by Daniel Defoe
there; nowish Friday there, no master there." In a word, he would not think ofgoing there without me. "I go there, Friday!" says I, "what shall I dothere?" He returned very quick upon me at this: "You do great deal muchgood," says he; "you teach wild mans be good, sober, tame mans; you tellthem know God, pray God, and live new life."--"Alas! Friday," says I,"thou knowest not what thou sayest; I am but an ignorant manmyself."--"Yes, yes," says he, "you teachee me good, you teachee themgood."--"No, no, Friday," says I, "you shall go without me; leave mehere to live by myself, as I did before." He looked confused again atthat word; and running to one of the hatchets which he used to wear, hetakes it up hastily, and gives it to me. "What must I do with this?"says I to him. "You take kill Friday," says he. "What must I kill youfor?" said I again. He returns very quick, "What you send Friday awayfor? Take kill Friday, no send Friday away." This he spoke so earnestly,that I saw tears stand in his eyes: in a word, I so plainly discoveredthe utmost affection in him to me, and a firm resolution in him, that Itold him then, and often after, that I would never send him away fromme, if he was willing to stay with me.
Upon the whole, as I found, by all his discourse, a settled affection tome, and that nothing should part him from me, so I found all thefoundation of his desire to go to his own country was laid in his ardentaffection to the people, and his hopes of my doing them good; a thing,which, as I had no notion of myself, so I had not the least thought, orintention, or desire of undertaking it. But still I found a stronginclination to my attempting an escape, as above, founded on thesupposition gathered from the discourse, viz. that there were seventeenbearded men there: and, therefore, without any more delay, I went towork with Friday, to find out a great tree proper to fell, and make alarge periagua, or canoe, to undertake the voyage. There were treesenough in the island to have built a little fleet, not of periaguas, orcanoes, but even of good large vessels: but the main thing I looked atwas, to get one so near the water that we might launch it when it wasmade, to avoid the mistake I committed at first. At last, Friday pitchedupon a tree; for I found he knew much better than I what kind of woodwas fittest for it; nor can I tell, to this day, what wood to call thetree we cut down, except that it was very like the tree we call fustic,or between that and the Nicaragua wood, for it was much of the samecolour and smell. Friday was for burning the hollow or cavity of thistree out, to make it for a boat, but I showed him how to cut it withtools; which, after I had showed him how to use, he did very handily:and in about a month's hard labour we finished it, and made it veryhandsome; especially when, with our axes, which I showed him how tohandle, we cut and hewed the outside into the true shape of a boat.After this, however, it cost us near a fortnight's time to get heralong, as it were inch by inch, upon great rollers into the water; butwhen she was in, she would have carried twenty men with great ease.
When she was in the water, and though she was so big, it amazed me tosee with what dexterity, and how swift my man Friday would manage her,turn her, and paddle her along. So I asked him if he would, and if wemight venture over in her. "Yes," he said, "we venture over in her verywell, though great blow wind." However, I had a farther design that heknew nothing of, and that was to make a mast and a sail, and to fit herwith an anchor and cable. As to a mast, that was easy enough to get; soI pitched upon a straight young cedar tree, which I found near theplace, and which there were great plenty of in the island: and I setFriday to work to cut it down, and gave him directions how to shape andorder it. But as to the sail, that was my particular care. I knew I hadold sails, or rather pieces of old sails enough; but as I had had themnow six and twenty years by me, and had not been very careful topreserve them, not imagining that I should ever have this kind of usefor them, I did not doubt but they were all rotten, and, indeed, most ofthem were so. However, I found two pieces, which appeared pretty good,and with these I went to work; and with a great deal of pains, andawkward stitching, you may be sure, for want of needles, I, at length,made a three-cornered ugly thing, like what we call in England ashoulder of mutton sail, to go with a boom at bottom, and a little shortsprit at the top, such as usually our ships' long-boats sail with, andsuch as I best knew how to manage, as it was such a one I had to theboat in which I made my escape from Barbary, as related in the firstpart of my story.
I was near two months performing this last work, viz. rigging andfitting my mast and sails; for I finished them very complete, making asmall stay, and a sail, or fore-sail, to it, to assist, if we shouldturn to windward; and, which was more than all, I fixed a rudder to thestern of her to steer with. I was but a bungling shipwright, yet, as Iknew the usefulness, and even necessity of such a thing, I appliedmyself with so much pains to do it, that at last I brought it to pass;though, considering the many dull contrivances I had for it that failed,I think it cost me almost as much labour as making the boat.
After all this was done, I had my man Friday to teach as to whatbelonged to the navigation of my boat; for, though he knew very well howto paddle a canoe, he knew nothing what belonged to a sail and a rudder;and was the most amazed when he saw me work the boat to and again in thesea by the rudder, and how the sail gibbed, and filled this way, or thatway, as the course we sailed changed; I say, when he saw this, he stoodlike one astonished and amazed. However, with a little use, I made allthese things familiar to him, and he became an expert sailor, exceptthat as to the compass; I could make him understand very little of that.On the other hand, as there was very little cloudy weather, and seldomor never any fogs in those parts, there was the less occasion for acompass, seeing the stars were always to be seen by night, and the shoreby day, except in the rainy seasons, and then nobody cared to stirabroad, either by land or sea.
I was now entered on the seven and twentieth year of my captivity inthis place; though the three last years that I had this creature with meought rather to be left out of the account, my habitation being quite ofanother kind than in all the rest of the time. I kept the anniversary ofmy landing here with the same thankfulness to God for his mercies as atfirst; and if I had such cause of acknowledgment at first, I had muchmore so now, having such additional testimonies of the care ofProvidence over me, and the great hopes I had of being effectually andspeedily delivered; for I had an invincible impression upon my thoughtsthat my deliverance was at hand, and that I should not be another yearin this place. I went on, however, with my husbandry; digging, planting,and fencing, as usual. I gathered and cured my grapes, and did everynecessary thing as before.
The rainy season was, in the mean time, upon me, when I kept more withindoors than at other times. We had stowed our new vessel as secure as wecould, bringing her up into the creek, where, as I said in thebeginning, I landed my rafts from the ship; and hauling her up to theshore, at high-water mark, I made my man Friday dig a little dock, justbig enough to hold her, and just deep enough to give her water enough tofloat in; and then, when the tide was out, we made a strong dam acrossthe end of it, to keep the water out; and so she lay dry, as to thetide, from the sea; and to keep the rain off, we laid a great manyboughs of trees, so thick, that she was as well thatched as a house; andthus we waited for the months of November and December, in which Idesigned to make my adventure.
When the settled season began to come in, as the thought of my designreturned with the fair weather, I was preparing daily for the voyage:and the first thing I did was to lay by a certain quantity ofprovisions, being the stores for our voyage: and intended, in a week ora fortnight's time, to open the dock, and launch out our boat. I wasbusy one morning upon something of this kind, when I called to Friday,and bid him go to the sea-shore, and see if he could find a turtle, ortortoise, a thing which we generally got once a week, for the sake ofthe eggs as well as the flesh. Friday had not been long gone, when hecame running back and flew over my outer-wall, or fence, like one thatfelt not the ground, or the steps he set his feet on; and before I hadtime to speak to him, he cries out to me, "O master! O master! O sorrow!O bad!"--"What's the matter, Friday?" says I. "O yonder, there," sayshe, "one,
two, three canoe; one, two, three!" By this way of speaking, Iconcluded there were six; but, on inquiry, I found it was but three."Well, Friday," says I, "do not be frightened." So I heartened him upas well as I could: however, I saw the poor fellow was most terriblyscared; for nothing ran in his head but that they were come to look forhim, and would cut him in pieces, and eat him; and the poor fellowtrembled so, that I scarce knew what to do with him. I comforted him aswell as I could, and told him I was in as much danger as he, and thatthey would eat me as well as him. "But," says I, "Friday, we mustresolve to fight them. Can you fight, Friday!"--"Me shoot," says he;but there come many great number."--No matter for that," said I,
