by Daniel Defoe
my face in a hot day. Besides this, when I came tothe till in the chest, I found there three great bags ofpieces-of-eight, which held about eleven hundred pieces in all; and inone of them, wrapped up in a paper, six doubloons of gold, and somesmall bars or wedges of gold; I suppose they might all weigh near apound. In the other chest were some clothes, but of little value; but,by the circumstances, it must have belonged to the gunner's mate; thoughthere was no powder in it, except two pounds of fine glazed powder, inthree small flasks, kept, I suppose, for charging their fowling-pieceson occasion. Upon the whole, I got very little by this voyage that wasof any use to me; for, as to the money, I had no manner of occasion forit; it was to me as the dirt under my feet; and I would have given itall for three or four pair of English shoes and stockings, which werethings I greatly wanted, but had none on my feet for many years. I hadindeed got two pair of shoes now, which I took off the feet of the twodrowned men whom I saw in the wreck, and I found two pair more in one ofthe chests, which were very welcome to me; but they were not like ourEnglish shoes, either for ease or service, being rather what we callpumps than shoes. I found in this seaman's chest about fiftypieces-of-eight in rials, but no gold: I suppose this belonged to apoorer man than the other, which seemed to belong to some officer. Well,however, I lugged this money home to my cave, and laid it up, as I haddone that before which I brought from our own ship: but it was a greatpity, as I said, that the other part of this ship had not come to myshare; for I am satisfied I might have loaded my canoe several timesover with money; and, thought I, if I ever escape to England, it mightlie here safe enough till I may come again and fetch it.
Having now brought all my things on shore, and secured them, I went backto my boat, and rowed or paddled her along the shore to her oldharbour, where I laid her up, and made the best of my way to my oldhabitation, where I found every thing safe and quiet. I began now torepose myself, live after my old fashion, and take care of my familyaffairs; and, for a while, I lived easy enough, only that I was morevigilant than I used to be, looked out oftener, and did not go abroad somuch; and if at any time I did stir with any freedom, it was always tothe east part of the island, where I was pretty well satisfied thesavages never came, and where I could go without so many precautions,and such a load of arms and ammunition as I always carried with me if Iwent the other way. I lived in this condition near two years more; butmy unlucky head, that was always to let me know it was born to make mybody miserable, was all these two years filled with projects anddesigns, how, if it were possible, I might get away from this island:for, sometimes I was for making another voyage to the wreck, though myreason told me that there was nothing left there worth the hazard of myvoyage; sometimes for a ramble one way, sometimes another; and I believeverily, if I had had the boat that I went from Sallee in, I should haveventured to sea, bound any where, I knew not whither. I have been, inall my circumstances, a _memento_ to those who are touched with thegeneral plague of mankind, whence, for aught I know, one half of theirmiseries flow; I mean that of not being satisfied with the stationwherein God and nature hath placed them: for, not to look back upon myprimitive condition, and the excellent advice of my father, theopposition to which was, as I may call it, my _original sin_, mysubsequent mistakes of the same kind had been the means of my cominginto this miserable condition; for had that Providence, which so happilyseated me at the Brazils as a planter, blessed me with confined desires,and I could have been contented to have gone on gradually, I might havebeen, by this time, I mean in the time of my being in this island, oneof the most considerable planters in the Brazils; nay, I am persuaded,that by the improvements I had made in that little time I lived there,and the increase I should probably have made if I had remained, I mighthave been worth a hundred thousand moidores: and what business had I toleave a settled fortune, a well-stocked plantation, improving andincreasing, to turn supercargo to Guinea to fetch negroes, when patienceand time would have so increased our stock at home, that we could havebought them at our own door from those whose business it was to fetchthem? and though it had cost us something more, yet the difference ofthat price was by no means worth saving at so great a hazard. But asthis is usually the fate of young heads, so reflection upon the folly ofit is as commonly the exercise of more years, or of the dear-boughtexperience of time: so it was with me now; and yet so deep had themistake taken root in my temper, that I could not satisfy myself in mystation, but was continually poring upon the means and possibility of myescape from this place: and that I may, with the greater pleasure to thereader, bring on the remaining part of my story, it may not be improperto give some account of my first conceptions on the subject of thisfoolish scheme for my escape, and how, and upon what foundation I acted.
I am now to be supposed retired into my castle, after my late voyage tothe wreck, my frigate laid up and secured under water, as usual, and mycondition restored to what it was before; I had more wealth, indeed,than I had before, but was not at all the richer; for I had no more usefor it than the Indians of Peru had before the Spaniards came there.
It was one of the nights in the rainy season in March, the four andtwentieth year of my first setting foot in this island of solitude, Iwas lying in my bed, or hammock, awake; very well in health, had nopain, no distemper, no uneasiness of body, nor any uneasiness of mind,more than ordinary, but could by no means close my eyes, that is, so asto sleep; no, not a wink all night long, otherwise than as follows:--Itis impossible to set down the innumerable crowd of thoughts that whirledthrough that great thoroughfare of the brain, the memory, in thisnight's time: I ran over the whole history of my life in miniature, orby abridgment, as I may call it, to my coming to this island, and alsoof that part of my life since I came to this island. In my reflectionsupon the state of my case since I came on shore on this island, I wascomparing the happy posture of my affairs in the first years of myhabitation here, compared to the life of anxiety, fear, and care, whichI had lived in, ever since I had seen the print of a foot in the sand;not that I did not believe the savages had frequented the island evenall the while, and might have been several hundreds of them at times onshore there; but I had never known it, and was incapable of anyapprehensions about it; my satisfaction was perfect, though my dangerwas the same, and I was as happy in not knowing my danger as if I hadnever really been exposed to it. This furnished my thoughts with manyvery profitable reflections, and particularly this one: How infinitelygood that Providence is, which has provided, in its government ofmankind, such narrow bounds to his sight and knowledge of things; andthough he walks in the midst of so many thousand dangers, the sight ofwhich, if discovered to him, would distract his mind and sink hisspirits, he is kept serene and calm, by having the events of things hidfrom his eyes, and knowing nothing of the dangers which surround him.
After these thoughts had for some time entertained me, I came to reflectseriously upon the real danger I had been in for so many years in thisvery island, and how I had walked about in the greatest security, andwith all possible tranquillity, even when perhaps nothing but the browof a hill, a great tree, or the casual approach of night, had beenbetween me and the worst kind of destruction, viz. that of falling intothe hands of cannibals and savages, who would have seized on me with thesame view as I would on a goat or a turtle, and have thought it no morea crime to kill and devour me, than I did of a pigeon or curlew. I wouldunjustly slander myself, if I should say I was not sincerely thankful tomy great Preserver, to whose singular protection I acknowledged, withgreat humility, all these unknown deliverances were due, and withoutwhich I must inevitably have fallen into their merciless hands.
When these thoughts were over, my head was for some time taken up inconsidering the nature of these wretched creatures, I mean the savages,and how it came to pass in the world, that the wise Governor of allthings should give up any of his creatures to such inhumanity, nay, tosomething so much below even brutality itself, as to devour its ownkind: but as this ended in some (at that time) fruitless speculations,it occurred to me to inquire
, what part of the world these wretcheslived in? how far off the coast was, from whence they came? what theyventured over so far from home for? what kind of boats they had? and whyI might not order myself and my business so, that I might be as able togo over thither as they were to come to me?
I never so much as troubled myself to consider what I should do withmyself when I went thither; what would become of me, if I fell into thehands of the savages; or how I should escape from them, if they attackedme; no, nor so much as how it was possible for me to reach the coast,and not be attacked by some or other of them, without any possibility ofdelivering myself; and if I should not fall into their hands, what Ishould do for provision, or whither I should bend my course: none ofthese thoughts, I say, so much as came in my way; but my mind was whollybent upon the notion of my passing over in my boat to the main land. Ilooked upon my present condition as the most miserable that couldpossibly be;
