The Life and strange surprising adventures of Robinson Crusoe of York, mariner

DANIEL DE FOE.

y

THE LIFE

AND

STRANGE SURPRISING AD VENTURES

OF

ROBINSON CRUSOE

Of York, Mariner.

AS RELATED BY HIMSELF.

BY

DANIEL DE FOE.
With an A.ulobiographical memoirr of the oAuthor,
AND A

LIFE OF ALEXANDER SELKIRK,
BY WHOSE RESIDENCE ON THE ISLAND OF JUAN FERNANDEZ THE WORK WAS SUGGESTED.

HUBBARD BROS., PHILA. & BOSTON; ':
E. HANNAFORD & Co., CINCINNATI AND CHICAGO; A. L. BAN.:ROPT
FRANCISCO; GOODWYN & CO., NEW ORLE '
1872.

A

Entoerd according to Act of Congress, in the year 1872, by

HUIliAIIRD BROTHERS,

In the Oflice of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.

INTRODUCTION.

E FOE published "Robinson Crusoe" in 1719, under
the following quaint title: "The Life and Strange Sur-
prising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Ma-
riner: who lived eight-and-twenty years all alone in an
uninhabited island on the coast of America, near the
mouth of the great river Oroonoque; having been cast on
shore by shipwreck, wherein all the men perished but
himself. With an account how he was at last strangely
delivered by Pirates. Written by himself."
Like "Paradise Lost," this romance, destined to so immediate and
lasting a popularity, is said to have been offered to the whole circle of
the trade" before any publisher could be found willing to incur the risk
of producing it. Its success however was so great that four editions
were printed in as many months. It appeared, in the first instance, with
the following prefce :-
If ever the story of any private man's adventures in the world were worth making
public, and were acceptable when published, the Editor of this account thinks this
will be so.
The wonders of this man's life exceed all that (he thinks) is to be found extant;
the life of one man being scarce capable of a greater variety.
The story is told with modesty, with seriousness, and with a religious application
of events to the uses to which wise men always apply them ; viz., to the instruction
of others, by this example, and to justify and honor the wisdom of Providence in all
the variety of circumstances, let them happen how they will.
The Editor believes the thing to be a just history of fact; neither is there any
appearance of fiction in it: and however thinks, because all such things are disputed,
that the improvement of it, as well to the diversion as to the instruction of the
reader, will he the same; and as such, he thinks, without farther compliment to the
world, he does them a great service in the publication.
The great success of the first part induced De Foe to write a second,
which was published in August, 1719; Part I. having appeared in the
previous April. A map of the world accompanied it, to give a greater
appearance of truth to the tale, on which the travels of Crusoe were
indicated, and its proper place assigned to the island.
Author's preface to the 2d Part:-
The success the former part of this work has met with in the world' has yet been
no other than is acknowledged to he due to the surprising variety of the subject, and
to the agreeable manner of the performance.
The just application of every incident, the religious and useful inferences drawn
.: 6

6 INTRODUCTION.

from every part, are so many testimonies to the good design of making it public, and
must legitimate all the part that may be called invention or parable in the story.
The second part, if the Editor's opinion may pass, is (contrary to the usage of
second parts) every way as entertaining as the first; contains as strange and sur-
prising incidents, and as great a variety of them ; nor is the application less serious
or suitable ; and doubtless will, to the sober as well as ingenious reader, be every
way as profitable and diverting.
In so far as Selkirk passed a certain number of years on an uninha-
bited island, he may be truly said to have furnished the idea of Crusoe;
but the subordinate figures, the grouping, and the scenery are altogether
due to the genius of De Foe. Herein he affords an exact parallel to
Shakespeare, who derived tie plots of his immortal dramas, now from an
Italian romance, now from passing events.
Whatever may have been the origin of the tale, however virulent may
have been the attacks made against its author, as he himself says, by
political enemies and senseless critics, the judgment of the most enlight-
ened men of all nations has placed Robinson Crusoe" upon a height
which no sounds of animosity can now reach. What pleasure has this
wonderful tale given, and still gives, to all readers! Young and old,
rich and poor, find in its pages an unfailing source of pure delight.
It blends instruction with amusement in a way no other production of
human intellect has ever succeeded in doing. While depicting a solitary
individual struggling against misfortune, it indicates the justice and the
mercy of Providence; and while inculcating the duty of self-help, asserts
the complete dependence of man upon a higher power for all he stands
in need of.
If we consider novels in their relation to life, "Robinson Crusoe"
must win the prize for truthfulness and reality. How naturally the in-
cidents occur! There is no deference shown by the author to the exi-
gencies of his story, nor to dramattic effect. The characters appear as
they do in real life-exercise some influence for good or evil on the
principal figure in the tale-and then disappear, to be seen no more.
Take, for instance, Xury. Would not a novelist of less power have
brought him forward, over and over again, after he had once introduced
him as the faithful friend of the hero ? But De Foe saw fit to do other-
wise. Xury is brought upon the stage; assists the escape of the chief
personage in the drama; and is seen no more. Is not this the way of
real life?
Nor does the effect of reality stop here. So natural are all the cha-
racters, that we seem to know them personally-to be ourselves assisting
at the scenes recorded in it.
For these excellencies the learned and the good have uniformly per-
sisted in singling out "Robinson Crusoe" for special commendation. To
mention only two-Rousseau held that it was the book a boy should read
first and read longest. Dr. Johnson remarked, "Was there ever any-
thing written by mere man that was wished longer by its readers, except-
ing 'Don Quixote,' 'Robinson Crusoe,' and the 'Pilgrim's Progress?'"

INTRODUCTION.

In conclusion, we present to our readers the touching lines in which
Cowper supposes Alexander Selkirk to record his feelings:-

I am monarch of all I survey,
My right there is none to dispute;
From the centre all round to the sea,
I am lord of the fowl and the brute.

O Solitude I where are the charms
That sages have seen in thy face ?
Better dwell in the midst of alarms,
Than reign in this horrible place.
I am out of humanity's reach,
I must finish my journey alone,
Never hear the sweet music of speech-
I start at the sound of my own.
The beasts, that roam over the plain,
My form with indifference see;
They are so unacquainted with mhn,
Their tameness is shocking to me.

Society, friendship, and love,
Divinely bestow'd upon man,
Oh! had I the wings of a dove,
How soon would I taste you again !

My sorrows I then might assuage
In the ways of religion and truth,
Might learn from the wisdom of age,
And be cheer'd by the sallies of youth.
Religion! what treasure untold
Resides in that heavenly word!
More precious than silver and gold,
Or all that this earth can afford.

But the sound of the church-going bell
These valleys and rocks never heard,
Never sigh'd at the sound of a knell,
Or smiled when a Sabbath appeared.

Ye winds, that have made me your sport,
Convey to this desolate shore
Some cordial, endearing report
Of a land I shall visit no more.
My friends, do they now and then send
A wish or a thought after me?
Oh tell me I yet have a friend,
Though a friend I am never to see.

How fleet is a glance of the mind !
Compared with the speed of its flight,
The tempest itself lags behind,
And the swift-wing'd arrows of light.

When I think of my own native land,
In a moment I seem to be there
But, alas recollection at hand
Soon hurries me back to despair.

But the sea fowl is gone to her nest,
The beast is laid down in his lair;
Even here is a season of rest,
And I to my cabin repair.
There's mercy in every place,
And mercy, encouraging thought!
Gives even affliction a grace,
And reconciles man to his lot.

__ -

I 0 I..

Ln-

CONTENTS.

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOB ........................... ........................... page 12

CHAPTER I.
My Birth and Parentage-At Nineteen Years of Age I determine to go to Sea-Dissuaded by my Parent--
Elope with a Schoolfellow, and go on board Ship-A Storm arises, during which I am dreadfully fright-
ened-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..- *.. 35

CHAPTER II.
Make a Trading Voyage to Guinea very successfully-Death of my Captain-Sail another Trip with his
Mate-The Vengeance of Provideiine for Disobedience to Parents now overtakes me-Taken by a Sale
Rover, and all sold as Slaves--My Master frequently sends me a-fishing, whicl suggests an idea of Escape
-Make my Escape in an open Boat, with a Moresco Boy. .-.................................... 48

CHAPTER III.
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 Brazils. and buy a Settlement
there-Cannot be quiet, but Sail on a Voyage of Adventure to Guinia-Ship strikes on a Sand-bank in
unknown Laud-All lost but myself, who am driven ashore, half dead.---........ ................. r,

CIAPTEIR IV.
Appearance of the Wreck and Country next Day-Swim on board of the Ship, and, by means of a Con-
trivance. gCt a quantity of Stores on Shore-Shoot a Bird, but it turns out perfect Carrion-Moralize
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.. -................................ 7*

CHAPTER V.
I begin to keep a Journal-Christen my desert bland the Island of Despair-Fall upon various Schemes
to make Tools, Baskets. &c. and begin to build my Iouse-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.-...............- -- .... ...... ....... ..... ..................... .. ........... ....

CHAPTER VI.
Observe the Ship driven farther 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
thereon-Find a Bible in one of the Seamen's Chelts thrown ashore, the reading whereof gives me great
comfort ............................ ............. .......... ........................ ........ .

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-Resolvw, to lay up a Store of these Articles, to furnish me against the
wet Season-My Cat, which I suppose 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. ..... ..... ...... ............................... 115

CHAPTER 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 tame-Return to my old Iabitation-Great plague
with my Harvest ...... ... ...... .. ... .... ................. .. .. .............. Pagel2
s

CONTENTS. 9

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.-.......... ........... 13

CHAPTER X.
t 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 call.
ing my name-Devise various schemes to tame Goats, and at last succeed. ... ..... .......... 148

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................ 159

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 folm my Magazine-My fearson account of the Savages begin to subside....................... 171

CHAPTER XIII.
Description of my Situation in the Twenty-third yearof 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 determine
on the Destruction of the next Party at all risks-A Ship lost off thr Island-Go on board the Wreck,
which I discern to be Spanish-Procure a great variety of Articles from the Vessel.................. 184

CHAPTER XIV.
RIilections-An extraordinary Dream-Discover five Canoes of Savages on Shore-Observe from my station
two miserable Wretches draggel out f their 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. ... 197

CHAPTER XV.
I ain at great pains to instruct Friday respecting my abhorrence of the Cannibal practices ofthe Savag--
tie is amazed at the effects of the Gun, and considers it an intelligent being-Begins to talk Englis) lb-
rably-A Dialogue-I instruct him in the knowledge of Religion, and find him very apt-He deitb
to me some white Men, who had come to his country, and still lived there......... ..........- 211

CHAPTER XVI.
I determine to go over to the Continent-Friday and I construct a Boat 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 tobe Friday's
Father.... ........................ ..................................... .... ............. 22

CHAPTER XVII.
learn from the Spaniard that there were sixteen more of his Countrymen among the Savages-The Spa-
niard and Friday's Father, well armed, sail on a Mission to the Continent-I discover an English Ship
lying at anchor off the Island-lier 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.. ............. ............... .

CHAPTER 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.......-.............................. ..5

CHAPTER XIX.
I take leave of the Island, and, after a long Voyage, arrive in England-Go down into Yorkshire antd fl

CONTENTS.

the greater part of my Family dead-Resolve to go to Lisbon fbr information respecting my Plantation
at the Brazils-Meet an old Friend there, by whose means I become rich-Set out for England overland
-Much annoyed by Wolves on the road.--................................................ 267

CIIAPTER XX.
Strange Battle betwixt Friday and a Bear-Terrible engagement with a whole Army of Wolves-Arrive
in England safely, and settle my affairs there-I marry and have a Family.. *........ ........... 280

PART II.

CHAPTER I.
Reflections.-Unsettled state of Mind, and Conversation with my Wife thereon-Purchase a Farm in the
County of Bedford-Loae my Wife-1 determine to revisit my Island, and for that purpose settle all my Af-
fairs in England-Description of the Cargo I carried out with me-Save the Crew ofa Vessel burnt at Sea. 2!2

CHAPTER II.
Steer for the West Indies-Distressing Account of a Bristol Ship, the Crew of which we save in a state of
Starvation-Arrive at my Island-Friday's joy on discovering it-Affecting interview betwixt him and
lis Father on landing-Narrative of the Occurrences on the Island during my Absence. .-........ :i07

CHAPTER III.
Narrative continued-Insolence of three of the Englishmen to the Spaniards-They are disarmed and
brought to order-A great body of Savages land upon the Island-They turnout to be two ndverse Nations
imet there by chance-A bloody Battle betwixt them-Several of the vanquished Party secured by the
Spaniards ........... ......... .............. ............ ..... ........... ................ ;24

CIIAPTER IV.
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.. -..... ....................... ........................ 337

CIIAPTER V.
lihe 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 Atkius's ingenious contrivance for his accommodation.. *............*........- 35G

CHAPTER VI.
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 theim
-Distribution of the Stores 1 brought with me-The Priest I saved at Sea solemnizes the Marriages of the
Sailors and Female Indians, who had hitherto lived together as Man and Wife.- .................. 368

CHAPTER VII.
Sincere and worthy character of the Priest--Dialogue with Will Atkins and myself-Conversation betwixt
Atkins and his Indian Wife on the subjectof Religion-Hler Baptism-Settlement of the Commonwealth. :ili

CIIAPTER VIII.
[ entertain the prospect of converting the Indians-Amiable character of the Young Woman we saved in a
famished state at Sea-Iler own relation of her sufferings from hunger-Sail from the Islaud for the Bra-
zils-Encounter and rout a whole fleet of Savages-Death of Friday-Arrival at Brazil............. 409

CHAPTER IX.
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-Arrival at Madagascar-Dreadful Os
curre cesa there.- ..***. .... ....................** ........ ................ .................. 420

CHAPTER X.
Difference with m: Nephew on account of the Oruilties practised at Madagascar-Flve men lost on the

CONTENTS. 11

Artaian Shore, off the Gulf of Persia-The Seamen refuse to sail, if I continue on board, in consequence
io which 1 am left on shore-Make a very advantageous trading Voyage in company with an English
Mrcihaut, and purchase a vessel, which, it turns out, the Crew had mutinied and run away with- 435

CHAPTER XI.
Make a trading Voyage in this Ship-Put into the River Cambodia-Am warned of my Danger by a Coun-
try man, in consequence of which we set sail, and are pursued-Great difficulty in making our Escape 446

CHAPTER XII.
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. 453

CHAPTER XIII.
We arrive in China in safety-Dispose of the Ship-Description of the Inhabitanta-Arrive at Pekin, and
find an opportunity of returning to Europe .......*........................................... 466

CHAPTER XIV.
Bet out by the Caravan-Account of the valuable Effects we took with us-Farther description of the In
terior of China-Pass the great Wall-Attacked by Tartars, who are dispersed by the Resolution of a
Soots Merchant-The old Pilot saves my Life-We are again attacked, and defeat the Tartars ....... 479

CHAPTER XV.
Further Account of our Journey-Description of an Idol, which we destroy-Great danger we incur thereby
-Account of our Travels through Muscovy............................*.......*................. 489

CHAPTER XVI.
Conversations with a Russian Grandee-Set out on my Journey Homewards-Harassed by Halmacks on
the Road-Arrival at Archangel-Sail from thence, and arrive safely in England.....*... .......... 505

APPENDIX-Lior AD ADVxTUREB OF ALEXANDER SrELKR........................ ........... 519

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

Daniel De Foe, (Portrait)..................... ......
AInong thll Itreaikers. ................................... 7
Our ll ..................... .................................. 34
ltblillsol Crusoe........ ................................. 3
Cruse nd Bob aboard Ship .......................... 41
Th Storm ............................................... .. 44
Attack of the Sallee Rover............................ 49
( u-iii ao i SIve ........ .................................... 50
ruloe Loadlinlg his iRaft ............................... 75
C'rusa Writing his Journal ......................... 96
(C'rui Discovers the Barley .......................... 97
('IL ( ill, reading the Bible........................... 112
Crusoe in his Bower .................................... 118
Cruiso-' Cat Family................................... 11
Crueo i Making Baskets................................. 122
Teaching the Parrot to talk........................... 133
Crusoe Making a Coat....................... ............ 135
Crusoe Startled by Hearing a Voice .............. 153
Cnusoe at Dinner........................................... 158
Crusoe Terrified by Seeing a Footprint ............ 164
Crusoe in hisFort.......................................... 186

Crusoe Sleeping in his Boat........................... 193
Friday lumlie ......................................... 204
Crusoe and Friday ...................................... 207
Crusoe ind Friday out Shooting................... ....... 213
Crusoe and Friday on the Hill ........................ 223
Discovering the Mutineers.............................. 240
Cruau very Ill.............................................. 273
Friday and the Bear...................................... 283
Crusoe M arrived ............................................ 291
Crusoo Welcomed by the Spaniard ................. 31
The Spaniard Introducing Crusoe.................. 318
Firing the Hut ............................................ 323
The Vagrants in the Wood............. ............. 325
Fight with the Cannibals.............................. 361
Marrying the Three Couples....................... 390
Priest and Negro Woman. ............... .............. 404
Firing the Town ......................................... 41
Tarring the Blacks.................................. .. 45
Ir.Tm..... .l a Chineab Merchant ............ 41
Cru.ue (r. r ai g the Dese .......................... M

i -"ji.^ ^

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR.

DANIEL FOE (for the DE was prefixed to his name by himself, at a late period
in life) was the son of James Foe, a citizen of London, who carried on the busi-
ness of a butcher, in St. Giles's, Cripplegate; but having "got a good estate by
merchandise, left off his trade" several years before his death. He was "a
wise and grave man," sincerely attached to the Presbyterian form of worship;
and when his pastor, the Rev. Samuel Annesley, LL. D., was ejected from
the parish of Cripplegate by the Act of Uniformity, in 1662, he followed him,
and worshipped at the chapel in Bishopsgate for many years.
His son DANIEL was born in 1661, the year following the Restoration; and
after receiving a competent "house education," and as far as "the free-school
generally goes," about the age of fourteen he was sent to a dissenting academy
at Newington Green, then superintended by the Rev. Charles Morton, who
was afterwards pastor of a church in Charlestown, Mass., and vice-president of
Harvard College. Here he received as much of a collegiate education as could
be obtained by a dissenter at this period, perfecting his acquaintance with lan-
guages, natural philosophy, logic, geography, and history; and, under the
special direction of his tutor, going through a complete course of theology.
In one of his "Reviews," in 1705, he says, "I owe this justice to my ancient
father, still living, and in whose behalf I freely testify, that if I am a block-
head, it was nobody's fault but my own, he having spared nothing in my
education."
It was the intention of his parents that he should become a Presbyterian
minister, and his education was adapted to that profession. The cause of his
abandoning it has been a matter of some speculation, but the reason may pro-
bably be gathered from the peculiar character of the times. He completed
his academical career in the year when Monmouth had just returned from the
slaughter of the Scottish Covenanters at Bothwell-bridge, and when "it was
not safe for a dissenting minister to be seen in the streets of London," the
liberties of England being prostrate before the court and high-church party;
and need we wonder that a person of his ardent temperament should be drawn
aside into the religio-political contests of the times? He himself merely
says, "It was my disaster first to be set apart for, and then to be set apart
from, the honour of that sacred employ."
At the age of twenty-one, he began that career of authorship which he con-
tinued unremittingly for the snace of half a century. His first attempt is a
12

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 13

small quarto volume of thirty-four pages, with the ridiculous title of "Speculnt
Crape-Gownorum; or a Looking-Glass for the Young Academicks, new Foyl'd.
With Reflections on some of the late high-flown Sermons: to which is added,
An Essay towards a Sermon of the newest Fashion. By a Guide to the In-
feriour Clergie. Ridentem dicere Yerum Quis Vetat? London: Printed for
E. Rydal. 1682." It was intended, says De Foe, "as a banter upon Sir
Roger L'Estrange's Guide to the Inferior Clergy," and seems to have produced
a much greater effect than the nature of the performance warranted. As a
specimen, we will select a passage from the "Essay towards a Sermon of the
newest Fashion." "Were I now to preach before a great magistrate that had
the power in his hands, I would say,-My Lord, you bear not the sword in
vain. Let them [the dissenters] be fined and imprisoned, nay hanged, my
Lord. Now, if my Lord should say, Do you endeavour to convince them of
their errors by sound doctrine and good example of life. Then would I say,- -
No, my Lord, they will never be convinced by us; for we have not wit nor
learning enough to do it; neither can we take so much pains. 'Tis easier to
talk an hour about state-affairs and make satires against the fanaticks than to
preach convincing and sound doctrine. The fanaticks, therefore, must be con-
futed by bolts and shackles; by fines and imprisonments; by excommunica-
tions and exterminations; and therefore, pray, my Lord, let 'em be scourged
out of the temple; let 'em be whipped out of the nation."
In 1683, he produced "A Treatise against the Turks." The Turks were at
this time threatening the existence of the Austrian empire; and on account
of the persecutions of the Protestants by that power, their irruption was
looked upon with complacency by many of the dissenters in England, and the
design of this work was to counteract that feeling.

In February, 1685, James II. ascended the throne, and immediately mani-
fested his attachment to Popery, and his intention of governing in defiance of
the laws. At first he was supported by the high-church party, and the dis-
senters seeing no prospect of being delivered from the shackles in which for the
last twenty-five years they had been held, prepared to throw off his authority.
In midsummer of this year, accordingly, the kingdom was invaded by the Duke
of Monmouth, a natural son of Charles II., and De Foe joined his standard.
After Monmouth's defeat, he had the good fortune to escape; but in after-
years he looked back upon his connection with this affair with satisfaction.
In 1686, he became an agent for the sale of hosiery, and had his establish-
ment in Freeman's Court, Cornhill, London; and judging it expedient to link
himself more closely with his fellow-citizens, he claimed his freedom by birth,
and was admitted a liveryman of London. In the chamberlain's book his name
is written Daniel Foe.
In the latter part of this reign, the dissenters were courted by the king ana
by the high-church party, who were about to proceed to open hostilities against
each other. In this aspect of affairs De Foe published two pamphlets, in
which he satirizes the altered tone of the churchmen, condemns the power
4 .- -*

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR.

J dispensing with the laws, assumed by King James, and warns the dissenters
against being deceived by a pretended toleration, when his real object was to
frrce a religion prohibited by law upon his subjects.

He who had drawn his sword in the cause of Monmouth was not backward
in the cause of William. On receiving intelligence of his landing, he imme-
diately set out to meet him, and got as far as Henley (thirty-five miles west
of London), which "the Prince of Orange, with the second line of the army,
entered that very afternoon." Being introduced to the Prince, he formed an
attachment to him which endured till the close of his life. At this period he
scems to have been in prosperous circumstances, having a country-house at
Tooting, in Surrey, at the same time that he carried on the hose-agency in
Cornhill. And when the citizens of London invited King William to a sump-
tuous banquet in Guildhall, and formed a procession to conduct him thither,
"among those troopers," says Oldmixon, "was Daniel Foe, at that time a
hosier in Freeman's Yard, Cornhill."
Though not inattentive to the political movements of this period, he was
more particularly occupied in trade, and that in a very extensive way. In
prosecuting his business he visited Spain, Portugal, the Low Countries, and
France; but partly from his own imprudence, the circumstances of the times,
and the knavery of others, he became bankrupt in 1692, and, to avoid incar-
ceration, concealed himself till he could obtain a settlement with -his creditors.
For some time he seems to have lived in concealment at Bristol, but so high a
sense of his honour was entertained by his creditors, that they soon agreed
to a composition, and accepted his personal security for the amount. This
confidence he more than justified, and, in 1705, he tells us, "that with a
numerous family and no help but his own industry, he had forced his way with
undiscouraged diligence through a sea of misfortunes, and reduced his debts,
exclusive of composition, from seventeen thousand to less than five thousand
pounds." In harmony with his own example, in the third volume of his
Review he gives the following advice to others: "Never think yourselves dis-
charged in conscience, though you may be discharged in law. The obligation
of an honest mind can never die. No title of honour, no recorded merit, no
mark of distinction can exceed the lasting appellation, 'an honest man.' He
that lies buried under such an epitaph has more said of him than volumes of
history can contain. The payment of debts, after fair discharges, is the clearest
title to such a character that I know; and how any man can begin again, and
hope for a blessing from Heaven, or favour from man, without such a resolu-
tion, I know not." To the honour of De Foe, it ought also to be mentioned,
that the position in which he was placed forcibly directed his attention to the
law of debtor and creditor, and "in a day when he could be heard," he
directed the attention of the legislature to several very flagrant abuses, which
were at that time remedied, though many of his suggestions are only being
adopted at the present time. (Review, iii. 75.)
During the two years (1692-3) which were occupied in obtaining a settle-

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR 15

ment of his affairs, while in retirement, he was engaged in writing his
'Essay upon Projects," the first of his works which has obtained a permanent
place in our literature. The projects are of a varied character, embracing the
subject of banks, road-making, bankruptcy, friendly societies, savings' banks,
asylums for the insane, education, profane swearing, military academies, sea-
men's register, education of females, &c. His projects are marked by good
sense, and much of the work is written in a very pleasing and forcible style.
Many of his proposals have since been tested by experience, and from a copy
of his works, which Dr. Franklin found in his father's library, he says, "I
might receive some impressions that have since influenced the principal events
of my life." It was not published till 1697.
"Misfortunes in business having unhinged me from matters of trade," says
De Foe, "it was about the year 1694 when I was invited by some merchants,
with whom I had corresponded abroad, and some also at home, to settle at
Cadiz, in Spain; and that with the offers of very good commissions. But
Providence, which had other work for me to do, placed a secret aversion in my
mind to quitting England upon any account, and made me refuse the best
offers of that kind. Sometime after this, I was, without the least appli-
cation of mine, and being then seventy miles from London, sent for to be
accountant to the commissioners of the glass duty, in which service I continued
to the determination of the commission," 1699.
About this time he became secretary to the pantile works at Tilbury, in
Essex, which works, he says, in his Review for March, 1705, "before violence,
injury, and barbarous treatment demolished him and his undertaking, employed
a hundred poor people in making pantiles in England, a manufacture always
bought'in Holland: and thus he pursued this principle with his utmost zeal
for the good of England: and those gentlemen who so eagerly prosecuted him
for saying what all the world since owns to be true, and which he has since a
hundred times offered to prove, were particularly serviceable to the nation, in
turning that hundred of poor people and their families a-begging for work,
besides three thousand pounds damage to the author of this, which he has paid
for this little experience."
From 1697 to 1701 he entered warmly into the discussion of political mat-
ters then agitated, and twelve pamphlets are extant written in this period, but
ip 1701 he produced "The True-Born Englishman," in rhyme, a work which
added much to his celebrity. He thus accounts for the origin of the poem.
"During this time, there came out a vile abhorred pamphlet, in very ill verse,
written by one Mr. Tutchin, and called 'The Foreigners;' in which the author
fell personally upon the king himself, and then upon the Dutch nation; and after
having reproached his majesty with crimes that his worst enemies could not
think of without horror, he sums up all in the odious name of Foreigner.
This filled me with a kind of rage against the book, anPgave birth to a trifle
which I never could hope should have met with so general an acceptation -is it
did." As a specimen, a few lines upon the folly of indulging in the pride of
ancestry may be given:

1G MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR.

These are the heroes that despise the Dutch,
And rail at new-come foreigneil so much;
Forgetting that themselves are all derived
From the most scoundrel race that ever lived;
A horrid crowd of rambling thieves and drones,
Who ransack'd kingdoms and dispeopled towns
The Pict and painted Briton, treach'rous Scot,
By hunger, theft, and rapine hither brought;
Norwegian pirates, buccaneering Danes,
Whose red-hair'd offspring everywhere remains;
Who, join'd with Norman-French compound the breed,
From whence your True-Born Englishmen proceed.
And let by length of time, it be pretended
The climate may the modern race have mended,
Wise Providence, to keep us where we are,
Mixes us daily with exceeding care."
The first edition was comprised in sixty pages, quarto; and such was 'ts
popularity, that in four years the author had printed nine editions, the copies
of which he sold at a shilling each, while lie calculated that not less than eigLty
ts'usand copies of pirated editions, ,old at from sixpence to a penny, were
disposed of in the streets of London. The loss he sustained by this conduct
must have been considerable. He tells us, that "had he been allowed to enjoy
the profit of his own labour, he had gained above a thousand pounds." This
poem having met the eye of King William, inspired him with the desire to
become acquainted with the author; he was accordingly presented to him,
and was ever after cordially received by him and his consort, and employed in
various secret services.
In his "Appeal to Honour and Justice," in 1715, he says, "How this poem
was the occasion of my being known to his majesty; how I was afterwards
received by him; how employed ; and how, above my capacity of deserving,
rewarded, is no part of the present case, and it is only mentioned here, as I
take all occasions to do, for the expressing the honour I ever preserved for the
immortal and glorious memory of that greatest and best of princes, and whom
it was my honour and advantage to call master as well as sovereign; whose
goodness to me I never forgot, neither can forget; and whose memory I
never patiently heard abused, nor ever can do so; and who, had he lived,
would never have suffered me to be treated as I have been in the world."
Between the publication of "The True-Born Englishman" and the death .of
his patron, in March 1702, he published ten pamphlets, in one of which,
"Reasons against a War with France," notwithstanding his passionate attach-
ment to William, he ventured, on patriotic grounds, to oppose the views of the
court.

The life and labours of De Foe are so interwoven with the political history of
his country, that the most satisfactory way of considering his life is by dividing
it into periods, commensurate with the reigns in which he flourished. We
have now arrived at the accession of Queen Anne. She had been educated
by Compton bishop of London, and immediately threw all the influence of the

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. IT

court into the tory or high-church party. The heat and fury of the clergy
went to that height (says De Foe) that even it became ludicrous, and attended
with all the little excesses which a person elevated beyond the government of
himself by some sudden joy is usually subject to. And, as a known author
remarks, that upon the restoration of King Charles II., the excesses and trans-
ports of the clergy and people ran out into revels, may-poles, and all manner
of extravagancies; so at this time, there were more may-poles set up in one
year in England than had been in twenty years before. Ballads for the church
was another expression of their zeal, wherein generally the chorus or burden
of the song was, 'Down with the Presbyterians.' And to such a height were
btings brought, that the dissenters began to be insulted in every place; their
meeting-houses and assemblies assaulted by the mobs; and even their ministers
and preachers were scarce admitted to pass the streets." Pamphlets inveigh-
ing against the dissenters were hawked about the streets, and the pulpits
especially resounded with the most violent tirades, and the lenity of the queen
in extending to them toleration was unscrupulously condemned. Familiar with
the sentiments and language of the high-church party, De Foe collected them
into a three-sheet pamphlet, entitled "The Shortest Way with the Dissenters;
)r, Proposals for the Establishment of the Church."
"When the book first appeared in the world," says he, "and before those
high-flown gentlemen knew its author; whilst the piece in its outward figure
looked so natural, and was so like a brat of their own begetting, that, like two
apples, they could not know them asunder, the author's true design in the
writing it had its immediate effect. The gentlemen of the high-church imme-
diately fell in with the project. Nothing could have been more grateful to
them than arguments to prove the necessity of ruining the dissenters, and
remooving those obstructions to the church's glory out of the way. We have
innumerable testimonies of the pleasure with which the party embraced the
proposal of sending all the dissenting ministers to the gallows and the galleys;
of having all their meeting-houses demolished; and being let loose upon the
people to plunder and destroy them. The soberer churchmen, whose princi-
ples were founded on charity, and who had their eye upon the laws and con-
stitution of their country, as that to which their own liberties were annexed,
though they still believed the book to be written by a high-churchman, yet
openly exclaimed against the proposal, condemned the warmth that appeared
in the clergy against their brethren, and openly professed that such a man as
Sacheverell and his brethren would blow up the foundations of the church.
But either side had scarce time to discover their sentiments, when the book
appeared to have been written by a dissenter; that it was designed in derision
of the standard held up by Sacheverell and others; that it was a gire up.on
the fury of the churchmen, and a plot to make the rest discover elves.
Nothing was more strange than to see the effect upon the whole nation which
this little book, a contemptible pamphlet of but three sheets of paper, had,
and in so short a time too. The most forward, hot and furious, as well among
the clergy as others, blushed when they reflected how far they had applauded
2

18 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR.

the book; raged that such an abuse should be put upon the church; and as
they were obliged to damn the book, so they were strangely hampered between
the doing so, and pursuing their rage at the dissenters. The greater part, the
better to qualify themselves to condemn the author, came earnestly in to con-
demn the principle; for it was impossible to do one without the other. They
laboured incessantly, both in print and in pulpit, to prove that this was a hor-
rible slander upon the church. But this still answered the author's end the
more; for they could never clear the church of the slander, without openly
condemning the practice; nor could they possibly condemn tae practice, with-
out censuring those clergymen who had gone such a length already as to say
the same thing in print. Nor could all their rage at the author of that book
contribute any thing to clear them, but still made the better side the worse.
It was plain they had owned the doctrine, had preached up the necessity of
expelling and rooting out the dissenters in their sermons and printed pamph-
lets; that it was evident they had applauded the book itself, till they knew the
author; and there was no other way to prevent the odium falling on the whole
body of the Church of England, but by giving up the authors of tlese mad
principles, and openly professing moderate principles themselves.
"Some people have blamed the author of 'The Shortest Way,' for that he
did not quote either in the margin, or otherwise, the sermon of Sacheverell
aforesaid, or such other authors from whom his notions were drawn, which
would have justified him in what he had suggested. But these men do not
see the design of the book at all, or the effect it had on the people it pointed
at. It is true, this had prevented the fate of the man, but it had, at the same
time, taken off the edge of the book; and that which now cut the throat of a
whole party, would not then have given the least wound. The case the book
pointed at, was to speak in the fist person of the party, and then, thereby,
nit only speak their language, but make them acknowledge it to be theirs;
which they did so openly, that it confounded all their attempts afterwards to
deny it, and to call it a scandal thrown upon them by another."
An attentive examination of the work might have excited the suspicion of
the arguments being ironical, but the temper of parties was too much excited
to consider calmly. Even by his dissenting brethren it was believed to be a
production of the high-church party; and the wit that practised the deception
had some difficulty in being forgiven. But the anger of the high-church men,
when they discovered the author, was unbounded, and as the party was in power,
it was resolved to institute a state prosecution against him. To further this
prosecution, a formal complaint was made in the House of Commons against
the author, and upon some of the obnoxious passages being read, it was resolved,
that the book, being full of false and scandalous reflections on this parlia-
ment, be burnt by the hands of the common hangman, to-morrow, in New
Palace Yard." A proclamation offering a reward of 501. was at the same time
offered for the discovery of the author, and advertised in the London Gazette
for January 10, 1702-3. For the sake of the description of his person it is
here given

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 19

"Whereas, Daniel De Foe, alias De Fooe, is charged with writing a scanda-
lnus and seditious pamphlet, entitled 'The Shortest Way with the Dissenters.'
He is a middle-sized, spare man, about forty years old, of a brown complexion,
and dark-brown coloured hair, but wears a wig; a hooked nose, a sharp chin,
gray eyes, and a large mole near his mouth: was born in London, and for
many years was a hose-factor in Freeman's Yard, Cornhill; and now is owner
of the brick and pantile works near Tilbury Fort, in Essex: whoever shall dis-
cover the said Daniel De Foe to one of her majesty's justices of the peace, so
that he may be apprehended, shall have a reward of 501. which her majesty has
ordered immediately to be paid upon such discovery."
The printer and bookseller being now taken into custody, to shield them
from prosecution, De Foe came forth from his retreat, and gave himself up to
the government. He was indicted at the Old Bailey sessions, Feb. 24, 1703, and
stood his trial in July following. Diffident of success, if he should have en-
tered upon his defence, his prosecutors tampered with his counsel, who held
out to him hopes of pardon, and advised him to plead guilty and throw himself
upon the mercy of the queen. Much to his regret afterwards, he complied
with the advice, and received a sentence infamous for its severity, while the
avenues to royal mercy for two years were vigilantly shut against him. He
was sentenced to pay a fine of 200 marks to the queen; stand three times in
the pillory; be imprisoned during the queen's pleasure; and find sureties for
his good behaviour for seven years.
On the 29th of July he stood in the pillory before the Royal Exchange, in
Cornhill; on the 30th near the Conduit in Cheapside; and on the 31st at
Temple Bar. But to his conduct men could attribute no guilt, and this
mark of degradation and infamy was deprived of all its sting. He was con-
ducted to the pillory by thousands, as to a chair of state; the pillory itself was
hung with garlands; and he himself tells that those who were expected to
treat him ill, on the contrary pitied him, and wished those who set him there to
he placed in his room, and expressed their affections by loud shouts and acclama-
tions, when he was taken down." All the disgrace of the punishment rebound-
ed upon his persecutors; and while his enemies were preparing the instrument
for his disgrace, he was composing a hymn of triumph. On the very day on
which he appeared there, he published his Hymn to the Pillory," in which,
with the keenest satire, he set their enmity at defiance.
"Thou art no shame to truth and honesty,
Nor is the character of such defaced by thee,
Who suffers by oppressive injury.
Shame, like the exhalations of the sun,
Falls back where first the motion was begun:
And he who for no crime shall on thy brows appear,
Bears less reproach than they who placed him there."
And concludes by invoking the pillory to speak, and
"Tell them the men who placed him hero
Are scandals to the times,
Are at a loss to find his guilt,
And cutn' commit hia crimes.'

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR

Before his imprisonment De Foe kept his carriage, and lived in an easy,
comfortable style; but being no longer able to attend to the pantile works, from
which he derived his support, they were given up, the capital invested in them
lost, and himself and a wife and six children thrown for their support upon
the products of his pen. Thus burdened, and made the companion of crimi-
nals, his fortitude did not forsake him: conscious of his integrity, and of the
righteousness of the cause for which he suffered, he cast himself upon the wis-
domi and goodness of thait Providence which had hitherto sustained him, and
rising superior to disgrace felt and said,
Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage ;
ilindsi innlrot t and quiet take
That for a hlermitiae."-Hlymn to th) e Pilory
There can be little doubt that lie associated E i. .., i, with the prisoners,
and communicated those moral and religious instructions which he was so well
fitted to give. It is ;alo probable that many of the desperate characters of his
novels were suggested by the companions lie had here; and that the prison be-
came a school of discipline, in which his mind was familiarized to degradation
and distress. But hitherto his writings had been devoted to politics, or those
plans by which the external condition of society might be ameliorated, and he
did not allow his imlprisonmeint to divert hlii from his course. Twenty-two
pamphlets were written by him while in prison ; and a pirated edition of his
works havin g been published, he gave the world "A True Collection of the
Writings of the Author of 'The True-Born Englishman,' corrected by him-
self." It contains twenty-two pieces, and in sonic copies there is the following
advertisement:-
SWhereas there is a spurious collection of the writings of 3Ir. De Foe, author
of 'The True-Born Englishman,' which contain several things not writ by the
said author, and those that are full of errors, mistakes, and omissions, which
invert the nsnse and design of the author, This is to give notice that the gen-
uine collection, price six shillings, is corrected by himself, with additions
never before printed, hath the author's picture before it, curiously engraved
on copper by Mr. Vaudergucht; and contains more than double the number
of tracts inserted in the said spurious collection."
This portrait was from a painting by Taverner, and represents the author in
such a dress as we may suppose he wore when he attended the levees of Wil-
liam and Mary. It is generally admitted to be the best likeness extant, and a
beautiful copy of it, engraved on wood by Clarkson, is prefixed to this edition.
The most important of the works which he projected in Newgate was "The
Review," the first number of which was issued on Saturday, February 19,
1704, and continued weekly till the ninth number, when it was published twice
a week, on the Tuesdays and Saturdays. It consisted at first of eight quarto
pages, and was sold at the low price of one penny, but with the fifth num-
ber it was reduced to half a sheet, "the publishers of this paper honestly
declaring that while they make it a whole sheet they get nothing by it;

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 21

and though the author is free to give his labours for God's sake, they don't
find it for their convenience to give their paper and print away." The nine
quarto volumes of this work were solely written by himself, and continued till
May, 1713, when it was finally abandoned. It was begun when its author was
in Newgate, and terminated when he was imprisoned again, under a shameful
prosecution. It would be impossible in our limits to convey any idea of the
variety of the contents of this work. The general tendency and design of the
articles were to subdue the prejudices of his countrymen, and give them juster
ideas of foreigners and foreign nations than they generally entertained-to give
information concerning trade, politics, and the general occurrences of the week
-to put down immoral practices, such as duelling and the slave-trade-with
the conversation of a Scandal Club," upon matters of all kinds; and the
most thankless of all undertakings, to correct the blunders of the contempo-
rary press. At the close of the first year, he proposed to discontinue it; but
several who were interested in it, being desirous to have it continued, he con-
sented to oblige them if they would provide for the charges of the press,
"which he was sorry he was not in a condition to oblige them with also."
The Review was doubtless the most popular periodical of the time, and with
the fifth volume it began to be reprinted in Edinburgh; but the author seems
never to have received much pecuniary benefit from it, and the labour he be-
stowed upon it must be solely attributed to his zeal for the public welfare. In
the seventh volume, he says: "Though I have the misfortune to amass infinite
enemies, and not at all to oblige even the men I serve, yet I defy the world to
prove I have directly or indirectly gained or received a single shilling, or the
value of it, by the sale of this paper for now almost four years; and honest
Mr. Morphew is able to detect me, if I speak false."
The intemperate conduct of the Tory party, in 1704, brought on a period of
reaction. "The queen," says De Foe, "though willing to favour the high-
church party, did not thereby design the ruin of those she did not employ, was
soon alarmed at their wild conduct, and turned them out, adhering to the
moderate counsels of those who better understood or more faithfully pursued
her majesty's and the country's interest." A new ministry was formed, in
which Lord Godolphin, the Duke of Marlborough, and Mr. Harley were lead-
ing members; the latter of whom, sensible of the influence so popular a writer
as De Foe would exert, opened a negotiation with him, immediately upon
coming into office. In his "Appeal to Honour and Justice," it is thus
noticed:-
"While I lay friendless and distressed in the prison of Newgate, my family
ruined, and myself without hope of deliverance, a message was brought me
fiom a person of honour [Mr. Harley], who, till that time, I had never had
the least acquaintance with, or knowledge of, other than by fame, or by sight, ,
as we know men of quality by seeing them on public occasions. I gave no
present answer to the person who brought it, having not duly weighed the
import of the message. The message was by word of mouth thus:-'Pray,
ask that gentleman what I can do for him?' But in return to this kind and

22 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR.

generous message, I immediately took my pen and ink, and wrote the story
of the blind man in the Gospel, who followed our Saviour, and to whom our
blessed Lord put the question, 'What wilt thou that I should do unto thee?'
Who, as if he had made it strange that such a question should be asked, or as
if he had said that I am blind, and yet ask me what thou shalt do for me?
IMy answer is plain in my misery, 'Lord, that I may receive my sight?'
"I needed not to make the application. And from this time, although I
lay four months in prison after this, and heard no more of it, yet from this
time, as I learned afterwards, this noble person nmade it his business to have
my case represented to her majesty, and methods taken for my deliverance.
I mention this part, because I am no more to forget the obligation upon me to
the queen, than to my first benefactor.
"When her majesty came to have the truth of the case laid before her, I
soon felt the effects of her royal goodness and compassion. And first, her
majesty declared, that she left all that matter to a certain person [the Earl of
Nottingham], and did not think lie would have used me in such a iiinner.
Probably these words may seem imaginary to some, and the speaking them to
be of no value, and so they would have been, had they not been followed with
further and more convincing proofs of what they imported, which were these,
that her majesty was pleased particularly to inquire into my circumstances and
family, and by my Lord-treasurer Godolphin to send a considerable supply to
my wife and family, and to send to me the prison-money to pay my fine and
the expenses of my discharge.
"Being delivered from the distress I was in, her majesty, who was not satis-
fied to do me good by a single act of her bounty, had the goodness to think
of taking me into her service, and I had the honour to be employed in several
honourable, though secret services, by the interposition of miy first benefactor,
who then appeared as a member in the public administration."
Upon his release, in August, 1704, lie retired to Bury St. Edmunds, "a town
famed for its pleasant situation and wholesome air, the Montpellier of Suffolk,
and perhaps of England; famous also for the number of gentry who reside in
the vicinity, and for the polite and agreeable conversation of the company
resorting there."
De Foe was no sooner at liberty than it was rumored that he had effected
an escape, and that warrants were issued for his apprehension; a mischievous
hoax was got up to annoy him; "his life threatened by bullying letters; his
creditors roused to a general prosecution of him for debts, though under former
trl aties and agreements, as if lie was more able to discharge them now, reduced
by a known disaster, and ruined by a public storm, than before, when in pros-
perous circumstances, lie was clearing himself of everybody, and all waited with
patience, being themselves satisfied ; now his morals were assaulted by impo-
tent and groundless slanders; his principles cried down by envious friends as
well as malicious enemies. His endeavours for the public advantage prove
none to himself; his family and fortunes sink under his constant attempts for
the country's welfare.-I have been told that 'tis no wonder all the threaten-

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 23

ings, sham actions, and malicious prosecutions I speak of, are practised upon
me, since I am pushing at a party daily in lampoons, ballads, and clandestine
scandals; and that I must expect no other till I lay down this paper and all
other scribbles of such a nature. . I have frequently answered this, as
to all the papers cried about in my name, assuring the world they have none
of them been wrote by me. . As to laying down the pen, or discontinuing
the subject I am upon, though I claim a privilege to be judge when I ought
to go backward or forward, yet to answer the proposal as to a cessation of pen
and ink debates, I shall make them a fair offer, which he that gives himself
the trouble to move me in it may make use of to the other party. Whenever
he will demonstrate they are inclined to peace, whenever the high-church party
will cease tacking of bills, invading the toleration, raising ecclesiastical alarms
against the dissenters and low-church; will cease preaching up division, perse-
cution, and ruin of their protestant brethren; when all the crowd of high-
church advocates, Relu'arsers, Observers, Reflectors, Whippers, Drivers [names
of periodicals and signatures of writers of that period] will declare a truce;-
when these conditions may be observed I fairly promise to be so far a contri-
butor to the public peace, as to lay this [the Review] down, and turn the paper
to the innocent discourses of trade and the matters of history, first proposed.
Indeed, I must do so of course; for the peace will be then made, the end
answered, and consequently the argument useless."
Such was De Foe's popularity at this time, that he had to warn the public
that printers, to make their pamphlets sell, affixed his name to things he "had
no concern in, crying them about the streets as mine; nay, and at last are come
to that height of injury as to print my name to every scandalous trifle ..
I entreat my friends once for all, that whenever they meet with a penny or half-
penny paper, sold or cried about in the streets, they would conclude them not
mine. I never write penny papers, this excepted [the Review], nor ever shall,
unless my name is publicly set to them."
In two years of comparative retirement, during a portion of which he
was compelled entirely to cease from labour on account of severe affliction,
upwards of thirty very considerable works proceeded from his pen, in addition
to the Review; now issued three tnmes a week He also published the second
volume of his collected writings. It would be impossible to give even the
title-pages of these works here, but two of the opinions, in his "Giving Alms
no Charity," are so pointed that we cannot avoid quoting them.
On vagrancy he says:-"No man that has limbs and his senses need beg;
and those that have not ought to be put in a condition not to want it, so that
begging is a mere scandal in the general. In the able, 'tis a scandal upon their
industry; and in the impotent, 'tis a scandal upon the country."
His theory of population differs widely from the popular Malthusian theory
of the English political economists of the present day, and both in language
and sentiment corresponds with the principles so ably expounded by our fellow.
citizen, Henry C. Carey. "I cannot but note that the glory, the strength, the
riches, the trade and all that is valuable in a nation as to its figure in the

24 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR.

world depends upon the number of its people, be they never so mean or poor.
The consumption of manufactures increases the manufacturers; the number
of manufacturers increases the consumption; provisions are consumed to feed
them, land improved, and more hands employed to furnish provisions. All the
wealth of the nation, and all the trade, is produced by numbers of people."
In this period also Ie gave the first specimen of those inventive powers which
lie exercised so successfully at a later period of life, in "A True Relation of
the Apparition of one Mrs. Veal, the next day after her death, to one Mrs.
Bargrave, at Canterbury, the 8th of September, 1705: which Apparition
recoiImmends the Perusal of Drelineourt's Book of Consolationis against the
Fear of Death." Being in company with the publisher of Dreliincnurt, lwho
complained of the dulnhss of the sale A.f the book, De F'oe asked if the author
had blended aught of the supernatural in his iwork ? The bookseller answered
in the negative. De Foe replied, "If you wish iour book to sell, I will put you
in the way of it," and immediately set about composing the story of the Iappa-
rition. The success was complete. It soon passed through forty editions; and
the recommendation of the ghost has been attended to by half the families in
England.
Sir Walter Scott, in illustrating the peculiar powers of De Foe in investing
fiction with all the tokens of reality, has entered into a particular analysis of
this story; and concludes, "that De Foe has put in force within those few
pages, peculiar specimens of his art of reicom ending the mo)st ioml)robable
narrative by his specious and serious mode of telling it. Whoever will read
it as told by De Foe himself, will agree that could the thing have happened in
reality, so it would have been told. In short, the whole is so distinctly cir-
cumstantial, that were it not for the impossibility, or extreme improbability at
least, of such an occurreIncte, te ie ll t bt sU rt the evidence would t ut supp tory."
In 1705, De Foe "had the honour to be employed in several honourable
though secret services, iln which he had run as much risk of his life as a gre
nadier upon the counterscarp," the particulars of whclh have not transpired,
but there is sufficient evidence that he executed them to the satisfaction of
Mr. Harley; and he received "an appointmentt" probably a sinecure one, for
his services. IHe was absent from England about two months.
From 1706 to 1711, the attention of De Foe was principally directed to the
affairs of Scotland. Exasperated by the massacre at Glencoe, and by the
manner in which the English government had treated their colony on the
Isthmus of Darien, the Scottish parliament threatened to dissent from England
in the matt r of the succession, unless there should be a free trade between the
two countries, lad their affairs more thoroughlyy secured from English influence.
The English ministers then saw that it would be necessary to incorporate that
country with England, to prevent the Pretender from gaining the Scottish
crown; and exerted themselves so effectually in the Scottish parliament, that
an act was passed enabling the queen to nominate commissioners for the arrange-
ment of a union. Thirty coulinissi)niers were accordingly nominated on each
side; and though, with cew exceptic:as, they were so friendly to the successor

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 25

of the Hanoverian family and to the measures of the court, that no opposition
was expected from them; yet such was the unpopularity of the act, that it
was thought unsafe to venture upon it without using some means tc soften the
national prejudices. The paltry trade that Scotland even at this time carried
on was beheld by Englishmen with envy; they were annoyed at the wealth
of many of the Scotsmen who were settled among them, and felt it as so much
taken from themselves, instead of profiting by the example of industry, per-
severance, and economy they had set them; and they spurned at union with a
beggarly country which could only burden them with its support. In Scotland
the opposition to the union was almost universal: they beheld in it the extine-
tion of their nation; and that peacefully if not treacherously accomplished
which England had for centuries vainly attempted to do by force. Especially
they feared for the safety of that church which they had so fondly cherished,
and which had tended so strongly to mould the national character. In these
circumstances IIarley cast his eye upon De Foe, as one eminently qualified and
able to forward the measure. In England he was one of the most popular
writers : and being a Presbyterian and opposed to the prelatic party, he calcu-
lated that he would be favourably received in Scotland.
The idea was familiar to De Foe-he himself had suggested it to King
William; one whole Review was devoted to the inculcation of peace and unity,
probably before the minister had spoken to him on the subject. He imme-
diately prepared to set out for Scotland, and arrived at Edinburgh in the
beginning of October, 1706, a few days before the articles of union were sub-
mitted to the Scottish parliament. Though without any official designation,
yet as the friend and adviser of the ministers, he was received by the commis-
sioners as one invested with plenipotentiary power. His business-habits enabled
him to render to them essential service, in making those calculations on which
the imposts in future should be levied; and in his "History of the Union"
he n(ters into many curious particulars of these matters, and of the dangers
to which he and the commissioners were exposed from the infuriated mob.
But finding that there was nothing to fear from "the treaters within doors, I
thought it my duty," says he, "to do my part without doors; and I knew no
part I could act in my sphere, so useful and proper, as to attempt to remove the
national prejudices, which both people, by the casualty of time and the errors
of parties, had too eagerly taken up, and were adhered to with too great tenacity,,
To this purpose I wrote two Essays against National Prejudices in England, ': .;4
while the treaty was in agitation there; and four more in Scotland, while it
was debating in the parliament there."
With the same object, in December, 1706, he published, in Edinburgh,
"Caledonia, a poem in honour of Scotland and the Scots nation." In it he
also invites the Scotch to an increased attention to the improvement of the agri-
culture and commerce of tlhe country. During the sixteen months in which he
resided in Scotland, he made several excursions throughout the country, and" '
his observations upon what he saw there evince great sagacity. At this time
Scotland contained scarcely a million of inhabitants, and even these were

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR

barely able to obtain a precarious existence. The best of the land was thought
capable of producing oats and barley only; and so late wore the seasons,
that the poor husbandman had often to gather his scanty harvest amid the
snow. Famines were frequent, when the poor were forced to live on noxious
roots, and thousands of them died of hunger. But De Foe foresaw its future
greatness, and held out prospects of plenty. "The poverty of Scotland, and
the fruitfulness of England, or rather the difference between them," said he,
"is owing not to mere difference of climate, or the nature of the soil; but to
the errors of time and their different constitutions.-Liberty and trade have
made tihe one rich, and tyranny the other poor."
The union between the two countries was completed in May 1, 1707, but De
Foe continued in Scotland till January, 1708. During his absence, the Review
appeared regularly, and lie assures the reader that, "though it is none of the
easiest things in tle world to write a paper to come out three times a week,
and perhaps liable to more censure and ill-usage than other papers; and at the
same time, to reside for sixteen inonths together, at almost four hundred miles
distance from London, and sometimes more," yet all the articles "are written
by 1. F." On his return to London, lie endeavoured to obtain a settlement
with his creditors; and after waiting on Mr. llarley and Lord Godolphin, im-
mediately returned to Scotland, as we lind him at Edinburgh in April.
In the begiining of this year, the intrigues which Mr. larley had for some
time carried on through Mrs. Mashain against his colleagues, the Duke of
Marlborough and Lord Godolphin, were discovered ; and they having insisted
upon the queen's removing hlim fronI ollice, in February lie tendered his resig-
nation. On learning Mr. lHarley's retirement, De Foe returned to London,
with the intention of tendering his resignation and uniting his fate with him
whom he always designated his benefactor.
When, upon that fatal breach," says lie, the secretary of state [Ilarley]
was dismissed from the service, 1 looked upon myself as lost: it being a gene-
ral rule in such eases, when a great ollicer falls, that all who came in by his
interest fall with him ; and resolving never to abandon the fortunes of the
man to whom I owed so much of my own, I quitted the usual applications
which I had made to my lord-treasurer.
"But my generous benefactor, when lie understood it, frankly told me that
I should by no means do so; For,' said lie, in the most engaging terms,
my lord-treusurer will employ you in nothing but what is for the public ser-
vice, and agreeably to your own sentiments of things; and besides, it is the
queen you are serving, who has been very good to you. Pray, apply yourself
as you used to do; I shall not take it ill from you in the least.'
"Upon this, 1 went to wait on my lord-treasurer [Godolphin], who received
me with great freedom, and told me, smiling, he had not seen me a long while.
I told his lordship very frankly the occasion-that the unhappy breach that
had fallen out made me doubtful whether I should be acceptable to his lord-
ship. That I knew it was usual when great persons fall, that all who were in
their int -est fell with them. That his lordship knew the obligations I was

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. T9

under, and that I could not but fear my interest in his lordship was lessened
on that account. 'Not at all, Mr. De Foe,' replied his lordship, 'I always
think a man honest till I find to the contrary.'
Upon this, I attended his lordship as usual; and being resolved to remove
all possible ground of suspicion that I kept any secret correspondence, I never
visited, or wrote to, or any way corresponded with my principal benefactor for
above three years; which he so well knew the reason of, and so well approved
that punctual behaviour in me, that he never took it ill from me at all.
In consequence of this reception, my Lord Godolphin had the goodness not
only to introduce nm for the second time to her majesty, and to the honour of
kissing her hand, but obtained for nm the continuance of an appointment which
her majesty had been pleased to make me, in consideration of a former special
service I had done, and in which I had run as much risk of my life as a gren-
adier upon the counterscarp; and which appointment, however, was first ob-
tained fir nme at tlhe intercession of my said first benefactor, and is all owing
to that intercession and her majesty's bounty. Upon this second introduction,
her mii:ajsty was pleased to tell me, with a goodness peculiar to herself, that
shle had such satisfaction in my former services, that she had appointed me for
another affair, which was something nice, and that my lord-treasurer should tell
mn the rest.; and so I withdrew.
"The next day, his lordship having commanded me to attend, told me that
hi miuist send lme to Scotland, and gave me but three days to prepare myself.
Accordingly, I went to Scotland, where neither my business, nor the manner
of mly discharging it, is material to this tract; nor will it be ever any part of
my character that I reveal what shIould be concealed. And yet, my errand was
such as was far from being unfit for a sovereign to direct, or an honest man to
perform ; and the service I did upon that occasion, as it is not unknown to the
greatest man now in the nation under the king and the prince, so, I dare say,
his grace was never displeased with the part I had in it, and I hope will not
forget it."--A Appetil to HIfiioti~ r nttd Justice, pp. 14-16, Oxford ed.
As De Foe has not revealed what this "something nice" was, it may be
fruitless to conjecture, but we find that immediately on his arrival in Edin-
burgh lie visited Lord Belhaven, who was at this time a prisoner in the castle
there ; and from his conversation with that nobleman, and the assurances he
gave himi of a favourable reception by her majesty when he should arrive at
Loindoln, it is plain that to comfort him under the wanton insult now committed
uIpon his character and person was one of the objects of his mission.
As soon as the union was completed, De Foe intimated his intention of giving
an account of the transaction, but it was delayed till 1709, when it was printed
at, Edinburgh. This edition of "The History of the Union," exclusive of
preliminary matter, contains 686 pages folio, and its subscription price in
sheets, was 20s. It is dedicated to the queen and the Duke of Queensbury,
secretary of state for Scotland. Mr. Chalmers, in his "Life of Do Foe," thus-
characterizes the work:-
"The minuteness with which %e describes what he saw and heard on the

28 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR.

turbulent stage, where he acted a conspicuous part, is extremely interesting to
us, who wish to know what actually passed, however this circumstantiality may
have disgusted contemporaneous readers. History is chiefly valuable as it
transmits a faithful copy of the manners and sentiments of every age. This
narrative of De Foe is a drama, in which he introduces the highest peers and
the lowest peasants, speaking and acting, according as they were each actuated
by their characteristic passions; and while the man of taste is amused by his
manner, the mian of business may draw instruction from the documents, which
are appended to the end, and interspersed in every page. This publication
had alone preserved his name, had his Crusoe pleased us less."-P. 51.
In 1710, De Foe resided at Stoke-Newington, and seems to have been in
comfortable circumstances. In November he again made an excursion to Scot-
land ; and upon the 1st of February, the town-council of Edinburgh, grateful
for the services he had formerly rendered them, empowered him to publish the
Edinburgh Courant, and prohibited any other person to print news under the
nanic of that paper. He relinquished the publication after printing forty-five
numbers, and in the month of March returned to London.
"I come now historically," says De Foe, "to the point of time when my
Lord Godolplin was dismissed from his employment, and the late unhappy di-
vision broke outt at court. I waited on my lord the day he was displaced, and
humbly asked his lordship's direction what course I should take? His lord-
ship's answer was, That he had the same good-will to assist me, but not the
same power; that I was the queen's servant, and that all he had done for me
was by her majesty's special and particular direction ; and that whoever should
succeed him, it was not material to me ; lie supposed I should be employed in
nothing relating to the present differences. My business was to wait till I saw
things settled, and then apply myself to the ministers of state, to receive her
majesty's commands from them.'
It occurred to meo immediately, as a principle for my conduct, that it was
not material to mne what ministers her majesty wais pleased to employ; my
duty was to go along with every ministry, so far as they did not break in upon
the constitution, and the laws and liberties of my country; my part being
only the duty of a subject, viz. to submit to all lawful commands, and to enter
into no service which was not justifiable by the laws; to all which I have ex-
actly obliged myself.
"By this, I was providentially cast back upon my original benefactor, who,
according to his wanted goodness, was pleased to lay my case before her ma-
jesty; and thereby I preserved my interest in her majesty's favour, but with-
out any engagement of service."
It is impossible in this sketch to give any idea of the eighty political works
that proceeded from his pen, from his first journey into Scotland till the
death of Queen Anne, which may be considered synchronous with the termina-
tion of his own political career. The reader is referred to Wilson's Life and
Times of De Foe, from which the materials of this memoir are chiefly selected,
for a synopsis of them. Those only that are necessary to complete the chain

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 2

of the narrative can be noticed. The members of the new cabinet, on coming
into power, immediately set about making a peace; and in this service they
had the hearty co-operation of De Foe, who wrote several pamphlets and largely
in the Review in favour of "a good peace." But when it had been concluded
at Utrecht, and the terms became known, "I wrote a public paper at that time,
and there it remains upon record against me. I printed it openly, and that so
plainly that others durst not do it, that I did not like the peace." He was
now placed as a mark for both parties, and so many pamphlets were daily
coming out in his name, of which he had no knowledge, that he deemed it pru-
dent to retire for a time from the contest, and for the greater part of a year
never put pen to paper, except in the public paper called the Review."
"After this I was long absent in the north of England; and observing the
insolence of the Jacobite party, and how they insinuated fine things into the
heads of the people; in order to detect the influence of their emissaries, the first
thing I wrote was a small tract, called 'A Seasonable Caution;' a book sincerely
written to open the eyes of the poor, ignorant country people, and to warn
them against the subtle insinuations of the emissaries of the Pretender; and
that it might be effectual to that purpose, I prevailed with several-of my friends
to give them away among the poor people, all over England, especially in the
north; and several thousands were actually given away, the price being reduced
so low, that the bare expense of paper and press was only preserved.
"Next to this, and with the same sincere design, I wrote two pamphlets,
one entitled, What if the Pretender should come ?' the other, 'Reasons against
the Succession of the House of Hanover.'
"Nothing can be more plain than that the titles of these books were amuse-
ments, in order to put the books into the hands of those people whom the
Jacobites had deluded, and to bring them to be read by them.
"Previous to what I shall further say of these books, I must observe that
all these books met with so general a reception and approbation among those
who were most sincere for the Protestant succession, that they sent them all
over the kingdom, and recommended them to the people as excellent and
useful pieces; insomuch that about seven editions of them were printed, and
they were reprinted in other places. And I do protest, had his present majesty,
then elector of Hanover, given me a thousand pounds to have written for the
interest of his succession, and to expose and render the interest of the Pre-
tender odious and ridiculous, I could have done nothing more effectual to those
purposes than these books were.
"No man in this nation ever had a more riveted aversion to the Pretender,
and to all the family he pretended to come of, than I; a man that had been
in arms under the Duke of Monmouth, against the cruelty and arbitrary go-
vernment of his pretended father; that for twenty years had to my utmost
opposed him (King James) and his party after his abdication; and had served
King William to his satisfaction, and the friends of the Revolution after t.
death, at all hazards and upon all occasions; that had suffered and been r3u4
under the administration of high-fliers and Jacobites, of whom some ai '

_-' .L 1 i P

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR.

day counterfeit Whigs. It could not be! The nature of the thing could by
no means allow it; it must be monstrous. For these books I was prosecuted,
taken into custody, and obliged to give 8001. bail.
"This matter making some noise, people began to inquire into it, and ask
what De Foe was prosecuted for, seeing the books were manifestly written
against the Pretender, and for the interest of the house of Hanover.-And my
friends expostulated freely with some of the men who appeared in it, who
answered with more truth than honesty, that they knew this book had nothing
in it, and that it was meant another way; but that De Foe had disobliged them
in other things, and they were resolved to take the advantage they had, both
to punish and expose him. They were no inconsiderable people who said this;
and had the case come to a trial, I had provided good evidence to prove the
words.
"Now, as this was the plot of a few men to see if they could brand me in
the world for a Jacobite, and persuade rash and ignorant people that I was
turned about for the Pretender, I think they might as easily have proved me
to be a Mohammedan; therefore, I say, this obliges me to state the matter as it
really stands, that impartial men may judge whether those books were written
for or against the Pretender. And this cannot be better done than by the
account of what followed after the information, which, in a few words, was
this:-
"Upon the several days appointed, I appeared at the Queen's Bench bar to
discharge my bail; and at last had an indictment for high crimes and mis-
demeanors exhibited against me by her majesty's attorney-general, which, as I
was informed, contained two hundred sheets of paper.
"I was not ignorant that in such cases it is easy to make any book a libel,
and that the jury must have found the matter of fact in the indictment, viz.
that I had written such books, and then what might have followed I know not.
Wherefore, I thought it was my only way to cast myself on the clemency of
her majesty, of whose goodness I had so much experience many ways; repre-
senting in my petition, that I was far from the least intention to favour the
interest of the Pretender, but that the books were all written with a sincere
design to promote the interest of the house of Hanover; and humbly laid
before her majesty, as I do now before the rest of the world, the books them-
selves to plead in my behalf; representing further, that I was maliciously
informed against by those who were willing to put a construction upon the
expressions different from my true meaning; and therefore, flying to her
majesty's goodness and clemency, I entreated her gracious pardon.
"It was not only the native disposition of her majesty to acts of clemency
and goodness that obtained me this pardon; but, as I was informed, her majesty
was pleased to express it in the council, 'She saw nothing but private pique
in the first prosecution.'"
The reader must be struck by the resemblance between this prosecution and
the former one, for the publication of the "Shortest Way with the Dissenters."
De FoP had been playing the same game and was caught in the same trap.

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 31

At this time the friendship of Lord Oxford to a considerable degree saved him
from the malice of his enemies, by taking the prosecution out of the hands
of the individual who instituted it, and intrusting it to the solicitor of the
treasury, who accepted a bail, 4hich by the original party was refused. One
of the consequences of this prosecution was the cessation of the Review, the
chief engine of his power; and feeling that his political life was drawing to a
close, he, shortly after, began his "Appeal to Honour and Justice," the reasons
for which are thus affectingly stated : "I think I have long enough been made
Fabnla Viulgi, and borne the weight of general slander, and I should be wanting
to truth, to my family, and to myself, if I did not give a fair and true state of
my conduct, for impartial men to judge of, when I am no more in being to
answer for myself. By the hints of mortality, and by the infirmities of a life
of sorrow and fatigue, I have reason to think I am not a great way off from,
if not very near to the great ocean of eternity, and the time may not be long
ere I embark on the last voyage. Wherefore, I think I should even accounts
with this world before I go, that no actions (slanders) may lie against my
heirs, executors, administrators, and assigns, to disturb them in the peaceable
possession of their father's (character) inheritance."
While engaged in this narrative he was struck with apoplexy, and the work
was published in an unfinished state. After languishing six months he gra.
dually recovered, but was long very weak.
We will conclude this sketch of his political labours with a quotation from the
preface to the eighth volume of the Review, in which he thus sums up his
chequered life:-"I know too much of the world to expect good in it, and
have learnt to value it too little to be concerned at the e4. I have gone
through a life of wonders, and am the subject of a vast variety of providence;
I have been fed more by miracle than Elijah, when the ravens were his pur-
veyors. I have sometime ago summed up the scenes of my life in this distich:
"No man has tasted differing fortunes more,
And thirteen times I have been rich and poor."
"In the school of affliction I have learnt more philosophy than at the aca-
demy, and more divinity than from the pulpit; in prison I have learnt to know
that liberty does not consist in open doors, and the free egress and regress of
locomotion. I have seen the rough side of the world as well as the smooth;
and have in less than half a year tasted the difference between the closet of a
king and the dungeon of Newgate. I have suffered deeply for cleaving to
principles, of which integrity I have lived to say, none but those I suffered for
ever reproached me with it. I look in, and upon the narrowest search I can
make af my own thoughts, desires, and designs, I find a clear untainted prin-
ciple, and consequently an entire calm of conscience, founded upon the satisfying
sense, that I neither am touched with bribes, guided or influenced by fear,
favour, hope, dependence, or reward from any person or party under heaven;
and that I have written, and do write nothing but what is my native, free,
undirected opinion and judgment, and which was so many years ago, I look
up, and without examining into His ways, tLe sovereignty.of whose providenee

ME.IOIR OF THE AUTHOR.

[ adore, I submit with an entire resignation to whatever happens to me, as
being by the immediate direction of that goodness, and for such wise and
glorious ends, as, however I may not yet see through, will at last issue in good,
even to me; fully depending, that I shall yetCbe delivered from the power of
slander and reproach, and the sincerity of my conduct be yet cleared up to the
world: and if not, Tc Deum laudiamus."

With the accession of the house of Hanover, Do Foe beheld the triumph
of those'principlcs which it had been the object of his life to establish. The
author and his enemies were struck down together: but rising from his ashes
he was destined to begin a more glorious career. With renovated health, in
1715, he commenced writing that series of didactic and imaginative works
which has made his name immortal. The first of these, "The Family Instrue.
tor," is a dialogue, designed to impress upon parents the duty of instructing
their children, and of children to listen to their instruction. To this work he
added a second volume in 1718, and another in 1727. The dialogue is well
sustained, and being a general favourite with the young it has passed through
many editions. Passing over six works in the catalogue, in 1717 we come to
" Memoirs of the Church of Scotland," now very scarce and valuable; and in
1719, the immortal narrative of "Robinson Crusoc." For the first part he
had difficulty in finding a bookseller; but it was so faiourably received that
he was encouraged to proceed, and after an interval of about three months the
second part appeared. It is too well known to require recommendation. The
success of this work encouraged him to persevere in the same line, and in the
same year he published "Dickory Cronke, the Dumb Philosopher." In 1720,
"The Life and Adventures of Duncan Campbell," and "The Pyracics of Capt.
Singleton." In 1721 he published Moll Flanders;" and Colonel Jacque,"
"The Religious Courtship," "Memoirs of a Cavalier," and "Journal of the
Plague Year," in 1722.
Lord Chatham was in the habit of recommending the "Memoirs of a Cava-
lier" as the best account of the Civil War extant, and was not a little mortified
when told that it was a romance; and Dr. Meade and many others have sup-
posed that "The History of the Plague" was an authentic history. "Had he
not been the author of Robinson Crusoe," says Sir Walter Scott, "De Foe
would have deserved immortality for the genius which he has displayed in this
work."
De Foe never tells a story for mere amusement. As a painter of life he had to
take the world as he found it: as a moralist his aim was to leave it better. Our
space will not permit us to enter into an analysis of the fifty works which he
produced in this period, nor even to mention their names. In taking leave
of a man of genius, it is grateful that we need be the apologist of no vice.
Strictly pious, temperate, and virtuous, his name is left without reproach.
The latter years of his life were spent chiefly at Stoke-Newington. To him
it was a comparatively tranquil period, but not one of idleness. Mr. Baker,
the author of the work on the Microscope," who married his youngest daugh-

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR 33

ter, left behind him a paper, in which he speaks of him as living "in a very
handsome house," and supposed "from his genteel way of living, that he must
be able to givehis daughter a decent portion."
He spent his time in the "pursuit of his studies" and in the "cultivation
of a large and pleasant garden." It would have been pleasing after such a
life of toil and vicissitude to have left him thus, surrounded by his family,
peacefully enjoying the fruits of his labour in his old age. But for several
years before his death he was much tormented by gout and stone, and in 1730
he was again for a short time an inmate of a prison. "But it is not the blow
I received from this wicked, perjured, and contemptible enemy," says he, in a
private letter to his son-in-law, "that has broken in upon my spirit. But it has
been the injustice, unkindness, and inhuman dealing of mine own son, which
has both ruined my family and broken my heart. . I would say (I hope)
with comfort, that 'tis yet well. I am so near my journey's end, and am hast-
ening to the place where the weary are at rest, and where the wicked cease to
trouble; be it that the passage is rough, and the day stormy, by what way
soever He please to bring me to the end of it, I desire to finish life with this
temper of soul in all cases: Te Deum laudamus."
Having completed the allotted term of human existence, with a mind steadily
fixed upon the scenes beyond, he passed the boundaries of time into eternity,
on the twenty-fourth of April, 1731, in the same parish in which he was born

The origin of this edition is stated in the advertisement. The particulars
of the life of De Foe are so little known, that it was thought a memoir of him
would be acceptable; and the life by Chalmers, though a goat work, being
now proved, by the investigations of Mr. Wilson, in many things to be incorrect,
it was thought necessary to compile a new one from original sources. For
,this purpose the materials were ample: the slanders of his enemies having
Soften compelled him to stand on his own defence, and the only task of the
editor has been to select judiciously.
The romance of Robinson Crusoe having been printed in so many forms, and
altered to suit the taste and convenience of its several publishers, is seldom to
be found in a perfect state. In preparing the Oxford edition of "De Foe's
Miscellaneous Works," in 1889, the early editions printed in his lifetime were
collected and compared, and the work issued as it came from the hands of the
author: of that edition this is a reprint; but it has been also carefully com-
pared with a copyright edition printed at Edinburgh in 1846, and several
slight errors corrected. With the exception of the omission of one vulgar
phrase, no way necessary to complete the sense, and which the author indicated
by dashes, thinking it improper to express it in words, no alteration has been
made; and it is believed that the edition here presented is the most perfect in,
existence.

i) Xak-., -
*Zj- -~ 3

I WAs born in the year 1632, in the city of York, of a good family,
though not of that country, my 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 which was a 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 did know what was become
of me.
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,

i) Xak-., -
*Zj- -~ 3

I WAs born in the year 1632, in the city of York, of a good family,
though not of that country, my 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 which was a 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 did know what was become
of me.
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,

---s; THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

who was very ancient, had given me a competent share of learning, as
far as house education, and a country free school generally goes, and
designed me for the law; but I would be satisfied with nothing but
going to sea; and my inclination to this led 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 propension 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 ex-
postulated 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 intro-
duced, and had a prospect of raising my fortune by application and
industry, with a life of ease and pleasure. He told me it was men of
desj',rate 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 found, by long experience, was
the best state in the world; the most suited to human happiness, not
exposed to the miseries and hardships, 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 happiness of this state by this one thing, namely,
that this was the state of life which all other people envied; that kings
have frequently lamented the miserable consequences 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 testimony to this, as the just standard of true felicity, when
he prayed to have neither po erty nor riches.
He bade me observe it, and I should always find, that the calamities
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 mankind ; nay,
they were not subjected to so many distempers and uneasiness, either
of body or mind, as those were, who, by vicious living, luxury, and
extravagances, on one hand, or by hard labour, want of necessaries,
and mean or insufficient diet, on the other hand, bring distempers upon
themselves by the natural consequences of their way of living; that

OF ROBINSON CRUSoE. 37

the middle station of life was calculated for all kind of virtues,
and all kind of enjoyments; that peace and plenty were the hand-
maids 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, or harassed with
perplexed circumstances, which rob the soul of peace and the body of
rest; not 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, or 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 necessity of seeking
my bread; that he would do well for me, and endeavour to enter me
fairly into the station of life which he had been just recommending 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 encouragement 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 prompt-
ing 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
would have leisure hereafter to reflect upon having neglected his coun-
sel, when there might be none to assist in my recovery.
I observed, in this last part of his discourse, which was truly pro-
phetic, 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, espe-
cially 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 discourse, and told me, his heart was so
full he could say no more to me.

38 THE LIFE AND ADVENTuItES

I was sincerely afflicted with this discourse, as indeed who could lie
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 far-
ther importunities, in a few weeks after, I resolved to run quite away
from him. However, I did not act so hastily neither, as the first heat
of my resolution prompted, but I took my mother at a time when I
thought her a little pleasanter than ordinary, and told her, that my
thoughts were so entirely bent upon seeing the world, that 1 should
never settle to any thing 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 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 any
such thing 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 myself, there was no hell
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 mean time I continued obstinately deaf to all proposals of settling
to business, and frequently expostulating 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, whither
I went casually, and without any purpose of making an elopement that
time; but, I say, being there, and one of my companions being going

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 39

by sea to London, in his father's ship, and prompting me to go with
them, with the common allurement of a seafaring man, that it shou:j
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, without 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, 1651, 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 sooner got out of the Humber, but 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 had 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 counsel 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 been 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, orihollow 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; but I would take his advice, and never run myselfinto
such miseries as these any more. Now I saw plainly the goodness of
his observations about the middle station of life, how easy, how com
fortable he had lived all his days, and never had been exposed to tem-
pests at sea, or trouble on shore; and, in short, I resolved, that I
would, like a true repenting prodigal, go home to my father.
These wise and sober thoughts continued all the while the storm '
continued, 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 toeit
However, I was very grave for all that day, being also a little sea-s
still; but towards night the weather cleared up. the wind was quite
over, and a charming fine evening followed; the sun went down ser-
,~i~BiPSiiiLftr

40 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

fcctly 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 lit-
tle a time after : and now, lest my good resolutions should continue.
my companion, who had indeed enticed me away, comes to me; Well,
Bob," says he, clapping me upon the shoulder, "how do you do after
it ? I warrant you were frightened, weren't you, last night, when it
blew but a capful of wind ?"-" A capful d'ye 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 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 calmness, 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
returned, 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 sometimes; but I
shook them off, and roused myself from them, as it were from a dis-
temper; 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 my 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 gene-
rally it does, resolved to leave me entirely without excuse: for if I
would not take this for a deliverance, the next was to be such an one
as the worst and most hardened wretch among us would confess both
the danger and the mercy.
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, namely, at south-west,
for seven or eight days; during which time, a great many ships from

C .O A"\ O ABOA__ D ",P. 4.--.

CIUSOE AND BOB ABOARD SHITP. 41

42 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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 every thing
snug and close, that the ship might ride as easy as possible. By noon,
the sea went very high indeed, and our ship rid forecastle ih, shipped
several seas, and we thought once or twice our anchor had come home;
upon which our master ordered out the sheet anchor; so that we rode
with two anchors a-head, and the cables veered out to the better end.
By this time, it blew a terrible storm indeed; and now, I began to
see terror and amazement in the faces even of the seamen themselves.
The master, though vigilant in the business of preserving 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 hur-
ries, 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, too, 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
frightened: I got up out of my cabin, and looked out; but such a dis-
mal sight I never saw: the sea went 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 rid near us, we found,
had cut their masts by the board, being deep laden; and our men cried
out, that a ship, which rid about a mile a-head 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 with not 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 sprit-sail out, before the wind.
Towards the evening, the mate and boatswain begged tne master of
our ship to let them cut away the foremast, which he was very unwill-
ing to do: but the boatswain protesting to him, that if he dia not the
ship would founder, he consented; and when they had cut away the

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE.

foremast, the mainmast stood so loose, and shook the ship so much,
they were obliged to cut her 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 ac-
count 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 condi-
tion, 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, 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 on
purpose 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
pump. At that very 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 dis-
tress. I, who knew nothing what that meant, was so surprised, that
I thought the ship.had broke, 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 rhad "
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 as it was not possible she could swim till we might run into
a port, so the master continued firing guns for help; and a light ship,
who had rid it out just a-head of us, ventured a boat out to help u.
... ...; .

V

-( :-

.r ..-
,.''.,

I I

TIHE STORM.

I
t :~ J;~j

i
I
i:: I~

'"' %''
i

OF ROBINSON C LUSOE. 45

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
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 to 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,
but we saw her sink: and then I understood, for the first time, what
was meant by a ship foundering in the sea. I must acknowledge I had
hardly eyes to look up, when the seamen told me she was sinking; for,
from that moment 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 shore 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 light-house at Winterton, the shore falls off to 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, an emblem of our blessed
Saviour's parable, had even killed the fatted calf for me; for hearing
the ship I went in was cast away in Yarmouth Roads, it was a great
while before he had any assurance that I was not drowned.
But my ill fate pushed me on now witn an obstinacy that nothing
could resist: and though I had several times loud calls from my reason
-, ..S3 ...f

46 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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, over-
ruling decree, that hurries us on to be the instruments of our own
destruction, even though it be before us, and that we push upon it with
our eyes open. Certainly, nothing but some such decreed unavoidable
misery attending, and which it was impossible for me to escape, could
have pushed me forward against the calm reasoning 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 me 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, askpd 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 farther 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 for a trial, you see what a taste Heaven has given you, of
what you are to expect, if you persist: perhaps all this has befallen
us on your account, like Jonah in the ship of Tarshish. Pray," con-
tinues 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 with 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 the spirits, which were
yet agitated by the sense of his loss, and was farther than he
could have authority to go. However, he afterwards talked very
gravely to me, exhorted me to go back to my father, and not tempt
Providence to my ruin; told me, I might see a 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 no-
thing 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 know not. As for me, having some
money in my pocket, I travelled to London by land; and ther-, as well

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 4T

as on the road, had many struggles with myself, what course of life
I should take, and whether I should go home or go 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, namely, that they are not ashamed to sin,
and yet are ashamed to repent; nor ashamed of the action for which
they ought justly to be esteemed fools, but are ashamed of the return-
ing, which only can make them be esteemed wise men. In this state
of life, however, I remained some time, uncertain what measures to
take, and what course of life to lead. An irresistible reluctance con-
tinued to going home; and as I stayed a while, the remembrance of
the distress I had been in wore off; and, as that abated, the little mo-
tion I had in my desires to a return wore off with it, till at last I quite
laid aside the thoughts of it, and looked out for a voyage.
That evil influence which carried me first away from my father's
house, that 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 entreaties and even the
command of my father,-I say, the same influence, whatever it was,
presented the most unfortunate of all enterprises to my view; and I
went on board a vessel bound to the coast of Africa; or, as our sailors
vulgarly call it, a voyage to Guinea.
It was my great misfortune, that in all these adventures I did not
ship myself as a sailor; whereby, though I might indeed have worked
:a little harder than ordinary, yet, at the same time, I had learned the
duty and office of a foremastman, 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, I would always
go on board in the habit of a gentleman; and so I neither had any
business in the ship, or learned to do any. ..

48 THE LIFE 'AND ADVENTURES

CHAPTER 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 fre-
quently sends me a-fishing, which suggests an idea of escape-Make my escape in
an open Boat, with a Moresco Boy.

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 unguided 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 fell
acquainted with a 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; and who taking a fancy to my conversation, 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 messmate and his companion; and if I
could carry any thing 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 and plain-dealing man, I went the voyage
with him, and carried a small adventure with me, which, by the disin-
terested honesty of my friend, the captain, I increased very considera-
bly; for I carried about forty pounds in such toys and trifles as the
captain directed me to buy. This forty pounds I had mustered together
by the assistance of some of my relations, whom I corresponded 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, and 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 course, take an observation, and, in short, to
understand some things that were needful to be understood 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

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 49

11

yielded me in London, at my return, almost three hundred pounds;
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 by the
excessive heat of the climate; our principal trading being upon the
coast, from the latitude of fifteen degrees 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 voy-
age again; and I embarked in the same vessel with one who was his
mate in the former voyage, and had now got the command 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, and which I lodged with my friend's widow, who was very just to
me, yet I fell into terrible misfortunes in this voyage ; and the first
was this,-namely, our ship, making her course towards the Canary
Islands, or rather between those islands and the African shore, was
surprised, in the gray of the morning, by a Moorish 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
have got clear; but finding the pirate gained upon us, and would cer-
tainly come up with us in a few hours, we prepared to fight, our ship
having twelve guns and the rover eighteen. About three in the after-
4

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

CRUSOE A SLAVE.
noon 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 our-
selves ; 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 decks 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 w'ere 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 apprehended:
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 busi-
xM5

--M

CRUSOE A SLAVE.
noon he came up with us, and bringing to, by mistake, just atbu art
our quarter, instead of athwart our stern, as lie intended, we brouailt
eight of 'ur guns to bear on that side, and poured in a broadside upon
him, which made him slicer off again, after returning our fire, and
pouring in also his small shot, fr'om near two hundred men which he
had on board. However, w e had not a mian touched, all our men
keeping close. Ile prepared to attack us again, and we to defend our-
selves; but laying us on board the next time upon our other quarter,
lie entered sixty men upon our decks, who immediately fell to cutting
and hacking the decks 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
bhip being disabled, and three of our men killed, and eight wounded,
we vtsra obliged to yield, and were carried all prisoners into Sallee, a
port belonging to the i\Moors.
The usage I had there was not so dreadful as at first I apprehended:
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 busi-

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 51

ness. At this surprising change of my circumstances, from a merchant
to a miserable slave, I was perfectly 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 ; that now the
hand of Heaven had overtaken me, and I was undone without redemp-
tion. 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, so I
was in hopes that lie would take me with him when lie went to sea
again, believing that it would be some time or other 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 cruize, 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 affect it; but found no way that had the least probability 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 a young Moresco 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 Moresco, as they called him, to catch a '*"
t sh of fish for him.
It happened one time. that going a-fishing with him in a calm morn-
ing, 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 morn-
ing 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 land: how-
ever, we got well in again, though with a great deal of labour, and

52 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

some danger; for the wind began to blow pretty fresh in the morning;
but, particularly, 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 which 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; and 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
jibbed 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 some small lockers to put in some bottles of such liquor as he
thought fit to drink, particularly his bread, rice, and coffee.
We were frequently out with this boat a-fishing; and as I was most
dexterous to catch fish for him, lie never went without me. It hap-
pened one day, that he had appointed to go out in this boat, either for
pleasure or for fish, with two or three Moors of some distinction, and
for whom he had provided extraordinary ; and had therefore sent on
board the boat over night a larger store of provisions than usual; and
had ordered me to get ready three fusils 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 morn-
ing with the boat washed clean, her ancient and pendants out, and
every thing to accommodate his guests; when by and by my patron
came on board alone, and told me his guests had put off going, upon
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; he commanded me, too, 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 like to have a little ship at my com-
mand; 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 would steer; for anywhere to get
out of that place was my way.
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 ea* of our patron's bread: he said, that was true; sc

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 53

he brought a large basket of rusk, or biscuit of their kind, and three
jars with 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 con-
veyed also a great lump of beeswax into the boat, which weighed above
half a hundred weight, with a parcel of twine or thread, a hatchet, a.
saw, and a hammer, all which were of great use to us afterwards, espe-
cially the wax to make candles. Another trick I tried upon him, which
he innocently came into also. His name was Ismael, whom they call
Muly, or Moley; so I called him: "Moley," 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 our-
selves, for I know he keeps the gunner's stores in the ship."-" Yes,"
says he, "I'll bring some;" and accordingly he brought a great leather.
pouch, which held about 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 'some 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 every thing 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 north-north-east, 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 watched 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 soBg '
thing behind him, I took him by surprise with my arm under his t'tit,
and tossed him clear overboard into the sea: he rose immediate foi
he swam like a cork, and called to me, beged to be takea-,
he'would go all over the world with meo -e'' wlSm so strong after-t..
boat, that he would have reached me VW-quickly, there being bh

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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 swimmer.
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 Mohammed 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 mistrust him; and swore to be faithful .to me, and go all
over the world with me.
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; 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 never once go
on shore, but we should be devoured by savage beasts, or more merci-
less 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
toward 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
1 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 domi-
nions, or, indeed, of any other king thereabouts, for we saw no people.
Yet such was the fright I had taken at the Moors, and the dreadful
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, tll 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 come to an anchor in the mouth of a little river, I knew

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 55

not what or where; neither what latitude, what country, what nation,
or what river: I neither saw, or desired to see, any people; the prin-
cipal 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 dis-
cover 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, 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
themselves for the pleasure of cooling themselves; and they made such
hideous howlings and yelling 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. ,
Poor Xury cried to me to weigh the anchor, and row away. "No,"
says I, Xury, we can slip our cable with a buoy to it, and go 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 some hyi .
surprised me; however, I immediately stepped to the cabin door, and
taking up my gun, fired at him; upon which he immediately tuirted
about, and swam to the shore again.
But it was not possible to describe the horrible noises, and,hideous
cries and cowlings, that were raised, as well upon the edge of the shore,
as higher within the country, upon the noise or report of a gunn.a.
thing I have some reason to believe those creatures had never
before. This convinced me, that there was rn. going on shore for -"
in the night upon that coast; and how to venture on shore in the
was another question too; for to have fallen into the' amds of anyj of
the savages, had been as bad as to have fallen intg es 0'6
and tigers; at least, we were equally apprehensive of
Be that as it would, we were obliged to gc on shore i~is

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

other for water, for we had not a pint left in the boat; when or where
to get 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 I should not go, and
he stay in the boat? The boy answered with so much affection, that
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 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 forward 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 thnt 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 flows 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.
As I had been one voyage to the 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 to take an obser-
vation to know what latitude we were in, and did not exactly know, or
at least not remember, what latitude they were in, and 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 their 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 domin-
ions and the Negroes, lies waste, and uninhabited, except by wild

OF 'ROBIDSON' CRUSOE.

beasts; the Negroes having abandoned it, and gone farther south for
fear of the Moors; and the Moors not thirfking it worth inhabiting,
by reason of its barrenness; and, indeed, both forsaking it because of
the prodigious numbers of tigers, lions, leopards, and other furious
creatures which harbour there; so that the Moors use it for their hunt-
ing 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 uninhabited 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 reaching 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 the best aim I could with the first piece to
have shot him into 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 broke, fell
down again, and then got up 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 immediately,
and though he began to move off, fired again, and shot him intq..g -
head, and had the pleasure to see him drop, and make but little ano \
but lie struggling for life. Then Xury took heart, and would have me

58 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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 into 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. How-
ever, 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 effect-
ually dried it in two days' time, and it afterwards served me to lie
upon.

CHAPTER III.

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 Brazils, and buy a Settlement there-Cannot be quiet, but sail on a Voyage of
Adventure to Guinea-Ship strikes on a Sand-bank in unknown Land-All lost but
myself, who am driven ashore, half-dead.

AFTER this stop, we made on to the southward continually for ten or
twelve days, living very sparing on our provisions, which began to abate
very much, and going no oftener into 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 the Cape de Verd, where 1
was in hopes to meet with some European ship; and if I did not, I
kne- 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.

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 59

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 that they were quite black, and stark naked.
I was once inclined to go on shore to them; but Xury was my better
counsellor, and said to me, "'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
hands, except one, who had a long slender stick, which Xury said was
a lance, and that they would throw them a great way with good aim;
so I kept at a distance, but talked with them by signs as well as 1
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 them ran up
into the country, and in less than half an hour came back, and brought
with them two pieces of dry flesh and some corn, such as is the produce
of their country; but we neither knew what the one nor the other was:
however, we were willing to accept it, but how to come at it was our
next dispute, for I was not for venturing 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 it was usual or strange, but I
believe it was the latter; because, in the first place, thqse 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
seem to 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 ready for him, for I had loaded my gun with. a) possible
expedition, and bade Xury load both the others. As soon as.-he came
fairly within my reach I fired, and shot him directly into t&ie k .
immediately he sank down into thw after, but rose instantly, a q

60 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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.
It is impossible to express the astonishment of these poor creatures
at the noise and the fire of my gun; some of them were even ready to
'lie 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 to the
shore, 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 was. I
found quickly the Negroes were for eating 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, making
as if 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
provision, which, though I did not understand, yet I accepted; then
I 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 burned, as I suppose, in the sun; this they set down for
me, as before, and I sent Xury on shore with my jars, and filled them
all three. The women were as stark 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 sea-ward; then I

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 61

concluded, as was most certain indeed, that this was the Cape de VArd,
and those the islands, called from thence Cape de Verd Island
However, they were at a great distance, and I could not tell what I'
had best to do; for if I should be taken with a fresh of wind, I might
neither reach one nor the other.
In this dilemma, as I was very pensive, I stepped into the cabin
and sat me 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, when I knew we were gotten far
enough out of their reach. I jumped out of the cabin, and imme-
diately saw, not only the ship, but what she was, namely, 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 that 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 me by the help of their perspec-
tive glasses, and that it was some European boat, which, as 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, k Scots 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 bade me come on board, and very kindly took
me in, and all my goods.
It was an inexpressible joy to me, as any one would believe, that I
was thus delivered, as I esteemed it, from such a miserable and almost
hopeless condition as I was in, and 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 t
delivered safe to me when I came to the Brazils; For," says he, "I
have saved your life on no other terms than I would be glad to be '.

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

saved myself; and it may one time or other be my lot to be taken up
Ci tisame condition: besides," said he, "when I carry you to the
BrIazils, 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, Seignor Inglese," says he, "Mr.
Englishman, I will carry you thither in charity, and those things will
help you to buy your subsistence there, and your passage home
again."
As he was charitable in his proposal, so he was just in the perform-
ance to a tittle; for he ordered the seamen, that none should offer to
ouch any thing I had: then he took every thing into his own posses-
sion, and gave me back an exact inventory of them, that I might have
them: even so much as my earthen jars.
As to my boat, it was a very good one, and that he saw, and told me
he ivould buy it of me for the ship's use, and asked me what I would
have for it ? I told him he had been so generous in every thing that I
could not offer 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 his 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 4so
sixty pieces of eight more for my boy Xury, which I was loath to take;
not that I was not willing 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
owvnd- 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 Chris-
tian. 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 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 now 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 every thing I had in the ship to
be punctually delivered me; and what I was willing to sell he bought,
such as the case of bottles, two of my guns, and a piece of the lump
of beeswax, 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.

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE.

I had not been long here, but being recommended to the house of a
good honest man like himself, who had an ingeino, 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 their planting
and making of sugar; and seeing how well the planters lived, and how
they grew rich suddenly, I resolved, if I could get license to settle
there, I would turn planter among them; resolving, in the mean time,
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 a letter of natural-
ization, I purchased as much land that was uncured as my money would
reach, and formed a plan for my plantation and settlement, and 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 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 any thing else, for about
two years. However, we began to increase, and our land began to
comOAnto 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 was gotten 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, I was coming into the very middle
station, or upper degree of low 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 thousand. 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
regret. I had nobody to converse with, but now and then this neigh-
bour; no work to be done but by the labour of my harnds;ind I'Ked
to say, I lived just like a man cast awayupon some desolate i ,
that had nobody there but himself. But how just has i\ been, and .ar'
should all men reflect, thqt, when they compare their preset craditii

64 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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 led, 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 providing his
loading, and preparing for his voyage, near three months; when, tell-
ing 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
here in form to me, with orders to the person who has your money in
London, to send your effects to Lisbon, to such persons 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, since 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 comes 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 friendly, that I could
not but be convinced it was the best course I could take; so I accord-
ingly prepared letters to the gentlewoman with whom I had left my
money, and a procuration to the Portuguese captain, as he desired.
I wrote the English captain's widow a full account of all my adven-
tures, my slavery, escape, and how I had met with the Portugal cap-
tain 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 at London, 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 pre-
sent for his humanity and charity to me.
The merchant in London vesting this hundred pounds in English
goods, such as the captain had writ 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 o' them), he had taken care to have all sort of tools, iron-work,

yl. ,Jn~t 'a'Yt;.Sr~;i-~&a

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 65

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 sur-
prised with 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 him-
self, 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; but my goods being all English manufactures,
such as cloth, stuffs, baize, and things particularly valuable and desira-
ble in the country, I found means to sell them to a very great advan-
tage; so that I may say, I had more than four times the value of my
first cargo, and was now infinitely beyond my poor neighbour, I mein
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.
But as abused prosperity is oftentimes made the means of our
greatest adversity, so was it 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 hundred
weight, were well cured and laid by against the return of the fleet from
Lisbon. And now, increasing in business and in 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; but other things attended
me, and I was still to be the wilful agent of all my own miseries y and
particularly to increase my fault, and double the reflections upon my-
self, which in my future sorrows I should have leisure to make, all
these miscarriages were procured by my apparent obstinate adhering
to my foolish inclination of wandering abroad, and pursuing that in-
clination, in contradiction to the clearest views of doing myself good
in a fair and plain pursuit of those prospects and those me s. _of
I'fe, which nature and Providence concurred to present me wi d and
to make my duty.
As I had done thus in my breaking away from my parents, so I
could not be content now, but I must go and leave the happy viw. I
had of being a rich and thriving man in my new plantation onl .
pursue a rash and immoderate desire of rising faster tha .
S "0A "-

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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 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 at St. Salvadore, which was our port; and that
in my discourse 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, &c.
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 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 the assientos, or permission, of
the kings of Spain and Portugal, and engrossed in the public, so that
few Negroes were bought, and those excessive 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 the 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 en-
joining me secrecy, they told me, that they had a mind to fit out a
ship to go to Guinea; that they had all plantations as well as I, and
were straitened for nothing so much as servants; that as it was a
trade could not be carried on, because they could not publicly sell the
Negroes when they came home, so they desired to make but one voy-
age, to bring the Negroes on shore privately, and divide them among
their own plantations; and, in a word, the question was, whether T
would go their supercargo in the ship, to manage the trading part upon
the coast of Guinea ? nd 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 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 go on as I had begun, for
three or four years more, and to have sent for the other hundred

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 65

pounds from England, and who, in that time and with that little addi-
tion, 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 cir-
cumstances 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 to be shipped to
England.
In short, I took all possible caution to preserve my effects, and keep
up my plantation: had I used half as much prudence to have looked
into my own 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 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 fitted out, and
the cargo furnished, and all things done as by agreement by my part-
ners in the voyage, I went on board in an evil hour again, the 1st of
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 aAtho-
rity, and the fool to my own interest.
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 odd trifles, especially little looking-glasses, knives, scissors, hatchets,
and the like. .. .. 1
The same day I went on board we set sail, statediMA) to. the
northward upon our own coast, with design to stretch # r -Jm-
African coast; when they came about ten or twelve degrees of
latitude, which, it seems, was the manner of their coarse in s.iB L

68 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

We had very good weather, only excessive hot, all the way upon our
own coast, till we came to the height of Cape St. Augustino, from
whence keeping farther off at sea, we lost sight of land, and steered as
if we were bound for the isle Fernand de Noronha, holding our course
north-east by north, 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 into the north-east; from 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 those 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 died 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 gotten upon the coast of Guinea, or the north part of Brazil,
beyond the river Amazons, toward that of the river Oroonoque, com-
monly 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
sea-coasts 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 Bar-
badoes, 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 ourselves.
With this design we changed our course, and steered away north-
west by west, 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 impetuosity westward,
and drove us so out of the very 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.

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 69

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, but 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 immediately; 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 circumstances:
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; and 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 minutes without breaking in pieces, unless the winds, by a kind
of miracle, should turn immediately about. In a word, we sat looking
one upon another, and expecting death every moment, and every man
acting accordingly, as preparing for another world: for there was little
or nothing more for us to do in this: that which was our present com-
fort, 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 too fast 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; however, there was no room to debate,
for we fancied 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 lays hold of the boat, and
with the help of the rest of the men they got her slung over the ship's
side, an 1, 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 went dreadful high upon
the shore, and might well be called den wild zee, as the Dutch call the '
sea in a storm.
And now our case was very dismal indeed; for we As&eaw plainly,
tha* the sea went so high that the boat could not live, and tht4mn

70 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

should be inevitably drowned. As to making sail, we had none, nor,
if we had, could we have done any thing 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 nearer the shore,
she would be dashed in a thousand 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 happen into 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 of this appeared; but, as we
made nearer and nearer the shore, the land looked more frightful than
the sea.
After we had rowed, or 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. In a word, it took
us with such a fury, that it overset the boat at once; and separating
us as well from the boat, as from one another, gave us not time hardly
to say 0 God for 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 hav-
ing 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. I had so much presence
of mind, as well as breath left, that seeing 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 breath, and raise myself upon the water, if I
could; and so, by swimming, to preserve my breathing, and pilot my-
self 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

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE.

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 breath, 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 ag iin
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 water went
from me, and then took to my heels, and ran with what strength I had
farther 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 forwards as before, the
shore being very flat.
The last time of these two had well near been fatal to me; for the
sea, having hurried me along as before, landed me, or rather dashed
me, against a piece of a rock, and that with such force as 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 immediately, 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 near 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 clifts 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, and 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 that custom, namely, that when a malefactor, 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' thea tell

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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 the contemplation of my deliverance.
making a thousand gestures and motions which I cannot describe:
reflecting upon all my comrades that were drowned, and that their.
i;hould 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 eyes 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 con-
sidered, Lord! how was it possible I could get on shore !
After I had solaced my mind with the comfortable part of my con-
dition, 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 any thing 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 provision, 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,
seeing 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 in my mouth to prevent hunger, I went to the tree, and
getting up into it, endeavoured to place myself so, as 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 the
inost refreshed with it that I think I ever was on such an occasion.

o;- L~n i~i

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE.

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-Moralize 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.

WHEN 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 first mentioned, where I
had been so bruised by the 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 from 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 hot to extremity, and took the water. But when
I came to the ship, my difficulty was still greater to know 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 swain" round her
twice, and the second time I spied a small piece of a rtpe, which I
wonders I did not see at first, hang down by the fore-chains, so low

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

as that with great difficulty I got hold of it, and, by the help of that
rope, got up into the forecastle of the ship. Here I found that the
ship was bulged, and had a great deal of water in her hold, but that
she lay so on the side of a bank of hard sand, or rather earth, and 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's 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, for 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 topmast or two in
the ship ; I resolved to fall to work with these, and flung as many of
them overboard as I could manage of their weight, tying every one
with a rope, that they might not drive away. When this was done, I
went down to the ship's side, and, pulling them to me, I tied four of
them fast 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 the carpepter's saw, I cut a spare topmast into three lengths,
and added them to my raft, with a great deal of labour and pains; but
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 considering this.
I first laid all the planks 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,
namely, 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

(,7 -

1-- A-i~

CRUSOE LOADING HIS RAFT.

76 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

with us, but the fowls were killed. There had been some barley and
wheat together, but, to my great disappointment, 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 above five or six gallons of rack: these I
stowed by themselves, there being no need to put them into the chest,
nor no room for them. While I was doing this, I found the tide
Segan to flow, though very calm, and I had the mortification to see my
coat, shirt, and waistcoat, which I had left on shore upon the sand,
swim away; as for my breeches, which were only linen, and open-
kneed, I swam' on board in them and my stockings: however, this put
me upon 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-
loading of gold would have been at that time. I got it down to my
raft, even whole as it was, without losing time to look into it, for I
knew in general what it contained.
My next care was for some ammunition and arms. There were 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 overset all my navigation.
I had three encouragements: 1. A smooth, calm sea; 2. The tide
rising and setting in to the shore; 3. What little wind there was blew
me toward 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; and 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 be-
fore; 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
rf the land, and I found a strong current of the tide set into it, so I
gul;ed my raft as well as I could to keep in the middle of the stream;

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 77

but here I had like to have suffered a second shipwreck, which, if I
had, I think verily would have broke my heart; for, knowing nothing
of the coast, my raft run 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 that 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, stood in that manner
near half an hour, in which time the rising 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,
or 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, as that, reaching ground with my oar, I could thrust her di-
rectly in; but here I had like to have dipped all my cargo in 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 the float, if it run 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 on 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 froa what-
ever might happen. Where I was, I yet knew not; whether o "tht .
continent or on an island-whether inhabited or not inhabited--whe-
ther in danger of wild beasts or not. There was a hill, not e ea
mile from me, which rose up very steep and high, and w oaied
to overtop some other hills which lay as in a ridge from it l rl

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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; namely, 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
this, 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 which, how-
ever, 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, but, from all parts of the wood, there arose an
innumerable number of fowls of many sorts, making a confused scream-
ing, and crying 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 a hawk, its colour and beak resembling it, but 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; and 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 afterwards found,
there was really no need for those fears.
However, as well as I could, I barricadoed myself round with the
chests and boards that I had brought on shore, and made a kind of a
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 got every
thing 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

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE.

my hut, having nothing on but a checked shirt and a pair of linen
browsers, and a pair of pumps on my feet.
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 use-
ful 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 several things belonging to the gunner, particu-
larly two or three iron crows, and two barrels of musket-bullets, seven
muskets, and another fowling-piece, with some small quantity of powder
more; a large bag full 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, hammock, and some bedding; and with this
I loaded my second raft, and brought them all safe on shore, to my
very great comfort.
I was under some apprehensions, during my absence from the land,
that at least my provisions might be devoured on shore; but, 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 com-
posed 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 of it,
and ate it, and looked, as pleased, for more; but I thanked her, and
could spare no more; so she marched off.
Having got my second cargo on shore, 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 every thing 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 sudden 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, spread-
ing one of the beds upon the ground, laying my two pistols O.at t

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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; as the
night before I had slept little, and had laboured very hard all day, as
well to fetch all those things from the ship, as 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 everything
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 can-
vas, 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 still more 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, and three large
runlets of rum or spirits, and 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 that bread, and wrapped it up parcel by par-
cel, 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; and cutting the great cable into pieces such as I could move,
I got two cables and a hawser on shore, with all the iron-work I could
get; and, having cut down the spritsail-yard, and the mizen yard, and
every thing I could to make a large raft, I loaded it with all those
heavy goods, and came away: but my good luck began now to leave
me; for this raft was so unwieldly and 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,
great part of it, lost, especially the iron, which I expected would have
been of great use to me: however, when the tide was out, I got most
of the pieces of cable ashore, and some of the iron, though with infi-
nite labour; for I was fain to dip for it into the water, a work which

OF ROBMSON CNU80g.

fatigued me very much. After this, I went every day on board, and
brought away what I could get.
I had been now 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 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, as 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 Euro-
pean coin, some Brazil, some pieces of eight, some gold, some silver.
I smiled to myself at the sight of this money. "0 drug !" said-I,
aloud, "what art thou good for? thou art not worth to me-no,.not
the taking off of the ground; one of those knives is worth all this heap;
I have no manner of use for thee; even 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 at all: accordingly, I let myself down into the
water, and swam across the channel which lay between the ship and
the sands, and even that with difficulty enough, partly with the, weight
of 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 was gotten home to my little tent, where I lay with all my
wealth about me very secure. It blew very hard all that 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;this satisfac-
tory reflection, namely, that I had lost no time, nor' abated no dilii
gence, to get every thing out of her that could be useful to .me, awl
that, indeed there was little left in her that I was able to bring awy :
if I had had more time.
I now gave-over any more thoughts of the ship, or- of any.t* out-
of her, except what might drive on shore from her wreck, as, irds4
6

82 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

divers pieces e" 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 many 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 I was in was not for my settlement, particu-
larly because it was upon a low moorish ground near the sea, and I
believed 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: 1st, Health and fresh water I just now mentioned.
2dly, Shelter from the heat of the sun. 3dly, Security from ravenous
creatures, whether man or beast. 4thly, A view of 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, wo that nothing could come down upon me from the top:
on the side of this 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 grounds
by the sea-side. It was on the north-north-west side of the hill, so
that I was sheltered from the heat every day, till it came to a west-
and-by-south 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 three
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 about five foot and a half, and sharpened
on the top: the two rows did not stand above six inches from one
another.

OF ROBINSON ORUSOE. 8

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 foot 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
afterward, 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 me a large tent, which, to preserve me
from the rains, that, in one part of the year, are very violent there, I
made double, namely, one smaller tent within, and one larger tent
above it, and covered the uppermost with a large tarpaulin, which I
had saved among the sails.
And now I 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 every thing 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, that
so 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 a cellar to my
huuse.
It cost me much labour and many days before all these things were
brought to perfection; and, therefore, I must go back to soiap
things which took up some of my thoughts. At the same timeB,'
opened, after I had laid my scheme for the setting up say td*i ij
making the cave, that a storm of rain falling from a thick A kBeilid,
a sudden flash of lightning happened, and after that a i
thunder, as is naturally the effectof it. I was not so mabk
-.ft.Ife

84 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

with the lightning, as I was with a 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
dest oyed, on which, not my defence only, but the providing me food,
as I thought, entirely depended: I was nothing near so anxious about
my own danger; though, had the powder took fire, I had never 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 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 appre-
hend 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 any thing fit for food, and, as near as I could, to acquaint myself
with what the island produced. The first time I went out, I presently
discovered that there were goats in the island, which was a great satis-
faction to me; but then, it was attended with this misfortune to me,
namely, that they were so shy, so 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 down-
ward, 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; but when
the old one fell, the kid stood stock still by her till I came and took
her up; and not only so, but, when I carried the old one with me upon

OF aDOINSON CRUSOE.

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 tc
provide a place to make a fire in, and fuel to burn; and whaL I did
for that, as also how I enlarged my cave, and what conveniences I:
made, I shall give a full account of in its place; but I must first 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, namely, some hundred of leagues out of the ordinary course of
the trade of mankind, I had great reason to consider it as a determin-
ation of Heaven, that, in this desolate place, and in this desolate man-
ner, 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 completely 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, expostulated 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 into the boat ? Where are the ten? Why were
they not saved, and you lost? Why were you singled out ? Isit'betfer
to be here or there ?" And then I pointed to the sea. All evils are
to be considered with the' good that is in them, and with what woie
attended them.
Then it occurred to me again, how well I was furnished for my sub-
sistence, and what would have been my case if it had not happened,
which was an hundred thousand to one, that the ship floated from the
Space where she first struck, and was driven so near the shore, that I ha
time to get all these things out of her. What would have been'ny .
if I had been to have lived in the condition in which I at first ~c
;shore, without necessaries of life, or neoeesarie& to ws y and

86 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

them ? "Particularly," said I, loud, though to myself, "what should
I have done without a gun, without ammunition, without any tools to
make any thing, or to work with; without clothes, bedding, a tent, or
any manner of covering ?" and that now I had all these to a sufficient
qua atity, and 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 should provide for the
accidents that might happen, and for the time that was to come, even
not only after my ammunition should be spent, but even after my
health or strength should decay.
I confess I had not entertained any notion of my ammunniion being
destroyed at one blast, I mean, my powder being blown up by light-
ning; and this made the thoughts of it so surprising to me when it
lightened and thundered, as I observed just now.
And now, being about 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 just 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 from the
working days; but, to prevent this, I cut it with my knife upon a large
post, in capital letters, and making it into a great cross, I set it up on
the shore where I first landed, namely, 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 1 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 par-
ticular, 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

I

OF ROmISON CRUSOE. 87

or no. Also, I found three very good Bibles, which came to me! i
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. b
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 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 he could not do. As I observed before, I found
pen, ink, and paper, and I husbanded them to the utmost; and I 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 puts me in mind that I wanted many things, notwithstand-
ing all that I had amassed together; and of these, this of ink was
one, as also 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 wfa
near a whole year before I had entirely finished my little pale, dr
surrounded 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, yet 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, af'least that I eould
foresee, except the ranging the island to seek for' od, 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 dome after me
(for I was like to have but few heirs), as to deliver my thoughts from
daily poring upon them, and afflicting my mind; and as my reason
began now to master my despondency, I began to comfort ag~hf an

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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 it very
impartially, like debtor and creditor, the comforts I enjoyed against
the miseries I suffered, thus:-

EVIL.
I am cast upon a horrible deso-
late island, void of all hope of re-
covery.
I am singled out and separated,
as it were, from all the world, to
be miserable.

I am divided from mankind, a
solitaire, one banished from hu-
n.-n society.
I have no clothes to cover me.

I am without
means to resist
man or beast.

any defence, or
any violence of

I have no soul to speak to, or
relieve me.

GOOD.
But I am alive, and not drown-
ed, as all my ship's company was.

But I am singled out, too, from
all the ship's crew to be spared
from death; and He that mira-
culously saved me from death, can
deliver me from this condition.
But I am not starved and per-
ishing on a barren place, affording
no sustenance.
But I am in a hot climate.
where, if I had clothes, I could
hardly 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 Afri-
ca: and what if I had been ship-
wrecked there ?
But God wonderfully sent the
ship in near enough to the shore,
that I have gotten out so 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 pos:iive to be thankful for in it; and let
this stand as a direction from the experience of the most miserable 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.

OF BOBINSON 10MOBE :g9

giving over these things, I began to apply- myself to accommodate 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 foot thick on the outside; and after some time-
I think it was a year and half-I raised rafters 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 goods, which, as they lay
in no order, so they took up all my place: I had no room to turn my-
self; so I set myself to enlarge my cave and works 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 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 were a back way to
my tent and to my storehouse, but gave me room to stow 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 I 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 original of the mathematics, so, by stating and
squaring every thing 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 contrivance, I found at last that I wanted
nothing but I could have made it, especially if I had had tools; how-
ever, I made abundance of things even without tools, and some with no
npore tools than an adze and a hatchet, which perhaps were never
made that way before, and that with infinite labour: for example, if 1
wanted a board, I had no other way but to cut down a tree, set it on
an edge before me, and hew it fiat on either side with my axe, till I
had brought it to be as thin as a plank, and then dub it smooth wib :
my adze. It is true, by this method, I could make but one board oat
of a whole tree; bu* this I had no remedy fot but patience, any sam.r
.

90 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

than I had for the prodigious deal of time and labour which it took
me up to made a plank or board; but my time and labour were little
worth, and so they were 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, and, in a word, to separate every thing at
large in their places, that I might come easily at them. I 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 every thing 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 em-
ployment; for indeed at first I was in too much a 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 : September the 30th, after I 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 was gotten into my stomach, and recovering myself 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 looking 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 stuff 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
tol' all these particulars over again) as long as it lasted; for, having
no more ink, I was forced to leave it off.

"\-;;*fRT1"~:r-~ ~ C:- 'i~--- wp~

CF ROBINSON CRUSOBE 1

CHAPTER V.

1 begin to keep a Journal-Christen my desert Island the Island ofDespair-Fall upon
various Schemes to make Tools, Baskets, &o., 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.
September 80, 1659.
I, POOR miserable Robinson Crusoe, being shipwrecked, during a
dreadful storm in the offing, came on shore on this dismal unfortunate
island, which I called the Island of Despair; all the rest of the ship's
company being drowned, and myself almost dead.
All the rest of that day I spent in afflicting myself at the dismal
circumstances I was brought to, namely, I had neither food, house,
clothes, weapon, or 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 again, much
nearer the island; which, as it was some comfort on one hand, for
seeing her sit upright, and not broken to pieces, I 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 car-
ried us to some other part of the word Ispent great part of this day
in perplexing myself on these thi i &t length, seeing the ship
almost dry, I went upon the sand a a *I a could, and then swam.=.
on board. This day also it continued jW though with no wind at
all.
From the 1st ff October to the 24th.--Al tAse days eary spent
m many several voyages to get all I could out of the shp, abhib: 1
brought* on shore, every tide of flood, upon raft. Much rain in

92 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

these days, though with some intervals of fair weather; but it seems
this was the rainy season.
Oct. 20.-1 overset my raft, and all the goods I had got upon it;
but being in shoal water, and the things being chiefly heavy, I reco-
vered 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 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 cable, and with-
out with turf.
From the 26th to the 30th I worked very hard in carrying all my
goods to my new habitation, though some part of the time it rained
exceeding hard.
The 31st, in the morning, I went out into the island with my gun,
to seek 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. 8.-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. I
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: namely, 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
ate what I had to live on, and from twelve to two I lay down to sleep,
the weather being excessive 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 work-

OF ROBINSON COR0BU 9a

man, though time and necessity made me a complete natural mechanic
soon after, as I believe it wguld 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 I killed I took off the skins and preserved them. Coming
back by the sea-shore, I saw many sorts of sea-fowls, which I did not
understand; but was surprised, and almost frighted 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. 7.-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
Sunday; for omitting my mark for them on my post, I forgot which
was which.
Nov. 13.-This day it rained, which refreshed me exceedingly, and
cooled the earth; but it was accompanied with terrible thunder and
lightning, which frighted 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 possible. 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 farther conveniency. Note-Three things I wanted
exceedingly for this work, namely, a pick-axe, a shovel, and a wheel-
barrow or basket; so I desisted from my work, and began to consider
how to supply that want, and make me some tools: as for a pick-axe,
I made use of the iron-crows, which were proper enough, though heavy;
but the next thing was a shovel or spade; this was so absolutely neces-
sary, that indeed I could do nothing effectually without it; but what
kind of one to make I knew not.
rFov. 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-tre4 far
its exceeding hardness: of this, with great labour, and almost spilig

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

my axe, I cut a piece, and brought it home too with difficulty enough,
for it was exceeding heavy.
The excessive hardness of the wood, and 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 broad 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 a-making.
I was still deficient, for I wanted a basket or a wheel-barrow; a
basket I could not make by any means, having no such things as twigs,
that would bend to make wicker-ware, at least not yet found out; and
as to a wheel-barrow, 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 except-
ing my morning walk with my gun, which I seldom failed; and very
seldom failed also bringing home something 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.-I 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 and one side, so much, that, in short,
it frighted me, and not without reason too; for if I had been under it,
I had never wanted a grave-digger. Upon this disaster I had a great
deal of work to d- over again; for I had the loose earth to carry out,

~IF ROBINSON CRaSOE. 9

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, or 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 partitions to part off my
house.
Dec. 17.-From this day to the twentieth I placed shelves, and
knocked up nails on the posts to hang every thing up that could be
hung up: and now I began to be in some order within doors.
Dec. 20.-Now I carried every thing into the cave, and begaL 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.
Dec. 26.-No rain, and the earth much cooler than before, and
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 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
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 enter-
tained a thought of breeding up some tame creatures, that I might have
food when my powder and shot were all spent.
Dec. 28, 29, 30.-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 l.-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 was plenty of goats, though exceeding 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
bqing attacked by somebcdy,I resolved to make very thick and strong.

9f THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

CRUSOE WRITING HIS JOURNAL.
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 less time
than from the 3d of January to the 14th of April, 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 until this wall was finished; and it is scarcely credible
what inexpressible labour every thing was done with, especially the
4. bringing piles out of the woods, and driving them into the ground;
for I made them much bigger than I need 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

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE.

.--- 4---i -
CRUSOE DISCOVERS THE BARLEY.
these walks, of something or other to my advantage; particularly, I
found a kind of wild pigeons, who built, not as wood pigeons, in a tree,
but rather as house pigeons, in the holes of the rocks ; and taking some
young ones, I endeavored 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, I
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 first it was impossible for
me to make, as indeed, as to 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 to the( l .'.. ;I. of making
one by them, though I spent many weeks about it; I could neither put
in the heads, or joint 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 candle, so that as
soon as ever it was dark, which was generally by seven o'clock, I was
obliged to go to bed. I remembered 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
7n 7

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

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 a 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. What little remainder of
corn had been in the bag was all devoured with the rats, and I saw
nothing in the bag but husks and dust; and being willing to have the
bag for some other use-I think it was to put powder in-when 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 of any thing, and not so much
as remembering that I had thrown any thing there; when about a
month after, or thereabout, 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, or had entertained any sense of any thing that had befallen me,
otherwise than as a 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 in 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
this 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 hap-
pen 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 but that there was more in the place, I went
all over that part of the island where I had been before, peeping in

OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 99

every corner, and under every rock, to see for more of it; but I could
not find any. At last, it occurred to my thought that I had shook a
bag of chicken's meat out in that place, and then the wonder began to
cease; and I must confess, my religious thankfulness to God's provi-
dence began to abate too, upon 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, as to me, that should order or
appoint ten or twelve grains of corn to remain unspoiled, when the rats
had destroyed all the rest, as if it had been dropped from heaven: as
also, that I 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 corn, you may be sure, in their 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 whose use was of the
same kind, or to the same purpose, namely, to make me bread, or
rather food; for I found ways to cook it up 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 in the outside of my habitation.
April 16.-I finished the ladder; so I went up with the ladder to
the top, and then pulled it up after me, and let it down on 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 aonost had all
nylabour overthrown at one&, and myself killed. The case was "hus:
as I was busy in the inside of it, behind my tent, just in the eunace
.nto my cave, I was terribly frighted with a most dreadful surprise' ,
thing indeed; for on a sudden I found the earth come crumbling down .
-11L1.3.'

	Frontispiece
	Title Page
	Introduction
	Table of Contents
	List of Illustrations
	Memoir of the author
	Part I
	Part II
	Appendix

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