The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Page 4

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

  satisfaction, 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, if

  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

  come at; and as the youth had a bill of lading for them, I made his

  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 wrote 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 Bristol, 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 degrees 32 minutes, 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, currents, &c., on the rest of our

  voyage; but to shorten my story, shall observe that I came to my

  old habitation, the island, on the 10th 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 islands in

  the mouth of the great river Orinoco, 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,

  Oh there!" pointing to our old habitation, and fell dancing 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.

  "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, 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 weap
ons.

  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. I 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, 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 something

  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. "Seignior," 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 made 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 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

  that one 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 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 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--much less had I 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

  remarkable 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 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 provisions,

  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

  planted 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