The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe
plantation there also; for, first, I had my little bower, as I called
it, which I kept in repair—that is to say, I kept the hedge which
encircled it in constantly fitted up to its usual height, the ladder
standing always in the inside. I kept the trees, which at first were no
more than stakes, but were now grown very firm and tall, always cut, so
that they might spread and grow thick and wild, and make the more
agreeable shade, which they did effectually to my mind. In the middle
of this I had my tent always standing, being a piece of a sail spread
over poles, set up for that purpose, and which never wanted any repair
or renewing; and under this I had made me a squab or couch with the
skins of the creatures I had killed, and with other soft things, and a
blanket laid on them, such as belonged to our sea-bedding, which I had
saved; and a great watch-coat to cover me. And here, whenever I had
occasion to be absent from my chief seat, I took up my country
habitation.
Adjoining to this I had my enclosures for my cattle, that is to say my
goats, and I had taken an inconceivable deal of pains to fence and
enclose this ground. I was so anxious to see it kept entire, lest the
goats should break through, that I never left off till, with infinite
labour, I had stuck the outside of the hedge so full of small stakes,
and so near to one another, that it was rather a pale than a hedge, and
there was scarce room to put a hand through between them; which
afterwards, when those stakes grew, as they all did in the next rainy
season, made the enclosure strong like a wall, indeed stronger than any
wall.
This will testify for me that I was not idle, and that I spared no
pains to bring to pass whatever appeared necessary for my comfortable
support, for I considered the keeping up a breed of tame creatures thus
at my hand would be a living magazine of flesh, milk, butter, and
cheese for me as long as I lived in the place, if it were to be forty
years; and that keeping them in my reach depended entirely upon my
perfecting my enclosures to such a degree that I might be sure of
keeping them together; which by this method, indeed, I so effectually
secured, that when these little stakes began to grow, I had planted
them so very thick that I was forced to pull some of them up again.
In this place also I had my grapes growing, which I principally
depended on for my winter store of raisins, and which I never failed to
preserve very carefully, as the best and most agreeable dainty of my
whole diet; and indeed they were not only agreeable, but medicinal,
wholesome, nourishing, and refreshing to the last degree.
As this was also about half-way between my other habitation and the
place where I had laid up my boat, I generally stayed and lay here in
my way thither, for I used frequently to visit my boat; and I kept all
things about or belonging to her in very good order. Sometimes I went
out in her to divert myself, but no more hazardous voyages would I go,
scarcely ever above a stone’s cast or two from the shore, I was so
apprehensive of being hurried out of my knowledge again by the currents
or winds, or any other accident. But now I come to a new scene of my
life.
It happened one day, about noon, going towards my boat, I was
exceedingly surprised with the print of a man’s naked foot on the
shore, which was very plain to be seen on the sand. I stood like one
thunderstruck, or as if I had seen an apparition. I listened, I looked
round me, but I could hear nothing, nor see anything; I went up to a
rising ground to look farther; I went up the shore and down the shore,
but it was all one; I could see no other impression but that one. I
went to it again to see if there were any more, and to observe if it
might not be my fancy; but there was no room for that, for there was
exactly the print of a foot—toes, heel, and every part of a foot. How
it came thither I knew not, nor could I in the least imagine; but after
innumerable fluttering thoughts, like a man perfectly confused and out
of myself, I came home to my fortification, not feeling, as we say, the
ground I went on, but terrified to the last degree, looking behind me
at every two or three steps, mistaking every bush and tree, and
fancying every stump at a distance to be a man. Nor is it possible to
describe how many various shapes my affrighted imagination represented
things to me in, how many wild ideas were found every moment in my
fancy, and what strange, unaccountable whimsies came into my thoughts
by the way.
When I came to my castle (for so I think I called it ever after this),
I fled into it like one pursued. Whether I went over by the ladder, as
first contrived, or went in at the hole in the rock, which I had called
a door, I cannot remember; no, nor could I remember the next morning,
for never frightened hare fled to cover, or fox to earth, with more
terror of mind than I to this retreat.
I slept none that night; the farther I was from the occasion of my
fright, the greater my apprehensions were, which is something contrary
to the nature of such things, and especially to the usual practice of
all creatures in fear; but I was so embarrassed with my own frightful
ideas of the thing, that I formed nothing but dismal imaginations to
myself, even though I was now a great way off. Sometimes I fancied it
must be the devil, and reason joined in with me in this supposition,
for how should any other thing in human shape come into the place?
Where was the vessel that brought them? What marks were there of any
other footstep? And how was it possible a man should come there? But
then, to think that Satan should take human shape upon him in such a
place, where there could be no manner of occasion for it, but to leave
the print of his foot behind him, and that even for no purpose too, for
he could not be sure I should see it—this was an amusement the other
way. I considered that the devil might have found out abundance of
other ways to have terrified me than this of the single print of a
foot; that as I lived quite on the other side of the island, he would
never have been so simple as to leave a mark in a place where it was
ten thousand to one whether I should ever see it or not, and in the
sand too, which the first surge of the sea, upon a high wind, would
have defaced entirely. All this seemed inconsistent with the thing
itself and with all the notions we usually entertain of the subtlety of
the devil.
Abundance of such things as these assisted to argue me out of all
apprehensions of its being the devil; and I presently concluded then
that it must be some more dangerous creature—viz. that it must be some
of the savages of the mainland opposite who had wandered out to sea in
their canoes, and either driven by the currents or by contrary winds,
had made the island, and had been on shore, but were gone away again to
sea; being as loath, perhaps, to have stayed in this desolate island as
I would have been to have had them.
While these reflections were rolling in my mind, I was very thankful in
my thoughts that I was so happy as not to be thereabouts at that time,
or that they did not see my boat, by which they would have concluded
that some inhabitants had been in the place, and perhaps have searched
farther for me. Then terrible thoughts racked my imagination about
their having found out my boat, and that there were people here; and
that, if so, I should certainly have them come again in greater numbers
and devour me; that if it should happen that they should not find me,
yet they would find my enclosure, destroy all my corn, and carry away
all my flock of tame goats, and I should perish at last for mere want.
Thus my fear banished all my religious hope, all that former confidence
in God, which was founded upon such wonderful experience as I had had
of His goodness; as if He that had fed me by miracle hitherto could not
preserve, by His power, the provision which He had made for me by His
goodness. I reproached myself with my laziness, that would not sow any
more corn one year than would just serve me till the next season, as if
no accident could intervene to prevent my enjoying the crop that was
upon the ground; and this I thought so just a reproof, that I resolved
for the future to have two or three years’ corn beforehand; so that,
whatever might come, I might not perish for want of bread.
How strange a chequer-work of Providence is the life of man! and by
what secret different springs are the affections hurried about, as
different circumstances present! To-day we love what to-morrow we hate;
to-day we seek what to-morrow we shun; to-day we desire what to-morrow
we fear, nay, even tremble at the apprehensions of. This was
exemplified in me, at this time, in the most lively manner imaginable;
for I, whose only affliction was that I seemed banished from human
society, that I was alone, circumscribed by the boundless ocean, cut
off from mankind, and condemned to what I call silent life; that I was
as one whom Heaven thought not worthy to be numbered among the living,
or to appear among the rest of His creatures; that to have seen one of
my own species would have seemed to me a raising me from death to life,
and the greatest blessing that Heaven itself, next to the supreme
blessing of salvation, could bestow; I say, that I should now tremble
at the very apprehensions of seeing a man, and was ready to sink into
the ground at but the shadow or silent appearance of a man having set
his foot in the island.
Such is the uneven state of human life; and it afforded me a great many
curious speculations afterwards, when I had a little recovered my first
surprise. I considered that this was the station of life the infinitely
wise and good providence of God had determined for me; that as I could
not foresee what the ends of Divine wisdom might be in all this, so I
was not to dispute His sovereignty; who, as I was His creature, had an
undoubted right, by creation, to govern and dispose of me absolutely as
He thought fit; and who, as I was a creature that had offended Him, had
likewise a judicial right to condemn me to what punishment He thought
fit; and that it was my part to submit to bear His indignation, because
I had sinned against Him. I then reflected, that as God, who was not
only righteous but omnipotent, had thought fit thus to punish and
afflict me, so He was able to deliver me: that if He did not think fit
to do so, it was my unquestioned duty to resign myself absolutely and
entirely to His will; and, on the other hand, it was my duty also to
hope in Him, pray to Him, and quietly to attend to the dictates and
directions of His daily providence.
These thoughts took me up many hours, days, nay, I may say weeks and
months: and one particular effect of my cogitations on this occasion I
cannot omit. One morning early, lying in my bed, and filled with
thoughts about my danger from the appearances of savages, I found it
discomposed me very much; upon which these words of the Scripture came
into my thoughts, “Call upon Me in the day of trouble, and I will
deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify Me.” Upon this, rising cheerfully
out of my bed, my heart was not only comforted, but I was guided and
encouraged to pray earnestly to God for deliverance: when I had done
praying I took up my Bible, and opening it to read, the first words
that presented to me were, “Wait on the Lord, and be of good cheer, and
He shall strengthen thy heart; wait, I say, on the Lord.” It is
impossible to express the comfort this gave me. In answer, I thankfully
laid down the book, and was no more sad, at least on that occasion.
In the middle of these cogitations, apprehensions, and reflections, it
came into my thoughts one day that all this might be a mere chimera of