to her now with all his heart.
This was just as I would have it. The priest was not with me at
that moment, but was not far off; so to try him further, I told him
I had a clergyman with me, and, if he was sincere, I would have
him married next morning, and bade him consider of it, and talk
with the rest. He said, as for himself, he need not consider of it at all,
for he was very ready to do it, and was glad I had a minister with me,
and he believed they would be all willing also. I then told him that
my friend, the minister, was a Frenchman, and could not speak
English, but I would act the clerk between them. He never so
much as asked me whether he was a Papist or Protestant, which
was, indeed, what I was afraid of. We then parted, and I went
back to my clergyman, and Will Atkins went in to talk with his
companions. I desired the French gentleman not to say anything
to them till the business was thoroughly ripe; and I told him what
answer the men had given me.
I
Before I went from their quarter they all came to me and told
me they had been considering what I had said; that they were
glad to hear I had a clergyman in my company, and they were
very willing to give me the satisfaction I desired, and to be formally
married as soon as I pleased; for they were far from desiring to
part with their wives, and that they meant nothing but what was
very honest when they chose them. So I appointed them to meet
me the next morning; and, in the meantime, they should let their
wives know the meaning of the marriage law; and that it was not
only to prevent any scandal, but also to oblige them that they
should not forsake them, whatever might happen.
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
297
The women were easily made sensible of the meaning of the
thing, and were very well satisfied with it, as, indeed, they had
reason to be: so they failed not to attend all together at my
apartment next morning, where I brought out my clergyman; and
though he had not on a minister's gown, after the manner of
England, or the habit of a priest, after the manner of France, yet
having a black vest something like a cassock, with a sash round it,
he did not look very unlike a minister; and as for his language, I
was his interpreter. But the seriousness of his behaviour to them,
and the scruples he made of marrying the women, because they
were not baptised and professed Christians, gave them an exceed-
ing reverence for his person; and there was no need, after that, to
inquire whether he was a clergyman or not. Indeed, I was afraid
his scruples would have been carried so far as that he would not
have married them at all; nay, notwithstanding all I was able to
say to him, he resisted me, though modestly, yet very steadily, and
at last refused absolutely to marry them, unless he had first talked
with the men and the women too; and though at first I was a little
backward to it, yet at last I agreed to it with a good will, perceiving
the sincerity of his design.
When he came to them he let them know that I had acquainted
him with their circumstances, and with the present design; that he
was very willing to perform that part of his function, and marry
them, as I had desired; but that before he could do it, he must
take the liberty to talk with them. He told them that in the sight
of all indifferent men, and in the sense of the laws of society, they
had lived all this while in a state of sin; and that it was true that
nothing but the consenting to marry, or effectually separating them
from one another, could now put an end to it; but there was a
difficulty in it, too, with respect to the laws of Christian matrimony,
which he was not fully satisfied about, that of marrying one that is
■ professed Christian to a savage, an idolater, and a heathen-one
that is not baptised; and yet that he did not see that there was
time left to endeavour to persuade the women to be baptised, or to
profess the name of Christ, whom they had, he doubted, heard
nothing of, and without which they could not be baptised. He told
them he doubted they were but indifferent Christians themselves;
that they had but little knowledge of God or of His ways, and,
therefore, he could not expect that they had said much to their
wives on that head yet; but that unless they would promise him to
use their endeavours with their wives to persuade them to become
Christians, and would, as well as they could, instruct them in the
knowledge and belief of God that made them, and to worship
Jesus Christ that redeemed them, he could not marry them; for he
would have no hand in joining Christians with savage, nor was it
consistent with the principles of the Christian religion, and was,
indeed, expressly forbidden in God's law.
They heard all this very attentively, and I delivered it very
#98
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
66
faithfully to them from his mouth, as near his own words as
could; only sometimes adding something of my own, to convince
them how just it was, and that I was of his mind; and I always
very faithfully distinguished between what I said from myself and
what were the clergyman's words. They told me it was very true
what the gentleman said, that they were very indifferent Christians
themselves, and that they had never talked to their wives about
religion. Lord, sir," says Will Atkins, 'how should we teach
them religion? Why, we know nothing ourselves; and besides,
sir," said he, "should we talk to them of God and Jesus Christ,
and heaven and hell, it would make them laugh at us, and ask us
what we believe ourselves. And if we should tell them that we
believe all the things we speak of to them, such as of good people
going to heaven, and wicked people to the devil, they would ask us
where we intend to go ourselves, that believe all this, and are such
wicked fellows as we indeed are? Why, sir, 'tis enough to give
them a surfeit of religion at first hearing; folks must have some
religion themselves before they begin to teach other people."-
"Will Atkins," said I to him, "though I am afraid that what you
say has too much truth in it, yet can you not tell your wife she is in
the wrong; that there is a God, and a religion better than her
own; that her gods are idols; that they can neither hear nor
speak; that there is a great Being that made all things, and that
can destroy all that he has made; that he rewards the good and
punishes the bad; and that we are to be judged by him at last for
all we do here? You are not so ignorant, but even nature itself
will teach you that all this is true; and I am satisfied you know it
all to be true, and believe it yourself."—" That is true, sir,” said
Atkins; "but with what face can I say anything to my wife of all
this, when she will tell me immediately it cannot be true "-" Not
f
true ! " said I ;
"what do you mean by that?"-" Why, sir," said
he, "she will tell me it cannot be true that this God I shall tell her
of can be just, or can punish or reward, since I am not punished
and sent to the devil, that have been such a wicked creature as she
knows I have been, even to her, and to everybody else; and that I
should be suffered to live, that have been always acting so contrary
to what I must tell her is good, and to what I ought to have done."
-66
"Why, truly, Atkins," said I, "I am afraid thou speakest too
much truth;" and with that I informed the clergyman of what
Atkins had said, for he was impatient to know Oh," said the
priest, "tell him there is one thing will make him the best minister
in the world to his wife, and that is repentance; for none teach
repentance like true penitents. He wants nothing but to repent,
and then he will be so much the better qualified to instruct bis
wife; he will then be able to tell her that there is not only a God,
and that he is the just rewarder of good and evil, but that he is
a merciful Being, and with infinite goodness and long-suffering
forbears to punish those that offend; waiting to be gracious,
(6
ROBINSON crusoe.
and willing not the death of a sinner, but rather that he should
return and live; and even reserves damnation to the general day of
retribution; that it is a clear evidence of God and of a future state
that righteous men receive not their reward, or wicked men their
punishment, till they come into another world; and this will lead
him to teach his wife the doctrine of the resurrection and of the
last judgment. Let him but repent himself, he will be an excellent
preacher of repentance to his wife."
I repeated all this to Atkins, who looked very serious all the
while, and, as we could easily perceive, was more than ordinarily
affected with it; when being eager, and hardly suffering me to
make an end-"I know all this, master," says he, "and a great
deal more; but I have not the impudence to talk thus to my wife,
when God and my conscience know, and my wife will be an
undeniable evidence against me, that I have lived as if I had never
heard of a God or future state, or anything about it; and to talk
of my repenting, alas! (and with that he fetched a deep sigh, and I
could see that the tears stood in his eyes) 'tis past all that with
me.”—“Past it, Atkins?" said I : "what dost thou mean by that?"
“I know well enough what I mean," says he; "I mean 'tis too
late, and that is too true."
I told the clergyman, word for word, what he said, and this
affectionate man could not refrain from tears; but, recovering
himself, said to me, "Ask him but one question: Is he easy that
it is too late; or is he troubled, and wishes it were not so?" ´ I put
the question fairly to Atkins; and he answered, with a great deal
of passion, "How could any man be easy in a condition that must
certainly end in eternal destruction? that he was far from being casy:
but that, on the contrary, he believed it would one time or other ruin
im."- What do you mean by that?" said I. Why," he said,
"he believed he should one time or other cut his throat, ce put an
end to the terror of it."
(C
The clergyman shook his head, with great concern in his face,
when I told him all this; but turning quick to me upon it, says,
"If that be his case, we may assure him it is not too late; Christ
will give him repentance. But pray," says he, "explain this to him;
that as no man is saved but by Christ, and the merit of His passion
procuring divine mercy for him, how can it be too late for any man
to receive mercy? Does he think he is able to sin beyond the
power or reach of afvine mercy Pray tell him there may be a
ime when provoked mercy will no longer strive, and when God
may refuse to hear, but that it is never too late for men to ask
mercy; and we, that are Christ's servants, are commanded to
preach mercy at all times, in the name of Jesus Christ, to all those
that sincerely repent: so that it is never too late to repent."
I told Atkins all this, and he heard me with great earnestness
but it seemed as if kɔ turned of the discourse to the rest, for he said
to me he would go and have some talk with his wife ;´so he went
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life and adventures of
L
out a while, and we talked to the rest. I perceived they were all
stupidly ignorant as to matters of religion, as much as I was when
I went rambling away from my father; yet there were none of them
backward to hear what had been said; and all of them seriously
promised that they would talk with their wives about it, and do
their endeavours to persuade them to turn Christians.
66
The clergyman smiled upon me when I reported what answer
they gave, but said nothing a good while; but at last, shaking his
head, We that are Christ's servants,” says he, “ can go no further
than to exhort and instruct: and when men comply, submit to the
reproof, and promise what we ask, 'tis all we can do; we are bound
to accept their good words; but believe me, sir," said he, "what-
ever you may have known of the life of that man you call Will
Atkins, I believe he is the only sincere convert among them: I will
not despair of the rest; but that man is apparently struck with the
sense of his past life, and I doubt not, when he comes to talk of
religion to his wife, he will talk himself effectually into it: for
attempting to teach others is sometimes the best way of teaching
ourselves. If that poor Atkins begins but once to talk seriously of
Jesus Christ to his wife, he will assuredly talk himself into a
thorough convert, make himself a penitent, and who knows what
may follow,"
Upon this discourse, however, and their promising, as above, to
endeavour to persuade their wives to embrace Christianity, he
married the two other couple; but Will Atkins and his wife were
not yet come in. After this, my clergyman, waiting a while, was
curious to know where Atkins was gone, and turning to me, said,
"I entreat you, sir, let us walk out of your labyrinth here and look ;
I daresay we shall find this poor man somewhere or other talking
seriously to his wife, and teaching her already something of religion."
I began to be of the same mind; so we went out together, and I
carried him a way which none knew but myself, and where the
trees were so very thick that it was not easy to see through the
thicket of leaves, and far harder to see in than to see out: when,
coming to the edge of the wood, I saw Atkins and his tawny wife
sitting under the shade of a bush, very eager in discourse: I
stopped short till my clergyman came up to me, and then having
showed him where they were, we stood and looked very steadily at
them a good while. We observed him very earnest with her,
pointing up to the sun, and to every quarter of the heavens, and
then down to the earth, then out to the sea, then to himself, then to
her, to the woods, to the trees. "Now," says the clergyman, "you
see my words are made good, the man preaches to her; mark him
now, he is telling her that our God has made him, her, and the
heavens, the earth, the sea, the woods, the trees, etc."—"I believe
he is," said 1. Immediately we perceived Will Atkins start upon
his feet, fall down on his knees, and lift up both his hands. We
supposed he said something, but we could not hear him; it was too
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301
far for that. He did not continue kneeling half a minute, but
comes and sits down again by his wife, and talks to her again; we
perceived then the woman very attentive, but whether she said any-
thing to him we could not tell. While the poor fellow was upon his
knees I could see the tears run plentifully down my clergyman's
cheeks, and I could hardly forbear myself; but it was a great
affliction to us both that we were not near enough to hear anything
that passed between then, Well, however, we could come no
nearer for fear of disturbing them: so we resolved to see an end of
this piece of still conversation, and it spoke loud enough to us
without the help of voice. He sat down again, as I have said, close
by her, and talked again earnestly to her, and two or three times we
could see him embrace her most passionately; another time we saw
him take out his handkerchief and wipe her eyes, and then kiss her
again with a kind of transport very unusual; and after several of
these things, we saw him on a sudden jump up again, and lend her
his hand to help her up, when immediately leading her by the hand
a step or two, they both kneeled down together, and continued so
about two minutes.
My friend could bear it no longer, but cries out aloud, "St. Paul !
St. Paul behold he prayeth." I was afraid Atkins would hear
him, therefore I entreated him to withhold himself a while, that we
might see an end of the scene, which to me, I must confess, was
the most affecting that ever I saw in my life. Well, he strove with
himself for a while, but was in such raptures to think that the poor
heathen woman was become a Christian, that he was not able to
contain himself; he wept several times, then throwing up his hands
and crossing his breast, said over several things ejaculatory, and by
the way of giving God thanks for so miraculous a testimony of the
success of our endeavours. Some he spoke softly, and I could not
well hear others; some things he said in Latin, some in French;
then two or three times the tears would interrupt him, that he
could not speak at all; but I begged that he would contain himself,
and let us more narrowly and fully observe what was before us,
which he did for a time, the scene not being near ended yet; for
after the poor man and his wife were risen again from their knees,
we observed he stood talking still eagerly to her, and we observed
her motion, that she was greatly affected with what he said, by her
frequently lifting up her hands, laying her hand to her breast, and
such other postures as express the greatest seriousness and atten-
tion: this continued about half a quarter of an hour, and then
they walked away, so we could see no more of them in that
situation
I took this interval to say to the clergyman, first, that I was glad
to see the particulars we had both been witnesses to; that, though
I was hard enough of belief in such cases, yet that I began to think
It was all very sincere here, both in the man and his wife, however
ignorant they might both be, and I hoped such a beginning would
you
life and adventures of
yet have a more happy end: "Bu, my friend," added 1, will you
give me leave to start one difficulty here? I cannot tell how to
object the least thing against that affectionate concern which you
show for the turning of the poor people from their paganism to the
Christian religion; but how does this comfort you, while these
people are, in your account, out of the pale of the Catholic church,
without which you believe there is no salvation? so that you esteem
these but heretics, as effectually lost as the pagans themselves."
To this he answered, with abundance of candour, thus: "Sir, I
am a Catholic of the Roman church, and a priest of the order of
St. Benedict, and I embrace all the principles of the Roman faith;
but yet, if you will believe me, and that I do not speak in compli-
ment to you, or in respect to my circumstances and your civilities;
I say nevertheless, I do not look upon you, who call yourselves
reformed, without some charity, I dare not say (though I know it
is our opinion in general) that you cannot be saved; I will by no
means limit the mercy of Christ so far as think that He cannot
receive you into the bosom of His church, in a manner to us unper-
ceivable; and I hope you have the same charity for us: I pray
daily for you being all restored to Christ's church, by whatsoever
method He, who is all-wise, is pleased to direct. In the meantime,
surely you will allow it consists with me as a Roman to distinguish
far between a Protestant and a Pagan; between one that calls on
Jesus Christ, though in a way which I do not think is according to
the true faith, and a savage or a barbarian, that knows no God, no
Christ, no Redeemer; and if you are not within the pale of the
Catholic church, we hope you are nearer being restored to it than
those who know nothing of God or of His church and I rejoice,
therefore, when I see this poor man, who you say, has been
profligate, and almost a murderer, kneel down and pray to Jesus
Christ, as we suppose he did, though not fully enlightened;
believing that God, from whom every such work proceeds, will
sensibly touch his heart, and bring him to the further knowledge of
that truth in His own time; and if God shall influence this poor
man to convert and instruct the ignorant savage. his wife, I can
never believe that he shall be cast away himself. And have I not
reason, then, to rejoice, the nearer any are brought to the knowledge
of Christ, though they may not be brought quite home into the
bosom of the Catholic church just at the time when I desire it,
leaving it to the goodness of Christ to perfect His work in His own
time, and in His own way? Certainly, I would rejoice if all the
savages in America were brought, like this poor woman, to pray to
God, though they were all to be Protestants at first, rather than
they should continue pagans or heathens; firmly believing, that
He that had bestowed the first light on them would farther
illuminate them with a beam of his Heavenly grace, and bring
them into the pale of His church when He should see good.”
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
jog
b
{
CHAPTER XXVII.
Sincere and worthy character of the priest-Dialogue with Will Atkins
and myself-Conversation betwixt Atkins and his Indian wife on the
subject of religion Her baptism-Settlement of the commonwealth.

WAS astonished at the sincerity and temper of this pious
Papist, as much as I was oppressed by the power of his
reasoning; and it presently occurred to my thoughts,
that if such a temper was universal, we might be all
Catholic Christians, whatever church or particular
profession we joined in; that a spirit of charity would soon work
us all up into right principles; and as he thought that the like
charity would make us all Catholics, so I told him I believed, had
all the members of his church the like moderation, they would soon
all be Protestants. And there we left that part; for we never dis-
puted at all. However, I talked to him another way, and taking
him by the hand, "My friend," says I, "I wish all the clergy of
the Romish church were blessed with such moderation, and had an
equal share of your charity. I am entirely of your opinion; but I
must tell you that if you should preach such doctrine in Spain or
Italy, they would put you into the Inquisition."-"It may be so,"
said he; "I know not what they would do in Spain or Italy; but
I will not say they would be the better Christians for that severity;
for I am sure there is no heresy in abounding with charity.”
Well, as Will Atkins and his wife were gone, our business there
was over, so we went back our own way; and when we came back,
we found them waiting to be called in: observing this, I asked my
clergyman if we should discover to him that we had seen him under
the bush or not and it was his opinion we should not, but that we
should talk to him first, and hear what he would say to us: so we
called him in alone, nobody being in the place but ourselves, and I
began by asking him some particulars about his parentage and
education. He told me frankly enough that his father was a
clergyman who would have taught him well, but that he, Will
Atkins, despised all instruction and correction; and by his brutish
conduct cut the thread of all his father's comforts and shortened
his days, for that he broke his heart by the most ungrateful, un-
natural return for the most affectionate treatment a father over
gave.
In what he said there seemed so much sincerity of repentance, that
It painfully affected me. I could not but reflect that I, too, had
shortened the life of a good, tender father by iny bad conduct and obsti-
nate self-will. I was, indeed, so surprised with what he had told
me, that I thought, instead of my going about to teach and instruct
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES of
him, the man was made a teacher and instructor to me in a most
unexpected manner.
I laid all this before the young clergyman, who was greatly
affected with it, and said to me, "Did I not say, sir, that when this
man was converted he would preach to us all? I tell you, sir, if
this one man be made a true penitent, there will be no need of me ;
he will make Christians of all in the island."-But having a little
composed myself, I renewed my discourse with Will Atkins.
But, Will," said I, "how comes the sense of this matter to touch
you just now?”
W. A.-Sir, you have set me about a work that has struck a dart
through my very soul: I have been talking about God and religion
to my wife, in order, as you directed me, to make a Christian of
her, and she has preached such a sermon to me as I shall never
forget while I live.
R. C.-No, no, it is not your wife has preached to you; but when
you were moving religious arguments to her, conscience has flung
them back upon you.
W. A.-Ay, sir, with such force as is not to be resisted.
R. C.—Pray, Will, let us know what passed between you and
your wife; for I know something of it already.
W. A.—Sir, it is impossible to give you a full account of it; I
am too full to hold it, and yet have no tongue to express it ; but
let her have said what she will, though I cannot give you an
account of it, this I can tell you, that I have resolved to amend and
reform my life.
R. C.-But tell us some of it: how did you begin, Will? For
this has been an extraordinary case, that is certain. She has
preached a sermon, indeed, if she has wrought this upon you.
W. A.-Why, I first told her the nature of our laws about
marriage, and what the reasons were that men and women were
obliged to enter into such compacts as it was neither in the power
of one nor other to break; that otherwise, order and justice
could not be maintained, and men would run from their wives, and
abandon their children, mix confusedly with one another, and
nefther families be kept entire, nor inheritances be settled by
legal descent.
R. C.-You talk like a civilian, Will. Could you make her
understand what you meant by inheritance and fainilies? They
know no such things among the savages, but marry anyhow,
without regard to relation, consanguinity, or family; brother and
sister, nay, as I have been told, even the father and the daughter,
and the son and the mother
ŕ
W. A.-I believe, sir, you are misinformed, and my wife assures
me of the Contrary, and that they abhor it; perhaps, for any further
relations, they may not be so exact as we are; but she tells me
never in the near relationship you speak of
R. C.-Well, what did she say to what you told her?
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305
W. A.—She said she liked it very well, as it was much better
than in her country.
R. C.-But did you tell her what marriage was?
W. A.-Ay, ay, there began our dialogue. I asked her if she
would be married to me our way. She asked me what way that
was; I told her marriage was appointed by God; and here we
had a strange talk together, indeed, as ever man and wife bad, I
believe.
N.B. This dialogue between Will Atkins and his wife, which I
took down in writing just after he told it me, was as follows:-
Wife.-Appointed by your God! Why, have you a God in your
country?
W. A.-Yes, my dear, God is in every country.
Wife.-No your God in my country; my country have the great
old Benamuckee God.
W. A.-Child, I am very unfit to show you who God is; God is
in heaven, and made the heaven and the earth, the sea, and all that
in them is.
Wife.—No makee de earth; no you God makee all earth; no
makee my country.
Will Atkins laughed a little at her expression of God not making
her country.
Wife.-No laugh; why laugh me? This no ting to laugh.
[He was justly reproved by his wife, for she was more serious
than he at first.
W. A.-That's true, indeed; I will not laugh any more, my
dear.
Wife.-Why you say you God makee all?
W. A.-Yes, child, our God made the whole world, and you, and
me, and all things; for He is the only true God, and there is no
God but Him; He lives for ever in heaven.
Wife.-Why you no tell me long ago?
W. A.-That's true, indeed; but I have been a wicked wretch,
and have not only forgotten to acquaint thee with anything before,
but have lived without God in the world myself
Wife.-What, have you a great God in your country, you no
know Him? No say O to Him? No do good ting for Him?
That no possible.
W. A. It is true; though, for all that, we five as if there was no
God in heaven, or that He had no power on earth.
Wife.--But why God let you do so?
good live?
Why He no makee you
W. A.-It Ts all our own fault,
Wife.-But you say me He is great, much great, have much
great power; can makee kill when He will: why He no makee
kill when you no serve Him no say O to Him? no be good
mans?
W. A.- ►That is true, he might strike me dead; and I ought to
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life and ADVENTURES OF
expect it, for I have been a wicked wretch, that is true; but God is
merciful, and does not deal with us as we deserve.
Wife. But then do you not tell God thankee for that toc?
W. A.-No, indeed, I have not thanked God for His mercy, any
more than I have feared God from His power.
Wife. Then you God no God; me no think, believe He be such
one, great much power, strong no makee kill you, though you
make Him much angry.
W. A.—What, will my wicked life hinder you from believing in
God? What a dreadful creature am II and what a sad truth is
it, that the horrid lives of Christians hinder the conversion of
heathens !
P
Wife.-How me tink you have great much God up there [she
points up to heaven], and yet no do well, no do good ting? Can
He tell? Sure He no tell what you do?
W. A.—Yes, yes, He knows and sees all things; He hears us
speak, sees what we do, knows what we think, though we do not
speak.
Wife. What! He no hear you curse, swear, speak de great
damn?
W. A.-Yes, yes, He hears it all.
Wife. Where be then the much great power strong?
P
W. A. He is merciful, that is all we can say for it; and this
proves Him to be the true God; He is God, and not man, and there-
fore we are not consumed.
M
J
[Here Will Atkins told us he was struck with horror to think how
he could tell his wife so clearly that God sees, and hears, and knows
the secret thoughts of the heart, and all that we do, and yet that he
had dared to do all the vile things he had done.]
Wife.-Merciful! What you call dat ?
W. A.-He is our father and maker, and He pities and spares
us.
Wife. So then He never makee kill, never angry when you do
wicked; then He no good Himself, or no great able.
W. A.-Yes, yes, my dear, He is infinitely good and infinitely
great, and able to punish too; and sometimes, to show His justice
and vengeance, He lets fly His anger to destroy sinners and make
examples; many are cut off in their sins.
Wife.-But no makee kill you yet; then He tell you, may be,
that He no makee you kill: so you makee de bargain with Him, you
do bad thing, He no be angry at you when He be angry at other
mans.
W. A.-No, indeed, my sins are all presumptions upon His
goodness; and He would be infinitely just if He destroyed me, as
He has done other men.
Wife.-Well, and yet no kill, no makee you dead: what you say
to Him for that? You no tell Him thankee for all that too?
W. 4.—I am an unthankful, ungrateful dog, that is true.
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
300
Wife. Why He no makee you much good better? you say He
makee you.
W. A.-He made me as He made all the world : It is i have
deformed myself and abused His goodness, and made myself an
abominable wretch.
Wife. I wish you makee God know me. I no makee Hin angry
-I no do bad wicked thing.
[Here Will Atkins said his heart sunk within him to hear poor
untaught creature desire to be taught to know God, and he such a
wicked wretch, that he could not say one word to her about God,
but what the reproach of his own carriage would make most
irrational to her to believe; nay, that already she had told him that
she could not believe in God, because he, that was so wicked, was
not destroyed.]
W. A.—My dear, you mean, you wish I could teach you to know
God, not God to know you; for He knows you already, and every
ought in your heart.
Wife.-Why, then, He know what I say to you now: He know
e wish to know Him. How shall me know who makee me?
GOSPE
W. A.-Poor creature, He must teach thee: I cannot teach thee
I will pray to Him to teach thee to know Him, and forgive me,
that am unworthy to teach thee.
[The poor fellow was in such an agony at her desiring him to
make her know God, and her wishing to know him, that he said he
fell down on his knees before her, and prayed to God to enlighten
her mind with the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, and to pardon
his sins, and accept of his being the unworthy instrument of instruct-
ing her in the principles of religion : after which he sat down by
her again, and their dialogue went on. This was the time when we
saw him kneel down and hold up his hands.]
Wife. What you put down the knee for? What
the hand for? What you say? Who you speak to?
that ?
N
you hold up
What is all
W. A.--My dear, I bow my knees in token of my submission to
Him that made me: I said O to Him, as you call it, and as your
old men do to their idol Benamuckee; that is, I prayed to Him.
Wife.-What say you O to Him for?
W. A.-I prayed to Him to open your eyes and your understand-
ing, that you may know Him, and be accepted by Him.
Wife.-Can He do that too?
W. A.-Yes, He can: He can do all things
Wife. But now He hear what you say?
W. A.—Yes, He has bid us pray to Him, and promised to hear
us.
Vi
Wife. Bid you pray? When He bid you? How He bid you?
What you hear Him speak?
W. A.-No, we do not hear Him speak; but fe has revealed
Himself many ways to us.
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
[Here he was at a great loss to make her understand that Goo
has revealed Himself to us by His word, and what His word was ;
but at last he told it to her thus :-]
W. A.—God has spoken to some good men in former days, even
from heaven, by plain words; and God has inspired good men by
His Spirit; and they have written all His laws down in a book.
Wife.-Me no understand that; where is book?
W. A.-Alas! my poor creature, I have not this book; but I
hope I shall one time or other get it for you, and help you to
read it.
[Here he embraced her with great affection, but with inexpressible
grief that he had not a Bible.]
Wife.-But how you makee me know that God teachee them to
write that book?
{
}
W. A.-By the same rule that we know Him to be God.
Wife.-What rule? What way you know Him?
W. A.-Because He teaches and commands nothing but what is
good, righteous, and holy, and tends to make us perfectly good, as
well as perfectly happy; and because He forbids and commands us
to avoid all that is wicked, that is evil in itself, or evil in its
consequence.
Wife.-That me would understand, that me fain see; if He
teachee all good thing, He makee all good thing, He give all thing,
He hear me when I say O to Him, as you do just now; He makee
me good if I wish to be good; He spare me, no makee kill me,
when I no he good: all this you say He do, yet He be great God;
me take, think, believe Him to be great God; me say O to Him
with you, my dear.
Here the poor man could forbear no longer, but raised her up,
made her kneel by him, and he prayed to God aloud to instruct her
in the knowledge of Himself, by His Spirit; and that by some good
providence, if possible, she might, some time or other, come to have
a Bible, that she might read the word of God, and be taught by it to
know Him. This was the time that we saw him lift her up by the
hand, and saw him kneel down by her, as above.
They had several other discourses, it seems, after this; and par-
ticularly she made him promise that, since he confessed his own life
had been a wicked, abominable course of provocations against God,
that he would reform it, and not make God angry any more, lest He
should make him dead, as she called it, and then she would be left
alone, and never be taught to know this God better; and lest he
should be miserable, as he had told her wicked men would be after
death.
This was a strange account, and very affecting to us both, but
particularly to the young clergyman; he was, indeed, wonderfully
surprised with it, but under the greatest affliction imaginable that
he could not talk to her, that he could not speak English to make
her understand him; and as she spoke but very broken English, he
¿
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
309
could not understand her; however, he turned himself to me, and
told me that he believed that there must be more to do with this
woman than to marry her. I did not understand him at first; but
at length he explained himself-viz., that she ought to be baptised.
I agreed with him in that part readily, and wished it to be done
presently, 'No, no; hold, sir," says he; "though I would have
her be baptised, by all means, for I must observe that Will Atkins,
her husband, has indeed brought her, in a wonderful manner, to be
willing to embrace a religious life, and has given her just ideas of
the being of a God; of His power, justice, and mercy: yet I desire
to know of him if he has said anything to her of Jesus Christ, and
of the salvation of sinners; of the nature of faith in Him, and
redemption by Him; of the Holy Spirit, the resurrection, the last
judgment, and the future state.”
&
I called Will Atkins again, and asked him; but the poor fellow
fell immediately into tears, and told us he had said something to her
of all those things, but that he was himself so wicked a creature,
and his own conscience so reproached him with his horrid, ungodly
life, that he trembled at the apprehensions that her knowledge of
him should lessen the attention she should give to those things, and
make her rather contemn religion than receive it; but he was
assured, he said, that her mind was so disposed to receive due
impressions of all those things, and that if I would but discourse
with her, she would make it appear t
appear t my satisfaction that my
labour would not be lost upon her.
Accordingly I called her in, and placing myself as interpreter
between my religious priest and the woman, I entreated him to
begin with her; but sure such a sermon was never preached by a
Popish priest in these latter ages of the world; and as I told him,
I thought he had all the zeal, all the knowledge, all the sincerity of
a Christian, without the error of a Roman Catholic; and that I
took him to be such a clergyman as the Roman bishops were before
the church of Rome assumed spiritual sovereignty over the con
sciences of men. In a word, he brought the poor woman to
embrace the knowledge of Christ, and of redemption by Him, not
with wonder and astonishment only, as she did the first notions of a
God, but with joy and faith; with an affection, and a surprising
degree of understanding, scarce to be imagined, much less to be
expressed; and, at her own request, she was baptised. ť
When he was preparing to baptise her, I entreated him that he
would perform that office with some caution, that the man might
not perceive he was of the Roman church, if possible, because of
other ill consequences which might attend a difference among us in
that very religion which we were instructing the other in. He told
me that as he had no consecrated chapel, nor proper things for the
office, I should see he would do it in a manner that I should not
know by it that he was a Roman Catholic myself, if I had not
known it before; and so he did; for saying only some words over
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life and adventures of
(
<<
to himself in Latin, which I could not understand, he poured a
whole dishful of water upon the woman's head, pronouncing in
French, very loud, Mary" (which was the name her husband
desired me to give her, for I was her godfather), "I baptise thee is
the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost;
so that none could know anything by it what religion he was of
He gave the benediction afterwards in Latin, but either Will Atking
did not know but it was French, or else did not take notice of it at
that time.
As soon as this was over we married them; and after the
marriage was over, he turned to Will Atkins, and in a very affec-
tionate manner exhorted him, not only to persevere in that good
disposition he was in, but to support the convictions that were upon
him by a resolution to reform his life: told him it was in vain to
say he repented if he did no forsake his crimes; represented to
him how God had honoured him with being the instrument of
bringing his wife to the knowledge of the Christian religion, and
that he should be careful he did not dishonour the grace of God;
and that if he did, he would see the heathen a better Christian than
himself; the savage converted, and the instrument cast away, He
said a great many good things to them both ; and then, recom-
mending them to God's goodness, gave them the benediction again,
I repeating everything to them in English; and thus ended the
ceremony. I think it was the most pleasant and agreeable day to
me that ever I passed in my whole life. But my clergyman had
not done yet: his thoughts hung continually upon the conversion
of the thirty-seven savages, and fain he would have stayed upon
the island to have undertaken it; but I convinced him, first, that
his undertaking was impracticable in itself; and, secondly, that
perhaps I would put it into a way of being done in his absence to
his satisfaction.
Having thus brought the affairs of the island to a narrow com
pass, I was preparing to go on board the ship, when the young man
I had taken out of the famished ship's company came to me, and
told me he understood I had a clergyman with me, and that I had
caused the Englishmen to be married to the savages: that he had
a match too, which he desired might be finished before I went,
between two Christians, which he hoped would not be disagreeable
to me.
I knew this must be the young woman who was his mother's
servant, for there was no other Christian woman on the island: so
I began to persuade him not to do anything of that kind rashly, or
because he found himself in this solitary circumstance. I repre-
sented to him that he had some considerable substance in the
world, and good friends, as I understood by himself, and the maid
also; that the maid was not only poor, and a servant, but was
unequal to him, she being six or seven and twenty years old, and he
not above seventeen or eighteen; that he might very probably
robinson crusoe.
31X
with my assistance, make a remove from this wilderness, and come
into his own country again; and that then it would be a thousand
to one but he would repent his choice, and the dislike of that
circumstance might be disadvantageous to both I was going to
say more, but he interrupted me, smiling, and tolue, with a great
deal of modesty, that I mistook in my guesses-that he had nothing
of that kind in his thoughts; and he was very glad to hear that I
had an intent of putting them in a way to see their own country
again; and nothing should have made him think of staying there,
but that the voyage I was going was so exceeding long and
hazardous, and would carry him quite out of the reach of all his
friends; that he had nothing to desire of me but that would settle
him in some little property in the island where he was, give him a
servant or two, and some few necessaries, and he would live here
like a planter, waiting the good time when, if ever I returned to
England, I would redeem him. He hoped I would not be unmind-
ful of him when I came to England: that he would give me some
letters to his friends in London, to let them know how good I had
been to him, and in what part of the world, and what circumstances
I had left him in: and he promised me that whenever I redeemed
him, the plantation, and all the improvements he had made upon it,
let the value be what it would, should be wholly mine.
His discourse was very prettily delivered, considering his youth,
and was the more agreeable to me, because he told me positively
the match was not for himself. I gave him all possible assurances
that if I lived to come safe to England, I would deliver his letters,
and do his business effectually; and that he might depend I should
never forget the circumstances I had left him in; but still I was
impatient to know who was the person to be married; upon which
he told me it was my Jack-of-all-trades and his maid Susan.
I was
most agreeably surprised when he named the match; for, indeed, I
thought it very suitable The character of that man I have given
already; and as for the maid, she was a very honest, modest, sober,
and religious young woman: had a very good share of sense, was
agreeable enough in her person, spoke very handsomely and to the
purpose, always with decency and good manners, and was neither
too backward to speak when requisite, nor impertinently forward
when it was not her business; very handy and housewifely, and an
excellent manager; fit, indeed, to have been governess to the whole
island; and she knew very well how to behave in every respect.
The match being proposed in this manner, we married them the
same day; and as I was father at the altar, and gave her away, so
I gave her a portion; for I appointed her and her husband a
handsome large space of ground for their plantation; and, indeed,
this match, and the proposal the young gentleman made to give him
a small property in the island, put me upon parcelling it out
amongst them, that they might not quarrel afterwards about their
situation.
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LIFF AND ADventures of
This sharing but the land to them I left to Will Atkins, who was
now grown a sober, grave, managing fellow, perfectly reformed,
exceedingly pious and religious; and, as far as I may be allowed to
speak positively in such a case, I verily believe he was a true
penitent He divided things so justly, and so much to every one's
satisfaction, that they only desired one general writing under my
hand for the whole, which I caused to be drawn up, and signed and
sealed, setting out the bounds and situation of every man's planta-
tion, and testifying that I gave them thereby severally a right to the
whole possession and inheritance of the respective plantations or
farms, with their improvements, to them and their heirs, reserving
all the rest of the island as my own property, and a certain rent for
every particular plantation after eleven years, if I, or any one from
me, or in my name, came to demand it, producing an attested copy
of the same writing. As to the government and laws among them,
I told them I was not capable of giving them better rules than they
were able to give themselves; only I made them promise me to
live in love and good neighbourhood with one another; and so I
prepared to leave them.
One thing I must not omit, and that is, that being now settled in
a kind of commonwealth among themselves, and having much
business in hand, it was odd to have seven-and-thirty Indians
live in a nook of the island, independent, and, indeed, unemployed
for except the providing themselves food, which they had difficulty
enough to do, sometimes they had no manner of business or
property to manage I proposed, therefore, to the governor
Spaniard, that he should go to them, with Friday's father, and
propose to them to remove, and either plant for themselves, or be
taken into their several families as servants, to be maintained for
their labour, but without being absolute slaves; for I would not
permit them to make them slaves by force, by any means; because
they had their liberty given them by capitulation, as it were
articles of surrender, which they ought not to break.
hey most willingly embraced the proposal, and came all very
cheerfully along with him: so we allotted them land and planta-
tions, which three or four accepted of, but all the rest chose to be
employed as servants in the several families we had settled. Thus
my colony was in a manner settled as follows:-The Spaniards
possessed my original habitation, which was the capital city, and
extended their plantations all along the side of the brook, which
made the creek that I have so often described, as far as my bower;
and as they increased their culture, it went always eastward The
English lived in the north-east part, where Will Atkins and his
comrades began, and came on southward and south-west, towards
the back part of the Spaniards; and every plantation had a great
addition of land to take in, if they found occasion, so that they need
not jostle one another for want of room. All the east end of the
island was left uninhabited, that if any of the savages should come
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
313
on shore there only for their usual customary barbarities, they might
come and ge; if they disturbed nobody, nobody would disturb
them and no doubt but they were often ashore, and went away
gain; for I never heard that the planters were ever attacked or
disturbed any more,
CHAPTER XXVIIL
I entertain the prospect of converting the Indians-Amiable character of
the young woman we saved in a famished state at sea-Her own
relation of her sufferings from hunger-Sail from the island for the
Brazils-Encounter and rout a whole fleet of savages-Death of Friday
-Arrival at Brazil.
☺
now came into my thoughts that I had hinted to my
friend the clergyman that the work of converting the
savages might perhaps be set on foot in his absence
to his satisfaction, and I told him that now I thought
that it was put in a fair way; for the savages, being
thus divided among the Christians, if they would but every one of
them do their part with those which came under their hands, I
hoped it might have a very good effect.
He agreed presently in that, if they did their part. “But how,"
says he, "shall we obtain that of them?" I told him we would
call them all together, and leave it in charge with them, or go to
them, one by one, which he thought best; so we divided it-he to
speak to the Spaniards, who were all Papists, and I to speak to the
English who were all Protestants; and we recommended it
earnestly to them, and made them promise that they would never
make any distinction of Papist or Protestant in their exhorting the
savages to turn Christians, but teach them the general knowledge
of the true God, and of their Saviour Jesus Christ; and they like-
wise promised us that they would never have any differences or
disputes one with another about religion. (
When I came to Will Atkins's house, I found there the young
woman I have mentioned above, and Will Atkins's wife, were
become intimates; and this prudent, religious young woman had
perfected the work Will Atkins had begun; and though it was not
above four days after what I have related, yet the new-baptised
savage woman was made such a Christian as I have seldom heard of
in all my observation or conversation in the world. It came next
into my mind in the morning before I went to them, that amongst
all the needful things I had to leave with them I had not left them
a Bible, in which I showed myself less considering for them than
my good friend the widow was for me when she sent me the cargo
of a hundred pounds from Lisbon, where she packed up three
(Theme Bonda

314
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
Bibles and a Prayer-book. However, the good woman's charity
had a greater extent than ever she imagined, for they were reserved
for the comfort and instruction of those that made much better use
of them than I had done.
I took one of the Bibles in my pocket, and when I came to Will
Atkins's tent, or house, and found the young woman and Atkins's
baptised wife had been discoursing of religion together-for Will
Atkins told it me with a great deal of joy—I asked if they were
together now, and he said, Yes; so I went into the house, and he
with me, and we found them together very earnest in discourse.
"Oh, sir," says Will Atkins, "when God has sinners to reconcile
to Himself, and aliens to bring home, He never wants a messenger;
my wife has got a new instructor: I knew I was unworthy as I was
incapable of that work; that young woman has been sent hither
from heaven-she is enough to convert a whole island of savages."
The young woman blushed, and rose up to go away, but I desired
her to sit still; I told her she had a good work upon her hands, and
I hoped God would bless her in it.
We talked a little, and I did not perceive that they had any book
among them, though I did not ask; but I put my hand into my
pocket, and pulled out my Bible; “Here," said I to Atkins, “I have
brought you an assistant that perhaps you had not before" The
man was so confounded that he was not able to speak for some
time; but, recovering himself, he takes it with both his hands, and
turning to his wife, "Here, my dear," says he, “did not I tell you
our God, though He lives above, could hear what we have said?
Here's the book I prayed for when you and I kneeled down under
the bush; now God has heard us and sent it." When he had said
so, the man fell into such passionate transports, that between the
joy of having it, and giving God thanks for it, the tears ran down
his face like a child that was crying.
The woman was surprised, and was like to have run into a
mistake that none of us were aware of: for she firmly believed God
had sent the book upon her husband's petition. It is true that
providentially it was so, and might be taken so in a consequent
sense; but I believe it would have been no difficult matter at that
time to have persuaded the poor woman to have believed that an
express messenger_came from heaven on purpose to bring that
individual book. But it was too serious a matter to suffer any
delusion to take piace, so I turned to the young woman, and told her
we did not desire to impose upon the new convert in her first and
more ignorant understanding of things, and begged her to explain
to her that God may be very properly said to answer our petitions,
when, in the course of His providence, such things are in a par
ticular manner brought to pass as we petitioned for: but we did
not expect returns from heaven in a miraculous and particular
manner, and it is a mercy that it is not so
This the young woman did afterwards effectually, so that there
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
315
was no priestcraft used here; and I should have thought it one of
But
the most unjustifiable frauds in the world to have had it so.
the effect upon Will Atkins is really not to be expressed, and there
we may be sure was no delusion. Sure no man was ever more
thankful in the world for anything of its kind than he was for the
Bible-nor, I believe, never any man was glad of a Bible from a
1
better principle; and though he had been a most profligate
creature, headstrong, furious, and desperately wicked, yet this man
is a standing rule to us all for the well instructing children—viz.,
that parents should never give over to teach and instruct, nor ever
despair of the success of their endeavours, let the children be ever
so refractory, or to appearance insensible to instruction; for, if
ever God, in His providence, touches the conscience of such, the
force of their education returns upon them, and the early instruc-
tion of parents is not lost, though it may have been many years
laid asleep, but some time or other they may find the benefit of it.
Thus it was with this poor man: however ignorant he was of
religion and Christian knowledge, he found he had some to do with
now more ignorant than himself, and that the least part of the
instruction of his good father that now came to his mind was of use
to him.
Among the rest, it occurred to him, he said, how his father used
to insist so much on the inexpressible value of the Bible, and the
privilege and blessing of it to nations, families, and persons; but
he never entertained the least notion of the worth of it till now,
when being to talk to heathens, savages, and barbarians, he wanted
the help of the written oracle for his assistance. The young woman
was glad of it also for the present occasion, though she had one,
and so had the youth, on board our ship among their goods, which
were not yet brought on shore. And now, having said so many
things of this young woman, I cannot omit telling one story more
of her and myself, which has something in it very instructive and
remarkable.
I have related to what extremity the poor young woman was
reduced; how her mistress was starved to death, and died on board
that unhappy ship we met at sea, and how the whole ship's com-
pany was reduced to the last extremity. The gentlewoman, and
her son, and this maid, were first hardly used as to provisions, and
at last totally neglected and starved-that is to say, brought to the
last extremity of hunger. One day, being discoursing with her on
the extremities they suffered, I asked her if she could describe, by
what she had felt, what it was to starve, and how it appeared?
She said she believed she could, and told her tale very distinctly
thus:
"
First, we had for some days fared exceedingly hard, and suffered
very great hunger; but at last we were wholly without food of any
kind except sugar, and a little wine and water. The first day after
I had received no food at all, I found myself, towards evening,
316
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
empty and sick at the stomach, and nearer night much inclined
yawning and sleep. I lay down on the couch in the great cabin to
sleep, and slept about three hours, and awaked a little refreshed,
having taken a glass of wine when I lay down; after being about
three hours awake, it being about fe o'clock in the morning,
found myself empty, and my stomach sickish, and lay down again,
but could not sleep at all, being very faint and ill; and thus I con-
tinued all the second day with a strange variety-first hungry, then
sick again, with retchings to vomit. The second night, being
obliged to go to bed again without any food more than a draught
of fresh water, and being asleep, I dreamed I was at Barbadoes,
and that the market was mightily stocked with provisions; that I
bought some for my mistress, and went and dined very heartily. I
thought my stomach was full after this, as it would have been after
a good dinner; but when I awaked I was exceedingly sunk in my
spirits to find myself in the extremity of famine. The last glass of
wine we had I drank, and put sugar in it, because of its having some
spirit to supply nourishment; but there being no substance in the
stomach for the digesting office to work upon, I found the only
effect of the wine was to raise disagreeable fumes from the stomach
into the head; and I lay, as they told me, stupid and senseless, as
one drunk, for some time. The third day, in the morning, after a
night of strange, confused, and inconsistent dreams, and rather
dozing than sleeping, I awaked ravenous and furious with hunger;
and I question, had not my understanding returned and conquered
it, whether if I had been a mother, and had had a little child with
me, its life would have been safe or not. This lasted about three
hours, during which time I was twice raging mad as any creature
in Bedlam, as my young master told me, and as he can now inform
you.
"In one of these fits of lacy or distraction I fell down and
struck my face against the corner of a pallet-bed, in which my
mistress lay, and with the blow the blood gushed out of my nose;
and the cabin-boy bringing me a little basin, I sat down and bled
into it a great deal; and as the blood came from me I came to
myself, and the violence of the flame or fever I was in abated, and
so did the ravenous part of the hunger. Then I grew sick, and
retched to vomit, but could not, for I had nothing in my stomach to
bring up. After I had bled some time I swooned, and they all
believed I was dead; but I came to myself soon after, and then had
a most dreadful pain in my stomach not to be described-not like
the colic, but a gnawing, eager pain for food; and towards night it
went off with a kind of earnest wishing or longing for food. I took
another draught of water with sugar in it; but my stomach foathed
the sugar and brought it all up again; then I took a draught of
water without sugar, and that stayed with me; and I laid me down
upon the bed, praying most heartily that it would please God to
take me away; and composing my mind in hopes of it, I slumbered
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
#
317
a while, and then waking, thought myself dying, being light with
vapours from an empty stomach. I recommended my soul then to
God, and then earnestly wished that somebody would throw me
into the sea
"All this while my mistress lay by me, just, as I .hought,
expiring, but she bore it with much more patience than I, and
gave the last bit of bread she had left to her child, my young
master, who would not have taken it, but she obliged him to eat it;
and I believe it saved his life. Towards the morning I slept again,
and when I awoke I fell into a violent passion of crying, and after
that had a second fit of violent hunger. I got up ravenous, and in a
most dreadful condition; and once or twice I was going to bite my
own arm. At last I saw the basin in which was the blood I had
bled at my nose the day before: I ran to it, and swallowed it with
such haste, and such a greedy appetite, as if I wondered nobody
had taken it before, and afraid it should be taken from me now.
After it was down, though the thoughts of it filled me with horror,
yet it checked the fit of hunger, and I took another draught of
water, and was composed and refreshed for some hours after. This
was the fourth day; and thus I kept up till towards night, when,
within the compass of three hours, I had all the several circum-
stances over again, one after another-viz., sick, sleepy, eagerly
hungry, pain in the stomach, then ravenous again, then sick, then
lunatic, then crying, then ravenous again, and so every quarter of an
hour, and my strength wasted exceedingly; at night I lay me down,
having no comfort but in the hope that I should die before morning.
All this night I had no sleep; but the hunger was now turned
into a disease; and I had a terrible colic and griping, by wind
instead of food having found its way into the bowels; and in this
condition I lay till morning, when I was surprised by the cries and
lamentations of my young master, who called out to me that his
mother was dead I lifted myself up a little, for I had not strength
to rise, but found she was not dead, though she was able to give
very little signs of life. I had then such convulsions in my
stomach, for want of some sustenance, as I cannot describe; with
such frequent throes and pangs of appetite as nothing but the
tortures of death can imitate; and in this condition I was when I
heard the seamen above cry out, ‘A sail, a sail !' and halloo and
jump about as if they were distracted I was not able to get off
from the bed, and my mistress much less; and my young master
was so sick that I thought he had been expiring; so we could not
open the cabin door, or get any account what it was that occasioned
such confusion; nor had we had any conversation with the ship's
company for twelve days, they having told us that they had not a
mouthful of anything to eat in the ship; and this they told us
afterwards-they thought we had been dead. It was this dreadful
condition we were in when you were sent to save our lives
how you found us, sir, you know as well as I, and better too.”
(*
218
Life LIFE
and Adventures of
1
This was her own relation, and is such a distinct account of
starving to death, as, I confess, I never met with, and was exceed-
ing instructive to me. I am the rather apt to believe it to be a true
account, because the youth gave me an account of a good part of it;
though I must own, not so distinct and so feeling as the maid; and
the rather, because it seems his mother fed him at the price of her
own life but the poor maid, whose constitution was stronger
than that of her mistress, who was in years, and a weakly woman
too, might struggle harder with it; nevertheless, she might be
supposed to feel the extremity something sooner than her mistress,
who might be allowed to keep the last bit something longer than
she parted with any to relieve her maid. No question, as the case
is here related, if our ship or some other had not so providentially
met them, but a few days more would have ended all their lives.
now return to my disposition of things among the people. And,
first, it is to be observed here, that for many reasons I did not
think fit to let them know anything of the sloop I had framed, and
which I thought of setting up among them; for I found, at least at
my first coming, such seeds of division among them, that I saw
plainly, had I set up the sloop, and left it among them, they would,
upon every light disgust, have separated, and gone away from one
another; or perhaps have turned pirates, and so made the island a
den of thieves, instead of a plantation of sober and religious people,
as I intended it; nor did I leave the two pieces of brass cannon
that I had on board, or the extra two quarter-deck guns that my
nephew had provided, for the same reason. I thought it was
enough to qualify them for a defensive war against any that should
invade them, but not to set them up for an offensive war, or to go
abroad to attack others; which, in the end, would only bring ruin
and destruction upon them I reserved the sloop, therefore, and the
guns, for their service another way, as I shall observe in its place.
Having now done with the island, I left them all in good circum-
stances and in a flourishing condition, and went on board my ship
again on the 6th of May, having been about twenty-five days
among them: and as they were all resolved to stay upon the island
till I came to remove them, I promised to send them further
relief from the Brazils, if I could possibly find an opportunity, I
particularly promised to send them some cattle, such as sheep,
hogs, and cows: as to the two cows and calves which I brought
from England, we had been obliged, by the length of our voyage,
to kill them at sea, for want of hay to feed them.
The next day, giving them a salute of five guns at parting, we
set sail, and arrived at the bay of All Saints in the Brazils in about
twenty-two days, meeting nothing remarkable in our passage but
this: that about three days after we had sailed, being becalmed,
and the current setting strong to the E.N.E., running, as it were,
nto a bay or gulf on the land side, we were driven something out
ní our course, and once or twice our men cried out, “Land to the
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
319
eastward!" but whether it was the continent or Islands we could
not tell by any means. But the third day, towards evening, the
sea smooth, and the weather calm, we saw the sea, as it were,
covered towards the land with something very black; not being
able to discover what it was, till after some time, our chief mate,
going up the main shrouds a little way, and looking at them with a
perspective, cried out it was an army. I could not imagine what he
meant by an army, and thwarted him a little hastily. Nay, sir,"
says he, "don't be angry, for 'tis an army, and a fleet too: for I
believe there are a thousand canoes, and you may see them paddle
along, for they are coming towards us apace."
-6
I was a little surprised then, indeed, and so was my nephew the
captain; for he had heard such terrible stories of them in the
island, and having never been in those seas before, that he could
not tell what to think of it, but said, two or three times, we should
all be devoured. I must confess, considering we were becalmed,
and the current set strong towards the shore, I liked it the worst ;
however, I bade them not be afraid, but bring the ship to an anchor
as soon as we came so near as to know that we must engage them.
The weather continued calm, and they came on apace towards us,
so I gave orders to come to an anchor, and furl all our sails; as
for the savages, I told them they had nothing to fear but fire, and
therefore they should get their boats out, and fasten them, one
close by the head and the other by the stern, and man them
both well, and wait the issue in that posture: this I did, that the
men in the boats might be ready with sheets and buckets to put
out any fire these savages might endeavour to fix to the outside of
the ship.
In this posture we lay by for them, and in a little while they
came up with us; but never was such a horrid sight seen by
Christians; though my mate was much mistaken in his calculation
of their number, yet when they came up we reckoned about a
hundred and twenty-six canoes; some of them had sixteen or
seventeen men in them, and some more, and the least six or seven.
When they came nearer to us, they seemed to be struck with
wonder and astonishment, as at a sight which doubtless they had
never seen before; nor could they at first, as we afterwards under-
stood, know what to make of ns; they came boldly up, however,
very near to us, and seemed to go about to row round us; but we
called to our men in the boats not to let ther come too near them.
This very order brought us to an engagement with them, without
our designing it; for five or six of the large canoes came so near
our long-boat, that our men beckoned with their hands to keep
them back, which they understood very well, and went back : but
at their retreat about fifty arrows came on board us from those
boats, and one of our men in the long boat was very much
wounded. However, I called to them not to fire by any means ;
but we handed down some deal boards into the boat, and the
7
320
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
*
carpenter presently set up a kind of fence, like waste boards, tú
cover them from the arrows of the savages, if they should shoot
again.
About half-an-hour afterwards they all came up in a body astern
of us, and so near that we could easily discern what they were,
though we could not tell their design; and I easily found they
were some of my old friends, the same sort of savages that
I had been used to engage with. In a short time more they
rowed a little further out to sea, till they came directly
broadside with us, and then rowed down straight upon us,
till they came so near that they could hear us speak; upon
this, I ordered all my men to keep close, lest they should
shoot any more arrows, and made all our guns ready; but
being so near as to be within hearing, I made Friday go out
upon the deck, and call out aloud to them in his language, to know
what they meant. Whether they understood him or not, that I
knew not; but as soon as he had called to them, six of them, who
were in the foremost or nighest boat to us, turned their canoes
from us, and stooping down, showed us their naked backs; whether
this was a defiance or challenge we knew not, or whether it was
done in mere contempt, or as a signal to the rest; but immediately
Friday cried out they were going to shoot, and, unhappily for him,
poor fellow, they let fly about three hundred of their arrows, and to
my inexpressible grief, killed poor Friday, no other man being in
their sight. The poor fellow was shot with no less than three
arrows, and about three more fell very near him; such unlucky
marksmen they were i
I was so annoyed at the loss of my old trusty servant and com-
panion, that I immediately ordered five guns to be loaded with
small shot, and four with great, and gave them such a broadside as
they had never heard in their lives before. They were not above
half a cable's length off when we fired; and our gunners took their
aim so well, that three or four of their canoes were overset, as we
had reason to believe, by one shot only. The ill manners of
turing up their bare backs to us gave us no great offence; neither
dia I know for certain whether that which would pass for the
greatest contempt among us might be understood so by them or
not; therefore, in return, I had only resolved to have fired four or
five guns at them with powder only, which I knew would frighten
them sufficiently: but when they shot at us directly with all the
fury they were capable of, and especially as they had killed my
poor Friday, whom I so entirely loved and valued, and who, indeed,
so well deserved it, I thought myself not only justifiable before God
and man, but would have been very glad if I could have overset
every canoe there, and drowned every one of them
I can neither tell how many we killed or how many we
wounded at this broadside, but sure such a fright and hurry
never were seen among such a multitude; there were thirteen or
1
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
321
fourteen of their canoes split and overset in all, and the men all set
a-swimming the rest, frightened out of their wits, scoured away as
fast as they could, taking but little care to save those whose boats
were split or spoilea with our shot; so I suppose that many of
them were lost; and our men took up one poor fellow swimming
for his life, above an hour after they were all gone. The small shot
from our cannon must needs kill and wound a great many; but, in
short, we never knew how it went with them, for they fled so fast,
that in three hours or thereabouts we could not see above three or
four straggling canoes, nor did we ever see the rest any more; for
a breeze of wind springing up the same evening, we weighed, and
set sail for the Brazils.
We had a prisoner, indeed, but the creature was so sulle that he
would neither eat nor speak, and we all fancied he would starve
himself to death. But I took a way to cure him : for I had made
them take him and turn him into the long-boat, and make him
believe they would toss him into the sea again, and so leave him
where they found him, if he would not speak; nor would that do,
but they really did throw him into the sea, and came away from
him. Then he followed them, for he swam like a cork, and called
to them in his tongue, though they knew not one word of what he
said; however at last they took him in again, and then he
began to be more tractable: nor did I ever design they should
drown him
on.
We were now under sail again, but I was the most disconsolate
creature alive for want of my man Friday, and would have been
very glad to have gone back to the island, to have taken one of the
rest from thence for my occasion, but it could not be so we went
We had one prisoner, as I have said, and it was a long time
before we could make him understand anything; but, in time, our
men taught him some English, and he began to be a little tractable.
Afterwards, we inquired what country he came from; but could
make nothing of what he said; for his speech was so edd, all
gutturals, and he spoke in the throat in such a hollow, odd manner,
that we could never form a word after him; and we were all of
opinion that they might speak that language as well if they were
gagged as otherwise; nor could we perceive that they had any
occasion either for teeth, tongue, lips, or palate, but formed their
words just as a hunting-horn forms a tune with an open throat.
He told us, however, some time after, when we had taught him to
speak a little English, that they were going with their kings to fight
a great battle. When he said kings, we asked him how many
kings i He said they were five nation (we could not make him
understand the plural 's), and that they all joined to go against two
nation. We asked him what made them come up to us? He said,
To makee te great wonder look." Here it is to be observed that
all those natives, as also those of Africa, when they learn English,
always add two f's at the end of the words where we
one; and
#1
Life and Adventures of
they place the accent upon them, as makée, takée, and the
like; nay, I could hardly make Friday leave it off, though at last
be did.
འ་
And now I name the poor fellow once more, I must take my last
leave of him. Poor honest Friday' We buried him with all the
decency and solemnity possible, by putting him into a coffin, and
throwing him into the sea; and I caused them to fire eleven guns
for him. So ended the life of the most grateful, faithful, honest,
and most affectionate servant that ever man had. ☺
We went now away with a fair wind for Brazil; and in about
twelve days' time we made land, in the latitude of five degrees
south of the line, being the north-easternmost land of all that part
of America. We kept on S. by E., in sight of the shore four days,
when we made Cape St. Augustine, and in three days came to an
anchor off the Bay of All Saints, the old place of my deliverance,
from whence came both my good and evil fate. Never ship came
to this port that had less business than I had, and yet it was with
great difficulty that we were admitted to hold the least correspond-
ence on shore: not my partner himself, who was alive, and made
a great figure among them, not my two merchant-trustees, not the
fame of my wonderful preservation in the island, could obtain me
that favour. My partner, however, remembering that I had given
five hundred moidores to the Prior of the Monastery of the
Augustines, and two hundred and seventy-two to the poor, went to
the monastery, and obliged the prior that then was to go to the
governor, and get leave for me personally, with the captain and one
more, besides eight seamen, to come on shore, and no more; and
this upon condition, absolutely capitulated for, that we should not
offer to land any goods out of the ship, or to carry any person away
without license. They were so strict with us as to landing any
goods, that it was with extreme difficulty that I got on shore three
bales of English goods, such as fine broadcloths, stuffs, and some
linen, which I had brought for a present to my partner.
He was a very generous, open-hearted man, although he began,
like me, with little at first Though he knew not that I had the
least design of giving him anything, he sent me on board a present
of fresh provisions, wine, and sweetmeats, worth about thirty
moidores, including some tobacco, and three or four fine medals of
gold but I was even with him in my present, which, as I have
said, consisted of fine broadcloth, English stuffs, lace, and fine
holland; also, I delivered him about the value of one hundred
pounds sterling in the same goods, for other uses; and I obliged
him to set up the sloop, which I had brought with me from
England, as I have said, for the use of my colony, in order to send
the refreshments I intended to my plantation.
Accordingly, he got hands, and finished the sloop in a very few
days, for she was already framed; and I gave the master of her
such instructions that he could not miss the place; nor did he, as I
ROBINSON CRUSOE
323
had an account from my partner afterwards. I got him soon loaded
with the small cargo I sent them; and one of our seamen, that had
been on shore with me there, offered to go with the sloop and settle
there, upon my letter to the governor Spaniard to allot him a
sufficient quantity of land for a plantation, and on my giving him
some clothes and tools for his planting work, which he said he
understood, having been an old planter at Maryland, and a
buccaneer into the bargain. I encouraged the fellow by granting
all he desired; and, as an addition, I gave him the savage whom
we had taken prisoner of war to be his slave, and ordered the
governor Spaniard to give him his share of everything he wanted
with the rest.
When we came to fit this man out, my old partner told me there
was a certain very honest fellow, a Brazil planter of his acquaint-
ance, who had fallen into the displeasure of the church. "I know
not what the matter is with him," says he, "but, on my conscience,
I think he is a heretic in his heart, and he has been obliged to
conceal himself for fear of the Inquisition." He then told me that
he would be very glad of such an opportunity to make his escape,
with his wife and two daughters; and if I would let them go to my
island, and allot them a plantation, he would give them a small
stock to begin with-for the officers of the Inquisition had seized
all his effects and estate, and he had nothing left but a little house-
hold stuff and two slaves; "and," adds he, "though I hate his
principles, yet I would not have him fall into their hands, for he
will be assuredly burned alive if he does." I granted this presently,
and joined my Englishman with them: and we concealed the man,
and his wife and daughters, on board our ship, till the sloop put out
to go to sea; and then having put all their goods on board some
time before, we put them on board the sloop after she was got out
of the bay. Our seaman was mightily pleased with this new
partner; and their stocks, indeed, were much alike, rich in tools, in
preparations, and a farm-but nothing to begin with, except as
above: however, they carried over with them what was worth all
the rest, some materials for planting sugar-canes, with some
plants of canes, which he, I mean the Brazil planter, understood
very well.
Among the rest of the supplies sent to my tenants in the island, I
sent them by the sloop three milch cows and five calves, about
twenty-two hogs, among them three sows, two mares, and a stone-
horse. For my Spaniards, according to my promise, I engaged
three Brazil women to go, and recommended it to them to marry
them, and use them kindly. I could have procured more women,
but I remembered that the poor persecuted man had two daughters,
and that there were but five of the Spaniards that wanted partners
-the rest had wives of their own, though in another country. All
this cargo arrived safe, and, as you may easily suppose, was very
welcome to my old inhabitants, who were now, with this addition,
324
life and ADVENTUREs of
between sixty and seventy people, besides little children, of which
there were a great many. I found letters at London from them
by way of Lisbon, when I came back to England.
:
I have now done with the island, and all manner of discourse
about it and whoever reads the rest of my memorandums would
do well to turn his thoughts entirely from it, and expect to read of
the follies of an old man, not warned by his own harms, much less
by those of other men, to beware; not cooled by almost forty years'
miseries and disappointments-not satisfied with prosperity beyond
expectation, nor made cautious by afflictions and distress beyond
example.
CHAPTER XXIX
I despatch a number of additional recruits, and a quantity of extra stores,
to the island, and take my leave of it for ever-I determine to go with
the ship to the East Indies-Arrive at Madagascar-Dreadful" occur-
rences there.

L
HAD no more business to go to the East Indies than
a man at full liberty has to go to the turnkey at
Newgate, and desire him to lock him up among the
risoners there, and starve him. Had I taken a small
vessel from England and gone directly to the island;
had I loaded her, as I did the other vessel, with all the necessaries
for the plantation, and for my people; taken a patent from the
government here to have secured my property, in subjection only to
that of England; had I carried over cannon and ammunition,
servants and people to plant, and taken possession of the place,
fortified and strengthened it in the name of England, and increased
it with people, as I might easily have done; had I then settled
myself there, and sent the ship back laden with good rice, as I
might also have done in six months' time, and ordered my friends
to have fitted her out again for our supply-had I done this, and
stayed there myself, I had at least acted like a man of common
sense. But I was possessed of a wandering spirit, and scorned all
advantages: I pleased myself with being the patron of the people I
placed there, and doing for them in a kind of haughty, majestic way,
like an old patriarchal monarch, providing for them as if I had been
father of the whole family, as well as of the plantation But I never
so much as pretended to plant in the name of any government or
nation, or to acknowledge any prince, or to call my people subjects
to any one nation more than another: nay, I never so much as
gave the place a name, but left it as I found it, belonging to nobody,
and the people under no discipline or government but my own, who,
though I had influence over them as a father and benefactor, had
***
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
325
no authority or power to act or command one way or other, further
than voluntary consent moved them to comply. Yet even this, had
I stayed there, would have done well enough; but as I rambled
from them, and came there no more, the last letters I had from any
of them were by my partner's means, who afterwards sent another
sloop to the place, and who sent me word, though I had not the
letter till I got to London, several years after it was written,
that they went on but poorly, were discontented with their long
stay there that Will Atkins was dead-that five of the Spaniards
were come away-and though they had not been much molested
by the savages, yet they had had some skirmishes with
them; and that they begged of him to write to me to think
of the promise I had made to fetch them away, that they might see
their country again before they died.
But I was gone a wildgoose chase, indeed! and they that will
have any more of me must be content to follow me into a new
variety of follies, hardships, and wild adventures, wherein the justice
of Providence may be duly observed; and we may see how easily
heaven can gorge us with our own desires, make the strongest of
our wishes be our affliction, and punish us most severely with those
very things which we think it would be our utmost happiness to be
allowed to possess. Whether I had business or no business, away
I went it is no time now to enlarge upon the reason or absurdity
of my own conduct, but to come to the history-I was embarked for
the voyage, and the voyage I went.
I shall only add a word or two concerning my honest Popish
clergyman-for let their opinion of us, and all other heretics in
general, as they call us, be as uncharitable as it may, I verily believe
this man was very sincere, and wished the good of all men : yet I
believe he used reserve in many of his expressions, to prevent giving
me offence; for I scarce heard him once call on the Blessed Virgin,
or mention St. Jago, or his guardian angel, though so common with
the rest of them. However, I say I had not the least doubt of his
sincerity and pious intentions: and I am firmly of opinion, if the
rest of the Popish missionaries were like him, they would strive to
visit even the poor Tartars and Laplanders, where they have
nothing to give them, as well as covet to flock to India, Persia,
China, etc., the most wealthy of the heathen countries; for if they
expected to bring no gains to their church by it, it may well be
admired how they came to admit the Chinese Confucius into the
calendar of the Christian saints.
A ship being ready to sail for Lisbon, my pious priest asked me
leave to go thither; being still, as he observed, bound never to
finish any voyage he began. How happy it had been for me if I
had gone with him. But it was too late now; all things heaven
appoints for the best: had I gone with him I had never had so
many things to be thankful for, and the reader had never heard of
the second part of the travels and adventures of Robinson Crusoe;
115
326
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
so I must here leave exclaiming at myself, and go on with my
voyage. From the Brazils we made directly over the Atlantic Sea
to the Cape of Good Hope, and had a tolerably good voyage, our
course generally south-east, now and then a storm, and some con-
trary winds; but my disasters at sea were at an end-my future
rubs and cross events were to befall me on shore, that it might
appear the land was as well prepared to be our scourge as the sea.
Our ship was on a trading voyage, and had a supercargo on
board, who was to direct all her motions after she arrived at the
Cape, only being limited to a certain number of days for stay, by
charter-party, at the several ports she was to go to. This was none
of my business, neither did I meddle with it; my nephew, the
captain, and the supercargo adjusting all those things between them
as they thought fit. We stayed at the Cape no longer than was
needful to take in fresh water, but made the best of our way for the
coast of Coromandel. We were, indeed, informed that a French
man-of-war, of fifty guns, and two large merchant ships, were gone
for the Indies; and as I knew we were at war with France, I had
some apprehensions of them; but they went their own way, and we
heard no more of them.
I shall not pester the reader with a tedious description of places,
journals of our voyage, variations of the compass, latitudes, trade-
winds, etc.; it is enough to name the ports and places which we
touched at, and what occurred to us upon our passage from one to
another. We touched first at the island of Madagascar, where,
though the people are fierce and treacherous, and very well armed
with lances and bows, which they use with inconceivable dexterity,
yet we fared very well with them a while. They treated us very
civilly; and for some trifles which we gave them, such as knives,
scissors, etc., they brought us eleven good fat bullocks, of a middling
size, which we took in, partly for fresh provisions for our present
spending, and the rest to salt for the ship's use.
We were obliged to stay here some time after we had furnianed our-
selves with provisions; and I, who was always too curious to look into
every nook of the world wherever I came, went on shore as often as
I could It was on the east side of the island that we went on shore
one evening: and the people, who, by the way, are very numerous,
came thronging about us, and stood gazing at us at a distance: As
we had traded freely with them, and had been kindly used, we
thought ourselves in no danger; but when we saw the people, we
cut three boughs out of a tree, and stuck them up at a distance from
us; which, it seems, is a mark in that country not only of a truce
and friendship, but when it is accepted the other side set up three
poles or boughs, which is a signal that they accept the truce too;
but then this is a known condition of the truce, that you are not to
pass beyond their three poles towards them, nor they to come past
your three poles or boughs towards you; so that you are perfectly
secure within the three poles, and all the space between your poles
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
327
and theirs is allowed like a market for free converse, traffic, and
commerce. When you go there you must not carry your weapons
with you; and if they come into that space they stick up their
javelins and lances all at the first poles, and come on unarmed;
but if any violence is offered them, and the truce thereby broken,
away they run to the poles, and lay hold of their weapons, and the
truce is at an end.
It happened or evening, when we went on shore, that a greater
number of their people came down than usual, but all very friendly
and civil; and they brought several kinds of provisions, for which
we satisfied them with such toys as we had; the women also
brought us milk and roots, and several things very acceptable to
us, and all was quiet; and we made us a little tent or hut of some
boughs or trees, and lay on shore all night. I know not what was
the occasion, but I was not so well satisfied to lie on shore as the
rest; and the boat riding at an anchor at about a stone's cast from
the land, with two men in her to take care of her, I made one of
them come on shore; and getting some boughs of trees to cover
us also in the boat, I spread the sail on the bottom of the boat, and
lay under the cover of the branches of the trees all night in the boat.
About two o'clock in the morning we heard one of our men
make a terrible noise on the shore, calling out, for God's sake, to
bring the boat in, and come and help them, for they were all like
to be murdered; at the same time I heard the fire of five muskets,
which was the number of guns they had, and that three times over;
for it seems the natives here were not so easily frightened with
guns as the savages were in America, where I had to do with them.
All this while I knew not what was the matter, but rousing imme-
Aiately from sleep with the noise, I caused the boat to be thrust in,
and resolved, with three fusees we had on board, to land and assist
our men. We got the boat soon to the shore, but our men were
in too much haste; for being come to the shore, they plunged
into the water, to get to the boat with all the expedition they could,
being pursued by between three and four hundred men. Our men
were but nine in all, and only five of them had fusees with them;
the rest had pistols and swords, indeed, but they were of small use
to them.
We took up seven of our men, and witè difficuny enough too,
three of them being very ill wounded; and that which was still
worse was, that while we stood in the boat to take our men in, we
were in as much danger as they were in on shore; for they poured
their arrows in upon us so thick that we were glad to barricade the
side of the boat up with the benches, and two or three loose boards,
which, to our great satisfaction, we had by mere accident in the
boat. And yet, had it been daylight, they are, it seems, such exact
marksmen, that if they could have seen but the least part of any of
us, they would have been sure of us. We had, by the light of the
moon, a little sight of them, as they stood pelting us from the shore
328
LIFE AND ADVENTURÈS OF
with darts and arrows; and having got ready our firearms, we
gave them a volley, that we could hear, by the cries of some of
them, had wounded several; however, they stood thus in battle
array on the shore till break of day, which we supposed was that
they might see the better to take their aim at us.
In this condition we lay, and could not tell how to weigh our
anchor, or set up our sail, because we must needs stand up in the
boat, and they were as sure to hit us as we were to hit a bird in a
tree with small shot We made signals of distress to the ship,
and though she rode a league off, yet my nephew, the captain,
hearing our firing, and by glasses perceiving the posture we lay in,
and that we fired towards the shore, pretty well understood us;
and weighing anchor with all speed, he stood as near the shore as
he durst with the ship, and then sent another boat, with ten hands
in her, to assist us. We called to them not to come too near,
telling them what condition we were in; however, they stood in
near to us, and one of the men taking the end of a tow-line in his
hand, and keeping one boat between him and the enemy, so that
they could not perfect.y see him, swam on board us, and made fast
the line to the boat: upon which we slipped out a little cable, and
leaving our anchor behind, they towed us out of reach of the arrows;
we all the while lying close behind the barricado we had made.
As soon as we were got from between the ship and the shore, that
we could lay her side to the shore, she ran along just by them, and
poured in a broadside among them, loaded with pieces of iron and
lead, small bullets, and such stuff, besides the great shot, which
made a terrible havoc among them.
When we were got on board, and out of danger, we haa time to
examine into the occasion of this fray; and, indeed, our supercargo,
who had been often in those parts, put me upon it; for he said he
was sure the inhabitants would not have touched us after we had
made a truce, if we had not done something to provoke them to it.
At length it came out that an old woman, who had come to sell us
some milk, had brought it within our poles, and a young woman
with her, who also brought some roots or herbs; and while the old
woman (whether she was mother to the young woman or no they
could not tell) was selling us the milk, one of our men offered some
rudeness to the girl that was with her, at which the old woman
made a great noise: however, the seaman would not quit his prize,
but carried her out of the old woman's sight among the trees, it
being almost dark; the old woman went away without her, and, as
we may suppose, made an outcry among the people she came
from; who, upon notice, raised that great army upon us in three or
four hours, and it was great odds but we had all been destroyed.
One of our men was killed with a lance thrown at him just at the
beginning of the attack, as he sallied out of the tent they had
made 1e rest came off free, all but the fellow who was the
occasion of all the mischief, who paid dear enough for his brutality,
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
329
for we could not hear what became of him for a great while. We
lay upon the shore two days after, though the wind presented, and
made signals for him, and made our boat sail up shore and down
shore several leagues, but in vain; so we were obliged to give him
over, and if he alone had suffered for it, the loss had been less. I
could not satisfy myself, however, without venturing on shore once
more, to try if I could learn anything of him or them; it was the
third night after the action that I had a great mind to learn, if 1
could by any means, what mischief we had done, and how the game
stood on the Indians' side. I was careful to do it in the dark, lest
we should be attacked again: but I ought, indeed, to have been
sure that the men I went with had been under my command, before
I engaged in a thing so hazardous and mischievous as I was
brought into by it, without design.
We took twenty as stout fellows with us as any in the ship,
besides the supercargo and myself, and we landed two hours before
midnight, at the same place where the Indians stood drawn up in
the evening before I landed here, because my design, as I have
said, was chiefly to see if they had quitted the field, and if they had
left any marks behind them of the mischief we had done them,
and I thought if we could surprise one or two of them, perhaps
we might get our man again, by way of exchange.
We landed without any noise, and divided our men into two
bodies, whereof the boatswain commanded one and I the other.
We neither saw nor heard anybody stir when we landed and we
marched up, one body at a distance from another, to the place. At
first we could see nothing, it being very dark; till by-and-by our
boatswain, who led the first party, stumbled and fell over a dead
body. This made them halt a while; for knowing by the circum-
stances that they were at the place where the Indians had stood,
they waited for my coming up there. We concluded to halt till the
moon began to rise, which we knew would be in less than an hour,
when we could easily discern the havoc we had made among them.
We told thirty-two bodies upon the ground, whereof two were not
quite dead; some had an arm, and some a leg shot off, and one his
head; those that were wounded, we supposed, they had carried
away. When we had made, as I thought, a full discovery of all we
could me to the knowledge of, I resolved on going on board; but
the boatswain and his party sent me word that they were resolved
to make a visit to the Indian town, where these dogs, as they called
them, dwelt, and asked me to go along with them; and if they
could find them, as they still fancied they should, they did not doubt
of getting a good booty; and it might be they might find Tom
Jeffry there: that was the man's name we had lost.
Had they sent to ask my leave to go, I knew well enough what
answer to have given them; for I should have commanded them
instantly on board, knowing it was not a hazard fit for us to run,
who had a ship and ship-loading in our charge, and a voyage to
330
life and adventures of
46
make which depended very much upon the lives of the men ; but
as they sent me word they were resolved to go, and only asked me
and my company to go along with them, I positively refused it, and
rose up, for I was sitting on the ground, in order to go to the boat.
One or two of the men began to importune me to go; and when I
refused, began to grumble, and say they were not under my com-
mand, and they would go. Come, Jack," says one of the men,
"will you go with me? I'll go for one." Jack said he would-and
then another-and, in a word, they all left me but one, whom I
persuaded to stay, and a boy left in the boat. So the supercargo
and I, with the third man, went back to the boat, where we told
them we would stay for them, and take care to take in as many of
them as should be left; for I told them it was a mad thing they
were going about, and supposed most of them would have the fate
Tom Jeffry.
They told me, like seamen, they would warrant it they would
come off again, and they would take care, etc.; so away they went.
I entreated them to consider the ship and the voyage, that their
lives were not their own, and that they were entrusted with the
voyage, in some measure; that if they miscarried, the ship might
be lost for want of their help, and that they could not answer for it
to God or man. But I might as well have talked to the mainmast
of the ship: they were mad upon their journey; only they gave me
good words, and begged I would not be angry; that they did
not doubt but they would be back again in about an hour at
furthest; for the Indian town, they said, was not above half-
a-mile off, though they found it above two miles before they got
to it.
Well, they all went away, and thougn the attempt was desperate,
and such as none but madmen would have gone about, yet, to give
them their due, they went about it as warily as boldly; they were
gallantly armed, for they had every man a fusee or musket, a
bayonet, and a pistol; some of them had broad cutlasses, some of
them had hangers, and the boatswain and two more bad poleaxes;
besides all which they had among them thirteen hand grenadoes.
Bolder fellows, and better provided, never went about any wicked
work in the world When they went out their chief design was
plunder, and they were in mighty hopes of finding gold there; but
a circumstance which none of them were aware of set them on fire
with revenge, and made devils of them all.
When they came to the few Indian houses which they thought had
been the town, which was not above half-a-mile off, they were under
great disappointment, for there were not above twelve or thirteen
houses, and where the town was, or how big, they knew not. They
consulted, therefore, what to do, and were some time before they
could resolve; for if they fell upon these, they must cut all their
throats; and it was ten to one but some of them might escape, it
being in the night, though the moon was up; and if one escaped,
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
331
he would run and raise all the town, so they should have a whole
army upon them; on the other hand, if they went away and left
those untouched, for the people were all asleep, they could not tell
which way to look for the town: however, the last was the best
advice, so they resolved to leave them, and look for the town as
well as they could They went on a little way, and found a cow
tied to a tree; this, they presently concluded, would be a good
guide to them; for, they said, the cow certainly belonged to the
town before them, or the town behind them, and if they untied her,
they should see which way she went: if she went back, they had
nothing to say to her; but if she went forward, they would follow
her. So they cut the cord, which was made of twisted flags, and
the cow went on before them, directly to the town; which, as they
reported, consisted of above two hundred houses or huts, and in
some of these they found several families living together.
Here they found all in silence, as profoundly secure as sleep
could make them: and, first, they called another council, to
consider what they had to do; and presently resolved to divide
themselves into three bodies, and so set three houses on fire in
three parts of the town; and as the men came out, to seize them
and bind them (if any resisted, they need not be asked what to do
then), and so to search the rest of the houses for plunder: but they
resolved to march silently first through the town, and see what
dimensions it was of, and if they might venture upon it or no.
They did so, and desperately resolved that they would venture
upon them but while they were animating one another to the
work, three of them, who were a little before the rest, called out
aloud to them, and told them that they had found Tom Jeffry:
they all ran up to the place, where they found the poor fellow hang-
ing up naked by one arm, and his throat cut. There was an
Indian house just by the tree, where they found sixteen or seventeen
of the principal Indians, who had been concerned in the fray with
us before, and two or three of them wounded with our shot; and
our men found they were awake, and talking one to another in that
house, but knew not their number.
The sight of their poor manglea comrade so enraged them, as
before, that they swore to one another that they would be revenged;
and that not an Indian that came into their hands should have any
quarter; and to work they went immediately, and yet not so madly
as might be expected from the rage and fury they were in. Their
first care was to get something that would soon take fire, but, after
a little search, they found that would be to no purpose; for most of
the houses were low, and thatched with flags and rushes, of which
the country is full; so they presently made some wildfire, as we
call it, by wetting a little powder in the palm of their hands, and in
a quarter of an hour they set the town on fire in four or five places,
and particularly that house where the Indians were not gone to
bod
..
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
Į
As soon as the fire began to blaze, the poor frightened creatures
began to rush out to save their lives, but met with their fate in the
attempt; and especially at the door, where they drove them back,
the boats vain himself killing one or two with his poleaxe. The
house being large, and many in it, he did not care to go in, but
called for hand grenado, and threw it among them, which at first
frightened them, but, when it burst, made such havoc among them
that they cried out in a hideous manner. In short, most of the
Indians who were in the open part of the house were killed or hurt
with the grenado, except two or three more who pressed to the
door, which the boatswain and two more kept, with their bayonets
on the muzzles of their pieces, and despatched all that came in their
way; but there was another apartment in the house, where the
prince or king, or whatever he was, and several others, were;
and these were kept in till the house, which was by this time
all in a light flame, fell in upon them, and they were smothered
together.
All this while they fired not a gun, because they would not waken
the people faster than they could master them; but the fire began
to waken them fast enough, and our fellows were glad to keep a
little together in bodies; for the fire grew so raging, all the houses
being made of light combustible stuff, that they could hardly bear
the street between them. Their business was to follow the fire, for
the surer execution as fast as the fire either forced the people out
of those houses which were burning, or frightened them out of
others, our people were ready at their doors to knock them on the
head, still calling and hallooing one to another to remember Tom
Jeffry.
While this was doing, I must confess I was very uneasy, and
especially when I saw the flames of the town, which, it being night,
seemed to be close by me. My nephew, the captain, who was
roused by his men seeing such a fire, was very uneasy, not knowing
what the matter was, or what danger I was in, especially hearing
the guns too, for by this time they began to use their fire-arms; a
thousand thoughts oppressed his mind concerning me and the
supercargo, what would become of us; and at last, though he could
ill spare any more men, yet not knowing what exigence we might
be in, he took another boat, and with thirteen men and himself
came ashore to me,
He was surprised to see me and the supercargo in the boat with
no more than two inen; and though he was glad that we were well,
yet he was in the same impatience with us to know what was
doing; for the noise continued, and the flame increased; in short,
it was next to an impossibility for any men in the world to restrain
their curiosity to know what had happened, or their concern for the
safety of the men in a word, the captain told me he would go and
help his men, let what would come. I argued with him, as I did
before with the men, the safety of the ship, the danger of the
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
333
voyage, the interest of the owners and merchants, etc., and told him
I and the two men would go, and only see if we could at a distance
learn what was likely to be the event, and come back and tell him.
It was in vain to talk to my nephew, as it was to talk to the rest
before; he would go it, he said; and he only wished he had only
left but ten men in the ship, for he could not think of having his
men lost for want of help: he had rather lose the ship, the voyage,
and his life, and all; and away he went.
I was no more able to stay behind now than I was to persuade
them not to go; so the captain ordered two men to row back the
pinnace, and fetch twelve men more, leaving the long boat at an
anchor; and that, when they came back, six men should keep the
two boats, and six more come after us; so that he left only sixteen
men in the ship; for the whole ship's company consisted of sixty-
five men, whereof two were lost in the late quarrel which brought
this mischief on
Being now on the march, we felt little of the ground we trod on ;
and being guided by the fire, we kept no path, but went directly to
the place of the flame. If the noise of the guns was surprising to
us before, the cries of the poor people were now quite of another
nature, and filled us with horror. I must confess I was never at the
sacking a city, or at the taking a town by storm. I had heard of
Oliver Cromwell taking Drogheda, in Ireland, and killing man,
woman, and child; and I had read of Count Tilly sacking the city
of Magdeburg and cutting the throats of twenty-two thousand of all
sexes; but I never had an idea of the thing itself before, nor is it
possible to describe it, or the horror that was upon our minds
at hearing it. However, we went on, and at length came to the
town, though there was no entering the streets of it for the fire.
The first object we met with was the ruins of a hut or house,
or rather the ashes of it, for the house was consumed; and just
before it, plainly now to be seen by the light of the fire, lay four men
and three women, killed, and, as we thought, one or two more lay
in the heap among the fire; in short, there were such instances of
rage, altogether barbarous, and of a fury something beyond what
was human, that we thought it impossible our men could be guilty
of it; or, if they were the authors of it, we thought they ought to
be every one of them put to the worst of deaths. But this was not
all: we saw the fire increase forward, and the cry went on just as
the fire went on; so that we were in the utmost confusion. We
advanced a little way further, and behold, to our astonishment,
three naked women, and crying in a most dreadful manner, came
flying as if they had wings, and after them sixteen or seventeen
men, natives, in the same terror and consternation, with three of
our English butchers in the rear, who, when they could not over-
take them, fired in among them, and one that was killed by their
shot fell down in our sight. When the rest saw us, believing us to
be their enemies, and that we would murder them as well as those
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
that pursued them, they set up a most dreadful shriek, especially
the women; and two of them fell down, as if already dead, with the
fright.
My very soul shrunk within me, and my blood ran chill-m my
veins, when I saw this; and, I believe, had the three English
sailors that pursued them come on, I had made our men kill them
all; however, we took some means to let the poor flying creatures
know that we would not hurt them; and immediately they came up
to us, and kneeling down, with their hands lifted up, made piteous
lamentation to us to save them, which we let them know we
would; whereupon they crept all together in a huddle close behina
us, as for protection. I left my men drawn up together, and,
charging them to hurt nobody, but, if possible, to get at some of our
people, and see what devil it was possessed them, and what they
intended to do, and to command them off; assuring them that if
they stayed till daylight they would have a hundred thousand men
about their ears: I say I left them, and went among those flying
people, taking only two of our men with me; and there was,
indeed, a piteous spectacle among them. Some of them had their
feet terribly burned with trampling and running through the fire;
others their hands burned; one of the women had fallen down in
the fire, and was very much burned before she could get out again ;
and two or three of the men had cuts in their backs and thighs,
from our men pursuing; and another was shot through the body,
and died while I was there.
I would fain have learned what the occasion of all this was; but
I could not understand one word they said; though, by signs, I
perceived some of them knew not what was the occasion them-
selves. I was so terrified in my thoughts at this outrageous attempt
that I could not stay there, but went back to my own men, and
resolved to go into the middle of the town, through the fire, or
whatever might be in the way, and put an end to it, cost what it
would; accordingly, as I came back to my men, I told them my
resolution, and commanded them to follow me, when, at the very
moment, came four of our men, with the boatswain at their head,
roving over heaps of bodies they had killed, all covered with blood
and dust, as if they wanted more people to massacre, when our
men hallooed to them as loud as they could halloo; and with much
ado one of them made them hear, so that they knew who we were,
and came up to us.
As soon as the boatswain saw us, he set up a halloo like a
shout of triumph, for having, as he thought, more help come; and,
without waiting to hear me, "Captain," says he "noble captain!
I am glad you are come; we have not half done yet. Villainous,
hell-hound dogs! I'll kill as many of them as poor Tom has hairs
upon his head: we have sworn to spare none of them; we'll root
out the very nation of them from the earth;" and thus he ran on,
out of breath, too, with action, and would not give us leave to speak
ROBINSON CRUSOR.
335
66
a word. At last, raising my voice, that I might silence him a
»said I,
little, "Barbarous dog!
what are you doing? I won't
have one creature touched more, upon pain of death; I charge you,
upon your life, to stop your hands, and stand still here, or you are
a dead man this minute."-"Why, sir," says he,
Why, sir," says he, “do you know
what you do, or what they have done? If you want a reason
for what we have done, come hither ;" and with that he showed me
the poor fellow hanging, with his throat cut.
<<
I confess I was urged then myself, and at another time would
have been forward enough; but I thought they had carried their
rage too far, and remembered Jacob's words to his sons Simeon
and Levi : Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their
wrath, for it was cruel." But I had now a new task upon my hands;
for when the men I carried with me saw the sight, as I had done, I
had as much to do to restrain them as I should have had with the
others; nay, my nephew himself fell in with them, and told me, in
their hearing, that he was only concerned for fear of the men being
overpowered; and as to the people, he thought not one of them
ought to live; for they had all glutted themselves with the murder
of the poor man, and that they ought to be used like murderers.
Upon these words, away ran eight of my men, with the boatswain
and his crew, to complete their bloody work; and I, seeing it quite
out of my power to restrain them, came away pensive and sad; for
I could not bear the sight, much less the horrible noise and cries of
the poor wretches that fell into their hands.
I got nobody to come back with me but the supercargo and two
.nen, and with these walked back to the boat. It was a very great
piece of folly in me, I confess, to venture back, as it were, alone;
for as it began now to be almost day, and the alarm had run over
the country, there stood about forty men armed with lances and
bows at the little place where the twelve or thirteen houses stood,
mentioned before: but by accident I missed the place, and came
directly to the sea-side, and by the time I got to the sea-side it was
broad day: immediately I took the pinnace and went on board,
and sent her back to assist the men in what might happen.
observed, about the time that I came to the boat-side, that the fire
was pretty well out, and the noise abated; but in about half-an-
hour after I got on board, I heard a volley of our men's fire-arms,
and saw a great smoke. This, as I understood afterwards, was our
men falling upon the men, who, as I said, stood at the few houses
on the way, of whom they killed sixteen or seventeen, and set all
the houses on fire, but did not meddle with the women
children.
ΟΙ
By the time the men got to the shore again with the pinnace our
men began to appear; they came dropping in, not in two bodies as
they went, but straggling here and there in such a manner, that a
small force of resolute men might have cut them all off. But the
dread of them was upon the whole country; and the men were
336
life and adventures of
surprised, and so frightened, that I believe a hundred of them would
have fled at the sight of but five of our men. Nor in all this terrible
action was there a man that made any considerable defence: they
were so surprised between the terror of the fire and the sudden
attack of our men in the dark, that they knew not which way to
turn themselves; for if they fled one way they were met by one
party, if back again by another, so that they were everywhere
knocked down; nor did any of our men receive the least hurt,
except one that sprained his foot, and another that had one of his
hands burned.
CHAPTER XXX
Difference with my nephew on account of the cruelties practised at
Madagascar-Five men lost on the Arabian shore, off the Gulf of
Persia-The seamen refuse to sail if I continue on board, in conse-
quence of which I am left on shore-Make a very advantageous
trading voyage, in company with an English merchant, and purchase
vessel which, it turns out, the crew had matinied and an zway
with.

WAS very angry with my nephew, the captain, and,
indeed, with all the men, but with him in particular,
as well for his acting so out of his duty, as com-
mander of the ship, and having the charge of the
voyage upon him, as in his prompting, rather than
cooling, the rage of his blind men, in so bloody and cruel an enter-
prise. My nephew answered me very respectfully, but told me that
when he saw the body of the poor seaman whom they had murdered
in so cruel and barbarous à manner he was not master of him-
self, neither could he govern his passion; he owned he should not
have done so, as he was commander of the ship; but as he was a
man, and nature moved him, he could not bear it As for the rest
of the men, they were not subject to me at all, and they knew it
well enough; so they took no notice of my dislike. The next day
we set sail, so we never heard any more of it. Our men differed in
the account of the number they had killed; but according to the
best of their accounts, put all together, they killed or destroyed
about one hundred and fifty people-men, women, and children,
and left not a house standing in the town. As for the poor fellow
Tom Jeffry, as he was quite dead (for his throat was so cut that his
head was half off), it would do him no service to bring him away;
so they only took him down from the tree, where he was hanging
by one hand.
However just our men thought this action, I was against them in
k, and I always, after that time, told them God would blast the
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339
¢
voyage; for I looked upon all the blood they shed that night to be
murder in them. For though it is true that they had killed Tom
Jeffry, yet Jeffry was the aggressor, had broken the truce, and had
ill-used a young woman of theirs, who came down to them innocently,
and on the faith of the public capitulation.
The boatswain defended this quarrel when we were afterwards
on board. He said it was true that we seemed to break the truce,
but really had not; and that the war was begun the night before
by the natives themselves, who had shot at us, and killed one of our
men without any just provocation; so that as we were in a capacity
to fight them now, we might also be in a capacity to do ourselves
justice upon them in an extraordinary manner; that though the poor
man had taken a little liberty with the girl, he ought not to have been
murdered, and that in such a villainous manner; and that they did
nothing but what was just and what the laws of God allowed to be
done to murderers. One would think this should have been
enough to have warned as against going on shore amongst heathens
and barbarians; but it is impossible to make mankind wise but at
their own expense, and their experience seems to be always of most
use to them when it is dearest bought.
We were now bound to the Gulf of Persia, and from thence to
the coast of Coromandel, only to touch at Surat; but the chief
of the supercargo's design lay at the Bay of Bengal; where, if he
missed his business outward-bound, he was to go out to China, and
return to the coast as he came home. The first disaster that
befell us was in the Gulf of Persia, where five of our men, venturing
on shore on the Arabian side of the gulf, were surrounded by the
Arabians, and either all killed or carried away into slavery; the rest
of the boat's crew were not able to rescue them, and had but just
time to get off their boat. I began to upbraid them with the just
retribution of heaven in this case; but the boatswain very warmly
told me, he thought I went further in my censures than I could
show any warrant for in Scripture; and referred to Luke xiii. 4,
where our Saviour intimates that those men on whom the Tower of
Siloam fell were not sinners above all the Galileans; but that which
put me to silence in the case was, that not one of these five men
who were now lost were of those who went on shore to the massacre
of Madagascar, so I always called it, though our men could not
bear to hear the word massacre with any patience.
But my frequent preaching to them on this subject had worse
consequences than I expected; and the boatswain, who had been
the head of the attempt, came up boldly to me one time, and told
me he found that I brought that affair continually upon the stage ;
that I made unjust reflections upon it, and had used the men very
ill on that account, and himself in particular; that as I was but a
passenger, and had no command in the ship, or concern in the
voyage, they were not obliged to bear it; that they did not know
but I might have some ill design in my head, and perhaps to call
338
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
O
them to an account for it when they came to England; and that,
therefore, unless I would resolve to have done with it, and also not
to concern myself any further with him, or any of his affairs, he
would leave the ship; for he did not think it safe to sail with me
among them.
I heard him patiently enough till he had done, and then told him
that I confessed I had all along opposed the massacre of Mada-
gascar, and that I had, on all occasions, spoken my mind freely
about it, though not more upon him than any of the rest; that as to
having no command in the ship, that was true; nor did I exercise
any authority, only took the liberty of speaking my mind in things
which publicly concerned us all; and what concern I had in the
voyage was none of his business; that I was a considerable owner
in the ship. In that claim I conceived I had a right to speak even
further than I had done, and would not be accountable to him or
any one else, and began to be a little warm with him. He made
but little reply to me at that time, and I thought the affair had been
over. We were at this time in the road at Bengal; and being
willing to see the place, I went on shore with the supercargo in the
ship's boat to divert myself; and towards evening was preparing to
go on board, when one of the men came to me, and told me he
would not have me trouble myself to come down to the boat, for
they had orders not to carry me on board any more. Any one may
guess what a surprise I was in at so insolent a message; and I
asked the man who bade him deliver that message to me? He told
me the coxswain.
I immediately found out the supercargo, and told him the story,
adding that I foresaw there would be a mutiny in the ship; and
entreated him to go immediately on board and acquaint the captain
of it. But I might have spared this intelligence, for before I had
The
spoken to him on shore the matter was effected on board.
boatswain, the gunner, the carpenter, and all the inferior officers, as
soon as I was gone off in the boat, came up, and desired to speak
with the captain; and then the boatswain, making a long harangue,
and repeating all he had said to me, told the captain that as I was
now gone peaceably on shore, they were loth to use any violence
with me, which, if I had not gone on shore, they would otherwise
have done, to oblige me to have gone. They, therefore, thought
fit to tell him that as they shipped themselves to serve in the ship
under his command, they would perform it well and faithfully; but
if I would not quit the ship, or the captain oblige me to quit it,
they would all leave the ship, and sail no further with him; and at
that word all he turned his face towards the mainmast, which was,
It seems, a signal agreed on, when the seamen, being got together
there, cried out, One and all! one and all!"
My nephew, the captain, was a man of spirit, and of great pre-
sence of mind; and though he was surprised, yet he told them
calmly that he would consider of the matter; but that he could de
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
399
nothing in it till he had spoken to me about it. He used some
arguments with them, to show them the unreasonableness and
injustice of the thing-but it was all in vain; they swore, and shook
hands round before his face, that they would all go on shore unless
he would engage to them not to suffer me to come any more on
board the ship.
•
This was a hard article upon him, who knew his obligation to me,
and did not know how I might take it. So he began to talk smartly
to them; told them that I was a very considerable owner of the
ship, and that if ever they came to England again it would cost
them very dear that the ship was mine, and that he could not put
me out of it; and that he would rather lose the ship, and the
voyage too, than disoblige me so much so they might do as they
pleased. However, he would go on shore and talk with me, and
invited the boatswain to go with him, and perhaps they might
accommodate the matter with me. But they all rejected the pro-
posal, and said they would have nothing to do with me any more;
and if I came on board they would all go on shore. "Well," said
the captain, "if you are all of this mind, let me go on shore and
talk with him." So away he came to me with this account, a
little after the message had been brought to me from the
Coxswain.
I was very glad to see my nephew, I must confess; for I was not
without apprehensions that they would confine him by violence, set
sail, and run away with the ship; and then I had been stripped
naked in a remote country, having nothing to help myself; in short,
I had been in a worse case than when I was alone in the island.
But they had not come to that length, it seems, to my satisfaction;
and when my nephew told me what they had said to him, and how
they had sworn and shook hands that they would, one and all,
leave the ship if I was suffered to come on board, I told him he
should not be concerned at it at all, for I would stay on shore. I
only desired he would take care and send me all my necessary
things on shore, and leave me a sufficient sum of money, and I
would find my way to England as well as I could. This was a
heavy piece of news to my nephew, but there was no way to help
it but to comply; so, in short, he went on board the ship again, and
satisfied the men that his uncle had yielded to their importunity,
and had sent for his goods from on board the ship; so that the
matter was over in a few hours, the men returned to their duty, and
I began to consider what course I should steer.
I was now alone in a most remote part of the world, for I was
near three thousand leagues by sea farther off from England than
I was at my island; only, it is true, I might travel here by land
over the Great Mogul's country to Surat, might go from thence to
Bassora by sea, up the Gulf of Persia, and take the way of the
caravans, over the desert of Arabia, to Aleppo and Scanderoon ;
from thence by sea again to Italy, and so overland into France. I
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LIFE AND ADVENTURes of
>
had another way before me, which was to wait for some English
ships, which were coming to Bengal from Achin, on the island of
Sumatra, and get passage on board them from England. But as I
came hither without any concern with the East Indian Company,
so it would be difficult to go from hence without their license,
unless with great favour of the captains of the ships, or the
Company's factors: and to both I was an utter stranger.
Here I had the mortification to see the ship set sail without me;
however, my nephew left me two servants, or rather one companion
and one servant; the first was clerk to the purser, whom he
engaged to go with me, and the other was his own servant. I then
took a good lodging in the house of an Englishwoman, where
several merchants lodged, some French, two Italians, or rather
Jews, and one Englishman. Here I stayed above nine months,
considering what course to take. I had some English goods with
me of value, and a considerable sum of money; my nephew
furnishing me with a thousand pieces of eight, and a letter of credit
for more, if I had occasion, that I might not be straitened, whatever
might happen. I quickly disposed of my goods to advantage; and,
as I originally intended, I bought here some very good diamonds,
which, of all other things, were the most proper for me in my
present circumstances, because I could always carry my whole
estate about me
During my stay nere many proposals were made for my return
to England, but none falling sat to my mind, the English merchant
who lodged with me, and whom I had contracted an intimate
acquaintance with, came to me one morning, saying: “Country-
man, I have a project to communicate, which, as it suits with my
thoughts, may, for aught I know, suit with yours also, when you
shall have thoroughly considered it. Here we are posted, you by
accident and I by my own choice, in a part of the world very
remote from our own country; but it is in a country where, by us
who understand trade and business, a great deal of money is to be
got. If you will put one thousand pounds to my one thousand
pounds, we will hire a ship here, the first we can get to our minds.
You shall be captain, I'll be merchant, and we'll go a trading
voyage to China; for what should we stand still for? The whole
world is in motion; why should we be idle?” ·
I liked this proposal very well; and the more so because it
seemed to be expressed with so much good will. In my loose,
unhinged circumstances, I was the fitter to embrace a proposal for
trade, or indeed anything else. I might perhaps say with some
truth, that if trade was not my element, rambling was; and no
proposal for seeing any part of the world which I had never seen
before could possibly come amiss to me It was, however, some
time before we could get a ship to our minds, and when we had got
a vessel, it was not easy to get English sailors-that is to say, so
many as were necessary to govern the voyage and manage the
ROBINSON crusoE.
341
sailors which we should pick up there. After some time we got a
mate, a boatswain, and a gunner, English; a Dutch carpenter, and
three foremast men. With these we found we could do well
enough, having Indian seamen, such as they were, to make up.
When all was ready we set sail for Achin, in the island of
Sumatra, and from thence to Siam, where we exchanged some of
our wares for opium and some arrack; the first a commodity which
bears a great price among the Chinese, and which at that time was
much wanted there. Then we went up to Suskan, were eight
months out, and on our return to Bengal I was very well satisfied
with my adventure. Our people in England often admire how
officers, which the Company send into India, and the merchants
which generally stay there, get such very great estates as they do,
and sometimes come home worth sixty or seventy thousand pounds
at a time; but it is little matter for wonder, when we consider the
innumerable ports and places where they have a free commerce;
indeed, at the ports where the English ships come there is such
great and constant demands for the growth of all other countries,
that there is a certain vent for the returns, as well as a market
abroad for the goods carried out.
got so much money by my fir adventure, and such an insight
into the method of getting more, that had I been twenty years
younger, I should have been tempted to have stayed here, and
sought no farther for making any fortune; but what was all this to
a man upwards of three-score, that was rich enough, and came
abroad more in obedience to a restless desire of seeing the world
than a covetous desire of gaining by it? A restless desire it really
was, for when I was at home I was restless to go abroad; and
when I was abroad I was restless to be at home. I say, what was
this gain to me? I was rich enough already, nor had I any uneasy
desires about getting more money; therefore the profit of the
voyage to me was of no great force for the prompting me forward
to further undertakings. Hence, I thought that by this voyage I
had made no progress at all, because I was come back, as I might
call it, to the place from whence I came, as to a home: whereas,
my eye, like that which Solomon speaks of, was never satisfied with
seeing. I was come into a part of the world which I was never in
before, and that part, in particular, which I heard much of, and was
resolved to see as much of it as I could: and then I thought I
might say I had seen all the world that was worth seeing.
But my fellow-traveller and I had different notions: I acknow.
ledge his were the more suited to the end of a merchant's life, who,
when he is abroad upon adventures, is wise to stick to that, as the
best thing for him, which he is likely to get the most money by.
On the other hand, mine was the notion of a mad, rambling boy,
that never cares to see a thing twice over. But this was not all : I
had a kind of impatience upon me to be nearer home, and yet an
ynsettled resolution which way to go. In the interval of these
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
consultations, my friend, who was always upon the search for busi-
ness, proposed another voyage among the Spice Islands, to bring
home a loading of cloves from the Manillas, or thereabouts
We were not long in preparing for this voyage; the chief
difficulty was in bringing me to come into it. However, at last,
nothing else offering, and as sitting still, to me especially, was the
unhappiest part of life, I resolved on this voyage too, which we
made very successfully, touching at Borneo and several other
islands, and came home in about five months, when we sold our
spices, with very great profit, to the Persian merchants, who carried
them away to the Gulf. My friend, when we made up this account,
smiled at me: "Well, now," said he, with a sort of friendly rebuke
on my indolent temper, "is not this better than walking about here,
like a man with nothing to do, and spending our time in staring at
the nonsense and ignorance of the Pagans ?"—"Why, truly," said I,
'my friend, I think it is, and I begin to be a convert to the prin-
ciples of merchandising; but I must tell you, by the way, you do not
know what I am doing; for if I once conquer my backwardness,
and embark heartily, old as I am, I shall harass you up and down
the world till I tire you; for I shall pursue it so eagerly, I shall
never let you lie still."
66
CHAPTER XXXI
Make a trading voyage in this ship-Put into the river of Cambodia-
Am warned of my danger by a countryman, in consequence of which
we set sail, and are pursued-Great difficulty in making our escape.

A
LITTLE while after this there came in a Dutch ship
from Batavia; she was a coaster, not an European
trader, of about two hundred tons burden; the inen,
as they pretended, having been so sickly that the
captain had not hands enough to go to sea with, so he
lay by at Bengal ; and having, it seems, got money enough, or
being willing, for other reasons, to go for Europe, he gave public
notice he would sel his ship. This came to my ears before my
new partner heard of it, and I had a great mind to buy it; so Í
went to him and told him of it. He considered a while, for he was
no rash man neither; and at last replied, "She is a little too big-
however, we will have her. Accordingly, we bought the ship, and
agreeing with the master, we paid for her, and took possession.
When we had done so we resolved to engage the men, if we could,
to join with those we had, for the pursuing our business; but, on a
sudden, they having received not their wages, but their share of
the money, as we afterwards learned, not one of them was to be
found; we inquired much about them, and at length were told
&
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
MS
that they were all gone together by land to Agra, the great city of
the Mogul's residence, to proceed from thence to Surat, and then go
by sea to the Gulf of Persia.
Nothing had so much troubled me a good while as that I should
miss the opportunity of going with them; for such a ramble, I
thought, and in such company as would both have guarded and
diverted me, would have suited mightily with my great design; and
I should have both seen the world and gone homeward too. But
I was much better satisfied a few days after, when I came to know
what sort of fellows they were; for, in short, their history was, that
this man they called captain was the gunner only, not the com-
mander; that they had been a trading voyage, in which they had
been attacked on shore by some of the Malays, who had killed the
captain and three of his men; and that after the captain was killed,
these men, eleven in number, having resolved to run away with the
ship, brought her to Bengal, leaving the mate and five men more on
shore.
:
Well, let them get the ship how they would, we came honestly by
her, as we thought, though we did not, I confess, examine into
things so exactly as we ought; for we never inquired anything of
the seamen, who would certainly have faltered in their account, and
contradicted one another. Somehow or other we should have had
reason to have suspected them; but the man showed us a bill of
sale for the ship, to one Emanuel Clostershoven, or some such name,
for I suppose it was all a forgery, and called himself by that name,
and we could not contradict him and withal, having no suspicion
of the thing, we went through with our bargain. We picked up
some more English sailors here after this, and some Dutch, and
now we resolved on a second voyage to the south-east for cloves,
etc.-that is to say, among the Philippine and Molucca isles. In
short, not to fill up this part of my story with trifles when what is
to come is so remarkable, I spent, from first to last, six years in
this country, trading from port to port, backward and forward, and
with very good success, and was now the last year with my new
partner, going in the ship above mentioned, on a voyage to China,
but designing first to go to Siam to buy rice.
In this voyage, being by contrary winds obliged to beat up and
down a great while in the Straits of Malacca and among the islands,
we were no sooner got clear of those difficult seas than we found
our ship had sprung a leak, but could not discover where it was.
This forced us to make some port; and my partner, who knew the
country better than I did, directed the captain to put into the river
of Cambodia; for I had made the English mate, one_Mr. Thomp-
son, captain, not being willing to take the charge of the ship upon
myself This river lies on the north side of the great bay or guli
which goes up to Siam. While we were here, and going often on
shore for refreshment, there comes to me one day an Englishman,
a gunner's mate on board an English East India ship, then riding
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Life and ADVENTURES OF
In the same river. "Sir," says he, addressing me, “you are a
stranger to me, and I to you; but I have something to tell you that
very nearly concerns you.. I am moved by the imminent danger
you are in, and, for ought I see, you have no knowledge of it."-" I
know no danger I am in," said I, "but that my ship is leaky, and I
cannot find it out; but I intend to lay her aground to-morrow, to
see if I can find it."-" But, sir," says he, "leaky or not leaky,
you will be wiser than to lay your ship on shore to-morrow when
you hear what I have to say to you Do you know, sir,” said
he, "the town of Cambodia lies about fifteen leagues up the
river; and there are two large English ships about five leagues on
this side, and three Dutch?"-" Well," said I, "and what is that
to me?"-"Why, sir," said he, "is it for a man that is upon such
adventures as you are to come into a port, and not examine first
what ships there are there, and whether he is able to deal with them?
I suppose you do not think you are a match for them?" I could
not conceive what he meant; and I turned short upon him, and
said: "I wish you would explain yourself; I cannot imagine what
reason I have to be afraid of any of the Company's ships, or Dutch
ships. I am no interloper. What can they have to say to me?"
"Well, sir," says he, with a smile, "if you think yourself secure you
must take your chance; but take my advice, if you do not put to
sea immediately, you will the very next tide be attacked by five
long-boats full of men, and perhaps if you are taken you will be
hanged for a pirate, and the particulars be examined afterwards. I
thought, sir," added he, "I should have met with a better reception
than this for doing you a piece of service of such importance."
"_"I ་
can never be ungrateful," said I, “for any service, or to any man
that offers me any kindness: but it is past my comprehension what
they should have such a design upon me for: however, since you
say there is no time to be lost, and that there is some villainous
design on hand against me, I will go on board this minute, and put
to sea immediately, if my men can stop the leak; but, sir," said I,
shall I go away ignorant of the cause of all this? Can you give
me no further light into it ?"
I can tell you but part of the story, sir," says he; "but I have
Dutch seaman here with me, and I believe I could persuade him
to tell you the rest; but there is scarce time for it. But the short
of the story is this-the first part of which I suppose you know well
enough that you were with this ship at Sumatra; that there your
captain was murdered by the Malays, with three of his men ; and
that you, or some of those that were on board with you, ran away
with the ship, and are since turned pirates. This is the sum of the
story, and you will all be seized as pirates, can assure you, and
executed with very little ceremony; for you know merchant ships
show but little law to pirates if they get them into their power."
"Now you speak plain English," said I, "and I thank you; and
though I know nothing that we have done like what you talk of, for
ܕ
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
I am sure we came honestly and fairly by the ship; yet .
such a work is doing, as you say, and that you seem to me.
honestly, I will be upon my guard."-"Nay, sir," says he,
“de
not talk of being upon your guard; the best defence is to be
out of danger. If you have any regard for your life and the lives
of all your men, put to sea without fail at high water; and as
you have a whole tide before you, you will be gone too far out
before they can come down; for they will come away at high water,
and as they have twenty miles to come, you will get near two hours
of them by the difference of the tide, not reckoning the length of the
way: besides, as they are only boats, and not ships, they will not
venture to follow you far out to sea, especially if it blows.""Well,"
said I,
you have been very kind in this: what shall I do to make
you amends?"—" Sir," says he,
Sir," says he, "you may not be willing to make
me any amends, because you may not be convinced of the truth of
it. I will make an offer to you: I have nineteen months' pay due
to me on board the ship
which I came out of England in ;
and the Dutchman that is with me has seven months' pay due to
him. If you will make good our pay to us we will go along with
you; if you find nothing more in it we will desire no more; but if
we do convince you that we have saved your lives, and the ship,
and the lives of all the men in her, we will leave the rest to you.”
"6
<<
I consented to this readily, and went immediately on board, and
the two men with me. As soon as I came to the ship's side,
my partner, who was on board, came out on the quarter-deck,
and called to me, with a great deal of joy, "We have stopped the
leak we have stopped the leak !"-" Say you so," said I; "thank
God; but weigh anchor, then, immediately.' Weigh!" says he ;
"what do you mean by that? What is the matter?"-"Ask no
questions, said I; “but set all hands to work, and weigh without
losing a minute.” He was surprised; however, he called the
captain, and he immediately ordered the anchor to be got up; and
though the tide was not quite down, yet a little land-breeze blowing,
we stood out to sea Then I called him into the cabin, and told
him the story; and we called in the men, and they told us the rest
of it; but as it took up a great deal of time, before we had done a
seaman comes to the cabin door, and called out to us that the
captain bade him tell us we were chased by five sloops, or boats,
full of men.—“Very well," said I, “then
"then it is apparent there is
something in it." I then ordered alt our men to be called up, and
told them there was a design to seize the ship, and take us for
pirates, and asked them if they would stand by us, and by one
another; the men answered cheerfully, one and all, that they would
live and die with us Then I asked the captain what way he
thought best for us to manage a fight with them: for resist them I
was resolved we would, and that to the last drop He said readily,
that the way was to keep them off with our great shot as long as
we could, and then to use our small arma, to keep them from
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life and adventuRES OF
boarding us: but when neither of these would do any longer, we
would retire to our close quarters, for perhaps they had not
materials to break open our bulkheads, or get in upon us.
The gunner had, in the meantime, orders to bring two guns, to
bear fore and aft, out of the steerage, to clear the deck, and load
them with musket-bullets and small pieces of old iron, and what
came next to hand. Thus we made ready for fight; but all this
while we kept out to sea, with wind enough, and could see the
boats at a distance, being five large long-boats, following us with
all the sail they could make.
{
Two of those boats (which by our glasses we could see were
English) outsailed the rest, were near two leagues ahead of them,
and gained upon us considerably, so that we found they would
come up with us: upon which we fired a gun without ball, to
intimate that they should bring to: and we put out a flag of truce,
as a signal for parley: but they came crowding after us till within
shot, when we took in our white flag, they having made no answer
to it, and hung out a red flag, and fired at them with a shot. Not-
withstanding this, they came on till they were near enough to call
to them with a speaking-trumpet, bidding them keep off at their
peril.
It was all one; they crowded after us, and endeavoured to come
under our stern, so as to board us on our quarter: upon which,
seeing they were resolute for mischief, and depended upon the
strength that followed them, I ordered to bring the ship to, so that
they lay upon our broadside; when immediately we fired five guns
at them, one of which had been levelled so true as to carry away
the stern of the hindermost boat, and we then forced them to take
down their sail, and to run all to the head of the boat, to keep her
from sinking; so she lay by, and had enough of it; but seeing the
foremost boat crowd on after us, we made ready to fire at her in
particular While this was doing one of the three boats that
followed made up to the boat which we had disabled, to relieve
ber, and we could see her take out the men. We then called again
to the foremost boat, and offered a truce, to parley again, and to
know what her business was with us; but had no answer, only she
crowded close under our stern. Upon this, our gunner, who was
a very dexterous fellow, ran out his two case-guns, and fired again
at her, but the shot missing, the men in the boat shouted, waved
their caps, and came en. The gunner, getting quickly ready again,
fired among them a second time, one shot of which, though it
missed the boat itself, yet fell in among the men, and we could
easily see did a great deal of mischief among them We now wore
the ship again, and brought our quarter to bear upon them, and
firing three guns more, we found the boat was almost split to
pieces; in particular, her rudder and a piece of her stern were shot
quite away; so they handed her sail immediately, and were in
great disorder. To complete their misfortune, our gunner let fly
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
·349
two guns at them again; where he hit them we could not tell, but
we found the boat was sinking, and some of the men already in the
water: upon this, I immediately manned out our pinnace, with
orders to pick up some of the men if they could, and save them
from drowning, and immediately come on board ship with them,
because we saw the rest of the boats began to come up. Our men
in the pinnace followed their orders, and took up three men, one of
whom was just drowning, and it was a good while before we could
recover him. As soon as they were on board we crowded all the
sail we could make, and stood farther out to the sea; and we found
that when the other boats came up to the first, they gave over their
chase.
Being thus delivered from a danger which, though I knew not the
reason of it, yet seemed to be much greater than I apprehended, I
resolved that we should change our course, and not let any one
know whither we were going: so we stood out to sea eastward,
quite out of the course of all European ships, whether they were
bound to China or anywhere else, within the commerce of the
European nations. When we were at sea we began to consult with
the two seamen, and inquire what the meaning of all this should be;
and the Dutchman confirmed the gunner's story about the false
sale of the ship and of the murder of the captain, and also how that
he, this Dutchman, and four more, got into the woods, where they
wandered about a great while, till at length he made his escape,
and swam off to a Dutch ship, which was sailing near the shore in
its way from China.
He then told us that he went to Batavia, where two of the seamen
belonging to the ship arrived, having deserted the rest in their
travels, and gave an account that the fellow who had run away
with the ship sold her at Bengal to a set of pirates, who were gone
a-cruising in her, and that they had already taken an English ship
and two Dutch ships very richly laden. This latter part we found
to concern us directly, though we knew it to be false; yet, as my
partner said, very justly, if we had fallen into their hands, and they
had had such a prepossession against us beforehand, it had been in
vain for us to have defended ourselves, or to hope for any good
quarter at their hands; especially considering that our accusers
had been our judges, and that we could have expected nothing from
them but what rage would have dictated, and an ungoverned passion
have executed Therefore it was his opinion we should go directly
back to Bengar, from whence we came, without putting in at any
port whatever-because there we could give a good account of our-
selves, could prove where we were when the ship put in, of whom
we bought her, and the like; and what was more than all the rest,
if we were put upon the necessity of bringing it before the proper
judges, we should be sure to have some justice, and not to be hanged
first and judged afterwards.
I was some time of my partner's opinion ; but after a little more
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
serious thinking, I told him I thought it was a very great hazard for
us to attempt returning to Bengal, for that we were on the wrong
side of the Straits of Malacca, and that if the alarm was given, we
should be sure to be waylaid on every side-that if we should be
taken, as it were, running away, we should even condemn or selves,
and there would want no more evidence to destroy us. I also
asked the English sailor's opinion, who said he was of my mind, and
that we should certainly be taken. This danger a little startled my
partner and all the ship's company, and we immediately resolved to
go away to the coast of Tonquin, and so on to the coast of China-
and pursuing the first design as to trade, find some way or other to
dispose of the ship, and come back in some of the vessels of the
country, such as we could get. This was approved of as the best
method for our security; and accordingly we steered away N.N.E.,
keeping above fifty leagues off from the usual course to the eastward.
This, however, put us to some inconvenience: for, first, the winds,
when we came that distance from the shore, seemed to be more
steadily against us, blowing almost trade, as we call it, from the E.
and E.N.E., so that we were a long while upon our voyage, and we
were but ill provided with victuals for so long a run and what was
still worse, there was some danger that those English and Dutch
ships whose boats pursued us, whereof some were bound that way,
might have got in before us, and if not, some other ship bound to
China might have information of us from them, and pursue us with
the same vigour.
I must confess I was now very uneasy, and thought myself,
including the late escape from the long-boats, to have been in the
most dangerous condition that ever I was in through my past life;
for whatever ill circumstances I had been in, I was never pursued
for a thief before; nor had I ever done anything that merited the
name of dishonest or fraudulent, much less thievish. I had chiefly
been my own enemy, or, as I may rightly say, I had been nobody's
enemy but my own; but now I was wofully embarrassed: for
though I was perfectly innocent, I was in no condition to make
that innocence appear; and if I had been taken, it had been under
a supposed guilt of the worst kind. This made me very anxious to
make an escape, though which way to do it I knew not, or what
port or place we could go to. My partner endeavoured to
encourage me by describing the several ports of that coast, and
told me he would put in on the coast of Cochin China, or the bay
of Tonquin, intending afterwards to go to Macao, where a great
many European families resided-and particularly the missionary
priests, who usually went thither in order to their going forward
to China.
Hither then we resolved to go; and, accordingly, though after &
tedious course, and very much straitened for provisions, we came
within sight of the coast very early in the morning; and upon
reflection on the past circumstances of danger we were in, we
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
349
resolved to put into a small river, which, however, had depth
enough of water for us, and to see if we could, either overland or by
the ship's pinnace, come to know what ships were in any port there-
about This happy step was, indeed, our deliverance: for though
we did not immediately see any European ships in the bay of
Tonquin, yet the next morning there came into the bay two Dutch
ships; and a third without any colours spread out, but which we
believed to be a Dutchman, passed by at about two leagues'
distance, steering for the coast of China; and in the afternoon
went by two English ships steering the same course; and thus we
thought we saw ourselves beset with enemies both one way and
the other. The place we were in was wild and barbarous-the
people thieves by occupation; and though, it is true, we had not
much to seek of them, and, except getting a few provisions, cared
not how little we had to do with them, yet it was with much
difficulty that we kept ourselves from being insulted by them
several ways.
We were in a small river of this country, within
a few leagues of its utmost limits northward; and by our boat we
coasted north-east, to the point of land which opens the great bay
of Tonquin; and it was in this beating up along the shore that we
discovered we were surrounded with enemies. The people we
were among were the most barbarous of all the inhabitants of the
coast; and among other customs they have this one: that if any
vessel has the misfortune to be shipwrecked upon their coast, they
make the men all prisoners or slaves; and it was not long before
we found a spice of their kindness this way, one the occasion
following.
*
I have observed above that our ship sprung a leak at sea, and
that we could not find it out: and it happened that, as I have said,
it was stopped unexpectedly, on the eve of our being pursued by the
Dutch and English ships in the bay of Siam; yet, as we did not
find the ship so perfectly tight and sound as we desired, we resolved
while we were at this place to lay her on shore, and clean her
bottom, and, if possible, to find out where the leaks were.
Accordingly, having lightened the ship, and brought all our guns
and other movables to one side, we tried to bring her down, that
we might come at her bottom; but, on second thoughts, we did not
care to lay her on dry ground, neither could we find out a proper
place for it.
J

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EIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
CHAPTER XXXII.
Obliged to come to anchor on a savage coast to repair our ship-We
are attacked by the natives, whom our carpenter disperses by a
whimsical contrivance-Serious reflections upon our disagreeable
situation.

HE inhabitants came wondering down the shore to
look at us; and seeing the ship lie down on one side
in such a manner, and heeling in towards the shore,
and not seeing our men, who were at work on her
bottom with stages, and with their boats on the
off-side, they presently concluded that the ship was cast away, and
lay fast on the ground. On this supposition they came about us in
two or three hours' time with ten or twelve large boats, having
some of them eight, some ten men in a boat, intending, no doubt,
to have come on board and plundered the ship, and if they found
us there, to have carried us away for slaves
When they came up to the ship, and began to row round her,
they discovered us all hard at work on the outside of the ship's
bottom and side, washing, and graving, and stopping, as every
seafaring man knows how. They stood for a while gazing at us,
and we, who were a little surprised, could not imagine what their
design was; but being willing to be sure, we took this opportunity
to get some of us into the ship, and others to hand down arms and
ammunition to those that were at work, to defend themselves with
if there should be occasion. And it was no more than need: for in
less than a quarter of an hour's consultation, they agreed, it seems,
that the ship was really a wreck, and that we were all at work
endeavouring to save her, or to save our lives by the help of our
boats; and when we handed our arms into the boat, they con-
cluded, by that act, that we were endeavouring to save some of our
goods. Upon this, they took it for granted we all belonged to them,
and away they came directly upon our men, as if it had been in
line-of-battle.
Our men, seeing so many of them, began to be frightened, for we
lay but in an ill posture to fight, and cried out to us to know what
they should do. I immediately called to the men that worked upon
the stages to slip them down, and get up the side into the ship, and
bade those in the boat to row round and come on board. The few
who were on board worked with all the strength and hands we had
' bring the ship to rights; however, neither the men upon the
stages nor those in the boats could do as they were ordered before
the Cochin Chinese were upon them, when two of their boats
boarded our long-boat, and began to lay hold of the men as their
prisoners.
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
358
22
The first man they laid hoid of was an English seaman, a stout,
strong fellow, who having a musket in his hand, never offered to
fire it, but laid it down in the boat, like a fool, as I thought; but he
understood his business better than I could teach him, for he
grappled the Pagan, and dragged him by main force out of their
boat into ours, where, taking him by the ears, he beat his head so
against the boat's gunnel that the fellow died in his hands. In the
meantime, a Dutchman, who stood next, took up the musket, and
with the butt-end of it so laid about him, that he knocked down
five of them who attempted to enter the boat. But this was doing
little towards resisting thirty or forty men, who, fearless because
ignorant of their danger, began to throw themselves into the long-
boat, where we had but five men in all to defend it; but the following
accident, which deserved our laughter, gave our men a complete
victory.
Our carpenter being prepared to grave the outside of the ship, as
well as to pay the seams where he had caulked her to stop the
leaks, had got two kettles just let down into the boat, one filled
with boiling pitch, and the other with rosin, tallow, and oil, and
such stuff as the shipwrights use for that work; and the man that
attended the carpenter had a great iron ladle in his hand, with
which he supplied the men that were at work with the hot stuff.
Two of the enemy's men entered the boat just where this fellow
stood in the fore-sheets; he immediately saluted them with a ladle
full of the stuff, boiling hot, which so burned and scalded them,
being half-naked, that they roared out like bulls, and, enraged with
the fire, leaped both into the sea. The carpenter saw it, and cried
out, “Well done, Jack! give them some more of it :" and stepping
forward himself, takes one of the mops, and dipping it in the pitch-
pot, he and his man threw it among them so plentifully, that, in
short, of all the men in the three boats, there was not one that
escaped being scalded in a most frightful manner, and made such a
howling and crying that I never heard a worse noise.
I was never better pleased with a victory in my life; not only as
1. was a perfect surprise t、 me, and that our danger was imminent
before, but as we got this victory without any bloodshed, except of
that man the seaman killed with his naked hands, and which I was
very much concerned at. Although it may be a just thing, because
necessary (for there is no necessary wickedness in nature), yet I
thought it was a sad sort of life, when we must be always obliged
to be killing our fellow-creatures to preserve ourselves-and,
indeed, I think so still; and I would even now suffer a great deal
rather than I would take away the life even of the worst person
injuring me; and I believe all considering people, who know the
value of life, would be of my opinion, if they entered seriously into
the consideration of it.
All the while this was doing, my partner and I, who managed
the rest of the men on board, had with great dexterity brought the
P
352
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
ship almost to rights, and having got the guns into their places
again, the gunner called to me to bid our boat get out of the way,
br he would let fly among them. I called back again to him, and
bid him not offer to fire, for the carpenter would do the work
without him; but bid him heat another pitch-kettle, which our
cook, who was on board, took care of. However, the enemy was
so terrified with what they had met with in their first attack, that
they would not come on again; and some of them who were
farthest off, seeing the ship swim, as it were, upright, began, as we
suppose, to see their mistake, and gave over the enterprise, finding
it was not as they expected. Thus we got clear of this merry fight;
and having got some rice and some roots and bread, with about
sixteen hogs, on board two days before, we resolved to stay here
no longer, but go forward, whatever came of it; for we made no
doubt but we should be surrounded the next day with rogues
enough, perhaps more than our pitch-kettle would dispose of for
us. Ie therefore got all our things on board the same evening,
and the next morning were ready to sail : in the meantime, lying at
anchor at some distance from the shore, we were not so much
concerned, being now in a fighting posture, as well as in a sailing
posture, if any enemy had presented. The next day, having
finished our work within board, and finding our ship was perfectly
healed of all her leaks, we set sail. We would have gone into the
bay of Tonquin, for we wanted to inform ourselves of what was to
be known concerning the Dutch ships that had been there; but we
durst not stand in there, because we had seen several ships go
in, as we supposed, but a little before; so we kept on N.E.
towards the island of Formosa, as much afraid of being seen by a
Dutch or English merchant ship as a Dutch or English mer hant
ship in the Mediterranean is of an Algerine man-of-war.
When we were thus got to sea, we kept on N.E., as if we would
go to the Manillas or the Philippine Islands; and this we did that
we might not fall into the way of any of the European ships; and
then we steered north, till we came to the latitude of 22 degrees 30
seconds, by which means we made the island of Formosa directly,
where we came to an anchor, in order to get water and fresh pro-
visions, which the people there, who are very courteous in their
manners, supplied us with willingly, and dealt very fairly and
punctually with us in all their agreements and bargains. This is
what we did not find among other people, and may be owing to the
remains of Christianity which was once planted here by a Dutch
missionary of Protestants, and it is a testimony of what I have often
observed--viz., that the Christian religion always civilises the people,
and reforms their manners, where it is received, whether it works
taving effects upon them or no.
From thence we sailed still north, keeping the coast of China at
an equal distance, till we knew we were beyond all the ports of
China where our European ships usually come; being resolved, if
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
353
possible, not to fall into any of their hands, especially in this
country, where, as our circumstances were, we could not fail of being
entirely ruined. Being now come to the latitude of 30 degrees, we
resolved to put into the first trading port we should come at ; and
standing in for the shore, a boat came off two leagues to us with an
old Portuguese pilot on board, who, knowing us to be an European
ship, came to offer his service, which, indeed, we were glad of and
took him on board; upon which, without asking us whither we
would go, he dismissed the boat he came in, and sent it back. I
thought it was now so much in our choice to make the old man
carry us whither we would, that I began to talk to him about carry-
ing us to the Gulf of Nankin, which is the most northern part of
the coast of China. The old man said he knew the Gulf of Nankin
very well; but smiling, asked us what we would do there? I told
him we would sell our cargo and purchase China wares, calicoes,
raw silks, tea, wrought silks, etc.; and so we would return by the
same course we came. He told us our best port would have been
to put in at Macao, where we could not have failed of a market for
our opium to our satisfaction, and might for our money have
purchased all sorts of China goods as cheap as we could at
Nankin.
แ
"L
Not being able to put the old man out of his talk, of which he
was very opinionated or conceited, I told him we were gentlemen
as well as merchants, and that we had a mind to go and see the
great city of Pekin, and the famous court of the monarch of China.
Why, then," says the old man, you should go to Ningpo, where,
by the river which runs into the sea there, you may go up within
five leagues of the great canal. This canal is a navigable stream,
which goes through the heart of that vast empire of China, crosses
all the rivers, passes some considerable hills by the help of sluices
and gates, and goes up to the city of Pekin, being in length near two
hundred and seventy leagues."- Well," said I, "Seignior Portu-
guese, but that is not our business now; the great question is, if you
can carry us up to the city of Nankin, from whence we can travel to
Pekin afterwards?" He said he could do so very well, and that
there was a great Dutch ship gone up that way just before. This
gave me a little shock, for a Dutch ship was now our terror, and we
had much rather have met the devil, at least if he had not come in
too frightful a figure; and we depended upon it that a Dutch ship
would be our destruction, for we were in no condition to fight them,
all the ships they trade with into those parts being of great burden,
and of much greater force than we were
46
A
(C
The old man found me a little confused, and under some concern
when he named a Dutch ship, and said to me, Sir, you need be
under no apprehensions of the Dutch; I suppose they are not now
at war with your nation?"-"No," said I, "that's true; but I
know not what liberties men may take when they are out of the
reach of the laws of their own country."-"Why," says he, "you
354
life and adventures of
are no pirates; what need you fear? They will not meddle with
peaceable merchants, sure." These words put me into the greatest
disorder and confusion imaginable; nor was it possible for me to
conceal it so, but the old man easily perceived it.
"Sir," says he, "I find you are in some disorder in your
thoughts at my talk: pray be pleased to go which way you think
fit, and depend upon it, I'll do you all the service I can." Upon
this we fell intc further discourse, in which, to my alarm and
amazement, he spoke of the villainous doings of a certain pirate
ship that had long been the talk of mariners in those seas; no
other, in a word, than the very ship he was now on board of, and
which we had so unluckily purchased. I presently saw there was
no help for it but to tell him the plain truth, and explain all the
danger and trouble we had suffered through this misadventure, and,
in particular, our earnest wish to be speedily quit of the ship
altogether: for which reason we had resolved to carry her up to
Nankin.
CC
The old man was amazed at this relation, and told us we were in
the right to go away to the north; and that, if he might advise us,
it should be to sell the ship in China, which we might well do, and
buy or build another in the country; adding, that I should meet
with customers enough for the ship at Nankin, that a Chinese
junk would serve me very well to go back again; and that he would
procure me people both to buy one and sell the other. "Well, but,
seignior," said I, as you say they know the ship so well, I may,
perhaps, if I follow your measures, be instrumental to bring some
honest, innocent men into a terrible broil; for wherever they find
the ship they will prove the guilt upon the men, by proving this was
the ship."
"_"Why," says the old man, "I'll find out a way to
prevent that; for as I know all those commanders you speak of
very well, and shall see them all as they pass by, I will be sure to
set them to rights in the thing, and let them know that they had
been so much in the wrong; that though the people who were on
board at first might run away with the ship, yet it was not true that
they had turned pirates; and that, in particular, these were not the
men that first went off with the ship, but innocently bought her for
their trade; and I am persuaded they will so far believe me as at
least to act more cautiously for the time to come."
In about thirteen days' sail we came to an anchor, at the south-
west point of the great Gulf of Nankin; where I learned by
accident that two Dutch ships were gone the length before me,
and that I should certainly fall into their hands. I consulted my
partner again in this exigency, and he was as much at a loss as Í
I then asked the old pilot if there was no creek or harbour
which I night put into, and pursue my business with the Chinese
privately, and be in no danger of the enemy. He told me if I
would sail to the southward about forty-two leagues, there was a
little port called Quinchang, where the fathers of the mission
was,
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
355
•
usually landed from Macao, on their progress to teach the Christian
zeligion to the Chinese, and where no European ships ever put in ;
and if I thought to put in there, I might consider what further
course to take when I was on shore. He confessed, he said, it was
not a place for merchants, except that at some certain times they
had a kind of a fair there, when the merchants from Japan came
over thither to buy Chinese merchandises. The name of the port
I may perhaps spell wrong, having lost this, together with the
names of many other places set down in a little pocket-book, which
was spoiled by the water by an accident; but this I remember, that
the Chinese merchants we corresponded with called it by a different
name from that which our Portuguese pilot gave it, who pronounced
it Quinchang. As we were unanimous in our resolution to go to
this place, we weighed the next day, having only gone twice on
shore where we were, to get fresh water; on both which occasions
the people of the country were very civil, and brought abundance of
provisions to sell to us: but nothing without money.
We did not come to the other port (the wind being contrary) for
five days; but it was very much to our satisfaction, and I was
thankful when I set my foot on shore, resolving, and my partner
too, that if it was possible to dispose of ourselves and effects any
other way, thought not profitably, we would never more set foot on
board that unhappy vessel. Indeed, I must acknowledge, that of
all the circumstances of life that ever I had any experience of,
nothing makes mankind so completely miserable as that of being in
constant fear. Well does the Scripture say, "The fear of man
brings a snare;" it is a life of death, and the mind is so entirely
oppressed by it, that it is capable of no relief.
Nor did it fail of its usual operations upon the fancy, by
heightening every danger; representing the English and Dutch
captains to be men incapable of hearing reason, or of distinguishing
between honest men and rogues: or between a story calculated for
our own turn, made out of nothing, on purpose to deceive, and a
true, genuine account of our whole voyage, progress, and design;
for we might many ways have convinced any reasonable creatures
that we were not pirates; the goods we had on board, the course we
steered, our frankly showing ourselves, and entering into such and
such ports; and even our very manner, the force we had, the
number of men, the few arms, the little ammunition, short
provisions; all these would have served to convince any men that
we were no pirates. The opium and other goods we had on board
would make it appear the ship had been at Bengal The Dutch-
men, who, it was said, had the names of all the men that were in
the ship, might easily see that we were a mixture of English,
Portuguese, and Indians, and but two Dutchmen on board. These,
and many other particular circumstances, might have made it
evident to the understanding of any commander, whose hands we
might fall into, that we were no pirates.
356
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
1.1
But fear, that blind, useless passion, worked another way, and
threw us into the vapours; it bewildered our understandings, and
set the imagination at work to form a thousand terrible things that
perhaps might never happen. We first supposed, as indeed every.
body had related to us, that the seamen on board the English and
Dutch ships, but especially the Dutch, were so enraged at the name
of pirate, and especially at our beating off their boats and
escaping, that they would not give themselves leave to inquire
whether we were pirates or no, but would execute us off-hand,
without giving us any room for a defence. We reflected that there
really was so much apparent evidence before them, that they would
scarce inquire after any more; as, first, that the ship was certainly
the same, and that some of the seamen among them knew her, and
had been on board her; and, secondly, that when we had intelli-
gence at the river of Cambodia that they were coming down to
examine us, we fought their boats and fled. Therefore we made no
doubt but they were as fully satisfied of our being pirates as we
were satisfied of the contrary; and, as I often said, I know
not but I should have been apt to have taken those circumstances
for evidence, if the tables were turned, and my case was theirs ;
and have made no scruple of cutting all the crew to pieces, without
believing, or perhaps considering what they might have to offer in
their defence.

But let that be how it will, these were our apprehensions; and
both my partner and I scarce slept a night without dreaming of
halters and yard-arms: of fighting, and being taken; of killing, and
being killed and one night I was in such a fury in my dream,
fancying the Dutchmen had boarded us, and I was knocking one of
their seamen down, that I struck my double fist against the side of
the cabin I lay in with such a force as wounded my hand grievously,
broke my knuckles, and cut and bruised the flesh, so that it awaked
me out of my sleep. Another apprehension I had was, the cruel
usage we might meet with from them if we fell into their hands;
then the story of Amboyna came into my head, and how the Dutch
might perhaps torture us, as they did our countrymen there, and
make some of our men, by extremity of torture, confess to crimes
they never were guilty of, or own themselves and all of us to be
pirates, and so they would put us to death with a form ppear-
ance of justice; and that they might be tempted to do this for the
gain of our ship and cargo, worth altogether four or five thousand
pounds We did not consider that the captains of ships have no
authority to act thus; and if we had surrendered prisoners to them,
they could not answer the destroying us, or torturing us, but would
be accountable for it when they came to their country. However,
if they were to act thus with us, what advantage would it be to us
that they should be called to an account for it? or if we were first
to be murdered, what satisfaction would it be to us to have them
punished when they came home?
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
357
1
I cannot refrain taking notice here what reflections I now had
upon the vast variety of my particular circumstances; how hard I
thought it that I, who had spent forty years in a life of continual
difficulties, and was at last come, as it were, to the port or haven
which all men drive at―viz., to have rest and plenty, should be a
volunteer in new sorrows by my own unhappy choice, and that I,
who had escaped so many dangers in my youth, should now come
to be hanged in my old age, and in so remote a place, for a crime
which I was not in the least inclined to, much less guilty of. After
these thoughts, something of religion would come in; and I would
be considering that this seemed to me to be a disposition of imme-
diate Providence, and I ought to look upon it and submit to it as
such. For, although I was innocent as to men, I was far from
being innocent as to my Maker; and I ought to look in and
examine what other crimes in my life were most obvious to me, and
for which Providence might justly inflict this punishment as a
retribution; and thus I ought to submit to this, just as I would to a
shipwreck, if it had pleased God to have brought such a disaster
upon me.
In its turn natural courage would sometimes take its place, and
then I would be talking myself up to vigorous resolutions; that I
would not be taken to be barbarously used by a parcel of merciless
wretches in cold blood; that it were much better to have fallen into
the hands of the savages, though I were sure they would feast upon
me when they had taken me, than those who would perhaps glut
their rage upon me by inhuman tortures and barbarities; that in
the case of the savages, I always resolved to die fighting to the last
gasp, and why should I not do so now? Whenever these thoughts
prevailed, I was sure to put myself into a kind of fever with the
agitation of a supposed fight; my blood would boil, and my
eyes sparkle, as if I was engaged, and I always resolved to take no
quarter at their hands; but, even, at last, if I could resist no
longer, I would blow up the ship and all that was in her, and leave
them but little booty to boast of.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
We arrive in China in safety-Dispose of the ship-Description of the
inhabitants-Arrive at Pekin, and find an opportunity of returning to
Europe.

HE greater weight the anxieties and perplexities of these
things were to our thoughts while we were at sea, the
greater was our satisfaction when we saw ourselves
on shore; and my partner told me he dreamed that
he had a very heavy load upon his back, which he
was to carry up a hill, and found that he was not able to stand
358
Life and ADVENTURES OF
:
longer under it; but that the Portuguese pilot came and took it off
his back, and the hill disappeared, the ground before him appearing
all smooth and plain and truly it was so; they were all like men
who had a load taken off their backs. For my part, I had a weight
taken off from my heart that it was not able any longer to bear;
and as I said above, we resolved to go no more to sea in that ship.
When we came on shore, the old pilot, who was now our friend, got
us a lodging, together with a warehouse for our goods; it was a
little hut, with a larger house adjoining to it, built and also palisadoed
round with canes, to keep out pilferers, of which there were not a
few in that country: however, the magistrates allowed us a little
guard, and we had a soldier with a kind of half-pike, who stood
sentinel at our do; to whom we allowed a pint of rice, and a piece
of money, about the value of threepence, per day, so that our goods
were kept very safe.
The fair or mart usually kept at this place had been over some
time: however, we found that there were three or four junks in the
river, and two ships from Japan, with goods which they had bought
in China, and were not gone away, having some Japanese merchants
on shore.
The first thing our old Portuguese pilot did for us was to get us
acquainted with three missionary Romish priests who were in the
town, and who had been there some time converting the people to
Christianity; but we thought they made but poor work of it, and
made them but sorry Christians when they had done. One of
these was a Frenchman, whom they called Father Simon; another
was a Portuguese; and the third a Genoese. Father Simon was
courteous, and very agreeable company; but the other two were
more reserved, seemed rigid and austere, and applied seriously to
the work they came about-viz., to talk with and insinuate them-
selves among the inhabitants wherever they had opportunity. We
often ate and drank with those men; and though, I must confess,
the conversion, as they call it, of the Chinese to Christianity, is so
far from the true conversion required to bring heathen people to the
faith of Christ that it seems to amount to little more than letting
them know the name of Christ, and say some prayers to the Virgin
Mary and her Son, in a tongue which they understood not, and to
cross themselves, and the like; yet it must be confessed that the
religionists, whom we call missionaries, have a firm belief that these
people will be saved, and that they are the instruments of it; and
on this account they undergo not only the fatigue of the voyage,
and the hazard of living in such places, but oftentimes death
itself, and the most violent tortures, for the sake of this work.
Father Simon was appointed, it seems, by order of the chief ɔt
the mission, to go up to Pekin, and waited only for another priest,
who was ordered to come to him from Macao, to go along with
him. We scarce ever met together but he was inviting me to go
that journey; telling me how he would show me all the glorious
1
ROBINSON crusoe.
359
things of that mighty empire, and, among the rest, Pekin, the
greatest city in the world; “A city," said he, "that your London
"A
and our Paris put together cannot be equal to." But as I looked
on those things with different eyes from other men, so I shall give
my opinion of them in a few words, when I come in the course of
my travels to speak more particularly of them.
"C
"C
.
Dining with Father Simon one day, and oeing very merry
together, I showed some little inclination to go with him; and he
pressed me and my partner very hard to consent. "Why, father,"
says my partner, should you desire our company so much? you
know we are heretics, and you do not love us, nor cannot keep us
company with any pleasure.”—“Oh," says he, "you may perhaps
be good Catholics in time; my business here is to convert heathens,
and who knows but I may convert you too?”—“Very well, father,"
said I, "so you will preach to us all the way?"-"I will not be
troublesome to you," says he ; our religion does not divest us of
good manners; besides, we are here like countrymen ; and so we
are, compared to the place we are in; and if you are Huguenots,
and I a Catholic, we may all be Christians at last; at least, we are
all gentlemen, and we may converse so, without being uneasy to
one another." I liked this part of his discourse very well, and
it began to put me in mind of my priest that I had left in the
Brazils; but Father Simon did not come up to his character by a
great deal; for though this friar had no appearance of a criminal
levity in him, yet he had not that fund of Christian zeal, strict piety,
and sincere affection to religion that my other good ecclesiastic
had.
But to leave him a little, though he never left us, nor solicited us
to go with him; we had something else before us at first, for we
had all this while our ship and our merchandise to dispose of, and
we began to be very doubtful what we should do, for we were now
in a place of very little business. Once I was about to venture to
sail for the river of Kilam, and the city of Nankin; but Providence
seemed now more visibly, as I thought, than ever to concern itself
in our affairs; and I was encouraged, from this very time, to think
I should, one way or other, get out of this entangled circumstance,
and be brought home to my own country again, though I had not
the least view of the manner. Providence, I say, began here to
clear up our way a little; and the first thing that offered was, that
our old Portuguese pilot brought a Japan merchant to us, who
inquired what goods we had : and, in the first place, he bought ail
our opium, and gave us a very good price for it, paying us in golů
by weight, some in small pieces of their own coin, and some in
small wedges, of about ten or twelve ounces each. While we were
dealing with him for our opium, it came into my head that he
might perhaps deal for the ship too, and I ordered the interpreter
to propose it to him.
to him. He shrunk up his shoulders at it when it was
first proposed to him; but in a few days after he came to me, with
360
life and adventures of
one of the missionary priests for his interpreter, and told ´.ne he had
a proposal to make to me, which was this: he had bought a great
quantity of our goods, when he had no thoughts of proposals made
to him of buying the ship; and that, therefore, he had not money
to pay for the ship: but if I would let the same men who were in
the ship navigate her, he would hire the ship to go to Japan; and
would send them from thence to the Philippine Islands with
another loading, which he would pay the freight of before they went
from Japan: and that at their return he would buy the ship. I
began to listen to his proposal, and so eager did my head still run
upon rambling, that I could not but begin to entertain a notion of
going myself with him, and so to set sail from the Philippine
Islands away to the South Seas; accordingly, I asked the Japanese
merchant if he would not hire us to the Philippine Islands and
discharge us there. He said No, he could not do that, for then he
could not have the return of his cargo; but he would discharge us
in Japan, at the ship's return. Well, still I was for taking him at
that proposal, and going myself; but my partner, wiser than
myself, persuaded me from it, representing the dangers, as well of
the seas as of the Japanese, who are a false, cruel, and treacherous
people; likewise those of the Spaniards at the Philippines, more
false, cruel, and treacherous than they.
But to bring this long turn of our affairs to a conclusion; the
first thing we had to do was, to consult with the captain of the ship,
and with his men, and know if they were willing to go to Japan.
While I was doing this, the young man whom my nephew had left
with me as my companion came up, and told me that he thought
that voyage promised very fair, and that there was a great prospect
of advantage, and he would be very glad if I undertook it; but that
if I would not, and would give him leave, he would go as a
merchant, or as I pleased to order him; that if ever he came to
England, and I was there and alive, he would render me a faithful
account of his success, which should be as much mine as I pleased.
I was loth to part with him; but considering the prospect of
advantage, which really was considerable, and that he was a young
fellow likely to do well in it, I inclined to let him go; but I told
him I would consult my partner, and give him an answer the next
day. I discoursed about it with my partner, who thereupon made
a most generous offer: "You know it has been an unlucky ship,"
said he,
"and we both resolve not to go to sea in it again; if your
steward (so he called my man) will venture the voyage, I will leave
my share of the vessel to him, and let him make the best of it; and
if we live to meet in England, and he meets with success abroad,
he shall account for one half of the profits of the ship's freight to
us; the other shall be his own."
If my partner, who was no way concerned with my young man,
made him such an offer, I could not do less than offer him the
same : and all the ship's company being willing to go with him, we
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
331
made over half the ship to him in property, and took a writing from
him, obliging him to account for the other, and away he went to
Japan, The Japan merchant proved a very punctual, honest man
to him. protected him at Japan, and got him a license to come on
shore, which the Europeans in general have not lately obtained.
He paid him his freight very punctually; sent him to the Philip-
pines, loaded with Japan and China wares, and a supercargo of
their own, who, trafficking with the Spaniards, brought back
European goods again, and a great quantity of spices; and there
he was not only paid his freight very well, and at a very good price,
but not being willing to sell the ship, then the merchant furnished
him goods on his own account; and with some money, and some
spices of his own which he brought with him, he went back to the
Manillas, where he sold his cargo very well. Here, having made a
good acquaintance at Manilla, he got his ship made a free ship, and
the governor of Manilla hired him to go to Acapulco, on the coast
of America, and gave him a license to land there, and to travel to
Mexico, and to pass in any Spanish ship to Europe with all his
men. He made the voyage to Acapulco very happily, and there
he sold his ship: and having there also obtained allowance to
travel by land to Porto Bello, he found means to get to Jamaica,
with all his treasure, and about eight years after came to England
exceeding rich.
But to return to our particular affairs, being how to part with
the ship and ship's company, it came before us, of course, to
consider what recompense we should give to the two men that
gave us such timely notice of the design against us in the river
Cambodia. The truth was, they had done us a very considerable
service, and deserved well at our hands; though, by the way, they
were a couple of rogues, too; for, as they believed the story of our
being pirates, and that we had really run away with the ship, they
came down to us, not only to betray the design that was formed
against us, but to go to sea with us as pirates. One of them
confessed afterwards that nothing else but the hopes of going
a-roguing brought him to do it: however, the service they did us
was not the less, and, therefore, as I had promised to be grateful to
them, I first ordered the money to be paid them which they said
was due to them on board their respective ships: over and above
that, I gave each of them a small sum of money in gold, which
contented them very well. I then made the Englishman gunner in
the ship, the gunner being now made second mate and purser; the
Dutchman I made boatswain; so they were both very well pleased,
and proved very serviceable, being both able seamen, and very
stout fellows.
We were now on shore in China; if I thought myself banished,
and remote from my own country at Bengal, where I had many
ways to get home for my money, what could I think of myself now,
when I was about a thousand leagues further off from home, and
125
of
363
OF
LIFE AND ADVENTURES destitute of all manner of prospect of return? All we had for it was
this: that in about four months' time there was to be another fair at
the place where we were, and then we might be able to purchase
various manufactures of the country, and withal might possibly find
some Chinese junks from Tonquin for sale, that would carry us and
our goods whither we pleased. This I liked very well, and resolved
to wait; besides, as our particular persons were not obnoxious, so
if any English or Dutch ships came thither, perhaps we might have
an opportunity to load our goods, and get passage to some other
place in India nearer home. Upon these hopes we resolved to
continue here; but, to divert ourselves, we took two or three
journeys into the country.
First we went ten days' journey to Nankin, a city well worth
seeing they say it has a million of people in it: it is regularly
built, and the streets are all straight, and cross one another in
direct lines. But when I come to compare the miserable people of
these countries with ours, their fabrics, their manner of living, their
government, their religion, their wealth, and their glory, as some
call it, I must confess that I scarcely think it worth my while to
mention them here. We wonder at the grandeur, the riches, the
pomp, the ceremonies, the government, the manufactures, the
commerce, and conduct of these people; not that there is really
any matter for wonder, but because, having a true notion of the
barbarity of those countries, the rudeness and the ignorance that
prevail there, we do not expect to find any such thing so far off.
Otherwise, what are their buildings to the palaces and royal
buildings of Europe? What their trade to the universal commerce
of England, Holland, France, and Spain? What are their cities to
ours, for wealth, strength, gaiety of apparel, rich furniture, and
infinite variety? What are their ports, supplied with a few junks
and barks, to our navigation, our merchant fleets, our large and
powerful navies? Our city of London has more trade than half
their mighty empire: one English, Dutch, or French man-of-war of
eighty guns would be able to fight almost all the shipping
belonging to China: but the greatness of their wealth, their trade,
the power of their government, and the strength of their armies,
may be a little surprising to us, because, as I have said, considering
them as a barbarous nation of pagans, little better than savages,
we did not expect such things among them. But all the forces of
their empire, though they were to bring two millions of men into the
field together, would be able to do nothing but ruin the country
and starve themselves; a million of their foot could not stand
before on mbattled body of our infantry, posted so as not to be
surrounded, though they were not to be one to twenty in number ;
nay, I do not boast if I say that thirty thousand German or English
foot, and ten thousand horse, well managed, could defeat all the
forces of China. Nor is there a fortified town in China that could
hold out one month against the batteries and attacks of an
-
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
363
European army. They have fire-arms, it is true, but they are
awkward and uncertain in their going off; and their powder has
but little strength. Their armies are badly disciplined, and want
skill to attack, or temper to retreat; and therefore, I must confess,
it seemed strange to me, when I came home, and heard our people
say such fine things of the power, glory, magnificence, and trade of
the Chinese; because, as far as I saw, they appeared to be a
contemptible herd or crowd of ignorant, sordid slaves, subjected to
a government qualified only to rule such a people; and were not
its distance inconceivably great from Muscovy, and that empire in
a manner as rude, impotent, and ill governed as they, the Czar of
Muscovy might with ease drive them all out of their country, and
conquer them in one campaign; and had the Czar (who is now a
growing prince) fallen this way, instead of attacking the warlike
Swedes, and equally improved himself in the art of war, as they say
he has done; and if none of the powers of Europe had envied or
interrupted him, he might by this time have been Emperor of
China, instead of being beaten by the King of Sweden at Narva,
when the latter was not one to six in number.
As their strength and their grandeur, so their navigation, com-
merce, and husbandry are very imperfect, compared to the same
things in Europe; also, in their knowledge, their learning, and in
their skill in the sciences, they are either very awkward or defective,
though they have globes or spheres, and a smattering of the mathe-
matics, and think they know more than all the world besides. But
they know little of the motions of the heavenly bodies; and so grossly
and absurdly ignorant are their common people, that when the sun
is eclipsed, they think a great dragon has assaulted it, and is going
to run away with it; and they fall a clattering with all the drums
and kettles in the country, to fright the monster away, just as we
do to hive a swarm of bees !
As this is the only excursion of the kind which I have made in
all the accounts I have given of my travels, so I shall make no
more such. It is none of my business, nor any part of my design;
but to give an account of my own adventures through a life of
inimitable wanderings, and a long variety of changes, which,
perhaps, few that come after me will have heard the like of: I shall,
therefore, say very little of all the mighty places, desert countries,
and numerous people I have yet to pass through, more than
relates to my own story, and which my concern among them make
necessary.
>
I was now, as near as I can compute, in the heart of China, about
thirty degrees north of the line, for we were returned from Nankin.
I had indeed a mind to see the city of Pekin, which I had heard so
much of, and Father Simon importuned me daily to do it. At
length his time of going away being set, and the other missionary
who was to go with him being arrived from Macao, it was necessary
that we should resolve either to go or not; so I referred it to my
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
partner, and left it wholly to his choice, who at length resolved It in
the affirmative, and we prepared for our journey, We set out with
very good advantage as to finding the way; for we got leave
to travel in the retinue of one of their mandarins, a kind of viceroy
or principal magistrate in the province where they reside, and who
take great state upon them, travelling with great attendance, and
great homage from the people, who are sometimes greatly im-
poverished by them, being obliged to furnish provisions for them
and all their attendants in their journeys. I particularly observed
in our travelling with his baggage, that though we received
sufficien provisions both for ourselves and our horses from the
country, as belonging to the mandarin, yet we were obliged to pay
for everything we had, after the market price of the country, and
the mandarin's steward collected it duly from us. Thus our
travelling in the retinue of the mandarin, though it was a great
act of kindness, was not such a mighty favour to us, but was a great
advantage to him, considering there were above thirty other people
travelled in the same manner besides us, under the protection
of his retinue; for the country furnished all the provisions for
nothing to him, and yet he took our money for them.
We were twenty-five days travelling to Pekin, through a country
exceeding populous, but I think badly cultivated; the husbandry,
the economy, and the way of living miserable, though they boast so
much of the industry of the people: I say miserable, if compared
with our own, but not so to these poor wretches, who know no
other. The pride of the poor people is infinitely great, and
exceeded by nothing but their poverty, in some parts, which adds
to that which I call their misery; and I must needs think the
savages of America live much more happy than the poorer sort of
these, because as they have nothing, so they desire nothing;
whereas these are proud and insolent, and in the main are in many
parts mere beggars and drudges. Their ostentation is inex-
pressible; and, if they can, they love to keep multitudes of servants
or slaves, which is to the last degree ridiculous, as well as their
contempt of all the world but themselves.
I must confess I travelled more pleasantly afterwards in the
deserts and vast wildernesses of Grand Tartary than here, and yet
the roads here are well paved and well kept, and very convenient
for travellers but nothing was more awkward to me than to
see such a haughty, imperious, insolent people, in .he midst of the
grossest simplicity and ignorance; and my friend Father Simon and
I used to be very merry upon these occasions, to see their beggarly
pride. For example, coming by the house of a country gentleman,
as Father Simon called him, about ten leagues off the city of
Nankin, we had first of all the honour to ride with the master
of the house about two miles; the state he rode in was a perfect
Don Quixotism, being a mixture of pomp and poverty. His habit
was very proper for a merry-Andrew, being a dirty calico, with
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
365
hanging sleeves, tassels, and cuts and slashes almost on every side:
it covered a taffety vest, so greasy as to testify that his honour must
be a most exquisite sloven. His horse was a poor, starved, hobbling
creature, and two slaves followed him on foot to drive the poor
creature along; he had a whip in his hand, and he belaboured the
beast as fast about the head as his slaves did about the tail; and
thus he rode by us, with about ten or twelve servants, going from
the city to his country seat, about half a league before us. We
travelied on gently, but this figure of a gentleman rode away before
us; and as we stopped at a village about an hour to refresh us,
when we came by the country seat of this great man, we saw him in
a little place before his door, eating a repast It was a kind of
garden, but he was easy to be seen; and we were given to under-
stand that the more we looked at him the better he would be
pleased. He sat under a tree, something like the palmetto, which
effectually shaded him over the head, and on the south side; but
under the tree was placed a large umbrella, which made that part
look well enough. He sat lolling back in a great elbow-chair, being
a heavy corpulent man, and had his meat brought him by two
women slaves He had two more, one of whom fed the squire with
a spoon, and the other held the dish with one hand, and scraped off
what he let fall upon his worship's beard and taffety vest.
Leaving the poor wretch to please himself with our looking
at him, as if we admired his idle pomp, we pursued our journey.
Father Simon had the curiosity to stay to inform himself what
dainties the country justice had to feed on in all his state, which he
had the honour to taste of, and which was, I think, a mess of
boiled rice, with a great piece of garlic in it, and a little bag filled
with green pepper, and another plant which they have there, some-
thing like our ginger, but smelling like musk, and tasting like
mustard; all this was put together, and a small piece of lean
mutton boiled in it, and this was his worship's repast. Four or five
servants more attended at a distance, who we supposed were to eat
of the same after their master. As for our mandarin with whom we
travelled, he was respected as a king, surrounded always with his
gentlemen, and attended in all his appearances with such pomp,
that I saw little of him but at a distance. I observed that there
was not a horse in his retinue but that our carriers' packhorses in
England seemed to me to look much better; though it was hard to
judge rightly, for they were so covered with equipage, mantles,
trappings, etc., that we could scarce see anything but their feet and
their heads as they went along.
I was now light-hearted, and all my late trouble and perplexity
being over, I had no anxious thoughts about me, which made this
journey the pleasanter to me; in which no ill accident attended
me, only in passing or fording a small river, my horse fell and made
me free of the country, as they call it-that is to say, threw me in.
The place was not deep, but it wetted me all over I mention it
366
life and adventures of
because it spoiled my pocket-book, wherein I had set down the
names of several people and places which I had occasion to
remember, and which not taking due care of, the leaves rotted, and
the words were never after to be read.
At length we arrived at Pekin. I had nobody with me out the
youth whom my nephew had given me to attend me as a servant,
and who proved very trusty and diligent; and my partner had
nobody with him but one servant, who was a kinsman. As for the
Portuguese pilot, he being desirous to see the court, we bore his
charges for his company, and for our use of him as an interpreter,
for he understood the language of the country, and spoke good
French and a little English. Indeed, this old man was most useful
to us everywhere; for we had not been above a week at Pekin,
when he came laughing. "Ah, Seignior Inglese," says he, "I
have something to tell will make your heart glad."-"My heart
glad," says I ; "what can that be? I don't know anything in this
country can either give me joy or grief to any great degree."-"Yes,
yes," said the old man, in broken English, "make you glad, me
Sorry." Why," said I, "will it make you sorry?"" Because,'
said he, "you have brought me here twenty-five days' journey, and
will leave me to go back alone; and which way shall I get to my
port afterwards, without a ship, without a horse, without pecune?"
-so he called money, being his broken Latin, of which he had
abundance to make us merry with. In short, he told us there was
a great caravan of Muscovite and Polish merchants in the city,
preparing to set out on their journey by land to Muscovy, within
four or five weeks; and he was sure we would take the opportunity
to go with them, and leave him behind, to go back alone.
}} (C
I confess I was greatly surprised with this good news, and had
scarce power to speak to him for some time, but at last I said to
him, "How do you know this? are you sure it is true? ”—“ Yes,”
says
he;
"I met this morning in the street an old acquaintance of
mine, an Armenian, who is among them. He came last from
Astracan, and was designed to go to Tonquin, where I formerly
knew him, but has altered his mind, and is now resolved to go with
the caravan to Moscow, and so down the river Wolga to Astracan."
"Well, Seignior," says I, "do not be uneasy about being left to
go back alone; if this be a method for my return to England, it
shall be your fault if you go back to Macao at all." We then went
to consult together what was to be done; and I asked my partner
what he thought of the pilot's news, and whether it would suit with
his affairs He told me he would do just as I would; for he had
settled all his affairs so well at Bengal, and left his effects in such
good hands, that as we had made a good voyage, if he could invest
it in China silks, wrought and raw, he would be content to go to
England, and then make a voyage back to Bengal by the
Company's ships.
Having resolved upon this, we agreed that if our Portuguése pilot
ROBINSONn crusoe.
307
would go with us, we would bear his charges to Moscow, or to
England, if he pleased; nor, indeed, were we to be esteemed over
generous in that either, if we had not rewarded him further, the
service he had done us being really worth more than that; for he
had not only been a pilot to us at sea, but he had been like a broker
for us on shore; and his procuring for us a Japan merchant was
some hundreds of pounds in our pockets. So, being willing to
gratify him, which was but doing him justice, and very willing also
to have him with us besides, for he was a most necessary man on
all occasions, we agreed to give him a quantity of coined gold,
which, as I computed it, was worth one hundred and seventy-five
pounds sterling, between us, and to bear all his charges, both for
himself and horse, except only a horse to carry his goods. Having
settled this between ourselves, we called him to let him know what
we had resolved. I told him he had complained of our being
willing to let him go back alone, and I was now about to tell him
we designed he should not go back at all. That as we had resolved
to go to Europe with the caravan, we were very willing he should
go with us; and that we called him to know his mind. He shook
his head and said it was a long journey, and that he had no pecure
to carry him thither, or to subsist himself when he came there.
We told him we believed it was so, and therefore we had resolved
to do something for him that should let him see how sensible we
were of the service he had done us, and also how agreeable he was
to us and then I told him what we had resolved to give him here,
which he might lay out as we would do our own; and that as for
his charges, if he would go with us we would set him safe on shore
(life and casualties excepted), either in Muscovy or England, as he
would choose, at our own charge, except only the carriage of his
goods. He received the proposal like a man transported, and told
us he would go with us over all the whole world; and so we all
prepared for our journey. However, as it was with us, so it was
with the other merchants: they had many things to do, and instead
of being ready in five weeks, it was four months and some days
before all things were got together.

368
life and adventures of
CHAPTER XXXIV.
Set out by the caravan-Account of the valuable effects we took with us-
Further description of the interior of China-Pass the great wall-
Attacked by Tartars, who are dispersed by the resolution of a Scots
merchant-The old pilot saves my life-We are again attacked, and
defeat the Tartars.
RST
T was the beginning of February, new style, when we
set out from Pekin. My partner and the old pilot
had gone express back to the port where we had first
put in, to dispose of some goods which we had left
there; and I, with a Chinese merchant whom I had
some knowledge of at Nankin, and who came to Pekin on his own
affairs, went to Nankin, where I bought ninety pieces of fine
damasks, with about two hundred pieces of other very fine silk of
several sorts, some mixed with gold, and had all these brought to
Pekin against my partner's return. Besides this, we bought a large
quantity of raw silk, and some other goods, our cargo amounting,
in these goods only, to about three thousand five hundred pounds
sterling; which, together with tea and some fine calicoes, and three
camels' loads of nutmegs and cloves, loaded in all eighteen camels
for our share, besides those we rode upon; these, with two or three
spare horses, and two horses loaded with provisions, made together
twenty-six camels and horses in our retinue.

The company was very great, and, as near as I can remember,
made between three and four hundred horses, and upwards of one
hundred and twenty men, very well armed and provided for all
events; for as the eastern caravans are subject to be attacked by
the Arabs, so are these by the fartars. The company consisted of
people of several nations; but there were above sixty of them
merchants or inhabitants of Moscow, though of them some were
Livonians; and to our particular satisfaction, five of them were
Scots, who appeared also to be men of great experience in business,
and of very good substance.
When we had travelled one day's journey, the guides, who were
five in number, called all the passengers, except the servants, to a
great council, as they called it. At this council every one deposited
a certain quantity of money to a common stock, for the necessary
expense of buying forage on the way, where it was not otherwise to
be had, and for satisfying the guides, getting horses, and the like.
Here, too, they constituted the journey, as they call it-viz., they
named captains and officers to draw us all up, and give the word of
command, in case of an attack, and give every one their turn of
command; nor was this forming us into order any more than what
we afterwards found needful on the way.
ROBINSON crusoe.
368
The road all on this side of the country is very populous, and is
full of potters and earth-makers-that is to say, people that temper
the earth for the China ware. As I was coming along, our
Portuguese pilot, who had always something or other to say to
make us merry, told me he would show me the greatest rarity in all
the country, and that I should have this to say of China, after all
the ill-humoured things that I had said of it, tha: had seen one
thing which was not to be seen in all the world besid
I was very
importunate to know what it was; at last he told me it was
a gentleman's house built with China ware. "Well," says I, "are
not the materials of their buildings the products of their own
country, and so it is all China ware, is it not ?"-" No, no," says
he, "I mean it is a house all made of China ware, such as you call
it in England, or as it is called in our country, porcelain." Well,"
says I, "such a thing may be ; how big is it? Can we carry it in
a box upon a camel? If we can we will buy it."-" Upon a
camel!" says the old pilot, holding up both his hands; "why, there
is a family of thirty people lives in it."
66
I was then curious, indeed, to see it; and when I came to it, it
was nothing but this: it was a timber house, or a house built, as
we call it in England, with lath and plaster, but all this plastering
was really China ware-that is to say, it was plastered with the
earth that makes China ware. The outside, which the sun shone
hot upon, was glazed, and looked very well, perfectly white, and
painted with blue figures, as the large China ware in England is
painted, and hard as if it had been burned. As to the inside, all
the walls, instead of wainscot, were lined with hardened and
painted tiles, like the little square tiles we call galley-tiles in
England, all made of the finest China, and the figures exceeding
fine indeed, with extraordinary variety of colours, mixed with gold,
many tiles making but one figure, but joined so artificially, the
mortar being made of the same earth, that it was very hard to see
where the tiles met. The floors of the rooms were of the same
composition, and as hard as the earthen floors we have in use in
several parts of England; as hard as stone, and smooth, but not
burned and painted, except some smaller rooms, like closets, which
were all, as it were, paved with the same tile; the ceiling and all
the plastering work in the whole house were of the same earth;
and, after all, the roof was covered with tiles of the same, but of a
deep shining black. This was a China warehouse indeed, truly
and literally to be called so, and had I not been upon the journey,
I could have stayed some days to see and examine the particulars
of it. They told me there were fountains and fishponds in the
garden, all paved on the bottom and sides with the same; and fine
statues set up in rows on the walks, entirely formed of the porcelain
earth, burned whole.
As this is one of the singularities of China, so they may be
allowed to excel in it; but I am very sure they excel in the
370
life and adVENTURES OF
accounts of it: for they told me such incredible things of their
performance in crockery-ware, for such it is, that I care not to
relate, as knowing it could not be true. They told me, in par-
ticular, of one workman that made a ship with all its tackle and
masts and sails in earthenware, big enough to carry fifty men.
If
they had told me he launched it, and made a voyage to Japan in it,
I might have said something to it indeed; but as it was, I knew
the whole of the story, which was, in short, that the fellow lied; so
I smiled, and said nothing to it. This odd sight kept me two hours
behind the caravan, for which the leader of it for the day fined me
about the value of three shillings; and told me if it had been three
days' journey without the wall, as it was three days' within, he must
have fined me four times as much, and made me ask pardon the
next council-day. I promised to be more orderly; and, indeed, I
found afterwards the orders made for keeping all together were
absolutely necessary for our common safety.
In two days more we passed the great China wall, made for
a fortification against the Tartars and a very great work it is,
going over hills and mountains in an endless track, where the rocks
are impassable, and the precipices such as no enemy could possibly
enter, or indeed climb up, or where, if they did, no wall could
hinder them. They tell us its length is near a thousand English
miles, but that the country is five hundred in a straight measured
line, which the wall bounds, without measuring the windings and
turnings it takes: it is about four fathoms high, and as many thick
in some places.
:
"6
I stood still an hour or thereabouts without trespassing on our
orders (for so long the caravan was in passing the gate), to look at
it on every side, near and far off; I mean what was within my
view and the guide, who had been extolling it for the wonder of
the world, was mighty eager to hear my opinion of it. I told him it
was a most excellent thing to keep out the Tartars; which he
happened not to understand as I meant it, and so took it for a
compliment; but the old pilot laughed: "Oh, Seignior Inglese,"
says he, you speak in colours."-" In colours !" said "what do
↳
you mean by that?”—“Why, you speak what looks white this way
and black that way-gay one way and dull another. You tell him
it is a good wall to keep out Tartars; you tell me by that it is good
for nothing but to keep out Tartars. I understand you, Seignior
Inglese, I understand you; but Seignior Chinese understood you
his own way." "Well," says I, "do you think it would stand out
an army of our country people, with a good train of artillery; or our
engineers, with two companies of miners? Would not they batter
it down in ten days, that an army might enter in battalia; or blow
it up in the air, foundation and all, that there should be no sign
of it left?"—"Ay, ay," says he, "I know that." The Chinese
wanted mightily to know what I said to the pilot, and I gave him
leave to tell him a few days after, for we were then almost out of
I
ROBINSON CRUSOE
WI
7.
their country, and he was to leave us a little time after this; but
when he knew what I said, he was dumb all the rest of the way,
and we heard no more of his fine story of the Chinese power
and greatness while he stayed.
After we passed this mighty nothing, called a wall, something
like the Picts' wall, so famous in Northumberland, built by the
Romans, we began to find the country thinly inhabited, and the
people rather confined to live in fortified towns, as being subject to
the inroads and depredations of the Tartars, who rob in great
armies, and therefore are not to be resisted by the naked inhabi-
tants of an open country. And here I began to find the necessity
of keeping together in a caravan as we travelled, for we saw several
troops of Tartars roving about; but when I came to see them
distinctly, I wondered more that the Chinese empire could be
conquered by such contemptible fellows; for they are a mere horde
of wild fellows, keeping no order, and understanding no discipline
or manner of fight. Their horses are poor lean creatures, taught
nothing, and fit for nothing; and this we found the first day we
saw them, which was after we entered the wilder part of the
country. Our leader for the day gave leave for about sixteen of us
to go a hunting as they call it; and what was this but a hunting of
sheep!-however, it may be called hunting too, for these creatures
are the wildest and swiftest of foot that ever I saw of their kind :
only they will not run a great way, and you are sure of sport when
you begin the chase, for they appear generally thirty or forty in a
flock, and, like true sheep, always keep together when they fly.
In pursuit of this odd sort of game it was our hap to meet with
about forty Tartars: whether they were hunting mutton, as
were, or whether they looked for another kind of prey, we know
not; but as soon as they saw us, one of them blew a hideous blast
on a kind of horn. This was to call their friends about them, and
in less than ten minutes a troop of forty or fifty more appeared, at
about a mile distance; but our work was over first, as it happened.
One of the Scots merchants of Moscow happened to be amongst
us; and as soon as he heard the horn, he told us that we had
nothing to do but to charge them without loss of time; and draw-
ing us up in a line, he asked if we were resolved. We told him we
were ready to follow him; so he rode directly towards them. They
stood gazing at us like a mere crowd, drawn up in no sort of order
at all; but as soon as they saw us advance, they let fly their arrows,
which missed us, very happily. Not that they mistook their aim,
but their distance; for their arrows all fell a little short of us, but
with so true an aim, that had we been about twenty yards nearer
we must have had several men wounded, if not killed.
Immediately we halted, and though it was at a great distance, we
fired, and sent them leaden bullets for wooden arrows, following our
shot full gallop, to fall in among them sword in hand-for so our
bold Scot that led us directed. He was, indeed, but a merchant,
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LIFE AND adventures of
but he behaved with such vigour and bravery on this occasion, and
yet with such cool courage too, that I never saw any man in action
fitter for command As soon as we came up to them we fired our
pistols in their faces and then drew; but they fled in the greatest
confusion imaginable The only stand any of them made was on
our right, where three of them stood, and, by signs, called the rest
to come back to them, having a kind of scimitar in their hands, and
their bows hanging to their backs. Our brave commander, with-
out asking anybody to follow him, gallops up close to them, and
with his fusee knocks one of them off his horse, killed the second
with his pistol, and the third ran away. Thus ended our fight;
but we had this misfortune attending it, that all our mutton we had
in chase got away. We had not a man killed or hurt; as for the
Tartars, there were about five of them killed-how many were
wounded we knew not; but this we knew, that the other party were
so frightened with the noise of our guns that they fled, and never
made any attempt upon us.
:
We were all this while in the Chinese dominions, and therefore
the Tartars were not so bold as afterwards; but in about five days
we entered a vast wild desert, which held us three days' and nights'
march and we were obliged to carry our water with us in great
leathern bottles, and to encamp all night, just as I have heard they
do in the desert of Arabia. I asked our guides whose dominion this
was in, and they told me this was a kind of border that might be
called no man's land, being a part of Great Karakathy, or Grand
Tartary that, however, it was all reckoned as belonging to China,
but that there was no care taken here to preserve it from the
inroads of thieves, and therefore it was reckoned the worst desert
in the whole march, though we were to go over some much larger.
In passing this frightful wilderness we saw, two or three times,
little parties of the Tartars, but they seemed to be upon their own
affairs, and to have no design upon us; and so, like the man who
met the devil, if they had nothing to say to us, we had nothing to
say to them: we let them go. Once, however, a party of them
Whether it was to
came so near as to stand and gaze at us.
consider if they should attack us or not, we knew not; but when we
had passed at some distance by them, we made a rear-guard of
forty men, and stood ready for them, letting the caravan pass half-
a-mile or thereabouts before us. After a while they marched off,
but they saluted us with five arrows at their parting, which wounded
a horse so that it disabled him, and we left him the next day, poor
creature, in great need of a good farrier. We saw no more arrows
or Tartars that time.
We travelled near a month after this, the ways not being so good
as at first, though still in the dominions of the Emperor of China,
but lay for the most part in the villages, some of which were
fortified, because of the incursions of the Tartars. When we were
come to one of these towns (about two days and a-half's journey
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
373
cefore we came to the city of Naum), I wanted to buy a camel, of
which there are plenty to be sold all the way upon that road, and
horses also, such as they are, because, so many caravans coming
that way, they are often wanted. The person that I spoke to
to get me a camel would have gone and fetched one for me; but I,
like a fool, must be officious, and go myself along with aim: the
place was about two miles out of the village, where it seems they
kept the camels and horses feeding under a guard.
walked in on foot, with my old pilot and a Chinese, being very
desirous of a little variety. When we came to the place it was a
low, marshy ground, walled round with stones, piled up dry, without
mortar or earth among them, like a park, with a little guard of
Chinese soldiers at the door. Having bought a camel, and agreed
for the price, I came away, and the Chinese that went with me led
the camel, when on a sudden came up five Tartars on horseback.
Two of them seized the fellow and took the camel from him, while
the other three stepped up to me and my old pilot, seeing us, as it
were, unarmed, for I had no weapon about me but my sword, which
could but ill defend me against three horsemen. The first that
came up stopped short upon my drawing my sword, for they are
arrant cowards; but a second, coming upon my left, gave me a
blow on the head, which I never felt till afterwards, and wondered,
when I came to myself, what was the matter, and where I was, fer
he laid me flat on the ground; but my never-failing old pilot, the
Portuguese, had a pistol in his pocket, which I knew nothing of,
nor the Tartars either: if they had I suppose they would not have
attacked us, for cowards are always boldest when there is no
danger. The old man seeing me down, with a bold heart stepped
up to the fellow that had struck me, and laying hold of his arm with
one hand, and pulling him down by main force a little towards
him, with the other shot him in the head, and laid him dead upon
the spot.
He then immediately stepped up to him who had
stopped us, as I said, and before he could come forward again,
made a blow at him with a scimitar, which he always wore, but
missing the man, struck his horse in the side of his head, cut one of
the ears off by the root, and a great slice down by the side of his
face. The poor beast, enraged with the wound, was no more to be
governed by his rider, though the fellow sat well enough too, but
away he flew, and carried him quite out of the pilot's reach; and
at some distance, rising upon his hind legs, threw down the Tartar,
and fell upon him.
In this interval the poor Chinese came in who had lost the camel,
but he had no weapon: however, seeing the Tartar down, and his
horse fallen upon him, away he runs to him, and seizing upon an
ugly weapon he had by his side, something like a pole-axe, he
wrenched it from him, and made shift to knock his Tartarian brains
out with it. But my old man had the third Tartar to deal with
still; and seeing he did not fly, as he expected, nor come on to
374
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
fight him, as he apprehended, but stood stock still, the old maa
stood still too, and fell to work with his tackle to charge his pistol
again but as soon as the Tartar saw the pistol away he scoured,
and left my pilot, my champion I called him afterwards, a complete
victory.
By this time I was a little recovered. I thought, when I first
began to wake, that I had been in a sweet sleep; but, as I said
above, I wondered where I was, how I came upon the ground, and
what was the matter. A few moments after, as sense returned, I
felt pain, though I did not know where; so I clapped my hand to
my head, and took it away bloody; then I felt my head ache: and
in a moment memory returned, and everything was present to me
again. I jumped upon my feet instantly, and got hold of my
sword, but no enemies were in view: I found a Tartar lying dead,
and his horse standing very quietly by him; and, looking further,
I saw my deliverer, who had been to see what the Chinese had
done, coming back with his hanger in his hand. The old man,
seeing me on my feet, came running to me, and joyfully embraced
me, being afraid before that I had been killed. Seeing me bloody,
he would see how I was hurt; but it was not much, only what we
call a broken head; neither did I afterwards find any great incon-
venience from the blow, for it was well again in two or three
days.
We made no great gain, however, by this victory, for we lost
a camel and gained a horse. I paid for the lost camel, and sent
for another; but I did not go to fetch it myself: I had had enough
of that.
The city of Naum, which we were approaching, is a frontier of
the Chinese empire, and is fortified in their fashion. We wanted,
as I have said, above two days' journey of this city when
messengers were sent express to every part of the road to tell
all travellers and caravans to halt till they had a guard sent for
them; for that an unusual body of Tartars, making ten thousand
in all, had appeared in the way, about thirty miles beyond the city.
This was very bad news to travellers: however, it was carefully
done of the governor, and we were very glad to hear we should
have a guard Accordingly, two days after, we had two hundred
soldiers sent as from a garrison of the Chinese on our left, and
three hundred more from the city of Naum, and with these we
advanced boldly. The three hundred soldiers from Naum marched
in our front, the two hundred in our rear, and our men on each side
of our camels, with our baggage and the whole caravan in the
centre; in this order, and well prepared for battle, we thought
ourselves a match for the whole ten thousand Mogul Tartars, if
they had appeared; but the next day, when they did appear,
★ was quite another thing.
ROBINSON crusoe.
VI
ܐ
CHAPTER XXXV.
Farther account of our journey-Description of an idol; which we destroy
--Great danger we incur thereby-Account of our travels through
Muscovy.

ARLY in the morning, when marching from a little
town called Changu, we had a river to pass, which we
were obliged to ferry; and, had the Tartars had any
intelligence, then had been the time to have attacked
us, when the caravan being over, the rear-guard was
behind; but they did not appear there. About three hours after,
when we were entered upon a desert of about fifteen or sixteen
miles over, we knew, by a cloud of dust-they raised, that the enemy
was at hand, and presently they came on upon the spur.
Our Chinese guards in the front, who had talked so big the day
before, began to stagger; and the soldiers frequently looked behind
them, a certain sign in a soldier that he is just ready to run
away. My old pilot was of my mind; and being near me, called
out, "Seignior Inglese, these fellows must be encouraged, or they
will ruin us all; for if the Tartars come on they will never stand
it."-
"-" I am of your mind," said I ; "but what must be done?"—
"Done?" says he, "let fifty of our men advance, and flank them
on each wing, and encourage them. They will fight like brave
fellows in brave company; but without this they will every man
turn his back." Immediately I rode up to our leader and told him,
who was exactly of our mind; accordingly, fifty of us marched to
the right wing, and fifty to the left, and the rest made a line of
rescue; and so we marched, leaving the last two hundred men to
make a body of themselves, and to guard the camels; only that,
if need were, they should send a hundred men to assist the last
fifty.
Át last the Tartars came on, and an innumerable company they
were; how many we could not tell, but ten thousand, we thought,
at the least. A party of them came on first, and viewed our
posture, traversing the ground in the front of our line; and, as we
found them within gunshot, our leader ordered the two wings to
advance swiftly, and give them a salvo on each wing with their
shot, which was done. They then went off, I suppose to give an
account of the reception they were like to meet with; indeed, that
salute cloyed their stomachs, for they immediately halted, stood a
while to consider of it, and wheeling off to the left, they gave
over their design for that time, which was very agreeable to our
circumstances.
Two days after we came to the city of Naun, or Naum; wề
thanked the governor for his care of us, and collected to the value
376
life and adventures of
of a hundred crowns, or thereabouts, which we gave to the soldiers
sent to guard us; and here we rested one day. This is a garrison
indeed, and there were nine hundred soldiers kept here; but the
reason of it was, that formerly the Muscovite fronters lay nearer to
them than they now do, the Muscovites having abandoned that
part of the country, which lies from this city west for about two
hundred miles, as desolate and unfit for use; and more especially
being so very remote, and so difficult to send troops thither for its
defence: for we were yet above two thousand miles from Muscovy
properly so called. After this we passed several great rivers, and
two dreadful deserts; one of which we were sixteen days passing
over; and, on the 13th of April, we came to the frontiers of the
Moscovite dominions. I think the first town or fortress, whichever
it may be called, that belonged to the Czar, was called Arguna,
being on the west side of the river Arguna.
I could not but feel great satisfaction that I was arrived in a
country governed by Christians; for though the Muscovites do,
in my opinion, but just deserve the name of Christians, yet such
they pretend to be, and are very devout in their way. It would
certainly occur to any reflecting man who travels the world as I
have done, what a blessing it is to be brought into the world where
the name of God and a Redeemer is known, adored, and wor-
shipped; and not where the people, given up to strong delusions,
worship the devil, and prostrate themselves to monsters, elements,
horrid-shaped animals, and monstrous images. Not a town or city
we passed through but had their pagodas, their idols, and their
temples, and ignorant people worshipping even the works of their
own hands. Now we came where, at least, a face of the Christian
worship appeared; where the knee was bowed to Jesus: and
whether ignorantly or not, yet the Christian religion was owned, and
the name of the true God was called upon and adored; and it
made my soul rejoice to see it. I saluted the brave Scots merchant
with my first acknowledgment of this; and taking him by the
hand, I said to him, "Blessed be God, we are once again amongst
Christians. He smiled, and answered, "Do not rejoice too soon,
countryman; these Muscovites are but an odd sort of Christians;
and but for the name of it you may see very little of the substance
for some months further of our journey."-"Well," says I, “but
still it is better than paganism, and worshipping of devils."- 'Why,
I will tell you," says he; "except the Russian soldiers in the
garrisons, and a few of the inhabitants of the cities upon the road, all
the rest of this country, for above a thousand miles further, is
inhabited by the worst and most ignorant of pagans."
And so,
indeed, we found it.
"(

We now launched into the greatest piece of solid earth that is to
be found in any part of the world; we had, at least, twelve thousand
miles to the sea eastward; two thousand to the bottom of the
Baltic Sea westward; and above three thousand, if we left that
ROBINSON CRUSOE,
377
sea, and went on west, to the British and French channels: we had
full five thousand miles to the Indian or Persian Sea south; and
about eight hundred to the Frozen Sea north.
We advanced from the river Arguna by easy and moderate
journeys, and were very visibly obliged to the care the Czar has
taken to have cities and towns built in as many places as it is
possible to place them, where his soldiers keep garrison, something
like the stationary soldiers placed by the Romans in the remotest
countries of their empire; some of which I had read of were placed
in Britain, for the security of commerce, and for the lodging of
travellers. Thus it was here; for wherever we came, though at
these towns and stations the garrisons and governors were Russians,
and professed Christians, yet the inhabitants were mere pagans,
sacrificing to idols, and worshipping the sun, moon, and stars, or all
the host of heaven; and not only so, but were, of all the heathens
and pagans that ever I met with, the most barbarous, except only
that they did not eat men's flesh.
Some instances of this we met with in the country between
Arguna, where we enter the Muscovite dominions, and a city of
Tartars and Russians together, called Nortziousky, in which is a
continued desert or forest, which cost us twenty days to travel over.
In a village near the last of these places I had the curiosity to go
and see their way of living, which is most brutish and unsufferable.
They had, I suppose, a great sacrifice that day; for there stood out,
upon an old stump of a tree, a diabolical kind of idol made of
wood; it was dressed up, too, in the most filthy manner; its upper
garment was of sheep-skins, with the wool outward; a great
Tartar bonnet on the head, with two horns growing through it; it
was about eight feet high, yet had no feet or legs, nor any other
proportion of parts.
This scarecrow was set up at the outer side of the village; and
when I came near to it there were sixteen or seventeen creatures
all lying flat upon the ground round this hideous block of wood ;
I saw no motion among them, any more than if they had been al
logs, like the idol, and at first I really thought they had been so;
but, when I came a little nearer, they started up upon their feet, and
raised a howl, as if it had been so many deep-mouthed hounds,
and walked away, as if they were displeased at our disturbing them.
A little way off from the idol, and at the door of a hut, made of
sheep and cowskins dried, stood three men with long knives in their
hands; and in the middle of the tent appeared three sheep killed,
and one young bullock. These, seems, were sacrifices to that
senseless log of an idol; the three men were priest's belonging to
it, and the seventeen prostrated wretches were the people who
brought the offering, and were making their prayers to that stock.
I confess I was more moved at their stupidity and brutish
worship of a hobgoblin than ever I was at anything in my life, and,
overcome with rage, I rode up to the hideous idol, and with my
{
+
$78
LIFE AND ADVENTURES of
sword made a stroke at the bonnet that was on its head, and cut it
in two; and one of our men that was with me, taking hold of the
sheep-skin that covered it, pulled at it, when, behold, a most
hideous outcry ran through the village, and two or three hundred
people came about my ears, so that I was glad to scour for it, for
some had bows and arrows; but I resolved from that moment to
visit them again. Our caravan rested three nights at the town,
which was about four miles off, in order to provide some horses
which they wanted, several of the horses having been lamed
and jaded with the long march over the last desert; so we had
some leisure here to put my design in execution. I communicated
it to the Scots merchant, of whose courage I had sufficient
testimony; I told him what I had seen, and with what indignation
I had since thought that human nature could be so degenerate; I
told him if I could get but four or five men well armed to go with
me, I was resolved to go and destroy that vile, abominable idol,
and let them see that it had no power to help itself, and con-
sequently could not be an object of worship, or to be prayed to,
much less help them that offered sacrifices to it.
He at first objected to my plan as useless, seeing that, owing to
the gross ignorance of the people, they could not be brought to
profit by the lesson I meant to teach them; and added that, from
his knowledge of the country and its customs, he feared we should
fall into great peril by giving offence to these brutal idol worship-
pers. This somewhat stayed my purpose, but I was still uneasy all
that day to put my project in execution; and that evening, meeting
the Scots merchant in our walk about the town, I again called upon
him to aid me in it. When he found me resolute he said that, on
further thoughts, he could not but applaud the design, and told me
I should not go alone, but he would go with me; but he would go
first and bring a stout fellow, one of his countrymen, to go also with
us; and one," said he, " as famous for his zeal as you can desire
any one to be against such devilish things as these." So we agreed
to go, only we three and my man-servant, and resolved to put it in
execution the following night about midnight, with all possible
secrecy.
We thought it better to delay it till the next night, because the
caravan being to set forward in the morning, we supposed the
governor could not pretend to give them any satisfaction upon us
when we were out of his power. The Scots merchant, as steady in
his resolution for the enterprise as bold in executing, brought me a
Tartar's robe or gown of sheep-skins, and a bonnet, with a bow and
arrows, and had provided the same for himself and his countryman,
that the people, if they saw us, should not determine who we were.
All the first night we spent in mixing up some combustible matter,
with aqua vitæ, gunpowder, and such other materials as we could
get; and having a good quantity of tar in a little pot, about an hour
after night we set out upon our expedition.
robinson Crusoe.
379
We came to the place about eleven o'clock at night, and found
that the people had not the least suspicion of danger attending
their idol. The night was cloudy: yet the moon gave us light
enough to see that the idol stood just in the same posture and place
that it did before. The people seemed to be all at their rest; only
that in the great hut, where we saw the three priests, we saw a
light, and going up close to the door, we heard people talking as if
there were five or six of them; we concluded, therefore, that if we
set wildfire to the idol, those men would come out immediately, and
run up to the place to rescue it from destruction; and what to do
with them we knew not. Once we thought of carrying it away, and
setting fire to it at a distance; but when we came to handle it, we
found it too bulky for our carriage, so we were at a loss again.
The second Scotsman was for setting fire to the hut, and knocking
the creatures that were there on the head when they came out; but
I could not join with that; I was against killing them, if it were
possible to avoid it. 'Well, then," said the Scots merchant,
"I will tell you what we will do we will try to make them
prisoners, tie their hands, and make them stand and see their idol
destroyed."
66
As it happened, we had twine or packthread enough about us,
which we used to tie our firelocks together with; so we resolved to
attack these people first, and with as little noise as we could. The
first thing we did we knocked at the door, when one of the priests
coming to it, we immediately seized upon him, stopped his mouth,
and tied his hands behind him, and led him to the idol, where we
gagged him that he might not make a noise, tied his feet also
together, and left him on the ground.
Two of us then waited at the door, expecting that another would
come out to see what the matter was: but we waited so long till
the third man came back to us; and then nobody coming out, we
knocked again gently, and immediately out came two more, and we
served them just in the same manner, but were obliged to go all
with them, and lay them down by the idol some distance from one
another; when, going back, we found two more were come out of
the door, and a third stood behind them within the door. We
seized the two, and immediately tied them, when the third, stepping
back and crying out, my Scots merchant went in after them, and
taking out a composition we had made that would only smoke and
stink, he set fire to it, and threw it in among them. By that time
the other Scotsman and my man, taking charge of the two men
already bound, and tied together also by the arm, led them away to
the idol, and left them there, to see if their idol would relieve them,
making haste back to us.
When the furze we had thrown in had filled the hut with so much
smoke that they were almost suffocated, we threw in a small leather
bag of another kind, which flamed like a candle, and following it
we found there were but four people, who, as we suppozed,
i
380
LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
1
been about some of their diabolical sacrifices. They appeared, in
short, frightened to death, at least so as to sit trembling and stupid,
and not able to speak either, for the smoke.
We quickly took them from the hut, where the smoke soon' drove
us out, bound them as we had done the other, and all without any
noise. Then we carried them altogether to the idol; when we
came there, we fell to work with him. First, we daubed him all
over, and his robes also, with tar, and tallow mixed with brimstone ;
then we stopped his eyes, and ears, and mouth full of gunpowder,
and wrapped up a great piece of wildfire in his bonnet; then
sticking all the combustibles we had brought with us upon him, we
looked about to see if we could find anything else to help to burn
him; when my Scotsman remembered that by the hut, where the
men were, there lay a heap of dry forage; away he and the other
Scotsman ran and fetched their arms full of that. When we had
done this, we took all our prisoners, and brought them, having
untied their feet and ungagged their mouths, and made them stand
up, and set them before their monstrous idol, and then set fire to
the whole.
We stayed by it a quarter of an hour or thereabouts, till the
powder in the eyes, and mouth, and ears of the idol blew up, and,
as we could perceive, had split altogether; and in a word, till we
saw it burned so that it would soon be quite consumed. We then
began to think of going away; but the Scotsman said, "No, we
must not go, for these poor deluded wretches will all throw them-
selves into the fire, and burn themselves with the idol." So we
resolved to stay till the forage was burned down too, and then came
away and left them. After the feat was performed, we appeared in
the morning among our fellow-travellers, exceedingly busy in
getting ready for our journey; nor could any man suppose that we
had been anywhere but in our beds.
But the affair did not end so; the next day came a great number
of the country people to the town gates, and in a most outrageous
manner demanded satisfaction of the Russian governor for the
insulting their priests and burning their great Cham Chi-Thaungu.
The people of Nertsinkay were at first in a great consternation, for
they said the Tartars were already no less than thirty thousand
strong. The Russian governor sent out messengers to appease
them, assuring them that he knew nothing of it, and that there had
not a soul in his garrison been abroad, so that it could not be from
anybody there: but if they could let him know who did it, they
should be exemplarily punished. They returned haughtily, that all
the country reverenced the great Char Chi-Thaungu, who dwelt in
the sun, and no mortal would have Cared to offer violence to his
image but some Christian miscreant; and they therefore resolved to
denounce war against him and all the Russians, who, they said, were
miscreants and Christians.
The governor, unwilling
make a breach, or to have any cause
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
¿
381
A
of war alleged to be given by him, the Czar having suictly charged
him to treat the conquered country with gentleness, gave them
all the good words he could. At last he told them there was a
caravan gone towards Russia that morning, and perhaps it was
some of them who had done them this injury; and that if they
would be satisfied with that, he would send after them to inquire
into it, This seemed to appease them a little; and accordingly the
governor sent after us, and gave us a particular account how the
thing was; intimating withal, that if any in our caravan had done
it they should make their escape; but that whether we had done it or
no, we should make all the haste forward that was possible: and that,
in the meantime, he would keep them in play as long as he could.
This was very friendly in the governor: however, when it came
to the caravan, there was nobody knew anything of the matter ;
and as for us that were guilty, we were least of all suspected.
However, the captain of the caravan for the time took the hint that
the governor gave us, and we travelled two days and two nights
without any considerable stop, and then we lay at a village called
Plothus: nor did we make any long stop here, but hastened on
towards Jarawena, another Muscovite colony, and where we
expected we should be safe, But upon the second days' march
from Plothus, by the clouds of dust behind us at a great distance,
it was plain we were pursued. We had entered a vast desert, and
had passed by a great lake called Schanks Oser, when we perceived
a large body of horse appear on the other side of the lake, to the
north, we travelling west. We observed they went away west, as
we did, but had supposed we would have taken that side of the
lake, whereas we very happily took the south side; and in two days
more they disappeared again: for they, believing we were still
before them, pushed on till they came to the Udda, a very great
river when it passes farther north, but when we came to it we found
it narrow and fordable.
The third day they had either found their mistake, or had
intelligence of us, and came pouring in upon us towards dusk. We
had, to our great satisfaction, just pitched upon a convenient place
for our camp; for as we had just entered upon a desert above five
hundred miles over, where we had no towns to lodge at, and,
indeed, expected none but the city Jarawena, which we had yet two
days' march to; the desert, however, had some few woods in it on
this side, and little rivers, which ran all into the great river Udda;
it was in a narrow strait, between little but very thick woods, that
we pitched our camp that night, expecting to be attacked before
morning As it was usual for the Mogul Tartars to go about in
troops in that desert, so the caravans always fortify themselves
every night against them, as against armies of robbers; and it was,
therefore, no new thing to be pursued. But we had this night a
most advantageous camp: for as we lay between two woods, with
a little rivulet running just before our front, we could not be
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LIFE AND ADVENTURes of
surrounded, or attacked any way but in our front or rear. We took
care also to make our front as strong as we could, by placing our
packs, with the camels and horses, all in a line, on the inside of the
river, and felling some trees in our rear.
In this posture we encamped for the night; but the enemy was
upon us before we had finished. They did not come on like
thieves, as we expected, but sent three messengers to us, to
demand the men to be delivered to them that had abused their
priests and burned their idol, that they might burn them with fire;
and upon this, they said, they would go away, and do us no further
narm, otherwise they would destroy us all. Our men looked very
blank at this message, and began to stare at one another to see who
looked with the most guilt in their faces; but nobody was the
word-nobody did it. The leader of the caravan sent word he was
well assured that it was not done by any of our camp; that we
were peaceful merchants, travelling on our business; that we had
done no harm to them or to any one else; and that, therefore, they
must look further for the enemies who had injured them, for we
were not the people; so they desired them not to disturb us, for if
they did we should defend ourselves.
They were far from being satisfied with this for an answer; and
a great crowd of them came running down in the morning, by
break of day, to our camp; but seeing us so well posted, they durst
come no further than the brook in our front, where they stood in
such number as to terrify us very much; indeed, some spoke of ten
thousand. Here they stood and looked at us a while, and then,
setting up a great howl, let fly a crowd of arrows among us; but
we were well enough sheltered under our baggage, and I do not
remember that one of us was hurt.
Some time after this we saw them move a little to our right, and
expected them on the rear: when a cunning fellow, a Cossack of
Jarawena, calling to the leader of the caravan, said to him, “I will
send all these people away to Sibeilka." This was a city four or
five days' journey at least to the right, and rather behind us. So
he takes his bow and arrows, and getting on horseback, he rides
away from our rear directly, as it were back to Nertsinskay; after this
he takes a great circuit about, and comes directly on the army of
the Tartars as if he had been sent express to tell them a long story
that the people who had burned the Cham Chi-Thaungu were gone
to Sibeilka, with a caravan of miscreants, as he called them—that
is to say, Christians; and that they had resolved to burn the god
Scal-Isar, belonging to the Tonguses. As this fellow was himself a
Tartar, and perfectly spoke their language, he counterfeited so well
that they all believed him, and away they drove in a violent hurry
to Sibeilka, In less than three hours they were entirely out of our
sight, and we never heard any more of them, nor whether they
went to Sibeilka or no. So we passed away safely on to Jarawena,
where there was a Russian garrison, and there we rested five days.
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
383
!
From this city we had a frightful desert, which held us twenty-
three days' march. We furnished ourselves with some tents here,
for the better accommodating ourselves in the night; and the
leader of the caravan procured sixteen waggons of the country, for
carrying our water or provisions, and these carriages were our
defence every night round our little camp; so that had the Tartars
appeared, unless they had been very numerous indeed, they would
not have been able to hurt us. We may well be supposed to have
wanted rest gain after this long journey; for in this desert we
neither saw house nor tree, and scarce a bush; though we saw
abundance of the sable-hunters, who are all Tartars of Mogul
Tartary, of which this country is a part; and they frequently attack
small caravans, but we saw no numbers of them together.
After we had passed this desert we came into a country pretty
well inhabited that is to say, we found towns and castles, settled
by the Czar with garrisons of stationary soldiers, to protect the
caravans and defend the country against the Tartars, who would
otherwise make it very dangerous travelling; and his czarish
majesty has given such strict orders for the well guarding the
caravans, that, if there are any Tartars heard of in the country,
detachments of the garrison are always sent to see the travellers
safe from station to station. Thus the governor of Adinskoy, whom
I had an opportunity to make a visit to, by means of the Scots
merchant, who was acquainted with him, offered us a guard of fifty
men, if we thought there was any danger, to the next station.
:
I thought, long before this, that as we came nearer to Europe we
should find the country better inhabited, and the people more
civilised; but I found myself mistaken in both for we had yet the
nation of the Tonguses to pass through, where we saw the same
tokens of paganism and barbarity as before; only, as they were
conquered by the Muscovites, they were not so dangerous, but for
rudeness of manners and idolatry no people in the world ever went
beyond them. They are all clothed in skins of beasts, and their
houses are built of the same; you know not a man from a woman,
neither by the ruggedness of their countenances nor their clothes;
and in the winter, when the ground is covered with snow, they live
underground in vaults, which have cavities going from one to
another. If the Tartars had their Cham Chi-Thaungu for a whole
village or country, these had idols in every hut and every cave.
This country, I reckon, was, from the desert I spoke of last, at least
four hundred miles, half of it being another desert, which took us
up twelve days' severe travelling, without house or tree; and we
were obliged again to carry our own provisions, as well water as
bread. After we were out of this desert, and had travelled two
days, we came to Janezay, a Muscovite city, or station, on the great
river Janezay, which, they told us there, parted Europe from Asia.
All the country between the river Oby and the river Janery is as
entirely pagan, and the people as barbarous, as the remotest of the
384
LINE AND ADVENTURES OF
Tartars. I also found, which I observed to the Muscovite gover-
nors whom I had an opportunity to converse with, that the poor
pagans are not much wiser, or nearer Christianity, for being under
the Muscovite government, which they acknowledged was true
enough-but that, as they said, was none of their business; that if
the Czar expected to convert his Siberian, Tonguse, or Tartar
subjects, it should be done by sending clergymen among them, not
soldiers; and they added, with more sincerity than I expected, that
it was not so much the concern of their monarch to make the
people Christians as to make them subjects.
From this river to the Oby we crossed a wild uncultivated country,
barren of people and good management, otherwise it is in itself a
pleasant, fruitful, and agreeable country. What inhabitants we
found in it are all pagans, except such as are sent among them from
Russia; for this is the country-I mean on both sides the river
Oby-whither the Muscovite criminals that are not put to death are
banished, and from whence it is next to impossible they should ever
get away. I have nothing material to say of my particular affairs
till I came to Tobolski, the capital city of Siberia, where I con-
tinued some time on the following account :-
We had now been almost seven months on our journey, and
winter began to come on apace; whereupon my partner and I
called a council about our particular affairs, in which we found it
proper, as we were bound for England, to consider how to dispose
of ourselves. They told us of sledges and reindeer to carry us over
the snow in the winter time, by which means, indeed, the Russians
travel more in winter than they can in summer, as in these sledges
they are able to run night and day: the snow, being frozen, is one
universal covering to nature, by which the hills, vales, rivers, and
lakes, are all smooth and hard as a stone, and they run upon the
surface, without any regard to what is underneath.
But I had no occasion to urge a winter journey of this kind. I
was bound to England, not to Moscow, and my route lay two ways:
either I must go on as the caravan went, till I came to Jarislaw, and
then go off west for Narva and the Gulf of Finland, and so on to
Dantzic, where I might possibly sell my China cargo to good
advantage; or I must leave the caravan at a little town on the
Dwina, from whence I had but six days by water to Archangel, and
from thence might be sure of shipping either to England, Holland,
or Hamburg.
Now, to go any of these journeys in the winter would have been
preposterous; for as to Dantzic, the Baltic would have been frozen
up and I could not get passage; and to go by land in those
countries was far less safe than among the Mogul Tartars: like-
wise, as to Archangel in October, all the ships would be gone from
thence, and even the merchants who dwell there in summer retire
south to Moscow in the winter, when the ships are gone; so that I
sould have nothing but extremity of cold to encounter, with a
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
385
scarcity of provisions, and must lie in an empty town all the winter.
Therefore, upon the whole, I thought it much my better way to let
the caravan go, and make provision to winter where I was, at
Tobolski, in Siberia, in the latitude of about sixty degrees, where I
was sure of three things to wear out a cold winter with-viz., plenty
of provisions, such as the country afforded, a warm house, with fuel
enough, and excellent company.
I was now in quite a different climate from my beloved island,
where I never felt cold, except when I had my ague; on the
contrary, I had much to do to bear any clothes on my back,
and never made any fire but without doors, which was necessary
for dressing my food, etc. Now I had three good vests, with large
robes or gowns over them, to hang down to the feet, and button
close to the wrists; and all these lined with furs, to make them
sufficiently warm. As to a warm house, I must confess I greatly
dislike our way in England of making fires in every room in the
house in open chimneys, which, when the fire is out, always
keeps the air in the room cold as the climate. So I took an
apartment in a good house in the town, and ordered a chimney to
be built like a furnace, in the centre of six several rooms, like a
stove; the funnel to carry the smoke went up one way, the door to
come at the fire went in another, and all the rooms were kept
equally warm, but no fire seen, just as they heat baths in England.
By this means we had always the same climate in all the rooms,
and an equal heat was preserved; and yet we saw no fire, nor were
ever incommoded with smoke.
The most wonderful thing of all was, that it should be possible to
meet with good company here, in a country so barbarous as this-
one of the most northernly parts of Europe. But this being the
country where the state criminals of Muscovy, as I observed before,
are all banished, this city was full of Russian noblemen, gentlemen,
soldiers, and courtiers. Here was the famous Prince Galitzin, the
old German Robostiski, and several other persons of note, and
some ladies. By means of my Scotch merchant, whom, neverthe-
less, I parted with here, I made an acquaintance with several of
these gentlemen; and from these, in the long winter nights
which I stayed here, I received several very agreeable visits.
·

386
life and adventures of
CHAPTER XXXVI.
Conversations with a Russian grandee-Set out on my journey home-
wards-Harassed by Kalmucks on the road-Arrival at Archangel-
Sail from thence, and arrive safely in England.

T was talking one night with a certain prince, one of
the banished ministers of state belonging to the Czar,
that the discourse of my particular case began. He
had been telling me abundance of fine things of the
greatness, the magnificence, the dominions, and the
absolute power of the Emperor of the Russians: I interrupted him,
and told him I was a greater and more powerful prince than ever
the Czar was, though my dominion were not so large, or my people
so many.
The Russian grandee looked a little surprised, and,
fixing his eyes steadily upon me, began to wonder what I meant. Í
said his wonder would cease when I had explained myself, and told
him the story at large of my living in the island; and then how I
managed both myself and the people that were under me, just as I
have since minuted it down. They were exceedingly taken with
the story, and especially the prince, who told me, with a sigh, that
the true greatness of life was to be masters of ourselves; that he
would not have exchanged such a state of life as mine to be Czar
of Muscovy; and that he found more felicity in the retirement he
seemed to be banished to there, than ever he found in the highest
authority he enjoyed in the court of his master the Czar; that the
height of human wisdom was to bring our tempers down to car
circumstances, and to make a calm within, under the weight of the
greatest storms without. When he came first hither, he said, he
used to tear the hair from his head, and the clothes from his back, as
others had done before him; but a little time and consideration had
made him look into himself, as well as round him to things without:
that he found the mind of man, if it was but once brought to reflect
upon the state of universal life, and how little this world was
concerned in its true felicity, was perfectly capable of making a
felicity for itself, fully satisfying to itself, and suitable to its own
best ends and desires, with but very little assistance from the
world. That being now deprived of all the fancied felicity which
he enjoyed in the full exercise of worldly pleasures, he said he was
at leisure to look upon the dark side of them, where he found all
manner of deformity; and was now convinced that virtue only
makes a man truly wise, rich, and great, and preserves him in the
way to a superior happiness in a future state; and in this, he said,
they were more happy in their banishment than all their enemies
were, who had the full possession of all the wealth and power they
40
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
387
had left behind them. 'Nor, sir," says he, "do I bring my mind
to this politically, from the necessity of my circumstances, which
some call miserable; but, if I know anything of myself, I would
not now go back, though the Czar my master should call me, and
reinstate me in all my former grandeur."
"
He spoke this with so much warmth in his temper, so much
earnestness and motion of his spirits, that it was evident it was the
true sense of his soul; there was no room to doubt his sincerity, I
told him I once thought myself a kind of monarch in my old
station, of which I had given him an account; but that I thought
he was not only a monarch, but a great conqueror; for he that had
got a victory over his own exorbitant desires, and the absolute
dominion over himself, he whose reason entirely governs his will, is
certainly greater than he that conquers a city.
I had been here eight months, and a dark, dreadful winter I
thought it; the cold so intense that I could not so much as look
abroad without being wrapped in furs, and a kind of mask of fur
before my face, with only a hole for breath, and two for sight: the
little daylight we had was for three months not above five hours
a-day, and six at most; only that the snow lying on the ground
continually, and the weather being clear, it was never quite dark.
Our horses were kept, or rather starved, underground; and as for
our servants, whom we hired here to look after ourselves and
horses, we had, every now and then, their fingers and toes to thaw
and take care of, lest they should mortify and fall off.
It is true, within doors we were warm, the houses being close,
the walls thick, the windows small, and the glass all double. Our
food was chiefly the flesh of deer, dried and cured in the season;
bread good enough, but baked as biscuits; dried fish of several
sorts, and some flesh of mutton, and of buffaloes, which is pretty
good meat. All the stores of provisions for the winter are laid up
in the summer, and well cured: our drink was water, mixed with
aqua vitæ instead of brandy; and for a treat, mead instead of wine,
which, however, they have very good. The hunters, who venture
abroad all weathers, frequently brought us in fine venison, and
sometimes bear's flesh, but we did not much care for the last. We
had a good stock of tea, with which we treated our friends, and we
lived cheerfully and well, all things considered.
It was now March, the days grown considerably longer, and the
weather at least tolerable; so the other travellers began to prepare
sledges to carry them over the snow, and to get things ready to be
going; but my measures being fixed, as I have said, for Archangel,
and not for Muscovy or the Baltic, I made no motion; knowing
very well that the ships from the south do not set out for that part
of the world till May or June, and that if I was there by the
beginning of August, it would be as soon as any ships would be
ready to sail. Therefore I made no haste to be gone, as others
did : in a word, I saw a great many people, nay, all the travellers,
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LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF
go away before me. It seems every year they go from thence to
Muscovy for trade, to carry furs, and buy necessaries, which they
bring back with them to furnish their shops: also others went on
the same errand to Archangel.
In the month of May I began to make all ready to pack up; and,
as I was doing this, it occurred to me that, seeing all these people
were banished by the Czar to Siberia, and yet, when they came
there, were left at liberty to go whither they would, why they did
not then go away to any part of the world, wherever they thought
fit and I began to examine what should hinder them from making
such an attempt. But my wonder was over when I entered upon
that subject with the person I have mentioned, who answered me
thus:
"Consider, first, sir," said he, "the place where we are;
and, secondly, the condition we are in; especially the generality of
the people who are banished thither. We are surrounded with
stronger things than bars or bolts; on the north side, an un-
navigable ocean, where ship never sailed, and boat never swam;
every other way we have above a thousand miles to pass through
the Czar's own dominions, and by ways utterly impassable, except
by the roads made by the government, and through the towns
garrisoned by his troops; in short, we could neither pass un-
discovered by the road, nor subsist any other way, so that it is in
vain to attempt it."
I was silenced at once, and found that they were in a prison every
jot as secure as if they had been locked up in the castle at Moscow:
however, it came into my thoughts that I might certainly be made
an instrument to procure the escape of this excellent person; and
that, whatever bazard I ran, I would certainly try if I could carry
him off. Upon this, I took an occasion one evening to tell him
my thoughts. I represented to him that it was very easy for me
to carry him away, there being no guard over him in the country;
and as I was not going to Moscow, but to Archangel, and that I
went in the retinue of a caravan, by which I was not obliged to lie
in the stationary towns in the desert, but could encamp every night
where I would, we might easily pass uninterrupted to Archangel,
where I would immediately secure him on board an English ship,
and carry him safe along with me; and as to his subsistence and
other particulars, it should be my care till he could better supply
himself.
He heard me very attentively, and looked earnestly on me all
the while I spoke; nay, I could see in his very face that what I said
put his spirits into an exceeding ferment; his colour frequently
changed, his eyes looked red, and his heart fluttered, till it might
be even perceived in his countenance; nor could he immediately
answer me when I had done, and, as it were, hesitated what he
would say to it: but after he had paused a little, he embraced me,
and said, “How unhappy are we, unguarded creatures as we are,
that even our greatest acts of friendship are made snares unto us,
Robinson Crusoe.
389
*
and we are made tempters of one another! He then beartily
thanked me for my offers of service, but withstood resolutely the
arguments I used to urge him to set himself free. He declared, in
earnest terms, that he was fully bent on remaining where he was
rather than seek to return to his former miserable greatness, as he
called it where the seeds of pride, ambition, avarice, and luxury
might revive, take root, and again overwhelm him. "Let me remain,
dear sir," he said, in conclusion-"let me remain in this blessed
confinement, banished from the crimes of life, rather than purchase
a show of freedom at the expense of the liberty of my reason, and
at the future happiness which I now have in my view, but should
then, I fear, quickly lose sight of; for I am but flesh; a man, a
mere man; and have passions and affections as likely to possess
and overthrow me as any man: Oh, be not my friend and tempter
both together!"
If I was surprised before, I was quite dumb now, and stood silent,
looking at him, and, indeed, admiring what I saw. The struggle in
his soul was so great that, though the weather was extremely cold,
it put him into a most violent heat; so I said a word or two, that
I would leave him to consider of it, and wait on him again, and
then I withdrew to my own apartment.
About two hours after I heard somebody at or near the door of
my room, and I was going to open the door, but he had opened it
and come in. "My dear friend," says he, " you had almost over-
set me, but I am recovered. Do not take it ill that I do not close
with your offer. I assure you it is not for want of sense of the
kindness of it in you; and I came to make the most sincere
acknowledgment of it to you; but I hope I have got the victory
over myself."- My lord," said I, "I hope you are fully satisfied
that you do not resist the call of heaven."-"Sir,” said he, "if it
had been from heaven, the same power would have influenced me
to have accepted it; but I hope, and am fully satisfied, that it is
from heaven that I decline it, and I have infinite satisfaction in the
parting, that you shall leave me an honest man still, though not
free man."
(<
A B
I had nothing to do but to acquiesce, and make professions to
him of my having no end in it but a sincere desire to serve him.
He embraced me very passionately, and assured me he was
sensible of that, and should always acknowledge it; and with that
he offered me a very fine present of sables-too much, indeed, for
me to accept from a man in his circumstances, and I would have
avoided them, but he would not be refused. The next morning
I sent my servant to his lordship with a small present of tea, and
two pieces of China damask, and four little wedges of Japan gold,
which did not all weigh above six ounces or thereabouts, bat were
far short of the value of his sables, which, when I came to England,
I found worth near two hundred pounds. He accepted the tea,
and one piece of the damask, and one of the pieces of gold, which
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life and adventURES OF
had a fine stamp upon it, of the Japan coinage, which I found he
took for the rarity of it, but would not take any more: and he sent
word by my servant that he desired to speak with me.
I
When I came to him he told me I knew what had passed
between us, and hoped I would not move him any more in that
affair; but that, since I had made such a generous offer to him, he
asked me if I had kindness enough to offer the same to another
person that he would name to me, in whom he had a great share of
concern. In a word, he told me it was his only son; who, though
I had not seen him, was in the same condition with himself, and
above two hundred miles from him, on the other side of the Oby ;
but that, if I consented, he would send for him.
I made no hesitation, but told him I would do it. I made some
ceremony in letting him understand that it was wholly on his
account; and that, seeing I could not prevail on him, I would show
my respect to him by my concern for his son. He sent the next
day for his son; and in about twenty days he came back with the
messenger, bringing six or seven horses, loaded with very rich furs,
which, in the whole, amounted to a very great value. His servants
brought the horses into the town, but left the young lord at a
distance till night, when he came incognito into our apartment, and
his father presented him to me; and, in short, we concerted the
manner of our travelling, and everything proper for the journey.
I had bought a considerable quantity of sables, black fox-skins,
fine ermines, and such other furs as are very rich in that city, in
exchange for some of the goods I had brought from China; in
particular for the cloves and nutmegs, of which I sold the greatest
part here, and the rest afterwards at Archangel, for a much better
price than I could have got at London; and my partner, who was
sensible of the profit, and whose business, more particularly than
mine, was merchandise, was mightily pleased with our stay, on
account of the traffic we made here.
It was the beginning of June when I left this remote place. We
were now reduced to a very small caravan, having only thirty-two
horses and camels in all, which passed for mine, though my new
guest was proprietor of eleven of them. It was natural also that I
should take more servants with me than I had before; and the
young lord passed for my steward; what great man I passed for
myself I know not, neither did it concern me to inquire. We had
here the worst and the largest desert to pass over that we met with
in our whole journey; I call it the worst, because the way was very
deep in some places, and very uneven in others; the best we had
to say for it was, that we thought we had no troops of Tartars or
robbers to fear, as they never came on this side of the river Oby,
or at least very seldom; but we found it otherwise.
My young lord had a faithful Siberian servant, who was perfectly
acquainted with the country, and led us by private roads, so that
we avoided coming into the principal towns and cities upon the
E
ROBINSON crusoe.
591
1.70
great road, such as Tumen, Soloy Kamaskoy, and several others ;
because the Muscovite garrisons which are kept there are very
curious and strict in their observation upon travellers, and search-
ing lest any of the banished persons of note should make their
escape that way into Muscovy; but, by this means, as we were
kept out of the cities, so our whole journey was a desert, and we
were obliged to encamp and lie in our tents, when we might have
had very good accommodation in the cities on the way; this the
young lord was so sensible of, that he would not allow us to lie
abroad when we came to several cities on the way, but lay abroad
himself, with his servant, in the woods, and met us always at the
appointed places.
We had just entered Europe, having passed the river Kama,
which in these parts is the boundary between Europe and Asia,
and the first city on the European side was called Soloy Kamaskoy,
that is, the great city on the river Kama. And here we thought to
see some evident alteration in the people; but we were mistaken ;
for as we had a vast desert to pass, which is near seven hundred
miles long in some places, but not above two hundred miles over
where we passed it, so, till we came past that horrible place, we
found very little difference between that country and Mogul
Tartary. The people are mostly pagans; their houses and towns
full of idols; and their way of living wholly barbarous, except in
the cities and villages near them, where they are Christians, as they
call themselves, of the Greek Church: but have their religion
mingled with so many relics of superstition, that it is scarce to be
known in some places from mere sorcery and witchcraft.
*
In passing this forest (after all our dangers were, to our imagina-
tion, escaped), I thought, indeed, we must have been plundered and
robbed, and perhaps murdered, by a troop of thieves of what
country they were I am yet at a loss to know; but they were all on
horseback, carried bows and arrows, and were at first about forty-
five in number They came so near to us as to be within two
musket shot, and, asking no questions, surrounded us with their
horses, and looked very earnestly upon us twice; at length, they
placed themselves just in our way; upon which we drew up in a
little line, before our camels, being not above sixteen men in all.
Thus drawn up, we halted, and sent out the Siberian servant, who
attended his lord, to see who they were; his master was the more
willing to let him go, because he was not a little apprehensive that
they were a Siberian troop sent out after him. The man came up
near them with a flag of truce, and called to them; but though hơ
spoke several of their languages, or dialects of languages rather, he
could not understand a word they said; however, after some signs
to him not to come near them at his peril, the fellow came back no
wiser than he went; only that by their dress, he said, he believed
them to be some Tartars of Kalmuck, or of the Circassian hordes,
and that there must be more of them upon the great desert,
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life and adventures of
though he never heard that any of them were seen so far north
before.
1
This was small comfort to us; however, we had no remedy :
there was on our left hand, at about a quarter of a mile distance,
little grove, and very near the road. I immediately resolved we
should advance to those trees, and fortify ourselves as well as we
could there; for, first, I considered that the trees would in a great
measure cover us from their arrows; and, in the next place, they
could not come to charge us in a body: it was, indeed, my old
Portuguese pilot who proposed it, and who had this excellency
attending him, that he was always readiest and most apt to direct
and encourage us in cases of the most danger. We advanced
immediately, with what speed we could, and gained that little
wood; the Tartars, or thieves, for we knew not what to call them,
keeping their stand, and not attempting to hinder us.
When we
came thither, we found, to our great satisfaction, that it was a
swampy piece of ground, and on the one side a very great spring of
water, which, running out in a little brook, was a little farther
joined by another of the like size; and was, in short, the source of
a considerable river, called afterwards the Wirtska; the trees
which grew about this spring were not above two hundred, but very
large, and stood pretty thick, so that as soon as we got in, we saw
ourselves perfectly safe from the enemy unless they attacked us on
foot.
While we stayed here waiting the motion of the enemy some
hours, without perceiving that they made any movement, our
Portuguese, with some help, cut several arms of trees half off, and
laid them hanging across from one tree to another, and in a manner
fenced us in. About two hours before night they came down
directly upon us; and though we had not perceived it, we found
they had been joined by some more, so that they were near four-
score horse; whereof, however, we fancied some were women.
They came on till they were within half-shot of our little wood,
when we fired one musket without ball, and called to them in the
Russian tongue to know what they wanted, and bade them keep
off; but they came on with a double fury up to the wood side, not
imagining we were so barricaded that they could not easily break
in. Our old pilot was our captain as well as our engineer, and
desired us not to fire upon them till they came within pistol-shot,
that we might be sure to kill, and that when we did fire we
should be sure to take good aim; we bade him give the word
of command, which he delayed so long that they were some of
them within two pikes' length of us when we let fly. We aimed
so true that we killed fourteen of them, and wounded several
others, as also several of their horses; for we had all of us loaded
our pieces with two or three bullets a-piece at least.
They were terribly surprised with our fire, and retreafed im-
mediately about one hundred rods from us; in which time we
ROBINSON CRUsoe.
395
loaded our pieces again, and seeing them keep that distance, we
sallied out, and caught four or five of their horses, whose riders we
supposed were killed; and coming up to the dead, we judged they
were Tartars, but knew not how they came to make an excursion
such an unusual length.,
About an hour after they again made a motion to attack us, and
rode round our little wood to see where they might break in; but
finding us always ready to face them, they went off again; and we
resolved not to stir for that night.
We slept little, but spent the most part of the night in strength-
ening our situation, and barricading the entrances into the wood,
and keeping a strict watch. We waited for daylight, and when it
came, it gave us a very unwelcome discovery indeed; for the
enemy, who we thought were discouraged with the reception they
met with, were now greatly increased, and had set up eleven or
twelve huts or tents, as if they were resolved to besiege us; and
this little camp they had pitched upon the open plain, about three-
quarters of a mile from us. I confess I now gave myself over for
lost, and all that I had; the loss of my effects did not lie so near
me, though very considerable, as the thoughts of falling into the
hands of such barbarians at the latter end of my journey, after so
many difficulties and hazards as I had gone through, and even in
sight of our port, where we expected safety and deliverance
As to
my partner, he was raging, and declared that to lose his goods
would be his ruin, and that he would rather die than be starved,
and he was for fighting to the last drop.
The young lord, a most gallant youth, was for fighting 'the last
also; and my old pilot was of opinion that we were able to resist
them all in the situation we were then in. Thus we spent the day
in debates of what we should do; but towards evening we found
that the number of our enemies still increased, and we did not
know but by the morning they might still be a greater number: so
I began to inquire of those people we had brought from Tobolski
if there were no private ways by which we might avoid them in the
night, and perhaps retreat to some town, or get help to guard us
over the desert. The young lord's Siberian servant told us, if we
designed to avoid them, and not fight, he would engage to carry us
off in the night, to a way that went north, towards the river
Petruz, by which he made no question but we might get away, and
the Tartars never discover it; but, he said, his lord had told him
he would not retreat, but would rather choose to fight. I told him
he mistook his lord: for that he was too wise a man to love fighting
for the sake of it; that I knew he was brave enough by what he
had showed already; but that he knew better than to desire seven-
teen or eighteen men to fight five hundred, unless an unavoidable
necessity forced them to it; and that if he thought it possible for
us to escape in the night, we had nothing else to do but to attempt
it. He answered, if his lordship gave him such orders, he would
394
life and adventures of
lose his life if he did not perform it; we soon brought his lord to
give that order, though privately, and we immediately prepared
for putting it in practice.
And first, as soon as it began to be dark, we kindled a fire in our
little camp, which we kept burning, and prepared so as to make it
burn all night, that the Tartars might conclude we were still there;
but as soon as it was dark, and we could see the stars (for our guide
would not stir before), having all our horses and camels ready
loaded, we followed our new guide, who I soon found steered him-
self by the north star, the country being level for a long way.
After we had travelled two hours very hard, it began to be lighter
still; not that it was dark all night, but the moon began to rise, so
that, in short, it was rather lighter than we wished it to be; but by
six o'clock the next morning we had got above thirty miles, having
almost spoiled our horses. Here we found a Russian village,
named Kermazinskoy, where we rested, and heard nothing of the
Kalmuck Tartars that day. About two hours before night we set
out again, and travelled till eight the next morning, though not
quite so hard as before; and about seven o'clock we passed a little
river, called Kirtza, and came to a good large town inhabited by
Russians, called Ozomys; there we heard that several troops of
Kalmucks had been abroad upon the desert, but that we were now
completely out of danger of them, which was to our great satisfac-
tion Here we were obliged to get some fresh horses, and having
IP OR
need enough of rest, we stayed five days; and my partner and I
agreed to give the honest Siberian who conducted us thither the
value of ten pistoles.
In five days more we came to Veussima, apon the river Witzogda,
and running into the Dwina: we were there, very happily, near the
end of our travels by land, that river being navigable, in seven
days' passage, to Archangel. From hence we came to Lawrenskoy,
the 3d of July; and providing ourselves with two luggage boats,
and a barge for our own convenience, we embarked the 7th, and
arrived all safe at Archangel the 18th; having been a year, five
months, and three days on the journey, including our stay of about
eight months at Tobolski.
We were obliged to stay at this place six weeks for the arrival of
the ships, and must have tarried longer, had not a Hamburgher
come in above a month sooner than any of the English ships;
when, after some consideration that the city of Hamburgh might
happen to be as good a market for our goods as London, we all
took freight with him; and, having put our goods on board, it was
most natural for me to put my steward on board to take care of
them; by which means my young lord had a sufficient opportunity
to conceal himself, never coming on shore again all the time we
stayed there; and this he did that he might not be seen in the city,
where some of the Moscow merchants would certainly have seen
and discovered him.
ROBINSON CRUSOE.
395
We then set sail from Archangel the 20th of August, the same
year; and, after no extraordinary bad voyage, arrived safe in the
Elbe the 18th of September. Here my partner and I found a very
good sale for our goods, as well those of China as the sables, etc.,
of Siberia und, dividing the produce, my share amounted to
£3475, 17s. 3d., including about six hundred pounds' worth of
diamonds, which I purchased at Bengal.
Here the young lord took his leave of us, and went up the Elbe,
in order to go to the court of Vienna, where he resolved to seek
protection and could correspond with those of his father's friends
who were left alive. He did not part without testimonials of
gratitude for the service I had done him, and for my kindness to
the prince, his father.
To conclude having, stayed near four months in Hamburgh, I
came from thence by land to the Hague, where I embarked in the
packet, and arrived in London the 10th of January 1705, having
been absent from England ten years and nine months. And here,
resolving to harass myself no more, I am preparing for a longer
journey than all these, having lived seven-two years a life of
infinite variety, and learned sufficiently to know the value of
retirement, and the blessing of ending our days in peace.

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