Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe - Chapter 8 – Surveys his Position

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Dream Audiobooks present Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. Chapter eight
surveys his position. I mentioned before that I had a
great mind to see all the island, and that I

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had traveled up the brook and so on to where
I built my bower, and where I had an opening
quite to the sea on the other side of the island.
I now resolved to travel quite across to the seashore
on that side, so taking my gun, a hatchet, and
my dog, and a larger quantity of powder and shot

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than usual, with two biscuit cakes and a great bunch
of raisins in my pouch for my store, I began
my journey. When I had passed the vale where my
bower stood. As above of I came within view of
the sea to the west, and had been a very
clear day. I fairly described land. Whether an island or

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a continent, I could not tell. But it lay very high,
extending from the west to the west southwest, at a
very great distance. By my guess, it could not be
less than fifteen or twenty leagues off. I could not
tell what part of the world this might be, otherwise

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than that I knew it must be part of America,
and as I concluded by all my observations, must be
near the Spanish dominions, and perhaps was all inhabited by savages,
where if I had landed, I had been in a
worse condition than I was now. Therefore I acquiesced in

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the dispositions of providence, which I began now to own,
and to believe orders everything for the best. I say.
Therefore I quieted my mind with this, and left off
afflicting myself with fruitless wishes of being there. Besides, after

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some thought upon this affair, I considered that if this
land was the Spanish coast, I should certainly, one time
or other see some vessel pass or repass one way
or other. But if not, then it was the Savage
coast between the Spanish country and Brazils, where are found

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the worst of savages, for they are cannibals or men eaters,
and fail not to murder and devour all the human
bodies that fall into their hands. With these considerations, I
walked very leisurely forward. I found that side of the
island where I now was was much pleasanter than mine.

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The open savannah or fields were sweet, adorned with flowers
and grass, and full of very fine woods. I saw
abundance of parrots, and fain I would have caught one,
if possible, to have kept it to be tame and
taught it to speak to me. I did, after some painstaking,

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catch a young parrot, for I knocked it down with
a stick, and having recovered it, I brought it home.
But it was some years before I could make him speak. However,
at last I taught him to call me by name,
very familiarly. But the accident that followed, though it be
a trifle, will be very diverting in its place, I

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was exceedingly diverted with this journey. I found in the
low grounds hairs as I thought them to be, and foxes,
but they differed greatly from all the other kinds that
I had met, Nor could I satisfy myself to eat them,
though I killed several. But I had no need to

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be venturous, for I had no want of food, and
of that which was very good too, especially these three
sorts that as goats, pigeons, and turtle or tortoise, which
added to my grapes. Leadenhall Market could not have furnished
a table better than I in proportion to the company

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and though my case was deplorable enough, yet I had
great cause for thankfulness that I was not driven to
any extremities for food, but had rather plenty, even to dainties.
I never traveled in this journey above two miles outright
in a day or thereabouts, but I took so many

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turns and returns to see what discoveries I could make,
that I came weary enough to the place where I
resolved to sit down all night. And then I either
reposed myself in a tree, or surrounded myself with a
row of stakes set upright in the ground, and either
from one tree to another, or so as no wild

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creature could come at me without waking me. As soon
as I came to the sea shore, I was surprised
to see that I had taken up my lot on
the worst side of the island. For here, indeed the
shore was covered with innumerable turtles, whereas on the other
side I had found but three in a year and

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a half. Here were also an infinite number of fowls
of many kinds, some of which I had seen and
some which I had not seen before, and many of
them very good meat, but such as I knew not
the names of except those called penguins. I could have

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shot as many as I pleased, but was very sparing
of my powder and shot, and therefore had more mind
to kill a she goat if I could, which I
could better feed on. And though there were many goats here,
more than on my side of the island, yet it
was with much more difficulty that I could come near them,

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the country being flat and even, and they saw me
much sooner than when I was on the hills. I
confess this side of the country was much pleasanter than mine.
But yet I had not the least inclination to remove,
For as I was fixed in my habitation, it became
natural to me, and I seemed all the while I

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was here to be, as it were. Upon a journey
and from home, however, I traveled along the shore of
the sea towards the east, I suppose about twelve miles,
and then setting up a great pole upon the shore
for a mark, I concluded I would go home again,

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and that the next journey I took should be on
the other side of the island, east from my dwelling,
And so round till I came to my post again.
I took another way to come back. Then that I went,
thinking I could easily keep all the island so much
in my view that I could not miss finding my

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first dwelling by viewing the country. But I found myself
to be mistaken for being come about two or three miles,
I found myself descended into a very large valley, but
so surrounded with hills, and those hills covered with wood,
that I could not see which was my way by

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any direction but that of the sun, nor even then,
unless I knew very well the position of the sun
at that time of the day. It happened to my
further misfortune that the weather proved hazy for three or
four days while I was in the valley and not
able to see the sun. I wandered about very uncomfortably,

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and at last was obliged to find the sea side
looking for my post, and come back the same way
I went. And then by easy journeys, I turned homeward,
the weather being exceeding hot, and my gun, ammunition, hatchet,
and other things very heavy. In this journey, my dog

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surprised a young kid and seized upon it, and I,
running in to take hold of it, caught it and
saved it alive. From the dog. I had a great
mind to bring it home if I could, for I
had often been musing whether it might not be possible
to get a kid or two, and so raise a
breed of tame goats, which might supply me, and my

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powder and shot should be all spent. I made a
collar for this little creature, and with a string which
I made of some rope yam, which I always carried
about me, I led to him along. There was some
difficulty till I came to my bower, and there I
enclosed him and left him, For I was very impatient

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to be at home, from whence I had been absent
above a month. I cannot express what a satisfaction it
was to me to come into my old hutch and
lie down in my hammock bed. This little wandering journey
without settled place of abode had been so unpleasant to
me that my own house, as I called it to myself,

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was a perfect settlement to me compared to that, And
it rendered everything about me so comfortable that I resolved
I would never go a great way from it again,
while it should be my lot to stay on the island.
I reposed myself here a week to rest and regale
myself after my long journey, during which most of the

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time was taken up in the weighty affair of making
a cage for my pall, who began now to be
a mere domestic and to be well acquainted with me.
Then I began to think of the poor kid which
I had pinned in within my little circle, and resolved
to go and fetch it home or give it some food. Accordingly,

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I went and found it where I had left it,
for indeed it could not get out, but was almost
starved for one of food. I went and cut boughs
of trees and branches of some shrubs as I could find,
and threw it over, And having fed it, I tied
it as I did before, to lead it away. But
it was so tame with being hungry that I had

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no need to have tied it, for it followed me
like a dog, And as I continually fed it, the
creature became so loving, so gentle, and so fond that
it became from that time one of my domestics also,
and would never leave me Afterwards. The rainy season of

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the autumnal equinox was now come, and I kept the
thirtieth of September in the same solemn manner as before,
being the anniversary of my landing on the island, having
now been there two years and no more prospect of
being delivered than the first day I came there. I
spent the whole day in humble and thankful acknowledgments of

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the many wonderful mercies which my solitary condition was attended with,
and without which it might have been infinitely more miserable.
I gave humble and hearty thanks that God had been
pleased to discover to me that it was possible I
might be more happy in this solitary condition than I

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should have been in the liberty of society, and in
all the pleasures of the world, that He could fully
make up to me the deficiencies of my solitary state
and the want of human society by his presence and
the communications of His grace to my soul, supporting, comforting,

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and encouraging me to depend upon His providence here and
hope for his eternal presence hereafter. It was now that
I began sensibly to feel how much more happy this
life I now led was, with all its miserable circumstances,
than the wicked cursed and abominable life I had led

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the past part of my days, and now I changed
both my sorrows and my joys. My very desires altered,
my affections changed their gusts, and my delights were perfectly
new from what they were at my first coming, or
indeed for the two years past before. As I walked about,

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either on my hunting or for viewing the country, the
anguish of my soul at my condition would break out
upon me on a sudden and my very heart would
die within me. To think of the woods, the mountains,
the deserts I was in, and how I was a
prisoner locked up with the eternal bars and bolts of

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the ocean, in an uninhabited wilderness without redemption. In the
midst of the greatest composure of mind. This would break
out upon me like a storm and make me wring
my hands and weep like a child. Sometimes it would
take me in the middle of my work, and I

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would immediately sit down and sigh and look upon the
ground for an hour or two together. And this was
still worse to me, for if I could burst out
into tears or vent myself by words, it would go off,
and the grief, having exhausted itself, would abate. But now

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I began to exercise myself with new thoughts. I daily
read the Word of God and applied all the comforts
of it to my present state. One morning, being very sad,
I opened the Bible upon these words, I will never
never leave THEE, nor forsake THEE. Immediately it occurred that

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these words were to me. Why else should they be
directed in such a manner, just at the moment when
I was mourning over my condition as one forsaken of
God and man? Well, then said I, if God does
not forsake me of what ill consequence can it be?

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Or what matters it? Though? The world should all forsake me. Seeing,
on the other hand, if I had all the world
and should lose the favor and blessing of God, there
would be no comparison in the loss. From this moment,
I began to conclude in my mind that it was

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possible for me to be more happy in this forsaken,
solitary condition than it was probable I should ever have
been in any other particular state in the world. And
with this thought I was going to give thanks to
God for bringing me to this place. I know not

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what it was, but something shocked my mind at that thought,
and I durst not speak the words. How canst thou
become such a hypocrite, said I even audibly, to pretend
to be thankful for a condition which, however, thou mayst

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endeavor to be contented with, Thou wouldst rather pray heartily
to be delivered from. So I stopped there. But though
I could not say, I thanked God for being there,
Yet I sincerely gave thanks to God for opening my eyes,
by whatever afflicting providences, to see the former condition of

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my life, and to mourn for my wickedness and repent.
I never opened the Bible or shut it, but my
very soul within me blessed God for directing my friend
in England, without any order of mine, to pack it
up among my goods, and for assisting me afterwards to

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save it out of the wreck of the ship. Thus,
and in this disposition of mind, I began my third year.
And though I have not given the reader the trouble
of so particular an account of my works this year
as the first, yet in general it may be observed
that I was very seldom idle, but having regularly divided

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my time according to the several daily employments that were
before me, such as, first my duty to God and
the reading the scriptures, which I constantly set apart sometime
for thrice every day. Secondly, the going abroad with my
gun for food, which generally took me up three hours

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and every morning when it did not rain. Thirdly, the ordering, cutting, preserving,
and cooking what I had killed or caught for my supply.
These took up great part of the day. Also, it
is to be considered that in the middle of the day,
when the sun was in the zenith, the violence of

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the heat was too great to stir out, so that
about four hours in the evening was all the time
I could be supposed to work in. With this exception
that sometimes I changed my hours of hunting and working,
and went to work in the morning and abroad with
my gun in the afternoon. To this short time allowed

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for labor, I desire maybe added the exceeding laboriousness of
my work, the many hours which, for want of tools,
want of help, and want of skill everything I did
took up out of my time. For example, I was
full two and forty days in making a board for

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a long shelf which I wanted in my cave. Whereas
two sawyers with their tools and a saw pit would
have cut six of them out of the same tree
in half a day. My case was this. It was
to be a large tree which was to be cut down,
because my board was to be a broad one. This

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tree I was three days in cutting down, and two
more cutting off the boughs and reducing it to a
log or piece of timber. With inexpressible hacking and hewing,
I reduced both the sides of it into chips till
it began to be light enough to move. Then I
turned it and made one side of it smooth and

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flat as a board from end to end. Then, turning
that side downward, cut the other side till I brought
the plank to be about three inches thick and smooth
on both sides. Anyone may judge the labor of my
hands and such a piece of work, but labor and
patients carried me through that, and many other things. I

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can only observe this in particular to show the reason
why so much of my time went away with so
little work. That is that what might be a little
to be done with help in tools was of vast labor,
and required a prodigious time to do alone and by hand.

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But notwithstanding this, with patience and labor, I got through
everything that my circumstances made necessary to me to do,
as will appear by what follows. I was now in
the months of November and December, expecting my crop of
barley and rice. The ground I had manured and dug

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up for them was not great, for as I observed,
my seed was of each not above the quantity of
half peck, and for I had lost one whole crop
by sowing in the dry season. But now my crop
promised very well, when on a sudden I found I

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was in danger of losing it all again by enemies
of several sorts, which it was scarcely possible to keep
from it. As first the goats and wild creatures, which
I called hares, who tasting the sweetness of the blade,
lay in it night and day as soon as it

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came up, and ate it so close that it could
get no time to shoot up into stalk. This I
saw no remedy for, but by making an enclosure about
it with the hedge, which I did with a great
deal of toil, and the more because it required speed. However,

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as my arable land was but small suited to my crop,
I got it totally well fenced in about three weeks time,
and shooting some of the creatures in the daytime. I
set my dog to guard it in the night, tying
him up to a steak at the gate, where he
would stand and bark all night long. So in a

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little time the enemies forsook the place, and the corn
grew well and strong and began to ripen apace. But
as the beasts ruined me before while my corn was
in the blade, so the birds were as likely to
ruin me now when it was in the ear. For

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going along by the place to see how it throve,
I saw my little crop surrounded with fowls, of I
know not how many sorts, who stood as it were
watching till I should be gone. I immediately let fly
among them, for I always had my gun with me,

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I had no sooner shot. But there rose up a
little cloud of fowls, which I had not seen at
all from among the corn itself. This touched me sensibly,
for I foresaw that in a very few days they
would devour all my hopes that I should be starved
and never be able to raise a crop at all,

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and what to do I could not tell. However, I
resolved not to lose my corn, if possible, though I
should watch it night and day. In the first place,
I went among it to see what damage was already done,
and found they had spoiled a good deal of it,
but that as it was yet too green for them,

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the loss was not so great, but that the remainder
was likely to be a good crop if it could
be saved. I stayed by it to load my gun,
and then coming away I could easily see the thieves
sitting upon all the trees about me, as if they
only waited till I was gone away, And the event
proved it to be so, for as I walked off

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as if I was gone, I was no sooner out
of their sight than they'd dropped down one by one
to the corn again. I was so provoked that I
could not have patience to stay till more came on,
knowing that every grain that they ate now was, as
it might be said, easily a peck loaf to me

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in the consequences. But coming up to the hedge, I
fired again and killed three of them. This was what
I wished for, so I took them up and served
them as we served notorious thieves, and England hanged them
in chains for a terror of them. It is impossible

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to imagine that this should have had such an effect
as it did, for the fowls would not only not
come at the corn, but in short they forsook all
that part of the island, and I could never see
a bird near the place as long as my scarecrows
on there. This I was very glad of, as you

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may be sure. And about the latter end of December,
which was our second harvest of the year, I reaped
my corn. I was sadly put for a scythe or
sickle to cut it down, and all I could do
was to make one as well as I could, out
of one of the broadswords or cutlasses, which I saved

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among the arms out of the ship. However, as my
first crop was but small, I had no great difficulty
to cut it down. In short, I reaped it in
my way, for I cut nothing off but the ears,
and carried it away in a great basket which I
had made, and so rubbed it out with my hands.

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And at the end of the harvesting, I found that
out of my half peck of seed, I had near
two bushels of rice, and about two bushels and a
half of barley, that is to say, by my guests,
for I had no measure at that time. However, this

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was a great encouragement to me, and I foresaw that
in time it would please God to supply me with bread.
And yet here I was perplexed again, for I neither
knew how to grind or to make meal of my corn,
or indeed how to clean it and part it, nor
if made into meal, how to make bread of it,

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and if how to make it, yet I knew not
how to bake it. These things being added to my
desire of having a good quantity of store and to
secure a constant supply, I resolved not to taste any
of this crop, but to preserve it all for seed
against the next season. In the meantime, to employ all

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my study and hours of working to accomplish this great
work of providing myself with corn bread. It might be
truly said that now I worked for my bread. I
believe few people have thought much upon the strange multitude
of little things necessary into providing, producing curing, dressing, making,

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and finishing this one article of bread. I that was
reduced to a mere state of nature, found this to
my daily discouragement, and was made more sensible of it
every hour, even after I had got the first handful
of seed corn, which as I have said, came up

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unexpectedly and indeed to a surprise. First I had no
plow to turn up the earth, no spade or shovel
to dig it. Well. This I conquered by making a
wooden spade, as I observed before. But this did my work,
but in a wooden manner. And though it cost me

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a great many days to make it, yet for want
of iron, it not only wore out soon, but made
my work the harder and made it be performed much worse. However,
this I bore with and was content to work with
it out with patience, and bear with the badness of

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the performance. When the corn was sown, I had no harrow,
but was forced to go over it myself and drag
a great heavy bough of a tree over it to
scratch it, as it may be called, rather than rake
or harrow it. When it was growing and grown, I
have observed already how many things I wanted to fence it,

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secure it, mow or reap it, cure and carry it home, thrash,
part it from the chaff, and say, then I wanted
a mill to grind it, sieves to dress it, yeast
and salt to make it into bread, and an oven

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to bake it in. But all these things I did without,
as Shelby observed. And yet the corn was an inestimable
comfort and advantage to me too. All this, as I said,
made everything laborious and tedious to me, but that there
was no help for neither was my time so much

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lost to me, because as I divided it, a certain
part of it was every day appointed to these works.
And as I had resolved to use none of the
corn for bread till I had a greater quantity by me,
I had the next six months to apply myself wholly
by labor and invention, to furnish myself with utensils proper

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for the performing all the the operations necessary for making
the corn, when I had it fit for my use.
And of Chapter eight