The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe
place to be uninhabited, and know not yet what to think of it.” “Where
are these brutes, your enemies?” said I; “do you know where they are
gone?” “There they lie, sir,” said he, pointing to a thicket of trees;
“my heart trembles for fear they have seen us and heard you speak; if
they have, they will certainly murder us all.” “Have they any
firearms?” said I. He answered, “They had only two pieces, one of which
they left in the boat.” “Well, then,” said I, “leave the rest to me; I
see they are all asleep; it is an easy thing to kill them all; but
shall we rather take them prisoners?” He told me there were two
desperate villains among them that it was scarce safe to show any mercy
to; but if they were secured, he believed all the rest would return to
their duty. I asked him which they were. He told me he could not at
that distance distinguish them, but he would obey my orders in anything
I would direct. “Well,” says I, “let us retreat out of their view or
hearing, lest they awake, and we will resolve further.” So they
willingly went back with me, till the woods covered us from them.
“Look you, sir,” said I, “if I venture upon your deliverance, are you
willing to make two conditions with me?” He anticipated my proposals by
telling me that both he and the ship, if recovered, should be wholly
directed and commanded by me in everything; and if the ship was not
recovered, he would live and die with me in what part of the world
soever I would send him; and the two other men said the same. “Well,”
says I, “my conditions are but two; first, that while you stay in this
island with me, you will not pretend to any authority here; and if I
put arms in your hands, you will, upon all occasions, give them up to
me, and do no prejudice to me or mine upon this island, and in the
meantime be governed by my orders; secondly, that if the ship is or may
be recovered, you will carry me and my man to England passage free.”
He gave me all the assurances that the invention or faith of man could
devise that he would comply with these most reasonable demands, and
besides would owe his life to me, and acknowledge it upon all occasions
as long as he lived. “Well, then,” said I, “here are three muskets for
you, with powder and ball; tell me next what you think is proper to be
done.” He showed all the testimonies of his gratitude that he was able,
but offered to be wholly guided by me. I told him I thought it was very
hard venturing anything; but the best method I could think of was to
fire on them at once as they lay, and if any were not killed at the
first volley, and offered to submit, we might save them, and so put it
wholly upon God’s providence to direct the shot. He said, very
modestly, that he was loath to kill them if he could help it; but that
those two were incorrigible villains, and had been the authors of all
the mutiny in the ship, and if they escaped, we should be undone still,
for they would go on board and bring the whole ship’s company, and
destroy us all. “Well, then,” says I, “necessity legitimates my advice,
for it is the only way to save our lives.” However, seeing him still
cautious of shedding blood, I told him they should go themselves, and
manage as they found convenient.
In the middle of this discourse we heard some of them awake, and soon
after we saw two of them on their feet. I asked him if either of them
were the heads of the mutiny? He said, “No.” “Well, then,” said I, “you
may let them escape; and Providence seems to have awakened them on
purpose to save themselves. Now,” says I, “if the rest escape you, it
is your fault.” Animated with this, he took the musket I had given him
in his hand, and a pistol in his belt, and his two comrades with him,
with each a piece in his hand; the two men who were with him going
first made some noise, at which one of the seamen who was awake turned
about, and seeing them coming, cried out to the rest; but was too late
then, for the moment he cried out they fired—I mean the two men, the
captain wisely reserving his own piece. They had so well aimed their
shot at the men they knew, that one of them was killed on the spot, and
the other very much wounded; but not being dead, he started up on his
feet, and called eagerly for help to the other; but the captain
stepping to him, told him it was too late to cry for help, he should
call upon God to forgive his villainy, and with that word knocked him
down with the stock of his musket, so that he never spoke more; there
were three more in the company, and one of them was slightly wounded.
By this time I was come; and when they saw their danger, and that it
was in vain to resist, they begged for mercy. The captain told them he
would spare their lives if they would give him an assurance of their
abhorrence of the treachery they had been guilty of, and would swear to
be faithful to him in recovering the ship, and afterwards in carrying
her back to Jamaica, from whence they came. They gave him all the
protestations of their sincerity that could be desired; and he was
willing to believe them, and spare their lives, which I was not
against, only that I obliged him to keep them bound hand and foot while
they were on the island.
While this was doing, I sent Friday with the captain’s mate to the boat
with orders to secure her, and bring away the oars and sails, which
they did; and by-and-by three straggling men, that were (happily for
them) parted from the rest, came back upon hearing the guns fired; and
seeing the captain, who was before their prisoner, now their conqueror,
they submitted to be bound also; and so our victory was complete.
It now remained that the captain and I should inquire into one
another’s circumstances. I began first, and told him my whole history,
which he heard with an attention even to amazement—and particularly at
the wonderful manner of my being furnished with provisions and
ammunition; and, indeed, as my story is a whole collection of wonders,
it affected him deeply. But when he reflected from thence upon himself,
and how I seemed to have been preserved there on purpose to save his
life, the tears ran down his face, and he could not speak a word more.
After this communication was at an end, I carried him and his two men
into my apartment, leading them in just where I came out, viz. at the
top of the house, where I refreshed them with such provisions as I had,
and showed them all the contrivances I had made during my long, long
inhabiting that place.
All I showed them, all I said to them, was perfectly amazing; but above
all, the captain admired my fortification, and how perfectly I had
concealed my retreat with a grove of trees, which having been now
planted nearly twenty years, and the trees growing much faster than in
England, was become a little wood, so thick that it was impassable in
any part of it but at that one side where I had reserved my little
winding passage into it. I told him this was my castle and my
residence, but that I had a seat in the country, as most princes have,
whither I could retreat upon occasion, and I would show him that too
another time; but at present our business was to consider how to
recover the ship. He agreed with me as to that, but told me he was
perfectly at a loss what measures to take, for that there were still
six-and-twenty hands on board, who, having entered into a cursed
conspiracy, by which they had all forfeited their lives to the law,
would be hardened in it now by desperation, and would carry it on,
knowing that if they were subdued they would be brought to the gallows
as soon as they came to England, or to any of the English colonies, and
that, therefore, there would be no attacking them with so small a
number as we were.
I mused for some time on what he had said, and found it was a very
rational conclusion, and that therefore something was to be resolved on
speedily, as well to draw the men on board into some snare for their
surprise as to prevent their landing upon us, and destroying us. Upon
this, it presently occurred to me that in a little while the ship’s
crew, wondering what was become of their comrades and of the boat,
would certainly come on shore in their other boat to look for them, and
that then, perhaps, they might come armed, and be too strong for us:
this he allowed to be rational. Upon this, I told him the first thing
we had to do was to stave the boat which lay upon the beach, so that
they might not carry her off, and taking everything out of her, leave
her so far useless as not to be fit to swim. Accordingly, we went on
board, took the arms which were left on board out of her, and whatever
else we found there—which was a bottle of brandy, and another of rum, a
few biscuit-cakes, a horn of powder, and a great lump of sugar in a
piece of canvas (the sugar was five or six pounds): all which was very
welcome to me, especially the brandy and sugar, of which I had had none
left for many years.
When we had carried all these things on shore (the oars, mast, sail,
and rudder of the boat were carried away before), we knocked a great
hole in her bottom, that if they had come strong enough to master us,
yet they could not carry off the boat. Indeed, it was not much in my
thoughts that we could be able to recover the ship; but my view was,
that if they went away without the boat, I did not much question to
make her again fit to carry us to the Leeward Islands, and call upon
our friends the Spaniards in my way, for I had them still in my
thoughts.
CHAPTER XVIII. THE SHIP RECOVERED
While we were thus preparing our designs, and had first, by main
strength, heaved the boat upon the beach, so high that the tide would
not float her off at high-water mark, and besides, had broke a hole in
her bottom too big to be quickly stopped, and were set down musing what
we should do, we heard the ship fire a gun, and make a waft with her
ensign as a signal for the boat to come on board—but no boat stirred;
and they fired several times, making other signals for the boat. At
last, when all their signals and firing proved fruitless, and they
found the boat did not stir, we saw them, by the help of my glasses,
hoist another boat out and row towards the shore; and we found, as they
approached, that there were no less than ten men in her, and that they
had firearms with them.
As the ship lay almost two leagues from the shore, we had a full view
of them as they came, and a plain sight even of their faces; because
the tide having set them a little to the east of the other boat, they
rowed up under shore, to come to the same place where the other had
landed, and where the boat lay; by this means, I say, we had a full
view of them, and the captain knew the persons and characters of all
the men in the boat, of whom, he said, there were three very honest
fellows, who, he was sure, were led into this conspiracy by the rest,
being over-powered and frightened; but that as for the boatswain, who
it seems was the chief officer among them, and all the rest, they were
as outrageous as any of the ship’s crew, and were no doubt made
desperate in their new enterprise; and terribly apprehensive he was
that they would be too powerful for us. I smiled at him, and told him
that men in our circumstances were past the operation of fear; that
seeing almost every condition that could be was better than that which
we were supposed to be in, we ought to expect that the consequence,
whether death or life, would be sure to be a deliverance. I asked him
what he thought of the circumstances of my life, and whether a
deliverance were not worth venturing for? “And where, sir,” said I, “is
your belief of my being preserved here on purpose to save your life,
which elevated you a little while ago? For my part,” said I, “there