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08 - Robinson Crusoe - Daniel Defoe · Classic Adventure Books Library

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Chapter eight surveys his position. I mentioned before that I had a great mind
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to see all the island, and that I had traveled up the brook and
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so on to where I built my bower, and where I had an opening
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quite to the sea on the other side of the island. I now resolved
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to travel quite across to the sea shore on that side, so taking my
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gun, a hatchet, and my dog, and a larger quantity of powder
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and shot than usual, with two biscuit cakes and a great bunch of raisins
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in my pouch for my store, I began my journey. When I had
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passed the vale where my bower stood. As above, I came within view
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of the sea to the west, and had been a very clear day.
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I fairly descried land. Whether an island or a continent, I could not
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tell, but it lay very high, extending from the west to the west
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southwest, at a very great distance. By my guess, it could not
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be less than fifteen or twenty leagues off. I could not tell what part
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of the world this might be, otherwise than that I knew it must be
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part of America, and, as I concluded by all my observations, must
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be near the Spanish dominions, and perhaps was all inhabited by savages, where
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if I had landed, I had been in a worse condition than I was
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now. Therefore I acquiesced in the dispositions of providence, which I began now
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to own, and to believe ordered everything for the best. I say,
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therefore I quieted my mind with this, and left off afflicting myself with fruitless
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wishes of being there. Besides, after some thought upon this affair, I
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considered that if this land was the Spanish coast, I should certainly one time
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or other see some vessel pass or repass one way or other. But if
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not, then it was the Savage coast, between the Spanish country and Brazils,
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where are found the worst of savages, for they are cannibals or men
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eaters, and fail not to murder and devour all the human bodies that fall
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into their hands. With these considerations, I walked very leisurely forward. I
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found that side of the island where I now was was much pleasanter than mine.
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The open savannah or fields were sweet, adorned with flowers and grass,
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and full of very fine woods. I saw abundance of parrots and fain I
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would have caught one, if possible, to have kept it to be tame
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and taught it to speak to me. I did, after some painstaking,
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catch a young parrot, for I knocked it down with a stick, and
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having recovered it, I brought it home. But it was some years before
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I could make him speak. However, at last I taught him to call
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me by name, very familiarly. But the accident that followed, though it
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be a trifle, will be very diverting in its place, I was exceedingly
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diverted with this journey. I found in the low grounds hares as I thought
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them to be, and foxes, but they differed greatly from all the other
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kinds that I had met, Nor could I satisfy myself to eat them,
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though I killed several. But I had no need to be venturous, for
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I had no want of food, and of that which was very good too,
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especially these three sorts that as goats, pigeons, and turtle or tortoise,
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which added to my grapes. Leadenhall Market could not have furnished a table
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better than I in proportion to the company. And though my case was deplorable
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enough, yet I had great cause for thankfulness that I was not driven to
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any extremities for food, but had rather plenty, even to dainties. I
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never traveled in this journey above two miles outright in a day or thereabouts,
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but I took so many turns and returns to see what discoveries I could make,
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that I came weary enough to the place where I resolved to sit down
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all night. And then I either reposed myself in a tree, or surrounded
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myself with a row of stakes set upright in the ground, and either from
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one tree to another, or so as no wild creature could come at me
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without waking me. As soon as I came to the sea shore, I
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was surprised to see that I had taken up my lot on the worst side
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of the island. For here, indeed the shore was covered with innumerable turtles,
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whereas on the other side I had found but three in a year and
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a half. Here were also an infinite number of fowls of many kinds,
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some of which I had seen and some which I had not seen before,
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and many of them very good meat. But such as I knew not the
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names of, except those called penguins. I could have shot as many as
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I pleased, but was very sparing of my powder and shot, and therefore
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had more mind to kill a she goat if I could, which I could
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better feed on. And though there were many goats here, more than on
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my side of the island, yet it was with much more difficulty that I
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could come near them, the country being flat and even, and they saw
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me much sooner than when I was on the hills. I confess this side
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of the country was much pleasanter than mine. But yet I had not the
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least inclination to remove, For as I was fixed in my habitation, it
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became natural to me, and I seemed all the while I was here to
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be as it were. Upon a journey and from home, however, I
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traveled along the shore of the sea towards the east, I suppose about twelve
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miles, and then setting up a great pole upon the shore for a mark,
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I concluded I would go home again, and that the next journey I
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took should be on the other side of the island, east from my dwelling,
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And so round till I came to my post again. I took another
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way to come back. Then that I went, thinking I could easily keep
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all the island so much in my view that I could not miss finding my
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first dwelling by viewing the country. But I found myself to be mistaken for
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being come about two or three miles, I found myself descended into a very
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large valley, but so surrounded with hills, and those hills covered with wood,
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that I could not see which was my way by any direction but that
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of the sun, nor even then, unless I knew very well the position
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of the sun at that time of the day. It happened to my further
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misfortune that the weather proved hazy for three or four days while I was in
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the valley and not able to see the sun. I wandered about very uncomfortably,
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and at last was obliged to find the seaside looking for my post,
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and come back the same way I went, And then by easy journeys,
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I turned homeward, the weather being exceeding hot, and my gun, ammunition,
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hatchet, and other things very heavy. In this journey, my dog
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surprised a young kid and seized upon it, and I, running in to
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take hold of it, caught it and saved it alive from the dog.
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I had a great mind to bring it home if I could, for I
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had often been musing whether it might not be possible to get a kid or
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two, and so raise a breed of tame goats which might supply me when
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my powder and shot should be all spent. I made a collar for this
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little creature, and with a string which I made of some rope yam,
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which I always carried about me, I led to him along. There was
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some difficulty till I came to my bower, and there I enclosed him and
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left him, for I was very impatient to be at home, from whence
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I had been absent above a month. I cannot express what a satisfaction it
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was to me to come into my old hutch and lie down in my hammock
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bed. This little wandering journey without settled place of abode had been so unpleasant
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to me that my own house, as I called it to myself, was
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a perfect settlement to me compared to that, and it rendered everything about me
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so comfortable that I resolved I would never go a great way from it again,
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while it should be my lot to stay on the island. I reposed
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myself here a week to rest and regale myself after my long journey, during
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which most of the time was taken up in the way affair of making a
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cage for my pall, who began now to be a mere domestic and to
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be well acquainted with me. Then I began to think of the poor kid
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which I had pinned in within my little circle, and resolved to go and
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fetch it home or give it some food. Accordingly, I went and found
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it where I had left it, for indeed it could not get out,
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but was almost starved for one of food. I went and cut boughs of
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trees and branches of some shrubs as I could find, and threw it over,
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And having fed it, I tied it as I did before, to
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lead it away. But it was so tame with being hungry that I had
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no need to have tied it, for it followed me like a dog.
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And as I continually fed it, the creature became so loving, so gentle,
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and so fond, that it became from that time one of my domestics
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also, and would never leave me Afterwards. The rainy season of the autumnal
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equinox was now come, and I kept the thirtieth of September in the same
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solemn manner as before, being the anniversary of my landing on the island,
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having now been there two years and no more prospect of being delivered than the
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first day I came there. I spent the whole day in humble and thankful
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acknowledgments of the many wonderful mercies which my solitary condition was attended with, and
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without which it might have been infinitely more miserable. I gave humble and hearty
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thanks that God had been pleased to discover to me that it was possible I
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might be more happy in this solitary condition than I should have been in the
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liberty of society, and in all the pleasures of the world, that He
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could fully make up to me the deficiencies of mine, my solitary state,
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and the want of human society, by his presence and the communications of His
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grace to my soul, supporting, comforting, and encouraging me to depend upon
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His providence here and hope for his eternal presence hereafter. It was now that
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I began sensibly to feel how much more happy this life I now led was,
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with all its miserable circumstances, than the wicked, cursed, and abominable
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life I had led the past part of my days. And now I changed
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both my sorrows and my joys. My very desires altered, my affections changed
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their guests, and my delights were perfectly new from what they were at my
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first coming, or indeed for the two years past before. As I walked
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about, either on my hunting or for viewing the country, the anguish of
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my soul at my condition would break out upon me on a sudden and my
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very heart would die within me. To think of the woods, the mountains,
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the deserts I was in, and how I was a prisoner, locked
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up with the eternal bars and bolts of the ocean, in an uninhabited wilderness
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without redemption. In the midst of the greatest composure of mind, this would
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break out upon me like a storm and make me wring my hands and weep
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like a child. Sometimes it would take me in the middle of my work,
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and I would immediately sit down and sigh and look upon the ground for
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an hour or two together. And this was still worse to me, for
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if I could burst out into tears or vent myself by words, it would
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go off, and the grief, having exhausted itself, would abate. But
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now I began to exercise myself with new thoughts. I daily read the Word
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of God and applied all the comforts of it to my present state. One
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morning, being very sad, I opened the Bible upon these words, I
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will never never leave THEE, nor forsake THEE. Immediately it occurred that these
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words were to me. Why else should they be directed in such a manner,
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just at the moment when I was mourning over my condition as one forsaken
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of God and man? Well, then said I, if God does not
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forsake me of what ill consequence can it be? Or what matters it?
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Though? The world should all forsake me. Seeing, on the other hand,
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if I had all the world and should lose the favor and blessing of
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God, there would be no comparison in the loss. From this moment,
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I began to conclude in my mind that it was possible for me to be
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more happy in this forsaken, solitary condition than it was probable I should ever
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have been in any other particular state in the world. And with this thought,
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I was going to give thanks to God for bringing me to this place.
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I know not what it was, but something shocked my mind at that
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thought, and I durst not speak the words. How canst Thou become such
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a hypocrite, said I even audibly, to pretend to be thankful for a
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condition which, however thou mayst endeavor to be contented with. Thou wouldst rather
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pray heartily to be delivered from. So I stopped there. But though I
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could not say I thanked God for being there, yet I sincerely gave thanks
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to God for opening my eyes, by whatever afflicting providences, to see the
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former condition of my life, and to mourn for my wickedness and repent.
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I never opened the Bible or shut it, but my very soul within me
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blessed God for directing my friend in England, without any order of mine,
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to pack it up among my goods, and for assisting me afterwards to save
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it out of the wreck of the ship. Thus, and in this disposition
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of mind, I began my third year. And though I have not given
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the reader the trouble of so particular account of my works this year as the
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first, yet in general it may be observed that I was very seldom idle,
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but having regularly divided my time according to the several daily employments that were
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before me, such as first my duty to God and the reading the scriptures,
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which I constantly set apart sometime for thrice every day. Secondly, the
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going abroad with my gun for food, which generally took me up three hours,
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and every morning when it did not rain. Thirdly, the ordering,
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cutting, preserving and cooking what I had killed or caught for my supply.
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These took up great part of the day. Also, it is to be
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considered that in the middle of the day, when the sun was in the
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zenith, the violence of the heat was too great to stir out, so
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that about four hours in the evening was all the time I could be supposed
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to work in. With this exception that sometimes I changed my hours of hunting
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and working and went to work in the morning and abroad with my gun in
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the afternoon. To this short time allowed for labor, I desire maybe added
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the exceeding laboriousness of my work, the many hours which, for want of
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tools, want of help, and want of skill everything I did took up
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out of my time. For example, I was full two and forty days
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in making a board for a long shelf which I wanted in my cave,
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whereas two sawyers with their tools and a saw pit would have cut six of
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them out of the same tree in half a day. My case was this.
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It was to be a large tree which was to be cut down,
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because my board was to be a broad one. This tree I was three
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days in cutting down, and two more cutting off the boughs and reducing it
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to a log or piece of timber. With inexpressible hacking and hewing, I
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reduced both the sides of it into chips till it began to be light enough
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to move. Then I turned it and made one side of it smooth and
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flat as a board from end to end. Then, turning that side downward,
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cut the other side till I brought the plank to be about three inches
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thick and smooth on both sides. Anyone may judge the labor of my hands
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and such a piece of work, but labor and patience carried me through that
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and many other things. I can only observe this in particular to show the
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reason why so much of my time went away with so little work. That
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is that what might be a little to be done with help in tools was
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of vast labor and required a prodigious time to do alone and by hand.
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But notwithstanding this, with patience and labor, I got through everything that my
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circumstances made necessary to me to do, as will appear by what follows.
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I was now in the months of November and December expecting my crop of barley
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and rice. The ground I had manured and dug up for them was not
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great, for, as I observed, my seed was of each not above
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the quantity of half peck, and for I had lost one whole crop by
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sowing in the dry season. But now my crop promised very well, when
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on a sudden I found I was in danger of losing it all again by
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enemies of several sorts, which it was scarcely possible to keep from it.
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As first the goats and wild creatures, which I called hares, who,
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tasting the sweetness of the blade, lay in it night and day as soon
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as it came up, and ate it so close that it could get no
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time to shoot up into stalk. This I saw no remedy for but by
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making an enclosure about it with the hedge, which I did with a great
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deal of toil, and the more because it required speed. However, as
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my arable land was but small, suited to my crop. I got it
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totally well fenced in about three weeks time, and shooting some of the creatures
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in the daytime. I set my dog to guard it in the night,
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tying him up to a steak at the gate, where he would stand and
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bark all night long. So in a little time the enemies forsook the place,
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and the corn grew well and strong, and began to ripen a pace.
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But as the beasts ruined me before while my corn was in the blade,
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so the birds were as likely to ruin me now when it was in
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the ear. For going along by the place to see how it throve,
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I saw my little crop surrounded with fowls, of I know not how many
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sorts, who stood as it were watching till I should be gone. I
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immediately let fly among them, for I always had my gun with me.
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I had no sooner shot. But there rose up a little cloud of fowls,
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which I had not seen at all from among the corn itself. This
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touched me sensibly, for I foresaw that in a very few days they would
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devour all my hopes, that I should be starved and never be able to
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raise a crop at all. And what to do I could not tell.
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However, I resolved not to lose my corn, if possible, though I
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should watch it night and day. In the first place, I went among
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it to see what damage was already done, and found they had spoiled a
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good deal of it, but that as it was yet too green for them,
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the loss was not so great, but that the remainder was likely to
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be a good crop if it could be saved. I stayed by it to
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load my gun, and then coming away I could easily see the thieves sitting
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upon all the trees about me, as if they only waited till I was
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gone away, And the event proved it to be so, for as I
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walked off, as if I was gone, I was no sooner out of
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their sight than they dropped down, one by one into the corn. Again.
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I was so provoked that I could not have patience to stay till more
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came on, knowing that every grain a day eight now was, as it
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might be said, easily a peck loaf to me in the consequences. But
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coming up to the hedge, I fired again and killed three of them.
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This was what I wished for, so I took them up and served them
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as we served notorious thieves, and England hanged them in chains for a terror
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of them. It is impossible to imagine that this should have had such an
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effect as it did, for the fowls would not only not come at the
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corn, but in short they forsook all that part of the island, and
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I could never see a bird near the place as long as my scarecrows on'm
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there. This I was very glad of, as you may be sure.
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And about the latter end of December, which was our second harvest of the
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year, my corn I was sadly put for a scythe or sickle to cut
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it down, and all I could do was to make one as well as
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I could, out of one of the broadswords or cutlasses, which I saved
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among the arms out of the ship. However, as my first crop was
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but small, I had no great difficulty to cut it down. In short,
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I reaped it in my way, for I cut nothing off but the
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ears, and carried it away in a great basket which I had made,
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and so rubbed it out with my hands. And at the end of the
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harvesting I found that out of my half peck of seed, I had near
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two bushels of rice, and about two bushels and a half of barley,
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that is to say, by my guess, for I had no measure at
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that time. However, this was a great encouragement to me, and I
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foresaw that in time it would please God to supply me with bread. And
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yet here I was perplexed again, for I neither knew how to grind or
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to make meal of my corn, or indeed how to clean it and part
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it, nor if made into meal, how to make bread of it,
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and if how to make it, yet I knew not how to bake it.
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These things being added to my desire of having a good quantity of store,
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and to secure a constant supply, I resolved not to taste any of
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this crop, but to preserve it all for seed against the next season.
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In the meantime, to employ all my study and hours of working to accomplish
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this great work of providing myself with corn and bread. It might be truly
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said that now I worked for my bread. I believe few people have thought
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much of upon the strange multitude of little things necessary into providing, producing,
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curing, dressing, making and finishing this one article of bread. I that
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was reduced to a mere state of nature. Found this to my daily discouragement,
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and was made more sensible of it every hour, even after I had
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got the first handful of seed corn, which as I have said, came
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up unexpectedly and indeed to a surprise. First I had no plow to turn
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up the earth, no spade or shovel to dig it. Well. This
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I conquered by making a wooden spade, as I observed before. But this
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did my work but in a wooden manner, And though it cost me a
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great many days to make it, yet for want of iron, it not
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only wore out soon, but made my work the harder and made it be
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performed much worse. However, this I bore with and was content to work
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with it out with patience, and bear with the badness of the performance.
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When the corn was sown, I had no harrow, but was forced to
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go over it myself and drag a great heavy bough of a tree over it
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to scratch it, as it may be called, rather than rake or harrow
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it. When it was growing and grown, I have observed already how many
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things I wanted to fence it, secure it, mow or reap it cure
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and carry it home, thrash, part it from the chaff, and save
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it. Then I wanted a mill to grind it, sieves to dress it,
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yeast and salt to make it into bread, and an oven to bake
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it in. But all these things I did without, as Shelby observed.
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And yet the corn was an inestimable comfort and advantage to me too. All
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this, as I said, made everything laborious and tedious to me, but
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that there was no help for neither was my time so much lost to me,
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Because as I divided it, a certain part of it was every day
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appointed to these works. And as I had resolved to use none of the
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corn for bread till I had a greater quantity by me, I had the
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next six months to apply myself wholly by labor and invention, to furnish myself
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with utensils proper for the performing all the operations necessary for making the corn,
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when I had it fit for my use. End of Chapter eight