The Man Who Was Robinson Crusoe

by Rick Wilson

  Every time he ate a goat, he would keep its skin which he used, most famously, to clothe himself. When his ship clothes eventually wore out, he dried the skins of the goats he had killed and then, with his knife and a sharp nail for a needle to draw slender thongs of leather, he shaped and sewed the goat-skins into garments that hardly resembled what they were meant to be: jacket, breeches and a cap. What did he look like? As his beard had not been shaved since he was put ashore, his own brown hair mingled with his goatskin clothes and he looked as animal-like as his four-legged companions. But he was comfortable in his second skin, which would eventually become the world’s accepted image of a marooned man.

  I calculate that I must have been senseless for the space of three Days, the length of which time I measur’d by the Moon’s Growth since my last observation of it. It had happened that, running on the summit of a Hill, I had made a Stretch to seize a Goat, with which under me, I fell down the Precipice. I awoke to find its lifeless Carcass still beneath me, and I gave praise to my Lord for this, the Beast having broken my Fall ... Though bloodless and only Bruis’d, my wound gave me such a Degree of Pain that I fear’d I could no longer walk upon the Leg; that it had broken, and that I would thus never leave the Precipice Alive. Yet I brought myself in a crawl over a great distance to return again to my Hutt, my Beasts, and my joyous Life of Tranquillity.

  A joyous life of tranquillity? Yes, it was true. Eventually, as he slowly got used to ‘this horrible place’, as Cowper’s poem called it, turned out to be less and less horrible to Selkirk and perhaps even more than pleasant. Nobody could deny that the island, which is 14 miles (2.2.5km) in length and nearly four miles (6.4km) in breadth, is remarkably beautiful, and it was – and is – not short of benign natural resources. Despite its sometimes unpredictable weather, it is generally warm. In Selkirk’s time huge pimento pepper trees as tall as a ship’s mast and cotton-wood trees with massive trunks formed the main elements of the forest that rose up from the edge of the beach and into the mountains. The floor of the forest was very fertile, dotted with familiar European vegetables like parsnips (the legacy of earlier voyages) while watercress grew abundantly in the streams. There was fruit too, the sweet white package from the tall cabbage-palm tree, and a type of small black plum, sharp and delicious, which became his favourite, although it was quite elusive, growing as it did on the steep rocky sides of the mountains.

  There are not many islands offering such advantages to a castaway, and perhaps, with the help of his Bible, Selkirk had learned to appreciate that. He had conquered his melancholy. But how did he then amuse himself to while away those many hours of solitude? Surprisingly enough, his days could be very full. There was his daily reading of the Scriptures; his keeping of a calendar carved on a tree to keep an exact account of the days, weeks and months and to be sure of when to celebrate the Sabbath; his study of his navigation books; the sewing of clothes; the making of fishing lines; the tending of his ‘goat farm’; the dancing with his cats; the carving of his name on his musket butt and the daily visits to his lookout spot to keep his eye on the horizon.

  Whether Selkirk’s time passed quickly or slowly, we shall never know, but his life was certainly not dull. There were, for instance, his many exciting life-or-death races with goats; he had run down and killed over 500 of them before he left the island. So precarious were some of the crag-to-crag climbs and high runs he did in pursuit of them, it was hardly surprising that he had a bad accident, which was reported by Howell:

  Selkirk was so stunned and bruised by the fall that he lay deprived of sensation, and almost of life. Upon his recovery he found the goat lying dead beneath him. This happened about a mile from his hut. Scarcely was he able to crawl to it when restored to his senses; and dreadful were his sufferings during the first two or three of the ten days that he was confined by the injury. He lay stretched upon his bed, unable to move but with extreme pain. There was no human being to reach him a drink of cold water, or to do the smallest service for him: yet he did not despair; his heart was at ease and he poured it forth in prayer; he felt a peace of mind which religion can alone bestow and, even in this forlorn and painful situation, a ray of hope enlivened the gloom with which he was surrounded.

  That was a serious reminder of his mortality; and he was keen to stay alive if only because, much as he liked them, he did not trust his cats and imagined that if he died in his bed, they would simply eat his body. It was a very troubling thought. And although he was now very comfortable with his island life after two years of it, he knew death was always lurking round the next tree. What if he fell ill? There was no one to help him recover.

  Soon, he was to have another brush with death when, from his look-out spot, he saw two ships, one of which was peeling off and heading for Cumberland Bay, two miles beneath him. In anticipation, he made his way stealthily through the undergrowth down towards the beach, getting closer and closer while he tried to establish its nationality ... French or Spanish? By the time he had recognised the vessel as Spanish, he had been seen and assumed to be English.

  Six sailors landed and gave chase; bullets whizzed past his head, but his speed of flight put enough distance between them so that he could give them the slip as he disappeared into the trees and climbed up a tall cabbage palm. He pulled the big leaves about him until he was completely hidden. They came beating behind him, though, as if they were trying raise a brace of grouse, and he could see two musket men reloading. But as the party approached his hideout they began to slow down, to take a rest and – in one man’s case – loosen his breeches and relieve himself. Selkirk could actually smell the urine and hear it dribbling on the bark, as the obese Spaniard relieved himself against the trunk of the tree.

  The next thing he heard was the crack of a musket shot. He jerked with shock, quickly examined himself to see that he had not been the target, and peered through the branches again. He saw the carcass of a large white goat being pulled across the ground. Then there was another crack, followed by an animal’s cry of distress. He saw a second goat being manhandled away, and the whole party heading back towards their ship.

  He realised with a sigh of relief that he was of no more interest to them but he waited until the ship had left the refuge of Cumberland Bay and rounded the point of the bay out of sight before he dared to move from the tree.

  When he finally climbed down and breathed more easily, he wondered how much of his fear had been less of the Spanish Inquisition but more of leaving his island. He would have been less afraid of a French landing party, but would he have gone willingly with them? And more pertinent still, if it had been an English ship with no reason to hurt him, would he have been happy to join them and be taken back home?

  The crux of that question would plague him for the rest of his life – the word ‘home.’ Where was his home now? Was it Scotland? Was it London? Was it this remote island which had, in the end, been very kind to him; where he had wanted for nothing except the company of fellow men and a woman?

  Of course, when the Duke and Dutchess appeared in early 1709 with their promise of salvation and a return to society, his heart leapt with excitement. As pleased to see them as they were surprised to see him, he was welcomed aboard and offered hospitality comfort, and answers to his many questions: Yes, Queen Anne still reigned. No, the Cinque Ports hadn’t made it, as he predicted. And Scotland? How fared it after the great Darien catastrophe? It had now joined with England in the union of 1707, he was told. He felt his face grimace slightly at that bitter fact, presented to him as if it were good news. But the biggest question of all was one that he would eventually have to answer himself. After his initial euphoria had settled down and he rejoined the world of people with all its political and power machinations, would he miss his goats and his cats and his now-beloved island?

  It was a question he would never quite be able to answer. But every time he asked it of himself, a tear came to his eye.

  THE NEW VISITORS

  So what is it li
ke today, Selkirk’s island? And are there any traces of his existence still to be found there? These are questions that have long prompted many people to venture there, a few of them even from the ancient mariner’s home village in Scotland some 7,500 miles distant (12,000km) as well as his relative Bruce Selcraig from America.

  He decided to visit the island in 2005 but was initially wary of the eight-seat Piper Navajo prop plane that took him there from a suburban Santiago airfield – despite the pilot’s assurance that ‘we only go when we know it’s safe.’ In fact, if the weather is tolerable the plane goes twice a week ‘across 400 miles of frigid Pacific’ to Juan Fernandez, and Selcraig, mostly concerned about answering that first question, reported:

  Thus assured, I put my trust in a 1979 craft whose outer skin seems no thicker than a beer can. With surprisingly little turbulence we finally climb over the city of six million, humming past the jagged Andes and across the ocean at 6,000 ft, just above foamy white clouds. We also carry school textbooks and new diapers; returning, we’ll take lobsters and octopus to Santiago restaurants.

  So far, not too hair-raising. But another visitor, Selkirk enthusiast Dr David Caldwell of National Museums Scotland, confessed to being ‘seriously worried’ by crosswinds and fuel consumption during his flight as ‘there’s not enough fuel to turn back if anything goes wrong’ and by the precarious nature of the short landing strip which cuts at right angles across the island’s narrow jutting end with sheer cliffs to the sea at either end. ‘It’s pure Biggles stuff,’ he said. ‘You’re very conscious that, because of the brevity of the strip, the pilot is trying to descend quickly with the wheels touching down right on the edge of the cliff. I don’t deny I was hanging on tight. But as far as I know there have never been any accidents.’

  Once there, with your heart and breath back, there is more stomach-churning fun to com. First a bumpy Land Rover ride to the shore, then a two-hour trip across rough waters to the other side of island in a big rowing boat with an outboard motor, before getting to the fishing-village settlement of San Juan Bautista. That’s where most of the 600 Chilean inhabitants live, descendants of Spaniards who settled on the island 40 years after Selkirk had left. Their buildings are gathered mostly around Cumberland Bay and described by Bruce Selcraig:

  Along deeply rutted dirt roads, there are eight or nine summer cabins and basic bed-and-breakfast operations – several hundred tourists came to the village last year – with a few in-home convenience stores, three churches (Evangelical, Mormon and Catholic), a leaky gymnasium, a lively school serving first through eighth grade, a city hall, a small Crusoe museum with translations of the novel in Polish and Greek, and an adjoining library with a satellite internet connection, thanks to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The homes are wooden bungalows for the most part, weathered but neat, with small yards and big leafy palm or fruit trees. Nearly everyone has TV, which consists of two Santiago channels. There’s neither visible poverty nor glaring wealth, with barely two dozen cars on the whole island. My guide told me: ‘There are fewer and fewer lobster, more and more tourists.’

  Dr Caldwell, who stayed for a month on the island in one of those ‘bed-and-breakfast operations’ – run by a ‘splendid, jolly woman’ – was intrigued by the friendly islanders’ way of life and dependence not just on lobsters, not just on the little plane coming in twice a week, but on regular visits by the little supply steamer Navarino, a Clyde puffer lookalike which, after a voyage of two or three days from Santiago, would pull in at the pier to unload provisions to a crowd of villagers waiting to fill their wheelbarrows. ‘After it arrived,’ he recalled, ‘there would be a big flurry of fruit and chicken from the mainland; then it would all run out again.’

  He believes the influence of human habitation and tourism has changed the island somewhat since Selkirk’s day – the great bay is peppered now with working boats and private yachts rather than fields of lolling seals, though these are still around ‘jumping out of the sea to look at you.’ Thanks to its long isolation over millions of years, Más a Tierra once had – in the manner of the Galapagos Islands – much unique flora and fauna. ‘There was no evidence of humans stepping on the island before the 16th century, and many species were special.’ But no more. ‘Inland from the settled area, there are introduced species such as eucalyptus and spruce trees before you get to the indigenous forests. And the only animals left that are different are the humming birds.’

  It remains an awesome place, however, with its high jagged mountain ridges rising to 3000ft (914m) and flanked by dramatic cliffs; and a bountiful, beautiful place. ‘If you’re going to be a castaway, it’s the place to choose,’ he said. ‘It has a warm climate all the year round, there are berries that you can eat safely, and abundant fish and other resources.’

  But what was Dr Caldwell actually there for? His visit was more about trying to answer that second question: are there any traces of Selkirk’s existence still to be found on the island? And after his stay with three expert colleagues, led by explorer Daisuke Takahashi, the following news item seemed to answer it.

  SELKIRK’S REFUGE FOUND

  The Times, September 17, 2005

  British, Japanese and Chilean archaeologists have discovered the spot where Alexander Selkirk, the model for the castaway Robinson Crusoe, survived in solitude for four years and four months, writes Richard Lloyd Parry in Tokyo.

  After a 13-year search, the team, led by Daisuke Takahashi, a Japanese explorer, believe that they have identified where the 18th-century sailor camped, cooked and kept a lonely look-out. The crucial breakthrough was the discovery of a fragment of one of Selkirk’s navigational instruments.

  The real-life Crusoe’s place of exile was Más a Tierra in the Juan Fernandez archipelago, off the coast of Chile. The identity of the island has long been known; the Chilean Government renamed it Isla de Robinson Crusoe in the hope of attracting fans of Daniel Defoe’s novel. But until now, no one knew where exactly Selkirk had lived.

  Last January Mr Takahashi took a team of four scientists to the remote spot where he suspected Selkirk’s camp had been. There they found traces of a fire, animal bones and holes in which Selkirk appears to have placed poles to support a shelter.

  But the decisive evidence was a 16mm piece of copper, discovered by David Caldwell of the National Museums Scotland, and identified by him as the point of a pair of 17th-century dividers. Dr Caldwell said: Selkirk was a navigator, and the account of his discovery states that he had his navigational equipment with him. In archaeological terms that is as good evidence as you are going to get.’

  The evidence may have been tiny and tenuous but it was still a triumph of probability. It looked very much as if the expedition had achieved its leader’s objective of finding the location where Selkirk had lived. Daisuke Takahashi had been obsessively devoted to the challenge since he read Robinson Crusoe as a child, to the point where he had not only written a book In Search of Robinson Crusoe but asked to be marooned himself on the uninhabited Alexander Selkirk island, with only a gun for company, so that he might experience and report on the sensation first-hand (his request was turned down). This was 2005 and his third visit to Juan Fernandez – he first explored it in 1994-95 – and, although he had his hunch as to where the Selkirk encampment might have been, he needed to pull in not just sponsorship for the trip (which was forthcoming from National Geographic magazine) but expert archaeological help who could, with fortune, make his theory stick.

  That was where, with local government backing, three Chilean archaeologists and Dr Caldwell came in. When they arrived they knew at least where not to look. ‘There is a cave at Puerto Ingles – a spot almost impossible to reach from Cumberland Bay – which since the 19th century has acquired a reputation for having been Selkirk’s Cave,’ said Caldwell. ‘But it has been excavated to hell and there is nothing there; no sign of human habitation; nothing. Certainly not treasure – which is not good news for a treasure-hunting group that’s been digging aw
ay there funded by an American millionaire.’

  Instead, Takahashi’s team focused on the area of Aguas Buenas. His hunch had been backed up by an elderly islander who showed him overgrown traces of a building on his 2001 visit. The man had discovered these in 1955 and they had remained unknown and unvisited ever since. Takahashi realised that the location – a flattish spot about two miles into and above the back of Cumberland Bay, reached by a hard, zigzag climb – corresponded well with his views on where he thought Selkirk’s campsite might be located and he believed the ruins were worthy of further examination. It was roughly en route to the higher spot that has long been well established as Selkirk’s Lookout, high above the harbour of San Juan Bautista and where there are a couple of memorial plaques, one left by a 19th-century Royal Navy party, reading:

  In memory of Alexander Selkirk, mariner

  A native of Largo, in the county of Fife, Scotland.

  Who lived on this island in complete solitude

  For four years and four months.

  He was landed from the Cinque Ports galley,

  96 tons, 16 guns, A.D. 1704, and was taken off in

  the Duke, privateer, 12th Feb, 1709.

  He died Lieutenant of HMS Weymouth,

  A.D. 1723, aged 47 years [sic].

  This tablet is erected near Selkirk’s Lookout,

  By Commodore Powell and the officers of

  HMS Topaze, A.D. 1868.