Robinson Crusoe

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
seems to be but one thing amiss in all the prospect of it.” “What is
that?” say he. “Why,” said I, “it is, that as you say there are three
or four honest fellows among them which should be spared, had they been
all of the wicked part of the crew I should have thought God’s
providence had singled them out to deliver them into your hands; for
depend upon it, every man that comes ashore is our own, and shall die
or live as they behave to us.” As I spoke this with a raised voice and
cheerful countenance, I found it greatly encouraged him; so we set
vigorously to our business.

We had, upon the first appearance of the boat’s coming from the ship,
considered of separating our prisoners; and we had, indeed, secured
them effectually. Two of them, of whom the captain was less assured
than ordinary, I sent with Friday, and one of the three delivered men,
to my cave, where they were remote enough, and out of danger of being
heard or discovered, or of finding their way out of the woods if they
could have delivered themselves. Here they left them bound, but gave
them provisions; and promised them, if they continued there quietly, to
give them their liberty in a day or two; but that if they attempted
their escape they should be put to death without mercy. They promised
faithfully to bear their confinement with patience, and were very
thankful that they had such good usage as to have provisions and light
left them; for Friday gave them candles (such as we made ourselves) for
their comfort; and they did not know but that he stood sentinel over
them at the entrance.

The other prisoners had better usage; two of them were kept pinioned,
indeed, because the captain was not able to trust them; but the other
two were taken into my service, upon the captain’s recommendation, and
upon their solemnly engaging to live and die with us; so with them and
the three honest men we were seven men, well armed; and I made no doubt
we should be able to deal well enough with the ten that were coming,
considering that the captain had said there were three or four honest
men among them also. As soon as they got to the place where their other
boat lay, they ran their boat into the beach and came all on shore,
hauling the boat up after them, which I was glad to see, for I was
afraid they would rather have left the boat at an anchor some distance
from the shore, with some hands in her to guard her, and so we should
not be able to seize the boat. Being on shore, the first thing they
did, they ran all to their other boat; and it was easy to see they were
under a great surprise to find her stripped, as above, of all that was
in her, and a great hole in her bottom. After they had mused a while
upon this, they set up two or three great shouts, hallooing with all
their might, to try if they could make their companions hear; but all
was to no purpose. Then they came all close in a ring, and fired a
volley of their small arms, which indeed we heard, and the echoes made
the woods ring. But it was all one; those in the cave, we were sure,
could not hear; and those in our keeping, though they heard it well
enough, yet durst give no answer to them. They were so astonished at
the surprise of this, that, as they told us afterwards, they resolved
to go all on board again to their ship, and let them know that the men
were all murdered, and the long-boat staved; accordingly, they
immediately launched their boat again, and got all of them on board.

The captain was terribly amazed, and even confounded, at this,
believing they would go on board the ship again and set sail, giving
their comrades over for lost, and so he should still lose the ship,
which he was in hopes we should have recovered; but he was quickly as
much frightened the other way.

They had not been long put off with the boat, when we perceived them
all coming on shore again; but with this new measure in their conduct,
which it seems they consulted together upon, viz. to leave three men in
the boat, and the rest to go on shore, and go up into the country to
look for their fellows. This was a great disappointment to us, for now
we were at a loss what to do, as our seizing those seven men on shore
would be no advantage to us if we let the boat escape; because they
would row away to the ship, and then the rest of them would be sure to
weigh and set sail, and so our recovering the ship would be lost.
However, we had no remedy but to wait and see what the issue of things
might present. The seven men came on shore, and the three who remained
in the boat put her off to a good distance from the shore, and came to
an anchor to wait for them; so that it was impossible for us to come at
them in the boat. Those that came on shore kept close together,
marching towards the top of the little hill under which my habitation
lay; and we could see them plainly, though they could not perceive us.
We should have been very glad if they would have come nearer us, so
that we might have fired at them, or that they would have gone farther
off, that we might come abroad. But when they were come to the brow of
the hill where they could see a great way into the valleys and woods,
which lay towards the north-east part, and where the island lay lowest,
they shouted and hallooed till they were weary; and not caring, it
seems, to venture far from the shore, nor far from one another, they
sat down together under a tree to consider it. Had they thought fit to
have gone to sleep there, as the other part of them had done, they had
done the job for us; but they were too full of apprehensions of danger
to venture to go to sleep, though they could not tell what the danger
was they had to fear.

The captain made a very just proposal to me upon this consultation of
theirs, viz. that perhaps they would all fire a volley again, to
endeavour to make their fellows hear, and that we should all sally upon
them just at the juncture when their pieces were all discharged, and
they would certainly yield, and we should have them without bloodshed.
I liked this proposal, provided it was done while we were near enough
to come up to them before they could load their pieces again. But this
event did not happen; and we lay still a long time, very irresolute
what course to take. At length I told them there would be nothing done,
in my opinion, till night; and then, if they did not return to the
boat, perhaps we might find a way to get between them and the shore,
and so might use some stratagem with them in the boat to get them on
shore. We waited a great while, though very impatient for their
removing; and were very uneasy when, after long consultation, we saw
them all start up and march down towards the sea; it seems they had
such dreadful apprehensions of the danger of the place that they
resolved to go on board the ship again, give their companions over for
lost, and so go on with their intended voyage with the ship.

As soon as I perceived them go towards the shore, I imagined it to be
as it really was that they had given over their search, and were going
back again; and the captain, as soon as I told him my thoughts, was
ready to sink at the apprehensions of it; but I presently thought of a
stratagem to fetch them back again, and which answered my end to a
tittle. I ordered Friday and the captain’s mate to go over the little
creek westward, towards the place where the savages came on shore, when
Friday was rescued, and so soon as they came to a little rising round,
at about half a mile distant, I bid them halloo out, as loud as they
could, and wait till they found the seamen heard them; that as soon as
ever they heard the seamen answer them, they should return it again;
and then, keeping out of sight, take a round, always answering when the
others hallooed, to draw them as far into the island and among the
woods as possible, and then wheel about again to me by such ways as I
directed them.

They were just going into the boat when Friday and the mate hallooed;
and they presently heard them, and answering, ran along the shore
westward, towards the voice they heard, when they were stopped by the
creek, where the water being up, they could not get over, and called
for the boat to come up and set them over; as, indeed, I expected. When
they had set themselves over, I observed that the boat being gone a
good way into the creek, and, as it were, in a harbour within the land,
they took one of the three men out of her, to go along with them, and
left only two in the boat, having fastened her to the stump of a little
tree on the shore. This was what I wished for; and immediately leaving
Friday and the captain’s mate to their business, I took the rest with
me; and, crossing the creek out of their sight, we surprised the two
men before they were aware—one of them lying on the shore, and the
other being in the boat. The fellow on shore was between sleeping and
waking, and going to start up; the captain, who was foremost, ran in
upon him, and knocked him down; and then called out to him in the boat
to yield, or he was a dead man. They needed very few arguments to
persuade a single man to yield, when he saw five men upon him and his
comrade knocked down: besides, this was, it seems, one of the three who
were not so hearty in the mutiny as the rest of the crew, and therefore
was easily persuaded not only to yield, but afterwards to join very
sincerely with us. In the meantime, Friday and the captain’s mate so
well managed their business with the rest that they drew them, by
hallooing and answering, from one hill to another, and from one wood to
another, till they not only heartily tired them, but left them where
they were, very sure they could not reach back to the boat before it
was dark; and, indeed, they were heartily tired themselves also, by the
time they came back to us.

We had nothing now to do but to watch for them in the dark, and to fall
upon them, so as to make sure work with them. It was several hours
after Friday came back to me before they came back to their boat; and
we could hear the foremost of them, long before they came quite up,
calling to those behind to come along; and could also hear them answer,
and complain how lame and tired they were, and not able to come any
faster: which was very welcome news to us. At length they came up to
the boat: but it is impossible to express their confusion when they
found the boat fast aground in the creek, the tide ebbed out, and their
two men gone. We could hear them call one to another in a most
lamentable manner, telling one another they were got into an enchanted
island; that either there were inhabitants in it, and they should all
be murdered, or else there were devils and spirits in it, and they
should be all carried away and devoured. They hallooed again, and
called their two comrades by their names a great many times; but no
answer. After some time we could see them, by the little light there
was, run about, wringing their hands like men in despair, and sometimes
they would go and sit down in the boat to rest themselves: then come
ashore again, and walk about again, and so the same thing over again.
My men would fain have had me give them leave to fall upon them at once
in the dark; but I was willing to take them at some advantage, so as to
spare them, and kill as few of them as I could; and especially I was
unwilling to hazard the killing of any of our men, knowing the others
were very well armed. I resolved to wait, to see if they did not
separate; and therefore, to make sure of them, I drew my ambuscade
nearer, and ordered Friday and the captain to creep upon their hands
and feet, as close to the ground as they could, that they might not be
discovered, and get as near them as they could possibly before they
offered to fire.

They had not been long in that posture when the boatswain, who was the
principal ringleader of the mutiny, and had now shown himself the most
dejected and dispirited of all the rest, came walking towards them,
with two more of the crew; the captain was so eager at having this
principal rogue so much in his power, that he could hardly have
patience to let him come so near as to be sure of him, for they only
heard his tongue before: but when they came nearer, the captain and
Friday, starting up on their feet, let fly at them. The boatswain was
killed upon the spot: the next man was shot in the body, and fell just
by him, though he did not die till an hour or two after; and the third
ran for it. At the noise of the fire I immediately advanced with my
whole army, which was now eight men, viz. myself, generalissimo;
Friday, my lieutenant-general; the captain and his two men, and the
three prisoners of war whom we had trusted with arms. We came upon
them, indeed, in the dark, so that they could not see our number; and I
made the man they had left in the boat, who was now one of us, to call
them by name, to try if I could bring them to a parley, and so perhaps
might reduce them to terms; which fell out just as we desired: for
indeed it was easy to think, as their condition then was, they would be
very willing to capitulate. So he calls out as loud as he could to one
of them, “Tom Smith! Tom Smith!” Tom Smith answered immediately, “Is
that Robinson?” for it seems he knew the voice. The other answered,
“Ay, ay; for God’s sake, Tom Smith, throw down your arms and yield, or
you are all dead men this moment.” “Who must we yield to? Where are
they?” says Smith again. “Here they are,” says he; “here’s our captain
and fifty men with him, have been hunting you these two hours; the
boatswain is killed; Will Fry is wounded, and I am a prisoner; and if
you do not yield you are all lost.” “Will they give us quarter, then?”
says Tom Smith, “and we will yield.” “I’ll go and ask, if you promise
to yield,” said Robinson: so he asked the captain, and the captain
himself then calls out, “You, Smith, you know my voice; if you lay down
your arms immediately and submit, you shall have your lives, all but
Will Atkins.”

Upon this Will Atkins cried out, “For God’s sake, captain, give me
quarter; what have I done? They have all been as bad as I:” which, by
the way, was not true; for it seems this Will Atkins was the first man
that laid hold of the captain when they first mutinied, and used him
barbarously in tying his hands and giving him injurious language.
However, the captain told him he must lay down his arms at discretion,
and trust to the governor’s mercy: by which he meant me, for they all
called me governor. In a word, they all laid down their arms and begged
their lives; and I sent the man that had parleyed with them, and two
more, who bound them all; and then my great army of fifty men, which,
with those three, were in all but eight, came up and seized upon them,
and upon their boat; only that I kept myself and one more out of sight
for reasons of state.

Our next work was to repair the boat, and think of seizing the ship:
and as for the captain, now he had leisure to parley with them, he
expostulated with them upon the villainy of their practices with him,
and upon the further wickedness of their design, and how certainly it
must bring them to misery and distress in the end, and perhaps to the
gallows. They all appeared very penitent, and begged hard for their
lives. As for that, he told them they were not his prisoners, but the
commander’s of the island; that they thought they had set him on shore
in a barren, uninhabited island; but it had pleased God so to direct
them that it was inhabited, and that the governor was an Englishman;
that he might hang them all there, if he pleased; but as he had given
them all quarter, he supposed he would send them to England, to be
dealt with there as justice required, except Atkins, whom he was
commanded by the governor to advise to prepare for death, for that he
would be hanged in the morning.

Though this was all but a fiction of his own, yet it had its desired
effect; Atkins fell upon his knees to beg the captain to intercede with
the governor for his life; and all the rest begged of him, for God’s
sake, that they might not be sent to England.

It now occurred to me that the time of our deliverance was come, and
that it would be a most easy thing to bring these fellows in to be
hearty in getting possession of the ship; so I retired in the dark from
them, that they might not see what kind of a governor they had, and
called the captain to me; when I called, at a good distance, one of the
men was ordered to speak again, and say to the captain, “Captain, the
commander calls for you;” and presently the captain replied, “Tell his
excellency I am just coming.” This more perfectly amazed them, and they
all believed that the commander was just by, with his fifty men. Upon
the captain coming to me, I told him my project for seizing the ship,
which he liked wonderfully well, and resolved to put it in execution
the next morning. But, in order to execute it with more art, and to be
secure of success, I told him we must divide the prisoners, and that he
should go and take Atkins, and two more of the worst of them, and send
them pinioned to the cave where the others lay. This was committed to
Friday and the two men who came on shore with the captain. They
conveyed them to the cave as to a prison: and it was, indeed, a dismal
place, especially to men in their condition. The others I ordered to my
bower, as I called it, of which I have given a full description: and as
it was fenced in, and they pinioned, the place was secure enough,
considering they were upon their behaviour.

To these in the morning I sent the captain, who was to enter into a
parley with them; in a word, to try them, and tell me whether he
thought they might be trusted or not to go on board and surprise the
ship. He talked to them of the injury done him, of the condition they
were brought to, and that though the governor had given them quarter
for their lives as to the present action, yet that if they were sent to
England they would all be hanged in chains; but that if they would join
in so just an attempt as to recover the ship, he would have the
governor’s engagement for their pardon.

Any one may guess how readily such a proposal would be accepted by men
in their condition; they fell down on their knees to the captain, and
promised, with the deepest imprecations, that they would be faithful to
him to the last drop, and that they should owe their lives to him, and
would go with him all over the world; that they would own him as a
father to them as long as they lived. “Well,” says the captain, “I must
go and tell the governor what you say, and see what I can do to bring
him to consent to it.” So he brought me an account of the temper he
found them in, and that he verily believed they would be faithful.
However, that we might be very secure, I told him he should go back
again and choose out those five, and tell them, that they might see he
did not want men, that he would take out those five to be his
assistants, and that the governor would keep the other two, and the
three that were sent prisoners to the castle (my cave), as hostages for
the fidelity of those five; and that if they proved unfaithful in the
execution, the five hostages should be hanged in chains alive on the
shore. This looked severe, and convinced them that the governor was in
earnest; however, they had no way left them but to accept it; and it
was now the business of the prisoners, as much as of the captain, to
persuade the other five to do their duty.

Our strength was now thus ordered for the expedition: first, the
captain, his mate, and passenger; second, the two prisoners of the
first gang, to whom, having their character from the captain, I had
given their liberty, and trusted them with arms; third, the other two
that I had kept till now in my bower, pinioned, but on the captain’s
motion had now released; fourth, these five released at last; so that
there were twelve in all, besides five we kept prisoners in the cave
for hostages.

I asked the captain if he was willing to venture with these hands on
board the ship; but as for me and my man Friday, I did not think it was
proper for us to stir, having seven men left behind; and it was
employment enough for us to keep them asunder, and supply them with
victuals. As to the five in the cave, I resolved to keep them fast, but
Friday went in twice a day to them, to supply them with necessaries;
and I made the other two carry provisions to a certain distance, where
Friday was to take them.

When I showed myself to the two hostages, it was with the captain, who
told them I was the person the governor had ordered to look after them;
and that it was the governor’s pleasure they should not stir anywhere
but by my direction; that if they did, they would be fetched into the
castle, and be laid in irons: so that as we never suffered them to see
me as governor, I now appeared as another person, and spoke of the
governor, the garrison, the castle, and the like, upon all occasions.

The captain now had no difficulty before him, but to furnish his two
boats, stop the breach of one, and man them. He made his passenger
captain of one, with four of the men; and himself, his mate, and five
more, went in the other; and they contrived their business very well,
for they came up to the ship about midnight. As soon as they came
within call of the ship, he made Robinson hail them, and tell them they
had brought off the men and the boat, but that it was a long time
before they had found them, and the like, holding them in a chat till
they came to the ship’s side; when the captain and the mate entering
first with their arms, immediately knocked down the second mate and
carpenter with the butt-end of their muskets, being very faithfully
seconded by their men; they secured all the rest that were upon the
main and quarter decks, and began to fasten the hatches, to keep them
down that were below; when the other boat and their men, entering at
the forechains, secured the forecastle of the ship, and the scuttle
which went down into the cook-room, making three men they found there
prisoners. When this was done, and all safe upon deck, the captain
ordered the mate, with three men, to break into the round-house, where
the new rebel captain lay, who, having taken the alarm, had got up, and
with two men and a boy had got firearms in their hands; and when the
mate, with a crow, split open the door, the new captain and his men
fired boldly among them, and wounded the mate with a musket ball, which
broke his arm, and wounded two more of the men, but killed nobody. The
mate, calling for help, rushed, however, into the round-house, wounded
as he was, and, with his pistol, shot the new captain through the head,
the bullet entering at his mouth, and came out again behind one of his
ears, so that he never spoke a word more: upon which the rest yielded,
and the ship was taken effectually, without any more lives lost.

As soon as the ship was thus secured, the captain ordered seven guns to
be fired, which was the signal agreed upon with me to give me notice of
his success, which, you may be sure, I was very glad to hear, having
sat watching upon the shore for it till near two o’clock in the
morning. Having thus heard the signal plainly, I laid me down; and it
having been a day of great fatigue to me, I slept very sound, till I
was surprised with the noise of a gun; and presently starting up, I
heard a man call me by the name of “Governor! Governor!” and presently
I knew the captain’s voice; when, climbing up to the top of the hill,
there he stood, and, pointing to the ship, he embraced me in his arms,
“My dear friend and deliverer,” says he, “there’s your ship; for she is
all yours, and so are we, and all that belong to her.” I cast my eyes
to the ship, and there she rode, within little more than half a mile of
the shore; for they had weighed her anchor as soon as they were masters
of her, and, the weather being fair, had brought her to an anchor just
against the mouth of the little creek; and the tide being up, the
captain had brought the pinnace in near the place where I had first
landed my rafts, and so landed just at my door. I was at first ready to
sink down with the surprise; for I saw my deliverance, indeed, visibly
put into my hands, all things easy, and a large ship just ready to
carry me away whither I pleased to go. At first, for some time, I was
not able to answer him one word; but as he had taken me in his arms I
held fast by him, or I should have fallen to the ground. He perceived
the surprise, and immediately pulled a bottle out of his pocket and
gave me a dram of cordial, which he had brought on purpose for me.
After I had drunk it, I sat down upon the ground; and though it brought
me to myself, yet it was a good while before I could speak a word to
him. All this time the poor man was in as great an ecstasy as I, only
not under any surprise as I was; and he said a thousand kind and tender
things to me, to compose and bring me to myself; but such was the flood
of joy in my breast, that it put all my spirits into confusion: at last
it broke out into tears, and in a little while after I recovered my
speech; I then took my turn, and embraced him as my deliverer, and we
rejoiced together. I told him I looked upon him as a man sent by Heaven
to deliver me, and that the whole transaction seemed to be a chain of
wonders; that such things as these were the testimonies we had of a
secret hand of Providence governing the world, and an evidence that the
eye of an infinite Power could search into the remotest corner of the
world, and send help to the miserable whenever He pleased. I forgot not
to lift up my heart in thankfulness to Heaven; and what heart could
forbear to bless Him, who had not only in a miraculous manner provided
for me in such a wilderness, and in such a desolate condition, but from
whom every deliverance must always be acknowledged to proceed.

When we had talked a while, the captain told me he had brought me some
little refreshment, such as the ship afforded, and such as the wretches
that had been so long his masters had not plundered him of. Upon this,
he called aloud to the boat, and bade his men bring the things ashore
that were for the governor; and, indeed, it was a present as if I had
been one that was not to be carried away with them, but as if I had
been to dwell upon the island still. First, he had brought me a case of
bottles full of excellent cordial waters, six large bottles of Madeira
wine (the bottles held two quarts each), two pounds of excellent good
tobacco, twelve good pieces of the ship’s beef, and six pieces of pork,
with a bag of peas, and about a hundred-weight of biscuit; he also
brought me a box of sugar, a box of flour, a bag full of lemons, and
two bottles of lime-juice, and abundance of other things. But besides
these, and what was a thousand times more useful to me, he brought me
six new clean shirts, six very good neckcloths, two pair of gloves, one
pair of shoes, a hat, and one pair of stockings, with a very good suit
of clothes of his own, which had been worn but very little: in a word,
he clothed me from head to foot. It was a very kind and agreeable
present, as any one may imagine, to one in my circumstances, but never
was anything in the world of that kind so unpleasant, awkward, and
uneasy as it was to me to wear such clothes at first.

After these ceremonies were past, and after all his good things were
brought into my little apartment, we began to consult what was to be
done with the prisoners we had; for it was worth considering whether we
might venture to take them with us or no, especially two of them, whom
he knew to be incorrigible and refractory to the last degree; and the
captain said he knew they were such rogues that there was no obliging
them, and if he did carry them away, it must be in irons, as
malefactors, to be delivered over to justice at the first English
colony he could come to; and I found that the captain himself was very
anxious about it. Upon this, I told him that, if he desired it, I would
undertake to bring the two men he spoke of to make it their own request
that he should leave them upon the island. “I should be very glad of
that,” says the captain, “with all my heart.” “Well,” says I, “I will
send for them up and talk with them for you.” So I caused Friday and
the two hostages, for they were now discharged, their comrades having
performed their promise; I say, I caused them to go to the cave, and
bring up the five men, pinioned as they were, to the bower, and keep
them there till I came. After some time, I came thither dressed in my
new habit; and now I was called governor again. Being all met, and the
captain with me, I caused the men to be brought before me, and I told
them I had got a full account of their villainous behaviour to the
captain, and how they had run away with the ship, and were preparing to
commit further robberies, but that Providence had ensnared them in
their own ways, and that they were fallen into the pit which they had
dug for others. I let them know that by my direction the ship had been
seized; that she lay now in the road; and they might see by-and-by that
their new captain had received the reward of his villainy, and that
they would see him hanging at the yard-arm; that, as to them, I wanted
to know what they had to say why I should not execute them as pirates
taken in the fact, as by my commission they could not doubt but I had
authority so to do.

One of them answered in the name of the rest, that they had nothing to
say but this, that when they were taken the captain promised them their
lives, and they humbly implored my mercy. But I told them I knew not
what mercy to show them; for as for myself, I had resolved to quit the
island with all my men, and had taken passage with the captain to go to
England; and as for the captain, he could not carry them to England
other than as prisoners in irons, to be tried for mutiny and running
away with the ship; the consequence of which, they must needs know,
would be the gallows; so that I could not tell what was best for them,
unless they had a mind to take their fate in the island. If they
desired that, as I had liberty to leave the island, I had some
inclination to give them their lives, if they thought they could shift
on shore. They seemed very thankful for it, and said they would much
rather venture to stay there than be carried to England to be hanged.
So I left it on that issue.

However, the captain seemed to make some difficulty of it, as if he
durst not leave them there. Upon this I seemed a little angry with the
captain, and told him that they were my prisoners, not his; and that
seeing I had offered them so much favour, I would be as good as my
word; and that if he did not think fit to consent to it I would set
them at liberty, as I found them: and if he did not like it he might
take them again if he could catch them. Upon this they appeared very
thankful, and I accordingly set them at liberty, and bade them retire
into the woods, to the place whence they came, and I would leave them
some firearms, some ammunition, and some directions how they should
live very well if they thought fit. Upon this I prepared to go on board
the ship; but told the captain I would stay that night to prepare my
things, and desired him to go on board in the meantime, and keep all
right in the ship, and send the boat on shore next day for me; ordering
him, at all events, to cause the new captain, who was killed, to be
hanged at the yard-arm, that these men might see him.

When the captain was gone I sent for the men up to me to my apartment,
and entered seriously into discourse with them on their circumstances.
I told them I thought they had made a right choice; that if the captain
had carried them away they would certainly be hanged. I showed them the
new captain hanging at the yard-arm of the ship, and told them they had
nothing less to expect.

When they had all declared their willingness to stay, I then told them
I would let them into the story of my living there, and put them into
the way of making it easy to them. Accordingly, I gave them the whole
history of the place, and of my coming to it; showed them my
fortifications, the way I made my bread, planted my corn, cured my
grapes; and, in a word, all that was necessary to make them easy. I
told them the story also of the seventeen Spaniards that were to be
expected, for whom I left a letter, and made them promise to treat them
in common with themselves. Here it may be noted that the captain, who
had ink on board, was greatly surprised that I never hit upon a way of
making ink of charcoal and water, or of something else, as I had done
things much more difficult.

I left them my firearms—viz. five muskets, three fowling-pieces, and
three swords. I had above a barrel and a half of powder left; for after
the first year or two I used but little, and wasted none. I gave them a
description of the way I managed the goats, and directions to milk and
fatten them, and to make both butter and cheese. In a word, I gave them
every part of my own story; and told them I should prevail with the
captain to leave them two barrels of gunpowder more, and some
garden-seeds, which I told them I would have been very glad of. Also, I
gave them the bag of peas which the captain had brought me to eat, and
bade them be sure to sow and increase them.