by Daniel Defoe
with;and therefore shall have the less occasion to interrupt the reader, whoperhaps may be impatient to hear how matters went with my colony; yetsome odd accidents, cross winds, and bad weather happened on this firstsetting out, which made the voyage longer than I expected it at first;and I, who had never made but one voyage, viz. my first voyage toGuinea, in which I might be said to come back again as the voyage was atfirst designed, began to think the same ill fate still attended me; andthat I was born to be never contented with being on shore, and yet to bealways unfortunate at sea.
Contrary winds first put us to the northward, and we were obliged to putin at Galway, in Ireland, where we lay wind bound two-and-thirty days;but we had this satisfaction with the disaster, that provisions werehere, exceeding cheap, and in the utmost plenty; so that while we layhere we never touched the ship's stores, but rather added to them: herealso I took several hogs, and two cows with their calves, which Iresolved, if I had a good passage, to put on shore in my island; but wefound occasion to dispose otherwise of them.
We set out the 5th of February from Ireland, and had a very fair gale ofwind for some days; as I remember, it might be about the 20th ofFebruary in the evening late, when the mate having the watch, came intothe round-house, and told us he saw a flash of fire, and heard a gunfired; and while he was telling us of it, a boy came in, and told us theboatswain heard another. This made us all run out upon the quarter-deck,where for a while we heard nothing, but in a few minutes we saw a verygreat light, and found that there was some very terrible fire at adistance. Immediately we had recourse to our reckonings, in which we allagreed that there could be no land that way in which the fire sheweditself, no, not for five hundred leagues, for it appeared at W.N.W. Uponthis we concluded it must be some ship on fire at sea; and as by ourhearing the noise of guns just before, we concluded it could not be faroff, we stood directly towards it, and were presently satisfied weshould discover it, because the farther we sailed the greater the lightappeared, though the weather being hazy we could not perceive any thingbut the light for a while; in about half an hour's sailing, the windbeing fair for us, though not much of it, and the weather clearing up alittle, we could plainly discern that it was a great ship on fire in themiddle of the sea.
I was most sensibly touched with this disaster, though not at allacquainted with the persons engaged in it; I presently recollected myformer circumstances, in what condition I was in when taken up by thePortugal captain; and how much more deplorable the circumstances of thepoor creatures belonging to this ship must be if they had no other shipin company with them: upon this I immediately ordered that five gunsshould be fired, one soon after another, that, if possible, we mightgive notice to them that there was help for them at hand, and that theymight endeavour to save themselves in their boat; for though we couldsee the flame in the ship, yet they, it being night, could seenothing of us.
We lay by some time upon this, only driving as the burning ship drove,waiting for daylight; when on a sudden, to our great terror, though wehad reason to expect it, the ship blew up in the air, and immediatelysunk. This was terrible, and indeed an afflicting sight, for the sake ofthe poor men, who, I concluded, must be either all destroyed in theship, or be in the utmost distress in their boats in the middle of theocean, which, at present, by reason it was dark, I could not see:however, to direct them as well as I could, I caused lights to be hungout in all the parts of the ship where we could, and which we hadlanterns for, and kept firing guns all the night long; letting them knowby this, that there was a ship not far off.
About eight o'clock in the morning we discovered the ship's boats, bythe help of our perspective-glasses; and found there were two of them,both thronged with people, and deep in the water; we perceived theyrowed, the wind being against them; that they saw our ship, and did theutmost to make us see them.
We immediately spread our ancient, to let them know we saw them; andhung a waft out, as a signal for them to come on board; and then mademore sail, standing directly to them. In a little more than half an hourwe came up with them, and in a word took them all in, being no less thansixty-four men, women, and children; for there were a great manypassengers.
Upon the whole, we found it was a French merchant-ship of three hundredtons, homeward-bound from Quebec, in the river of Canada. The mastergave us a long account of the distress of his ship, how the fire beganin the steerage by the negligence of the steersman; but, on his cryingout for help, was, as everybody thought, entirely put out: but they soonfound that some sparks of the first fire had gotten into some part ofthe ship, so difficult to come at, that they could not effectuallyquench it; and afterwards getting in between the timbers, and within theceiling of the ship, it proceeded into the hold, and mastered all theskill and all the application they were able to exert.
They had no more to do then but to get into their boats, which, to theirgreat comfort, were pretty large; being their long-boat, and a greatshallop, besides a small skiff, which was of no great service to them,other than to get some fresh water and provisions into her, after theyhad secured themselves from the fire. They had indeed small hope oftheir lives by getting into these boats at that distance from any land;only, as they said well, that they were escaped from the fire, and had apossibility, that some ship might happen to be at sea, and might takethem in. They had sails, oars, and a compass; and were preparing to makethe best of their way to Newfoundland, the wind blowing pretty fair; forit blew an easy gale at S.E. by E. They had as much provisions andwater, as, with sparing it so as to be next door to starving, mightsupport them about twelve days; in which, if they had no bad weather,and no contrary winds, the captain said, he hoped he might get to thebanks of Newfoundland, and might perhaps take some fish to sustain themtill they might go on shore. But there were so many chances against themin all these cases; such as storms to overset and founder them; rainsand cold to benumb and perish their limbs; contrary winds to keep themout and starve them; that it must have been next to miraculous if theyhad escaped.
In the midst of their consultations, every one being hopeless, and readyto despair, the captain with tears in his eyes told me, they were on asudden surprised with the joy of hearing a gun fire, and after that fourmore; these were the five guns which I caused to be fired at firstseeing the light: this revived their hearts, and gave them the noticewhich, as above, I designed it should, viz. that there was a ship athand for their help.
It was upon the hearing these guns, that they took down their masts andsails; and the sound coming from the windward, they resolved to lie bytill morning. Some time after this, hearing no more guns, they firedthree muskets, one a considerable while after another; but these, thewind being contrary, we never heard.
Some time after that again, they were still more agreeably surprisedwith seeing our lights, and hearing the guns, which, as I have said, Icaused to be fired all the rest of the night: this set them to work withtheir oars to keep their boats ahead, at least that we might the soonercome up with them; and at last, to their inexpressible joy, they foundwe saw them.
It is impossible for me to express the several gestures, the strangeecstasies, the variety of postures, which these poor delivered peopleran into, to express the joy of their souls at so unexpected adeliverance; grief and fear are easily described; sighs, tears, groans,and a very few motions of head and hands, make up the sum of itsvariety: but an excess of joy, a surprise of joy, has a thousandextravagances in it; there were some in tears, some raging and tearingthemselves, as if they had been in the greatest agonies of sorrow; somestark raving and downright lunatic; some ran about the ship stampingwith their feet, others wringing their hands; some were dancing, severalsinging, some laughing, more crying; many quite dumb, not able to speaka word; others sick and vomiting, several swooning, and ready to faint;and a few were crossing themselves and giving God thanks.
I would not wrong them neither; there might be many that were thankfulafterward; but the passion was too strong for them at first, and theywere not able to master it; they we
re thrown into ecstasies and a kindof frenzy, and so there were but a very few who were composed andserious in their joy.
Perhaps also the case may have some addition to it, from the particularcircumstance of the nation they belonged to; I mean the French, whosetemper is allowed to be more volatile, more passionate, and moresprightly, and their spirits more fluid, than of other nations. I am notphilosopher to determine the cause, but nothing I had ever seen beforecame up to it: the ecstasies poor Friday, my trusty savage, was in, whenhe found his father in the boat, came the nearest to it; and thesurprise of the master, and his two companions, whom I delivered fromthe two villains that set them on shore in the island, came a little waytowards it; but nothing was to compare to this, either that I saw inFriday, or any where else in my life.
It is farther observable, that these extravagances did not shewthemselves in that different manner I have mentioned, in differentpersons only: but all the variety would appear in a
