by Daniel Defoe
shewn him any other of their retired places, such as thecave in the valley, or the new retreat which the two Englishmen hadmade, and the like.
The first testimony they had that this fellow had given intelligence ofthem was, that about two months after this, six canoes of savages, withabout seven or eight, or ten men in a canoe, came rowing along the northside of the island, where they never used to come before, and landedabout an hour after sunrise, at a convenient place, about a mile fromthe habitation of the two Englishmen, where this escaped man had beenkept. As the Spaniard governor said, had they been all there the damagewould not have been so much, for not a man of them would have escaped:but the case differed now very much; for two men to fifty were too muchodds. The two men had the happiness to discover them about a league off,so that it was about an hour before they landed, and as they landedabout a mile from their huts, it was some time before they could come atthem. Now having great reason to believe that they were betrayed, thefirst thing they did was to bind the slaves which were left, and causetwo of the three men whom they brought with the women, who, it seems,proved very faithful to them, to lead them with their two wives, andwhatever they could carry away with them, to their retired place in thewoods, which I have spoken of above, and there to bind the two fellowshand and foot till they heard farther.
In the next place, seeing the savages were all come on shore, and thatthey bent their course directly that way, they opened the fences wheretheir milch-goats were kept, and drove them all out, leaving their goatsto straggle into the wood, whither they pleased, that the savages mightthink they were all bred wild; but the rogue who came with them was toocunning for that, and gave them an account of it all, for they wentdirectly to the place.
When the poor frighted men had secured their wives and goods, they sentthe other slave they had of the three, who came with the women, and whowas at their place by accident, away to the Spaniards with all speed, togive them the alarm, and desire speedy help; and in the mean time theytook their arms, and what ammunition they had, and retreated towards theplace in the wood where their wives were sent, keeping at a distance;yet so that they might see, if possible, which way the savages took.
They had not gone far but that, from a rising ground, they could see thelittle army of their enemies come on directly to their habitation, andin a moment more could see all their huts and household-stuff flaming uptogether, to their great grief and mortification; for they had a verygreat loss, and to them irretrievable, at least for some time. They kepttheir station for a while, till they found the savages, like wildbeasts, spread themselves all over the place, rummaging every way, andevery place they could think of, in search for prey, and in particularfor the people, of whom it plainly appeared they had intelligence.
The two Englishmen, seeing this, thinking themselves not secure wherethey stood, as it was likely some of the wild people might come thatway, so they might come too many together, thought it proper to makeanother retreat about half a mile farther, believing, as it afterwardshappened, that the farther they strolled, the fewer would be together.
The next halt was at the entrance into a very thick grown part of thewoods, and where an old trunk of a tree stood, which was hollow, andvastly large; and in this tree they both took their standing, resolvingto see what might offer.
They had not stood there long, but two of the savages appeared runningdirectly that way, as if they had already notice where they stood, andwere coming up to attack them; and a little way farther they espiedthree more coming after them, and five more beyond them, all coming thesame way; besides which, they saw seven or eight more at a distance,running another way; for, in a word, they ran every way, like sportsmenbeating for their game.
The poor men were now in great perplexity, whether they should stand andkeep their posture, or fly; but after a very short debate withthemselves, they considered that if the savages ranged the country thusbefore help came, they might, perhaps, find out their retreat in thewoods, and then all would be lost; so they resolved to stand them there;and if there were too many to deal with, then they would get to the topof the tree, from whence they doubted not to defend themselves, fireexcepted, as long as their ammunition lasted, though all the savagesthat were landed, which were near fifty, were to attack them.
Having resolved upon this, they next considered whether they should fireat the two first, or wait for the three, and so take the middle party,by which the two and the five that followed would be separated: atlength they resolved to let the two first pass by, unless they shouldspy them in the tree, and come to attack them. The two first savagesalso confirmed them in this resolution, by turning a little from themtowards another part of the wood; but the three, and the five afterthem, came forwards directly to the tree, as if they had known theEnglishmen were there.
Seeing them come so straight towards them, they resolved to take them ina line as they came; and as they resolved to fire but one at a time,perhaps the first shot might hit them all three; to which purpose, theman who was to fire put three or four bullets into his piece, and havinga fair loop-hole, as it were, from a broken hole in the tree, he took asure aim, without being seen, waiting till they were within about thirtyyards of the tree, so that he could not miss.
While they were thus waiting, and the savages came on, they plainly saw,that one of the three was the runaway savage that had escaped from them;and they both knew him distinctly, and resolved that, if possible, heshould not escape, though they should both fire; so the other stoodready with his piece, that if he did not drop at the first shot, heshould be sure to have a second. But the first was too good a marksmanto miss his aim; for as the savages kept near one another, a littlebehind in a line, he fired, and hit two of them directly; the foremostwas killed outright, being shot in the head; the second, which was therunaway Indian, was shot through the body, and fell, but was not quitedead; and the third had a little scratch in the shoulder, perhaps by thesame ball that went through the body of the second; and being dreadfullyfrightened, though not so much hurt, sat down upon the ground, screamingand yelling in a hideous manner.
The five that were behind, more frightened with the noise than sensibleof the danger, stood still at first; for the woods made the sound athousand times bigger than it really was, the echoes rattling from oneside to another, and the fowls rising from all parts, screaming, andevery sort making a different noise, according to their kind; just as itwas when I fired the first gun that perhaps was ever shot off inthe island.
However, all being silent again, and they not knowing what the matterwas, came on unconcerned, till they came to the place where theircompanions lay in a condition miserable enough. Here the poor ignorantcreatures, not sensible that they were within reach of the samemischief, stood all together over the wounded man, talking, and, as maybe supposed, inquiring of him how he came to be hurt; and who, it isvery rational to believe, told them that a flash of fire first, andimmediately after that thunder from their gods, had killed those two andwounded him. This, I say, is rational; for nothing is more certain thanthat, as they saw no man near them, so they had never heard a gun in alltheir lives, nor so much as heard of a gun; neither knew they anythingof killing and wounding at a distance with fire and bullets: if theyhad, one might reasonably believe they would not have stood sounconcerned to view the fate of their fellows, without someapprehensions of their own.
Our two men, as they confessed to me, were grieved to be obliged to killso many poor creatures, who had no notion of their danger; yet, havingthem all thus in their power, and the first having loaded his pieceagain, resolved to let fly both together among them; and singling out,by agreement, which to aim at, they shot together, and killed, or verymuch wounded, four of them; the fifth, frightened even to death, thoughnot hurt, fell with the rest; so that our men, seeing them all falltogether, thought they had killed them all.
The belief that the savages were all killed made our two men come boldlyout from the tree before they had charged their guns, which was a wrongstep; and they we
re under some surprise when they came to the place, andfound no less than four of them alive, and of them two very little hurt,and one not at all. This obliged them to fall upon them with the stocksof their muskets; and first they made sure of the runaway savage, thathad been the cause of all the mischief, and of another that was hurt inthe knee, and put them out of their pain; then the man that was not hurtat all came and kneeled down to them, with his two hands held up, andmade piteous moans to them, by gestures and signs, for his life, butcould not say one word to them that they could understand. However, theymade signs to him to sit down at the foot of a tree hard by; and one ofthe Englishmen, with a piece of rope-yarn, which he had by great chancein his pocket, tied his two hands behind him, and there they left him;and with what speed they could made after the other two, which were gonebefore, fearing they, or any more of them, should find the way to theircovered place in the woods, where their wives, and the few goods theyhad left, lay. They came once in sight of the
