The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808)
Page 40
extreme hot; but, as I supposed, to dress some of theirbarbarous diet of human flesh which they had brought with them, whetheralive or dead I could not know.
They had two canoes with them, which they had haled up upon the shore;and as it was then tide of ebb, they seemed to me to wait the return ofthe flood to go away again. It is not easy to imagine what confusionthis sight put me into, especially seeing them come on my side theisland, and so near me too; but when I observed their coming must bealways with the current of the ebb, I began afterwards to be more sedatein my mind, being satisfied that I might go abroad with safety all thetime of tide of flood, if they were not on shore before; and having madethis observation, I went abroad about my harvest work with the morecomposure.
As I expected, so it proved; for as soon as the tide made to thewestward, I saw them all take boat, and row (or paddle, as we call it)all away: I should have observed, that for an hour and more before theywent off, they went to dancing, and I could easily discern theirpostures and gestures by my glasses; I could only perceive, by my nicestobservation, that they were stark naked, and had not the least coveringupon them; but whether they were men or women, that I could notdistinguish.
As soon as I saw them shipped and gone, I took two guns upon myshoulders, and two pistols at my girdle, and my great sword by my side,without a scabbard; and with all the speed I was able to make, I wentaway to the hill, where I had discovered the first appearance of all. Assoon as I got thither, which was not less than two hours, (for I couldnot go apace, being so loaded with arms as I was,) I perceived there hadbeen three canoes more of savages on that place; and looking outfurther, I saw they were all at sea together, making over for the main.
This was a dreadful sight to me, especially when, going down to theshore, I could see the marks of horror which the dismal work they hadbeen about had left behind it, viz. the blood, the bones, and part ofthe flesh of human bodies, eaten and devoured by those wretches withmerriment and sport. I was so filled with indignation at the sight, thatI began now to premeditate the destruction of the next that I saw there,let them be who or how many soever.
It seemed evident to me, that the visits which they thus made to thisisland were not very frequent; for it was above fifteen months beforeany more of them came on shore there again; that is to say, I never sawthem, or any footsteps or signals of them, in all that time; for as tothe rainy seasons, then they are sure not to come abroad, at least notso far; yet all this while I lived uncomfortably, by reason of theconstant apprehensions I was in of their coming upon me by surprise;from whence I observe, that the expectation of evil is more bitter thanthe suffering, especially if there is no room to shake off thatexpectation or those apprehensions.
During all this time, I was in the murdering humour; and took up most ofmy hours, which should have been better employed, in contriving how tocircumvent and fall upon them the very next time I should see them;especially if they should be divided, as they were the last time, intotwo parties; nor did I consider at all, that if I killed one party,suppose ten or a dozen, I was still the next day, or week, or mouth, tokill another, and so another, even _ad infinitum_, till I should be atlength no less a murderer than they were in being men-eaters, andperhaps much more so.
I spent my days now in great perplexity and anxiety of mind, expectingthat I should one day or other fall into the hands of those mercilesscreatures; if I did at any time venture abroad, it was not withoutlooking round me with the greatest care and caution imaginable; and nowI found, to my great comfort, how happy it was that I had provided atame flock or herd of goats; for I durst not, upon any account, fire mygun especially near that side of the island, where they usually came,lest I should alarm the savages; and if they had fled from me now, I wassure to have them come back again, with perhaps two or three hundredcanoes with them in a few days, and then I knew what to expect.
However, I wore out a year and three months more before I ever saw anymore of the savages, and then I found them again, as I shall soonobserve. It is true, they might have been there once or twice, buteither they made no stay, or, at least, I did not hear them; but in themonth of May, as near as I could calculate, and in my four-and-twentiethyear, I had a very strange encounter with them, of which in its place.
The perturbation of my mind, during this fifteen or sixteen monthsinterval, was very great; I slept unquiet, dreamed always frightfuldreams, and often started out of my sleep in the night; in the day greattroubles overwhelmed my mind; in the night I dreamed often of killingthe savages, and the reasons why I might justify the doing of it. But towave all this for awhile, it was in the middle of May, on the sixteenthday, I think, as well as my poor wooden calendar would reckon, for Imarked all upon, the post still; I say, it was on the sixteenth of Maythat it blew a great storm of wind all day, with a great deal oflightning and thunder, and a very foul night was after it: I know notwhat was the particular occasion of it; but as I was reading in theBible, and taken up with serious thoughts about my present condition, Iwas surprised with the noise of a gun, as I thought, fired at sea.
This was, to be sure, a surprise of a quite different nature from any Ihad met with before; for the notions this put into my thoughts werequite of another kind: I started up in the greatest haste imaginable;and in a trice clapped up my ladder to the middle place of the rock, andpulled it after me, and mounting it the second time, got to the top ofthe hill; that very moment a flash of fire bade me listen for a secondgun, which accordingly in about half a moment I heard, and by the soundknew that it was from that part of the sea where I was driven out withthe current in my boat.
I immediately considered that this must be some ship in distress, andthat they had some comrade, or some other ship in company, and firedthese guns for signals of distress, and to obtain help. I had thispresence of mind at that minute as to think, that though I could nothelp them, it may be they might help me; so I brought together all thedry wood I could get at hand, and making a good handsome pile, I set iton fire upon the hill; the wood was dry, and blazed freely, and thoughthe wind blew very hard, yet it burnt fairly out, so that I was certain,if there was any such thing as a ship, they must need see it, and nodoubt they did; for as soon as ever my fire blazed up, I heard anothergun, and after that several others, all from the same quarter. I pliedmy fire all night long, till day broke; and when it was broad day, andthe air cleared up, I saw something at a great distance at sea, fulleast of the island, whether a sail, or an hull, I could not distinguish,no not with my glasses, the distance was so great, and the weatherstill something hazy also; at least it was so out at sea.
I looked frequently at it all that day, and soon perceived that it didnot move; so I presently concluded that it was a ship at anchor; andbeing eager, you may be sure, to be satisfied, I took my gun in my hand,and ran towards the south-east side of the island, to the rocks, where Ihad been formerly carried away with the current; and getting up there,the weather by this time being perfectly clear, I could plainly see, tomy great sorrow, the wreck of a ship cast away in the night upon thoseconcealed rocks which I found when I was out in my boat; and whichrocks, as they checked the violence of the stream, and made a kind ofcounter-stream, or eddy, were the occasion of my recovering then fromthe most desperate hopeless condition that ever I had been in allmy life.
Thus, what is one man's safety is another man's destruction; for itseems these men, whoever they were, being out of their knowledge, andthe rocks being wholly under water, had been driven upon them in thenight, the wind blowing hard at E. and E.N.E. Had they seen the island,as I must necessarily suppose they did not, they must, as I thought,have endeavoured to have saved themselves on shore by the help of theirboat; but the firing of their guns for help, especially when they saw,as I imagined, my fire, filled me with many thoughts: first, I imagined,that, upon seeing my light, they might have put themselves into theirboat, and have endeavoured to make the shore; but that the sea goingvery high, they might have been cast away; other times I imagined, thatthey might have lost their b
oat before, as might be the case many ways;as particularly, by the breaking of the sea upon their ship, which manytimes obliges men to stave, or take in pieces their boat; and sometimesto throw it overboard with their own hands; other times I imagined, theyhad some other ship or ships in company, who, upon the signals ofdistress they had made, had taken them up, and carried them off: otherwhiles I fancied they were all gone off to sea in their boat, and beinghurried away by the current that I had been formerly in, were carriedout into the great ocean, where there was nothing but misery andperishing; and that perhaps they might by this time think of starving,and of being in a condition to eat one another.
All these were but conjectures at best, so, in the condition I was in, Icould do no more than look upon the misery of the poor men, and pitythem; which had still this good effect on my side, that it gave me moreand more cause to give thanks to God, who had so happily and comfortablyprovided for me in my desolate condition; and that of two