The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808)

by Daniel Defoe

hard, the rains hindering me many days, nay,sometimes weeks together; But I thought I should never be perfectlysecure until this wall was finished; and it is scarce credible whatinexpressible labour every thing was done with, especially the bringingpiles out of the woods, and driving them into the ground, for I madethem much bigger than I need to have done.

  When this wall was finished, and the outside double fenced with a turfwall raised up close to it, I persuaded myself that if any people wereto come on shore there, they would not perceive any thing like ahabitation; and it was very well I did so, as may be observed hereafterupon a very remarkable occasion.

  During this time I made my rounds in the woods for game every day, whenthe rain admitted me, and made frequent discoveries in these walks ofsomething or other to my advantage; particularly I found a kind of wildpigeons, who built not as wood pigeons in a tree, but rather as housepigeons, in the holes of the rocks; and taking some young ones, Iendeavoured to breed them up tame, and did so; but when they grew olderthey flew away, which perhaps was at first for want of feeding them, forI had nothing to give them; however, I frequently found their nests, andgot their young ones, which were very good meat.

  And now, in the managing my household affairs, I found myself wanting inmany things, which I thought at first it was impossible for me to make,as indeed as to some of them it was; for instance, I could never make acask to be hooped; I had a small runlet or two, as I observed before,but I could never arrive to the capacity of making one by them, though Ispent many weeks about it; I could neither put in the heads, or jointthe staves so true to one another as to make them hold water: so I gavethat also over.

  In the next place, I was at a great loss for candle; so that as soon asever it was dark, which was generally by seven o'clock, I was obliged togo to bed: I remembered the lump of bees-wax with which I made candlesin my African adventure, but I had none of that now; the only remedy Ihad, was, that when I had killed a goat I saved the tallow, and with alittle dish made of clay, which I baked in the sun, to which I added awick of some oakum, I made me a lamp; and this gave me light, though nota clear steady light like a candle. In the middle of all my labours ithappened, that, rummaging my things, I found a little bag, which, as Ihinted before, had been filled with corn for the feeding of poultry; notfor this voyage, but before, as I suppose, when the ship came fromLisbon; what little remainder of corn had been in the bag, was alldevoured with the rats, and I saw nothing in the bag but husks and dust;and being willing to have the bag for some other use, I think it was toput powder in, when I divided it for fear of the lightning, or some suchuse, I shook the husks of corn out of it on one side of my fortificationunder the rock.

  It was a little before the great rains, just now mentioned, that I threwthis stuff away, taking no notice of any thing, and not so much asremembering that I had thrown any thing there; when about a month after,or thereabout, I saw some few stalks of something green shooting out ofthe ground, which I fancied might be some plant I had not seen; but Iwas surprised and perfectly astonished, when after a little longer timeI saw about ten or twelve ears come out, which were perfect green barleyof the same kind as our European, nay, as our English barley.

  It is impossible to express the astonishment and confusion of mythoughts on this occasion; I had hitherto acted upon no religiousfoundation at all; indeed I had very few notions of religion in my head,or had entertained any sense of any thing that had befallen me,otherwise than as a chance, or, as we lightly say, what pleases God;without so much as inquiring into the end of Providence in these things,or his order in governing events in the world: but after I saw barleygrow there, in a climate which I knew was not proper for corn, andespecially that I knew not how it came there, it startled me strangely,and I began to suggest, that God had miraculously caused this grain togrow without any help of seed sown, and that it was so directed purelyfor my sustenance on that wild miserable place.

  This touched my heart a little, and brought tears out of my eyes, and Ibegan to bless myself, that such a prodigy of nature should happen uponmy account; and this was the more strange to me, because I saw near itstill, all along by the side of the rock, some other straggling stalks,which proved to be stalks of rice, and which I knew, because I had seenit grow in Africa, when I was ashore there.

  I not only thought these the pure productions of Providence for mysupport, but not doubting but that there was more in the place, I wentall over that part of the island, where I had been before, peeping inevery corner and under every rock to see for more of it, but I could notfind any; at last it occurred to my thought, that I had shook a bag ofchicken's meat out in that place, and then the wonder began to cease;and I must confess, my religious thankfulness to God's providence beganto abate too upon discovering that all this was nothing but what wascommon; though I ought to have been as thankful for so strange andunforeseen a providence as if it had been miraculous; for it was reallythe work of Providence as to me, that should order or appoint ten ortwelve grains of corn to remain unspoiled, when the rats had destroyedall the rest, as if it had been dropped from heaven: as also, that Ishould throw it out in that particular place, where, it being in theshade of a high rock, it sprang up immediately; whereas if I had thrownit any were else at that time, it had been burnt up and destroyed.

  I carefully saved the ears of corn, you may be sure, in their season,which was about the end of June, and laying up every corn, I resolved tosow them all again, hoping in time to have some quantity sufficient tosupply me with bread; but it was not till the fourth year that I couldallow myself the least grain of this corn to eat, and even then butsparingly, as I shall say afterwards in its order; for I lost all that Isowed the first season, by not observing the proper time; for I sowed itjust before the dry season, so that it never came up at all, at leastnot as it would have done: of which in its place.

  Besides this barley there were, as above, twenty or thirty stalks ofrice, which I preserved with the same care, and whose use was of thesame kind or to the same purpose, viz. to make me bread, or rather food;for I found ways to cook it up without baking, though I did that alsoafter some time. But to return to my journal.

  I worked excessive hard these three or four months to get my wall done;and the 14th of April I closed it up, contriving to go into it, not by adoor, but over the wall by a ladder, that there might be no sign in theoutside of my habitation.

  April 16. I finished the ladder; so I went up with the ladder to thetop, and then pulled it up after me, and let it down on the inside: thiswas a complete enclosure to me; for within I had room enough, andnothing could come at me from without, unless it could first mountmy wall.

  The very next day after this wall was finished, I had almost had all mylabour overthrown at once, and myself killed; the case was thus: As Iwas busy in the inside of it behind my tent, just in the entrance intomy cave, I was terribly frighted with a most dreadful surprising thingindeed; for on a sudden I found the earth come crumbling down from theroof of my cave, and from the edge of the hill, over my head, and two ofthe posts I had set up in the cave cracked in a frightful manner: I washeartily scared, but thought nothing of what was really the cause, onlythinking that the top of my cave was falling in, as some of it had donebefore; and for fear I should be buried in it, I ran forward to myladder, and not thinking myself safe there neither, I got over my wallfor fear of the pieces of the hill which I expected might roll down uponme. I was no sooner stept down upon the firm ground, but I plainly sawit was a terrible earthquake, for the ground I stood on shook threetimes at about eight minutes distance, with three such shocks, as wouldhave overturned the strongest building that could be supposed to havestood on the earth; and a great piece of the top of a rock, which stoodabout half a mile from me next the sea, fell down with such a terriblenoise as I never heard in all my life: I perceived also the very sea wasput into violent motion by it; and I believe the shocks were strongerunder the water than on the island.

  I was so amazed with the thing itself, having never felt
the like, ordiscoursed with any one that had, that I was like one dead or stupified;and the motion of the earth made my stomach sick, like one that wastossed at sea; but the noise of the falling of the rock awaked me, as itwere, and rousing me from the stupified condition I was in, filled mewith horror, and I thought of nothing then but the hill falling upon mytent and all my household goods, and burying all at once; and this sunkmy very soul within me a second time.

  After the third shock was over, and I felt no more for some time, Ibegan to take courage, and yet I had not heart enough to get over mywall again, for fear of being buried alive, but sat still upon theground, greatly cast down and disconsolate, not knowing what to do. Allthis while I had not the least serious religious thought, nothing butthe common "Lord have mercy upon me!" and when it was over, thatwent away too.

  While I sat thus, I found the air overcast, and grow cloudy, as if itwould rain; soon after that the wind rose by little and little, so