Chapter 8: Surveys His Position

by Daniel Defoe

　　I mentioned before that I had a great mind to see the whole island,and that I had travelled up the brook, and so on to where I builtmy bower, and where I had an opening quite to the sea, on the otherside of the island. I now resolved to travel quite across to thesea-shore on that side; so, taking my gun, a hatchet, and my dog,and a larger quantity of powder and shot than usual, with twobiscuit-cakes and a great bunch of raisins in my pouch for mystore, I began my journey. When I had passed the vale where mybower stood, as above, I came within view of the sea to the west,and it being a very clear day, I fairly descried land - whether anisland or a continent I could not tell; but it lay very high,extending from the W. to the W.S.W. at a very great distance; by myguess it could not be less than fifteen or twenty leagues off.I could not tell what part of the world this might be, otherwisethan that I knew it must be part of America, and, as I concluded byall my observations, must be near the Spanish dominions, andperhaps was all inhabited by savages, where, if I had landed, I hadbeen in a worse condition than I was now; and therefore Iacquiesced in the dispositions of Providence, which I began now toown and to believe ordered everything for the best; I say I quietedmy mind with this, and left off afflicting myself with fruitlesswishes of being there.Besides, after some thought upon this affair, I considered that ifthis land was the Spanish coast, I should certainly, one time orother, see some vessel pass or repass one way or other; but if not,then it was the savage coast between the Spanish country andBrazils, where are found the worst of savages; for they arecannibals or men-eaters, and fail not to murder and devour all thehuman bodies that fall into their hands.With these considerations, I walked very leisurely forward. Ifound that side of the island where I now was much pleasanter thanmine - the open or savannah fields sweet, adorned with flowers andgrass, and full of very fine woods. I saw abundance of parrots,and fain I would have caught one, if possible, to have kept it tobe tame, and taught it to speak to me. I did, after somepainstaking, catch a young parrot, for I knocked it down with astick, and having recovered it, I brought it home; but it was someyears before I could make him speak; however, at last I taught himto call me by name very familiarly. But the accident thatfollowed, though it be a trifle, will be very diverting in itsplace.I was exceedingly diverted with this journey. I found in the lowgrounds hares (as I thought them to be) and foxes; but theydiffered greatly from all the other kinds I had met with, nor couldI satisfy myself to eat them, though I killed several. But I hadno need to be venturous, for I had no want of food, and of thatwhich was very good too, especially these three sorts, viz. goats,pigeons, and turtle, or tortoise, which added to my grapes,Leadenhall market could not have furnished a table better than I,in proportion to the company; and though my case was deplorableenough, yet I had great cause for thankfulness that I was notdriven to any extremities for food, but had rather plenty, even todainties.I never travelled in this journey above two miles outright in aday, or thereabouts; but I took so many turns and re-turns to seewhat discoveries I could make, that I came weary enough to theplace where I resolved to sit down all night; and then I eitherreposed myself in a tree, or surrounded myself with a row of stakesset upright in the ground, either from one tree to another, or soas no wild creature could come at me without waking me.As soon as I came to the sea-shore, I was surprised to see that Ihad taken up my lot on the worst side of the island, for here,indeed, the shore was covered with innumerable turtles, whereas onthe other side I had found but three in a year and a half. Herewas also an infinite number of fowls of many kinds, some which Ihad seen, and some which I had not seen before, and many of themvery good meat, but such as I knew not the names of, except thosecalled penguins.I could have shot as many as I pleased, but was very sparing of mypowder and shot, and therefore had more mind to kill a she-goat ifI could, which I could better feed on; and though there were manygoats here, more than on my side the island, yet it was with muchmore difficulty that I could come near them, the country being flatand even, and they saw me much sooner than when I was on the hills.I confess this side of the country was much pleasanter than mine;but yet I had not the least inclination to remove, for as I wasfixed in my habitation it became natural to me, and I seemed allthe while I was here to be as it were upon a journey, and fromhome. However, I travelled along the shore of the sea towards theeast, I suppose about twelve miles, and then setting up a greatpole upon the shore for a mark, I concluded I would go home again,and that the next journey I took should be on the other side of theisland east from my dwelling, and so round till I came to my postagain.I took another way to come back than that I went, thinking I couldeasily keep all the island so much in my view that I could not missfinding my first dwelling by viewing the country; but I foundmyself mistaken, for being come about two or three miles, I foundmyself descended into a very large valley, but so surrounded withhills, and those hills covered with wood, that I could not seewhich was my way by any direction but that of the sun, nor eventhen, unless I knew very well the position of the sun at that timeof the day. It happened, to my further misfortune, that theweather proved hazy for three or four days while I was in thevalley, and not being able to see the sun, I wandered about veryuncomfortably, and at last was obliged to find the seaside, lookfor my post, and come back the same way I went: and then, by easyjourneys, I turned homeward, the weather being exceeding hot, andmy gun, ammunition, hatchet, and other things very heavy.In this journey my dog surprised a young kid, and seized upon it;and I, running in to take hold of it, caught it, and saved it alivefrom the dog. I had a great mind to bring it home if I could, forI had often been musing whether it might not be possible to get akid or two, and so raise a breed of tame goats, which might supplyme when my powder and shot should be all spent. I made a collarfor this little creature, and with a string, which I made of somerope-yam, which I always carried about me, I led him along, thoughwith some difficulty, till I came to my bower, and there I enclosedhim and left him, for I was very impatient to be at home, fromwhence I had been absent above a month.I cannot express what a satisfaction it was to me to come into myold hutch, and lie down in my hammock-bed. This little wanderingjourney, without settled place of abode, had been so unpleasant tome, that my own house, as I called it to myself, was a perfectsettlement to me compared to that; and it rendered everything aboutme so comfortable, that I resolved I would never go a great wayfrom it again while it should be my lot to stay on the island.I reposed myself here a week, to rest and regale myself after mylong journey; during which most of the time was taken up in theweighty affair of making a cage for my Poll, who began now to be amere domestic, and to be well acquainted with me. Then I began tothink of the poor kid which I had penned in within my littlecircle, and resolved to go and fetch it home, or give it some food;accordingly I went, and found it where I left it, for indeed itcould not get out, but was almost starved for want of food. I wentand cut boughs of trees, and branches of such shrubs as I couldfind, and threw it over, and having fed it, I tied it as I didbefore, to lead it away; but it was so tame with being hungry, thatI had no need to have tied it, for it followed me like a dog: andas I continually fed it, the creature became so loving, so gentle,and so fond, that it became from that time one of my domesticsalso, and would never leave me afterwards.The rainy season of the autumnal equinox was now come, and I keptthe 30th of September in the same solemn manner as before, beingthe anniversary of my landing on the island, having now been theretwo years, and no more prospect of being delivered than the firstday I came there, I spent the whole day in humble and thankfulacknowledgments of the many wonderful mercies which my solitarycondition was attended with, and without which it might have beeninfinitely more miserable. I gave humble and hearty thanks thatGod had been pleased to discover to me that it was possible I mightbe more happy in this solitary condition than I should have been inthe liberty of society, and in all the pleasures of the world; thatHe could fully make up to me the deficiencies of my solitary state,and the want of human society, by His presence and thecommunications of His grace to my soul; supporting, comforting, andencouraging me to depend upon His providence here, and hope for Hiseternal presence hereafter.It was now that I began sensibly to feel how much more happy thislife I now led was, with all its miserable circumstances, than thewicked, cursed, abominable life I led all the past part of my days;and now I changed both my sorrows and my joys; my very desiresaltered, my affections changed their gusts, and my delights wereperfectly new from what they were at my first coming, or, indeed,for the two years past.Before, as I walked about, either on my hunting or for viewing thecountry, the anguish of my soul at my condition would break outupon me on a sudden, and my very heart would die within me, tothink of the woods, the mountains, the deserts I was in, and how Iwas a prisoner, locked up with the eternal bars and bolts of theocean, in an uninhabited wilderness, without redemption. In themidst of the greatest composure of my mind, this would break outupon me like a storm, and make me wring my hands and weep like achild. Sometimes it would take me in the middle of my work, and Iwould immediately sit down and sigh, and look upon the ground foran hour or two together; and this was still worse to me, for if Icould burst out into tears, or vent myself by words, it would gooff, and the grief, having exhausted itself, would abate.But now I began to exercise myself with new thoughts: I daily readthe word of God, and applied all the comforts of it to my presentstate. One morning, being very sad, I opened the Bible upon thesewords, "I will never, never leave thee, nor forsake thee."Immediately it occurred that these words were to me; why elseshould they be directed in such a manner, just at the moment when Iwas mourning over my condition, as one forsaken of God and man?"Well, then," said I, "if God does not forsake me, of what illconsequence can it be, or what matters it, though the world shouldall forsake me, seeing on the other hand, if I had all the world,and should lose the favour and blessing of God, there would be nocomparison in the loss?"From this moment I began to conclude in my mind that it waspossible for me to be more happy in this forsaken, solitarycondition than it was probable I should ever have been in any otherparticular state in the world; and with this thought I was going togive thanks to God for bringing me to this place. I know not whatit was, but something shocked my mind at that thought, and I durstnot speak the words. "How canst thou become such a hypocrite,"said I, even audibly, "to pretend to be thankful for a conditionwhich, however thou mayest endeavour to be contented with, thouwouldst rather pray heartily to be delivered from?" So I stoppedthere; but though I could not say I thanked God for being there,yet I sincerely gave thanks to God for opening my eyes, by whateverafflicting providences, to see the former condition of my life, andto mourn for my wickedness, and repent. I never opened the Bible,or shut it, but my very soul within me blessed God for directing myfriend in England, without any order of mine, to pack it up amongmy goods, and for assisting me afterwards to save it out of thewreck of the ship.Thus, and in this disposition of mind, I began my third year; andthough I have not given the reader the trouble of so particular anaccount of my works this year as the first, yet in general it maybe observed that I was very seldom idle, but having regularlydivided my time according to the several daily employments thatwere before me, such as: first, my duty to God, and the reading theScriptures, which I constantly set apart some time for thrice everyday; secondly, the going abroad with my gun for food, whichgenerally took me up three hours in every morning, when it did notrain; thirdly, the ordering, cutting, preserving, and cooking whatI had killed or caught for my supply; these took up great part ofthe day. Also, it is to be considered, that in the middle of theday, when the sun was in the zenith, the violence of the heat wastoo great to stir out; so that about four hours in the evening wasall the time I could be supposed to work in, with this exception,that sometimes I changed my hours of hunting and working, and wentto work in the morning, and abroad with my gun in the afternoon.To this short time allowed for labour I desire may be added theexceeding laboriousness of my work; the many hours which, for wantof tools, want of help, and want of skill, everything I did took upout of my time. For example, I was full two and forty days inmaking a board for a long shelf, which I wanted in my cave;whereas, two sawyers, with their tools and a saw-pit, would havecut six of them out of the same tree in half a day.My case was this: it was to be a large tree which was to be cutdown, because my board was to be a broad one. This tree I wasthree days in cutting down, and two more cutting off the boughs,and reducing it to a log or piece of timber. With inexpressiblehacking and hewing I reduced both the sides of it into chips tillit began to be light enough to move; then I turned it, and made oneside of it smooth and flat as a board from end to end; then,turning that side downward, cut the other side til I brought theplank to be about three inches thick, and smooth on both sides.Any one may judge the labour of my hands in such a piece of work;but labour and patience carried me through that, and many otherthings. I only observe this in particular, to show the reason whyso much of my time went away with so little work - viz. that whatmight be a little to be done with help and tools, was a vast labourand required a prodigious time to do alone, and by hand. Butnotwithstanding this, with patience and labour I got througheverything that my circumstances made necessary to me to do, aswill appear by what follows.I was now, in the months of November and December, expecting mycrop of barley and rice. The ground I had manured and dug up forthem was not great; for, as I observed, my seed of each was notabove the quantity of half a peck, for I had lost one whole crop bysowing in the dry season. But now my crop promised very well, whenon a sudden I found I was in danger of losing it all again byenemies of several sorts, which it was scarcely possible to keepfrom it; as, first, the goats, and wild creatures which I calledhares, who, tasting the sweetness of the blade, lay in it night andday, as soon as it came up, and eat it so close, that it could getno time to shoot up into stalk.This I saw no remedy for but by making an enclosure about it with ahedge; which I did with a great deal of toil, and the more, becauseit required speed. However, as my arable land was but small,suited to my crop, I got it totally well fenced in about threeweeks' time; and shooting some of the creatures in the daytime, Iset my dog to guard it in the night, tying him up to a stake at thegate, where he would stand and bark all night long; so in a littletime the enemies forsook the place, and the corn grew very strongand well, and began to ripen apace.But as the beasts ruined me before, while my corn was in the blade,so the birds were as likely to ruin me now, when it was in the ear;for, going along by the place to see how it throve, I saw my littlecrop surrounded with fowls, of I know not how many sorts, whostood, as it were, watching till I should be gone. I immediatelylet fly among them, for I always had my gun with me. I had nosooner shot, but there rose up a little cloud of fowls, which I hadnot seen at all, from among the corn itself.This touched me sensibly, for I foresaw that in a few days theywould devour all my hopes; that I should be starved, and never beable to raise a crop at all; and what to do I could not tell;however, I resolved not to lose my corn, if possible, though Ishould watch it night and day. In the first place, I went among itto see what damage was already done, and found they had spoiled agood deal of it; but that as it was yet too green for them, theloss was not so great but that the remainder was likely to be agood crop if it could be saved.I stayed by it to load my gun, and then coming away, I could easilysee the thieves sitting upon all the trees about me, as if theyonly waited till I was gone away, and the event proved it to be so;for as I walked off, as if I was gone, I was no sooner out of theirsight than they dropped down one by one into the corn again. I wasso provoked, that I could not have patience to stay till more cameon, knowing that every grain that they ate now was, as it might besaid, a peck-loaf to me in the consequence; but coming up to thehedge, I fired again, and killed three of them. This was what Iwished for; so I took them up, and served them as we servenotorious thieves in England - hanged them in chains, for a terrorto of them. It is impossible to imagine that this should have suchan effect as it had, for the fowls would not only not come at thecorn, but, in short, they forsook all that part of the island, andI could never see a bird near the place as long as my scarecrowshung there. This I was very glad of, you may be sure, and aboutthe latter end of December, which was our second harvest of theyear, I reaped my corn.I was sadly put to it for a scythe or sickle to cut it down, andall I could do was to make one, as well as I could, out of one ofthe broadswords, or cutlasses, which I saved among the arms out ofthe ship. However, as my first crop was but small, I had no greatdifficulty to cut it down; in short, I reaped it in my way, for Icut nothing off but the ears, and carried it away in a great basketwhich I had made, and so rubbed it out with my hands; and at theend of all my harvesting, I found that out of my half-peck of seedI had near two bushels of rice, and about two bushels and a half ofbarley; that is to say, by my guess, for I had no measure at thattime.However, this was a great encouragement to me, and I foresaw that,in time, it would please God to supply me with bread. And yet hereI was perplexed again, for I neither knew how to grind or make mealof my corn, or indeed how to clean it and part it; nor, if madeinto meal, how to make bread of it; and if how to make it, yet Iknew not how to bake it. These things being added to my desire ofhaving a good quantity for store, and to secure a constant supply,I resolved not to taste any of this crop but to preserve it all forseed against the next season; and in the meantime to employ all mystudy and hours of working to accomplish this great work ofproviding myself with corn and bread.It might be truly said, that now I worked for my bread. I believefew people have thought much upon the strange multitude of littlethings necessary in the providing, producing, curing, dressing,making, and finishing this one article of bread.I, that was reduced to a mere state of nature, found this to mydaily discouragement; and was made more sensible of it every hour,even after I had got the first handful of seed-corn, which, as Ihave said, came up unexpectedly, and indeed to a surprise.First, I had no plough to turn up the earth - no spade or shovel todig it. Well, this I conquered by making me a wooden spade, as Iobserved before; but this did my work but in a wooden manner; andthough it cost me a great many days to make it, yet, for want ofiron, it not only wore out soon, but made my work the harder, andmade it be performed much worse. However, this I bore with, andwas content to work it out with patience, and bear with the badnessof the performance. When the corn was sown, I had no harrow, butwas forced to go over it myself, and drag a great heavy bough of atree over it, to scratch it, as it may be called, rather than rakeor harrow it. When it was growing, and grown, I have observedalready how many things I wanted to fence it, secure it, mow orreap it, cure and carry it home, thrash, part it from the chaff,and save it. Then I wanted a mill to grind it sieves to dress it,yeast and salt to make it into bread, and an oven to bake it; butall these things I did without, as shall be observed; and yet thecorn was an inestimable comfort and advantage to me too. All this,as I said, made everything laborious and tedious to me; but thatthere was no help for. Neither was my time so much loss to me,because, as I had divided it, a certain part of it was every dayappointed to these works; and as I had resolved to use none of thecorn for bread till I had a greater quantity by me, I had the nextsix months to apply myself wholly, by labour and invention, tofurnish myself with utensils proper for the performing all theoperations necessary for making the corn, when I had it, fit for myuse.