Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe - Chapter 13 – Wreck of a Spanish Ship

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
visit LibriVox dot org. Recorded by Dennis Sayers in Modesto, California,
Winter two thousand and six. Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe,

(00:31):
Chapter thirteen, Wreck of a Spanish Ship. I was now
in the twenty third year of my residence in this island,
and was so naturalized to the place and the manner
of living, that could I but have enjoyed the certainty
that no savages would come to the place to disturb me.

(00:53):
I could have been content for capitulating to spend the
rest of my time there, even to the last moment
till I had laid me down and died like the
old goat in the cave. I had also arrived to
some little diversions and amusements, which made the time pass
a great deal more pleasantly with me than it did before. First,

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I had taught my pal, as I noted before, to speak,
and he did it so familiarly, and talked so articulately
and plain, that it was very pleasant to me. And
he lived with me no less than six and twenty years.
How long he might have lived afterwards, I know not,

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though I know they have a notion in the Brazils
that they live a hundred years. My dog was a
pleasant and loving companion to me for no less than
sixteen years of my time, and then died of mere
old age. As for my cats, they multiplied, as I
have observed, to that degree that I was obliged to

(02:00):
shoot several of them at first to keep them from
devouring me and all I had. But at length, when
the two old ones I brought with me were gone,
and after some time continually driving them from me and
letting them have no provision with me, they all ran
wild into the woods, except two or three favorites, which

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I kept tame and who's young. When they had any
I always drowned, and these were part of my family.
Besides these, I always kept two or three household kids
about me, whom I taught two feet out of my hand.
And I had two more parrots, which talked pretty well

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and would all call Robin Crusoe. But not like my first,
nor indeed did I take the pains with any of
them that I had done with him. I had also
several tame sea fowls whose name I knew, not that
I caught upon the shore and cut their wings, and

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the little steaks which I had planted before my castle wall,
being now grown up to a good thick rove. These
fowls all lived among these low trees and bred there,
which was very agreeable to me, so that, as I
said above, I began to be very well contented with
the life I led, if I could have secured from

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the dread of the savages. But it was otherwise directed.
And it may not be amiss for all people who
shall meet with my story to make this just observation
from it. How frequently, in the course of our lives,
the evil, which in itself we seek most to shun,

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and which when we are fallen into, is the most
dreadful to us, is oftentimes the very means or door
of our deliverance, which alone we can be raised again
from the affliction we are fallen into. I could give
many examples of this in the course of my unaccountable life,

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But in nothing was it more particularly remarkable than in
the circumstances of my last years of solitary residence in
this island. It was now the month of December, as
I said above, in my twenty third year, and this
being the southern solstice for winter I cannot call. It

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was the particular time of my harvest, and required me
to be pretty much abroad in the fields. When going
out early in the morning, even before it was thorough daylight,
I was surprised with seeing a light of some fire
upon the shore at a distance from me of about

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two miles, toward that part of the island where I
had observed some savages had been as before, and not
on the other side. But to my great affliction, it
was on my side of the island. I was indeed
terribly surprised, and stopped short within my grove at the sight,

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not daring to go out lest I might be surprised.
And yet I had no more peace within from the
apprehensions I had that if these savages, in rambling over
the island should find my corn standing, or or cut
or any of my works or improvements, they would immediately
conclude that there were people in the place, and would

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never rest then till they had found me out. And
this extremity, I went back directly to my castle, pulled
up the ladder after me, and made all things without
look as wild and natural as I could. Then I
prepared myself within, putting myself in a posture of defense.

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I loaded all my cannon as I called them, that
is to say, my muskets, which were mounted upon my
new fortification, and all my pistols, and resolved to defend
myself to the last gasp, not forgetting to commend myself
seriously to the divine protection and earnestly to pray to

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God to deliver me out of the hands of the barbarians.
I continued in this posture about two hours and began
to be impatient for intelligence abroad, for I had no
spies to send out. After sitting a while longer and
musing what I should do in this case, I was

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not able to bear sitting in ignorance longer, so setting
up my ladder to the side of the hill where
there was a flat place as I observed before, and
then pulling the ladder after me, I set it up
again and mounted the top of the hill, and pulling
out my prospective glass, which I had taken on purpose,

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I laid me down flat on my belly on the
ground and began to look for the place I presently
found there were no less than nine naked savages sitting
round a small fire they had made, not to warm them,
for they had no need of that, the weather being

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extremely hot. But as I supposed to dress some of
their barbarous diet of human flesh, which they had brought
with them, Whether alive or dead, I could not tell.
They had two canoes with them, which they had hauled
up upon the shore, and as it was then ebb

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of tide, they seemed to me to wait for the
return of the flood to go away again. It is
not easy to imagine what confusion this sight put me into,
especially seeing them come on my side of the island
and so near to me. But when I considered their
coming must be always with the current of the ebb,

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I began afterwards to be more sedate in my mind,
being satisfied that I might go abroad with safety all
the time of the flood, all the time of the tide,
if they were not on shore before. And having made
this observation, I went abroad about my harvest work with

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the more composure as I expected. So it proved, for
as soon as the tide made to the westward, I
saw them all take boat and row, or paddle as
we call it, away. I should have observed that for
an hour or more before they went off, they were dancing,

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and I could discern their postures and gestures by my glass.
I could not perceive, by my nicest observation, but that
they were stark naked and had not the least covering
upon them. But whether they were men or women I
could not distinguish. As soon as I saw them shipped

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and gone, I took two guns upon my shoulders, and
two pistols in my girdle, and my great sword by
my side without a scabbard, and with all the speed
I was able to make, went away to the hill
where I had discovered the first appearance of all. And
as soon as I got thither, which was not in
less than two hours, for I could not go quickly,

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being so loaded with arms as I was, I perceived
there had been three canoes more of the savages at
that place, and looking out farther I saw they were
all at sea together, making over for the main. This
was a dreadful sight to me, especially as going down

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to the shore I could see the marks of horror
which the dismal work they had been about had left
behind it, that is, the blood, the bones, and part
of the flesh of human bodies eaten and devoured by
those wretches with merriment and sport. I was so filled

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with indignation at the sight that I now began to
premeditate the destruction of the next that I saw there.
Let them be whom or how many soever. It seemed
evident to me that the visits which they made thus
to this island were not very frequent, for it was
above fifteen months before any more of them came on

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shore there again, that is to say, I neither saw them,
nor any footsteps or signals of them, in all that time.
For as to the rainy seasons, then they are sure
not to come abroad, at least not so far. Yet.
All this while I lived uncomfortably by reason of the

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constant apprehensions of their coming upon me by surprise. From
whence I observe that the expectation of evil is more
bitter than the suffering, especially if there is no room
to shake off that expectation or those apprehensions. During all

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this time I was in a murdering humor, and spent
most of my hours which should have been better employed
in contriving how to circumvent and fall upon them the
very next time I should see them, especially if they
should be divided, as they were the last time, into
two parties. Nor did I consider at all that if

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I killed one party supposed ten or a dozen, I
was still the next day or week or a month
to kill another, and so another, even ad infinitum, till
I should be at length no less a murderer than
they were in being man eaters, and perhaps much more so.

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I spent my days now in great perplexity and anxiety
of mind, expecting that I should one day or other
fall into the hands of these merciless creatures. And if
I did, at any time venture abroad, it was not
without looking around me with the greatest care and caution imaginable.

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And now I found, to my great comfort how happy
it was that I had provided a tame flock or
herd of goats for I durst not upon any account
fire my gun, especially near that side of the island
where they usually came, lest I should alarm the savages.
And if they had fled from me, now I was

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sure to have them come again, with perhaps two or
three hundred canoes with them in a few days, and
then I knew what to expect. However, I wore out
a year in three months more before I ever saw
any more of the savages. And then I found them again.
As I shall soon observe, it is true they might

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have been there once or twice, but either they made
no stay, or at least I did not see them.
But in the month of May, as far as I
could calculate, and in my four and twentieth year, I
had a very strange encounter with them, of which in
its place, the perturbation of my mind during this fifteen

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or sixteen months interval was very great. I slept unquietly, dreamed,
always frightful dreams, and often started out of my sleep
in the night night. In the day, great troubles overwhelmed
my mind, and in the night I dreamed often of
killing the savages, and of the reasons why I might

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justify doing it. But to waive all of this for
a while. It was in the middle of May on
the sixteenth day, I think, as well as my poor
wooden calendar would reckon, for I marked all upon the posts. Still,
I say it was on the sixteenth of May that

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it blew a very great storm of wind all day,
with a great deal of lightning and thunder, and a
very foul night. It was after it I knew not
what was the particular occasion of it. But as I
was reading in the Bible and taken up with very
serious thoughts about my present condition, I was surprised with

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the noise of a gun. As I thought at sea.
This was, to be sure, a surprise quite of different
nature from any I had met with before, for the
notions this put into my thoughts were quite of another kind.
I started up in the greatest haste imaginable, and in

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a trice, clapped my ladder in the middle place of
the rock, pulled it up after me, and mounting it
the second time, got to the top of the hill
the very moment that a flash of fire bid me
listen for a second gun, which, accordingly, in about half
a minute I heard, and by the sound knew that
it was from that part of the sea where I

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was driven down the current in my boat. I immediately
considered that this must be some ship in distress, and
that they had some comrade or some other ship in company,
and fired these for signals of distress. And to obtain help.
I had the presence of mine at that minute to

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think that though I could not help them, it might
be that they might help me. So I brought together
all the dry wood I could get at hand, and
making a good handsome pile, I set it on fire
upon the hill. The wood was dry and blazed freely,
and though the wind blew very hard, yet it burned

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fairly out, so that I was certain if there was
any such thing as a ship, they must needs see it,
and no doubt they did, for as soon as ever
my fire blazed up, I heard another gun, and after
that several others, all from the same quarter. I plied
my fire all night long till daybreak, and when it

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was broad day and the air cleared up, I saw
something at a great distance at sea, full east of
the island. Whether a sail or a hull, I could
not distinguish, no, not with my glass. Distance was so great,
and the weather still something hazy. Also, at least it

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was so out at sea. I looked frequently at it
all that day, and soon perceived that it did not move.
So I presently concluded that it was a ship at anchor,
and being eager, you may be sure to be satisfied.
I took my gun in my hand and ran towards

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the south side of the island to the rocks where
I had formerly been carried away by the current, and
getting up there, the weather by this time being perfectly clear,
I could plainly see, to my great sorrow, the wreck
of a ship cast away in the night upon those
concealed rocks which I found when I was out in

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my boat, and which rocks, as they checked the violence
of the stream and made a kind of counter system
or eddy, where the occasion of my recovering from the
most deathks hopeless condition that ever I had been in
in all my life. Thus, what is one man's safety

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is another man's destruction. For it seems these men, whoever
they were, being out of their knowledge, and the rocks
being wholly under water, had been driven upon them, and
the night and the wind blowing hard at east northeast.
Had they seen the island, as I must necessarily suppose

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they did not. They must, as I thought, have endeavored
to have saved themselves on shore by the help of
their boat. But their firing of guns for help, especially
when they saw, as I imagined, my fire filled me
with many thoughts. First I imagined that upon seeing my light,

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they might have put themselves into their boat and endeavored
to make the shore, but that the sea running very high,
they might have been cast away. Other times I imagined
that they might have lost their boat before, as might
be the case in many ways, particularly by the breaking

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of the sea upon their ship, which many times obliged
men to stave or take to pieces their boat, and
sometimes to throw it overboard with their own hands. Other
times I imagined that they had some other ship or
ships in company, who, upon the signals of distress they made,

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had taken them up and carried them off. Other times
I fancied they were all gone off to sea in
their boat, and, being hurried away by the current that
I had formerly been in, were carried out into the
great ocean, where there was nothing but misery and perishing,

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And that perhaps they might by this time think of starving,
and of being in a condition and to eat one another.
As all these were but conjectures at best, So in
the condition I was in, I could do no more
than look on upon the misery of the poor men

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and pity them, which had still this good effect upon
my side. That it gave me more and more cause
to give thanks to God who had so happily and
comfortably provided for me in my desolate condition, and that
of two ships companies who were now cast away upon

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this part of the world. Not one life should be
spared but mine. I learned here again to observe that
it is very rare that the providence of God casts
us into any condition so low, or any misery so great.
But we may see something or other to be thankful for,

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and may see others in worse circumstances than our own.
Such certainly was the case of these men, of whom
I could not so much as see room to suppose
any were saved. Nothing could make it rational so much
as to wish or expect that they did not all
perish there, except the possibility only of their being taken

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up by another ship in company. And this was but
mere possibility, indeed, for I saw not the least sign
or appearance of any such thing. I cannot explain by
any possible energy of words, what a strange longing I
felt in my soul upon this site, breaking out sometimes thus, Oh,

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that there had been but one or two, nay, or
but one soul saved out of the ship, to have
escaped to me, that I might but have had one companion,
one fellow, to have spoken to me, and to have
conversed with In all the time of my solitary life,

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I never felt so earnest, so strong a desire after
the society of my fellow creatures, or so deep a
regret at the want of it. There are some secret
springs in the affections which, when they are set agoing
by some object in view, or though not in view,

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yet rendered present to the mind by the power of imagination,
that motion carries out the soul by its impetuosity, to
such violent, eager embracings of the object, that the absence
of it is insupportable. Such were these earnest wishings that

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but one man had been saved. I believe I repeated
the words, oh, that it had been but one a
thousand times, and my desires were so moved by it
that when I spoke the words, my hands would clinch together,
and my fingers would press the palms of my hands,

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so that if I had had any soft thing in
my hand, I would have crushed it involuntarily, and the
teeth in my head would strike together and set against
one another so strong that for some time I could
not part them again. Let the naturalists explain these things
and the reason and manner of them. All I can

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do is to describe the fact which was even surprising
to me when I found it, though I knew not
from whence it proceeded. It was doubtless the effect of
ardent wishes and of strong ideas formed in my mind,
realizing the comfort which the conversation of one of my

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fellow Christians would have been to me. But it was
not to be. Either their fate for mine, or both,
forbade it. For till the last year of my being
on this island, I never knew whether any were saved
out of that ship or no, and had only the

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affliction some days after to see the corpse of a
drowned boy come on shore at the end of the
island which was next the wreck. He had no clothes
on but a seaman's waistcoat, a pair of open kneed
linen drawers, and a blue linen shirt, but nothing to

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direct me so much as to guess what nation he
was of. He had nothing in his pockets but two
pieces of eight and a tobacco pipe. The last was
to me of ten times more value than the first.
It was now calm, and I had a great mind
to venture out in my boat to this wreck, not

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doubting but I might find something on board that might
be useful to me. But that did not altogether press
me so much as the possibility that there might be
yet some living creature on board whose life I might
not only save, but might, by saving his life, comfort
my own to the last degree. And this thought clung

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so to my heart that I could not be quiet
night or day, but I must venture out in my
boat on board this wreck, and committing the rest to
God's providence. I thought the impression was so strong upon
my mind that it could not be resisted, that it
must come from some invisible direction, and that I should

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be wanting to myself if I did not go under
the power of this impression. I hastened back to my castle,
prepared everything for my voyage, took a quantity of bread,
a great pot fresh water, compass to steer by, a
bottle of rumfort I've still had a great deal of
that left, and a basket of raisins, And thus loading

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myself with everything necessary. I went down to my boat,
got the water out of her, got her afloat, loaded
all my cargo in her, and then went home again
for more. My second cargo was a great bag of rice,
the umbrella to set up over my head for a shade,
another large pot of water, and about two dozen of

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small loaves or barley cakes more than before, with a
bottle of goat's milk, and a cheese, all which with
great labor and sweat I carried to my boat, and,
praying to God to direct my voyage, I put out, and,
rowing or paddling the canoe along the shore, came at
last to the utmost point of the island on the

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northeast side. And now I was to launch out into
the ocean, and either to venture or not to venture.
I looked on the rapid currents which ran constantly on
both sides of the island at a distance, and which
were very terrible to me from the remembrance of the
hazard I had been in before, and my heart began

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to fail me. For I foresaw that if I was
driven into either of those currents, I should be carried
a great way out to sea, and perhaps out of
my reach or sight of the island again, and that then,
as my boat was so small, if any little gale
of wind should rise, I should be inevitably lost. These

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thoughts so oppressed my mind that I began to give
over my enterprise. And having hauled my boat into a
little creek on the shore, I stepped out and sat
down upon a rising bit of ground, very pensive and
anxious between fear and desire about my voyage. When as

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I was musing, I could perceive that the tide was
turned and the flood come on, upon which my going
was impracticable for so many hours. Upon this, presently it
occurred to me that I should go up to the
highest piece of ground I could find and observe if

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I could how the sets of the tide or currents
lay when the flood came in, that I might judge
whether if I was driven one way out, I might
not expect to be driven another way home with the
same rapidity of the currents. This thought was no sooner
in my head than I cast my eye upon a

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little hill which sufficiently overlooked the sea both ways, and
from whence I had a clear view of the currents
or sets of the tide, and which way I was
to guide myself in my return. Here I found that
as the current of Ebbs set out close by the
south point of the island, so the current of the

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flood set in close by the shore of the north side,
and that I had nothing to do but to keep
to the north side of the island in my return,
and I should do well enough. Encouraged by this observation,
I resolved the next morning to set out with the
first of the tide, and reposing myself for the night

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in my canoe under the watch coat I mentioned, I
launched out. I first made a little out to sea
full north, till I began to feel the benefit of
the current which set eastward, and which carried me at
a great rate, and yet did not so hurry me
as the current on the south side had done before,

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so as to take from me all government of the boat.
But having a strong steerage with my paddle, I went
at a great rate directly for the wreck, and in
less than two hours I came up to it. It
was a dismal sight to look at the ship, which
by its building was Spanish, stuck fast jammed in between

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two rocks. All the stern and quarter of her were
beaten to pieces by the sea, and as her forecastle,
which stuck in the rocks, had run on with great violence.
Her mainmast and foremast were brought by the board, that
is to say, broken short off. But her bowsprit was sound,

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and the head and bow appeared firm. When I came
close to her, a dog appeared upon her, who, seeing
me coming, yelped and cried, and as soon as I
called him, jumped into the sea to come to me.
I took him into the boat, but found him almost
dead with hunger and thirst. I gave him a cake

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of my bread, and he devoured it like a ravenous
wolf that had been starving a fortnight in the snow.
I then gave the poor creature some fresh water, with which,
if I would have let him, he would have burst himself.
After this I went on board, but the first sight
I met was two men drowned in the cook room

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or forecastle of the ship, with their arms fast about
one another. I concluded, as is indeed probable, that when
the ship struck it, being in a storm, the sea
broke so high and so continually over her, that the
men were not able to bear it. And were strangled

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with the constant rushing inn of the water as much
as if they had been under water. Besides the dog,
there was nothing left in the ship that had life,
nor any goods that I could see, but what were
spoiled by the water. There were some casts of liquor,
whether wine or brandy, I knew not which lay lower

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in the hold, and which the water, being ebbed out,
I could see, but they were too big to meddle with.
I saw several chests, which I believe belonged to some
of the seamen, and I got two of them into
my boat without examining what was in them. Had the
stern of the ship been fixed and the forepart broken off,

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I am persuaded I might have made a good voyage,
for by what I found in those two chests, I
had room to suppose the ship had a great deal
of wealth on board. And if I may guess from
the course she steered, she must have been bound from
Buenos Ayres or the Rio de la Plata in the

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south part of America, beyond the Brazils, to the Havana
in the Gulf of Mexico, and so perhaps to Spain.
She had no doubt a great treasure in her, but
of no use at that time to anybody. And what
became of the crew I then knew not. I found

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beside those chests a little cask full of liquor of
about twenty gallons, which I got into my boat with
much difficulty. There were several muskets in the cabin, and
a great powder horn with about four pounds of powder
in it. As for the muskets, I had no occasion
for them, so I left them, but took the powder horn.

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I took a fire shovel and tongs, which I wanted extremely,
as also two little brass kettles, a copper pot to
make chocolate, and a gridiron. And with this cargo and
the dog, I came away the tide, beginning to make
home again, and the same evening, about an hour within night,

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I reach the island again. Weary and fatigued to the
last degree, I reposed that night in the boat, and
in the morning I resolved to harbor what I had
got in my new cave and not carry it home
to my castle. After refreshing myself, I got all my
cargo on board and began to examine the particulars the

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casks of liquor I found to be a kind of rum,
but not such as we had at the brazils, and
in a word, not at all good. But when I
came to open the chests I found several things of
great use to me. For example, I found in one
a fine case of bottles of an extraordinary kind, and

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filled with cordial waters, fine and very good. The bottles
held about three pints each and were tipped with silver.
I found two pots of very good souccades or sweetmeats
fastened also on the top, that the salt water had
not hurt them, and two more of the same which

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the water had spoiled. I found some very good shirts,
which were very welcome to me, and about a dozen
and a half of white linen handkerchiefs and colored neckcloths.
The former were also very welcome, being exceedingly refreshing to
wipe my face in a hot day. Besides this, when

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I came to the till in the chest, I found
three great bags of pieces of eight, which held about
eleven hundred pieces in all, and in one of them,
wrapped up in a paper, six doubloons of gold. In
some small bars or wedges of gold, I suppose they

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might all weigh near a pound. In the other chest
there were some clothes, but of little value, but by
the circumstances it must have belonged to the gunner's mate,
though there was no powder in it except two pounds
of fine glazed powder in three flasts, kept I suppose

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for charging their falling pieces on occasion upon the whole.
I got very little by this voyage that was of
any use to me. For as to the money, I
had no manner of occasion for it. It was to
me as the dirt under my feet, And I would

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have given it all for three or four pair of
English shoes and stockings, which were things I greatly wanted,
but had had none on my feet for many years.
I had indeed got two pair of shoes now, which
I took off the feet of the two drowned men
whom I saw in the wreck, and I found two

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pair more and one of the chests, which were very
welcome to me. But they were not like our English shoes,
either for ease or service, being rather what we call
pumps than shoes. I found in this seaman's chest about
fifty pieces of eight in rial's, but no gold. I

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suppose this belonged to a poorer man than the other,
which seemed to belong to some officer. Well, however, I
lugged this money home to my cave, as I had
done that before, which I had brought from our own ship.
But it was a great pity, as I said, that

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the other part of this ship had not come to
my share. For I am satisfied. I might have loaded
my canoe several times over with money, and thought, if
I ever escaped to England, it might lie here safe
enough till I come again and fetch it. End of

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Chapter thirteen.