 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recorded by Dennis Sayers in Modesto, California, Winter 2006. Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. Chapter 19 Return to England. Having done all this, I left them the next day and went on board the ship. We prepared immediately to sail, but did not weigh that night. The next morning early two of the five men came swimming to the ship side and making the most lamentable complaint of the other three, begged to be taken into the ship for God's sake, for they should be murdered, and begged the captain to take them on board, though he hanged them immediately. Upon this the captain pretended to have no power without me, but after some difficulty and after their solemn promises of amendment, they were taken on board. And were, some time after, soundly whipped and pickled, after which they proved very honest and quiet fellows. Some time after this the boat was ordered on shore, the tide being up and with the things promised to the men, to which the captain at my intercession caused their chests and clothes to be added, which they took and were very thankful for. I also encouraged them by telling them that if it lay in my power to send any vessel to take them in, I would not forget them. When I took leave of this island, I carried on board for relics the great goat skin cap I had made, my umbrella, and one of my parrots. Also, I forgot not to take the money I formerly mentioned, which had lain by me so long, useless, that it was grown rusty or tarnished, and could hardly pass for silver till it had been a little rubbed and handled, as also the money I found in the wreck of the Spanish ship. And thus I left the island the 19th of December, as I found by the ship's account, in the year of 1686, after I had been upon it eight and twenty years, two months and nineteen days, being delivered from this second captivity the same day of the month that I first made my escape in the longboat from among the moors of Silly. In this vessel, after a long voyage, I arrived in England the eleventh of June in the year 1687, having been thirty-five years absent. When I came to England, I was as perfect a stranger to all the world as if I had never been known there. My benefactor and faithful steward, whom I had left my money in trust with, was alive, but had had great misfortunes in the world, was become a widow the second time, and very low in the world. I made her very easy as to what she owed me, assuring her I would give her no trouble. But, on the contrary, in gratitude for her former care and faithfulness to me, I relieved her as my little stock would afford, which at that time would indeed allow me to do but little for her, but I assured her I would never forget her former kindness to me, nor did I forget her when I had sufficient to help her, as shall be observed in its proper place. I went down afterwards into Yorkshire, but my father was dead, and my mother and all the family extinct, except that I found two sisters and two of the children of one of my brothers, and as I had long been given over for dead, there had been no provision made for me, so that in a word I found nothing to relieve or assist me, and that the little money I had would not do much for me as to settling in the world. I met with one piece of gratitude indeed, which I did not expect, and this was that the master of the ship whom I had so happily delivered, and by the same means saved the ship and cargo, having given a very handsome account to the owners of the manner how I had saved the lives of the men and the ship, they invited me to meet them and some other merchants concerned, and altogether made me a very handsome compliment upon the subject and a present of almost two hundred pounds sterling. But after making several reflections upon the circumstances of my life and how little way this would go towards settling me in the world, I resolved to go to Lisbon and see if I might not come at some information of the state of my plantation in the Brazils and of what was become of my partner, who, I had reason to suppose, had some years past given me over for dead. With this view I took shipping for Lisbon, where I arrived in April following, my man Friday accompanying me very honestly in all these ramblings and proving a most faithful servant upon all occasions. When I came to Lisbon I found out, by inquiry, and to my particular satisfaction, my old friend, the captain of the ship who first took me up at sea off the shore of Africa, he was now grown old and had left off going to sea having put his son, who was far from a young man, into his ship and who still used the Brazil trade. The old man did not know me and indeed I hardly knew him but I soon brought him to my remembrance and as soon brought myself to his remembrance when I told him who I was. After some passionate expressions of the old acquaintance between us, I inquired, you may be sure, after my plantation and my partner. The old man told me he had not been in the Brazils for about nine years that he could assure me that when he came away my partner was living but the trustees whom I had joined with him to take cognizance of my part were both dead, that, however, he believed I would have a very good account of the improvement of the plantation for that upon the general belief of being my cast away and drowned my trustees had given the account of the produce of my part of the plantation to the procurator Fiskl who had appropriated it in case I never came to claim it one-third to the king and two-thirds to the monastery of St. Augustine to be expended for the benefit of the poor and for the conversion of the Indians to the Catholic faith but that if I appeared or anyone for me to claim the inheritance it would be restored only that the improvement or annual production being distributed to charitable uses could not be restored but he assured me that the steward of the king's revenue from lands and the providore or steward of the monastery had taken great care all along yet the incumbent, that is to say my partner, gave every year a faithful account of the produce of which they had duly received my moiety I asked them if he knew to what height of improvement he had brought to plantation and whether he thought it might be worth looking after or whether on my going dither I should meet with any obstruction to my possessing my just right in the moiety he told me he could not tell exactly to what degree the plantation was improved but this he knew that my partner was grown exceedingly rich upon the enjoying his part of it and that to the best of his remembrance he had heard that the king's third of my part which was, it seems, granted away to some other monastery or religious house amounted to above 200 moidores a year that as to my being restored to a quiet possession of it there was no question to be made of that my partner being alive to witness my title and my name being also enrolled in the registry of the country also he told me that the survivors of my two trustees were very fair, honest people and very wealthy and he believed I would not only have their assistance for putting me in possession but would find a very considerable sum of money in their hands for my account being the produce of the farm while their fathers held the trust and before it was given up as above which as he remembered was for about twelve years I showed myself a little concerned and uneasy at this account and inquired of the old captain how it came to pass that the trustees should thus dispose of my effects when he knew that I had made my will and had made him, the Portuguese captain, my universal heir, etc he told me that was true but that as there was no proof of my being dead he could not act as executor until some certain account should come of my death and besides he was not willing to inter-medal with a thing so remote that it was true he had registered my will and put in his claim and could he have given any account of my being dead or alive he would have acted by procuration and taken possession of the Inheño so they called the sugar house and have given his son who was now at the Brazils orders to do it but, says the old man, I have one piece of news to tell you which perhaps may not be so acceptable to you as the rest and that is believing you were lost and all the world believing so also your partner and trustees did offer to account with me, in your name for the first six or eight years of profits which I received there being at that time great disbursements for increasing the works building an Inheño and buying slaves it did not amount to near so much as afterwards it produced however says the old man I shall give you a true account of what I have received and all and how I have disposed of it after a few further days conference with this ancient friend he brought me an account of the first six years income of my plantation signed by my partner and the merchant trustees being always delivered in goods that is tobacco and roll and sugar and chests besides rum, molasses, etc which is the consequence of a sugar work and I found by this account that every year the income considerably increased but, as above, the disbursements being large the sum at first was small however the old man let me see that he was a debtor to me four hundred and seventy moydorties of gold besides sixty chests of sugar and fifteen double rolls of tobacco which were lost in his ship he having been shipwrecked coming home to Lisbon about eleven years after my having the place the good man then began to complain of his misfortunes and how he had been obliged to make use of my money to cover his losses and buy him a share and a new ship however my old friend says he you shall not want a supply in your necessity and as soon as my son returns you shall be fully satisfied upon this he pulls out an old pouch and gives me one hundred and sixty Portugal moydores in gold and giving the writings of his title to the ship which his son was gone to the Brazils in of which he was quarter part owner and his son another he puts them both into my hands for security of the rest I was too much moved with the honesty and kindness of the poor man to be able to bear this and remembering what he had done for me how he had taken me up at sea and how generously he had used me on all occasions and particularly how sincere a friend he was now to me I could hardly refrain from weeping at what he had said to me therefore I asked him if his circumstances admitted him to spare so much money at that time and if it would not straighten him he told me he could not say but it might straighten him a little but however it was my money and I might want it more than he everything the good man said was full of affection and I could hardly refrain from tears while he spoke in short I took one hundred of the moydores and called for a pen and ink to give him a receipt for them then I returned him the rest and told him if ever I had possession of the plantation I would return the other to him as well as indeed I afterwards did and that as to the bill of sale of his part and his sonship I would not take it by any means but that if I wanted the money I found he was honest enough to pay me and if I did not but came to receive what he gave me reason to expect I would never have a penny more from him when this was passed the old man asked me if he should put me into a method to make a claim to my plantation I told him I thought to go over to it myself he said I might do so if I pleased but that if I did not there were ways enough to secure my right and immediately to appropriate the profits to my use and as there were ships in the river of Lisbon just ready to go away to Brazil he made me enter my name in a public register with his affidavit affirming upon oath that I was alive and that I was the same person who took up the land for the planting the said plantation at first this being regularly attested by a notary and a procuration affixed he directed me to send it with a letter of his writing to a merchant of his acquaintance at the place and then proposed my staying with him till an account came of the return never was anything more honorable than the proceedings upon this procuration for in less than seven months I received a large packet from the survivors of my trustees the merchants for whose account I went to see in which were the following particular papers and letters enclosed first there was the account current of the produce of my farm or plantation from the year when their fathers had balanced with my old Portugal captain being six years the balance appeared to be one thousand one hundred and seventy-four moidores in my favor secondly there was the account of four years more while they kept the effects in their hands before the government claimed the administration as being the effects of a person not to be found which they called civil death and the balance of this the value of the plantation increasing amounted to nineteen thousand four hundred and forty six cruzadois being about three thousand two hundred and forty moidores thirdly there was the prior of St. Augustine's account who had received the profits for above fourteen years but not being able to account for what was disposed of by the hospital very honestly declared he had eight hundred seventy-two moidores not distributed which he acknowledged to my account as to the king's part they refunded nothing there was a letter of my partners congratulating me very affectionately upon my being alive giving me an account how the estate was improved and what it produced a year with the particulars of the number of squares or acres that it contained how planted how many slaves there were upon it and making two and twenty crosses for blessings told me that he had said so many ave marias to thank the blessed virgin that I was alive inviting me very passionately to come over and take possession of my own and in the meantime to give him orders to whom he should deliver my effects if I did not come myself concluding with a hearty tender of his friendship and that it was family and sent me as a present seven fine leopard skins which he had it seems received from Africa by some other ship that he had sent thither and which it seems had made a better voyage than I he sent me also five chests of excellent sweet meats and a hundred pieces of gold uncoined not quite so large as Moedores by the same fleet my two merchant trustees shipped me one thousand two hundred chests of sugar eight hundred rolls of tobacco and the rest of the whole account in gold I might well say now and indeed that the latter end of Job was better than the beginning it is impossible to impress the flutterings of my heart when I found all my wealth about me for as the Brazil ships come all in fleets the same ships which brought my letters brought my goods and the effects were safe in the river before the letters came to my hand in a word I turned pale and grew sick and had not the old man run and fetched me a cordial I believe the sudden surprise of joy had overset nature and I had died upon the spot nay, after that I continued very ill and was so for some hours till a physician being sent forth and something of the real cause of my illness being known he ordered me to be let blood after which I had relief and grew well but I verily believe if I had not been let and eased by event, given in that manner to the spirits I should have died I was now master all of a sudden of about five thousand pounds sterling in money and had an estate, as I might well call it in the Brazils of above a thousand pounds a year as sure as an estate of lands in England and in a word I was in a condition which I scarce knew how to understand or how to compose myself for the enjoyment of it the first thing I did was to recompense my original benefactor my good old captain who had been first charitable to me in my distress kind to me in my beginning and honest to me at the end I showed him all that was sent to me I told him that next to the providence of heaven which disposed all things it was owing to him that now lay on me to reward him which I would do a hundred fold so I first returned to him the hundred Moedores I had received of him then I sent for a notary and caused him to draw up a general release or discharge from the four hundred and seventy Moedores which he had acknowledged healed me in the fullest and firmest manner possible after which I caused a procuration to be drawn empowering him to be the receiver of the annual profits of my plantation and appointing my partner to account with him and make the returns by the usual fleets to him in my name and by a clause in the end made a grant of one hundred Moedores a year to him during his life out of the effects and fifty Moedores a year to a son after him for his life and thus I requited my old man I had now to consider which way to steer my course next and what to do with the estate that providence had thus put into my hands and indeed I had more care upon my head now than I had in my state of life in the island where I wanted nothing but what I had and had nothing but what I wanted whereas I had now a great charge upon me and my business was how to secure it I had not a cave now to hide my money in or a place where it might lie without lock or key till it grew moldy and tarnished before anybody would meddle with it on the contrary I knew not where to put it or whom to trust it with my old patron the captain indeed was honest and that was the only refuge I had in the next place my interest in the Brazil seemed to summon me thither but now I could not tell how to think of going thither till I had settled my affairs and left my effects in some safe hands behind me at first I thought of my old friend the widow who I knew was honest and would be just to me but then she was in years and but poor and for ought I knew might be in debt so that in a word I had no way but to go back to England myself and take my effects with me it was some months however before I resolved upon this and therefore as I had rewarded the old captain fully and to his satisfaction who had been my former benefactor so I began to think of the poor widow whose husband had been my first benefactor and she while it was in her power my faithful steward and instructor so the first thing I did I got a merchant in Lisbon to write to his correspondent in London not only to pay a bill but to go find her out and carry her in money a hundred pounds from me and to talk with her and comfort her in her poverty by telling her she should if I lived have a further supply at the same time I sent my two sisters in the country a hundred pounds each they being though not in want yet not in very good circumstances one having been married and left a widow and the other having a husband not so kind to her as he should be but among all my relations or acquaintances I could not yet pitch upon one to whom I durst commit the gross of my stock that I might go away to the Brazils and leave things safe behind me and this greatly perplexed me I had once a mind to have gone to the Brazils and have settled myself there for I was as it were naturalized to the place but I had some little scruple in my mind about religion which insensibly drew me back however it was not religion that kept me from going there for the present and as I had made no scruple of being openly of the religion of the country all the while I was among them so neither did I yet only that now and then having of late thought more of it than formerly when I began to think of living and dying among them I began to regret having professed myself a papist and thought it might not be the best religion to die with but as I have said this was not the main thing that kept me from going to the Brazils but that I really did not know with whom to leave my effects behind me so I resolved at last to go to England where if I arrived I concluded that I should make some acquaintance or find some relations that would be faithful to me and accordingly I prepared to go to England with all my wealth in order to prepare things for my going home I first, the Brazil fleet being just gone away resolved to give answers suitable to the just and faithful account of things I had from thence and first to the prior of St. Augustine I wrote a letter full of thanks for his just dealings and the offer of the 872 Moedores which were undisposed of which I desired might be given 500 to the monastery and 372 to the poor as the prior should direct desiring the good Padres prayers for me and the like I wrote next a letter of thanks to my two trustees with all the acknowledgement that so much justice and honesty called for as for sending them any present they were far above having any occasion of it lastly I wrote to my partner acknowledging his industry in the improving the plantation and his integrity in increasing the stock of the works giving him instructions for his future government of my part according to the powers I had left with my old patron to whom I desired him to send whatever became due to me till he should hear from me more particularly assuring him that it was my intention not only to come to him but to settle myself there for the remainder of my life to this I added a very handsome present of some Italian silks for his wife and two daughters for such the captain's son informed me he had with two pieces of fine English broad cloth the best I could find in Lisbon five pieces of black bays and some Flanders lace of a good value having thus settled my affairs sold my cargo and turned all my effects into good bills of exchange my next difficulty was which way to go to England I had been accustomed enough to the sea and yet I had a strange aversion to go to England by the sea at that time and yet I could not give reason for it still the difficulty increased upon me so much that though I had once shipped my baggage in order to go yet I altered my mind and that not once but two or three times it is true I had been very unfortunate by sea and this might be one of the reasons but let no man slight the strong impulses of his own thoughts in cases of such moment two of the ships which I had singled out to go in I mean more particularly singled out than any other having put my things on board one of them and in the other having agreed with the captain I say two of these ships miscarried one was taken by the Algerians and the other was lost on the start near Torbay and all the people drowned except three so that in either of those vessels I had been made miserable having thus been harassed in my thoughts my old pilot to whom I communicated everything pressed me earnestly not to go by sea but either to go by land to the groina and cross over by the bay of Biscay to Rochelle and once it was but an easy and safe journey by land to Paris and so to Calais and Dover or to go up to Madrid and so all the way by land through France in a word I was so prepossessed against my going by sea at all except from Calais to Dover that I resolved to travel all the way by land which as I was not in haste and did not value the charge was by much the pleasanter way and to make it more so my old captain brought an English gentleman the son of a merchant in Lisbon who was willing to travel with me after which we picked up two more English merchants also and two young Portuguese gentlemen the last going to Paris only so that in all there were six of us and five servants the two merchants and the two Portuguese contending themselves with one servant between two to save the charge and as for me I got an English sailor to travel with me as a servant besides my man Friday who was too much a stranger to be capable of supplying the place of a servant on the road in this manner I set out from Lisbon and our company being very well mounted and armed we made a little troop whereof they did me the honor to call me captain as well because I was the oldest man as because I had two servants and indeed was the origin of the whole journey as I have troubled you with none of my sea journals so I shall trouble you now with none of my land journals but some adventures that happen to us in this tedious and difficult journey I must not omit when we came to Madrid we being all of us strangers to Spain were willing to stay some time to see the court of Spain and what was worth observing but it being the latter part of the summer we hastened away and set out from Madrid about the middle of October but when we came to the edge of Navarre we were alarmed at several towns on the way with an account that so much snow was falling on the French side of the mountains that several travelers were obliged to come back to Pampiluna after having attempted an extreme hazard to pass on when we came to Pampiluna itself we found it so indeed and to me that had been always used to a hot climate and to countries where I could scarce bear any clothes on the cold was insufferable nor indeed was it more painful than surprising to come but ten days before we were out of old Castile where the weather was not only warm but very hot and immediately to feel a wind from the Perennian mountains so very keen so severely cold as to be intolerable and to endanger benumbing and perishing of our fingers and toes poor Friday was really frightened when he saw the mountains all covered with snow and felt cold weather which he had never seen or felt before in his life to mend the manner when we came to Pampiluna it continues snowing with so much violence and so long that the people said winter was come before its time and the roads which were difficult before were now quite impassable for in a word no lay in some places too thick for us to travel and being not hard frozen as is the case in the northern countries there was no going without being in danger of being buried alive every step we stayed no less than twenty days at Pampiluna when seeing the weather coming on and no likelihood of its being better for it was the severest winter all over Europe that had been known in the memory of man I propose that we should go away to Fontarabia and there take shipping for Bordeaux which was a very little voyage but while I was considering this there came in four French gentlemen who having been stopped on the French side of the passes as we were on the Spanish without a guide who traversing the country near the head of Landoc had brought them over the mountains by such ways that they were not much incommodated by the snow for where they met with snow in inequality they said it was frozen hard enough to bear them and their horses we sent for this guide who told us he would undertake to carry us the same way no hazard from the snow provided we were armed sufficiently to protect ourselves from wild beasts for he said in these great snows it was frequent for some wolves to show themselves at the foot of the mountains being made ravenous for want of food the ground being covered with snow we told him we were well enough prepared for such creatures as they were if he would insure us from a kind of two-legged wolves which we were told we were in most danger from especially on the French side of the mountains he satisfied us that there was no danger of that kind in the way that we were to go so we readily agreed to follow him as did also 12 other gentlemen with their servants some French, some Spanish who as I said had attempted to go and decided to come back again accordingly we set out from Pompiluna with our guide on the 15th of November and indeed I was surprised when instead of going forward we came directly back with us on the same road that we came from Madrid about 20 miles when having passed two rivers and come into the plain country we found ourselves in a warm climate again where the country was pleasant and no snow to be seen but on a sudden turning to his left he approached the mountains another way and though it is true the hills and precipices looked dreadful yet he made so many tours such meanders and led us by such winding ways that we insensibly passed the height of the mountains without being much encumbered with the snow and all on a sudden he showed us the pleasant and fruitful provinces of Langdok and Gascony all green and flourishing though at a great distance and we had some rough way to pass still we were a little uneasy however when we found it snowed one whole day and a night so fast that we could not travel but he bit us be easy we should soon be passed at all we found indeed that we began to descend every day and to come more north than before and so depending upon our guide we went on it was about two hours before night when our guide being something before us and not just in sight three monstrous wolves and after them a bear from a hollow way adjoining to a great wood two of the wolves made at the guide and had he been far before us he would have been devoured before we could have helped him one of them fastened upon his horse and the other attacked the man with such violence that he had not time or presence of mind enough to draw his pistol he hallowed and cried out to us most lustily my man Friday being next to me I bade him right up and see what was the matter as soon as Friday came inside of the man he hallowed out as loud as the other oh master oh master but like a bold fellow rode directly up to the poor man and with his pistol shot the wolf in the head he was happy for the poor man that it was my man Friday for having been used to such creatures in his country he had no fear upon him but went close up to him and shot him whereas any other of us would have fired at a farther distance and have perhaps either missed the wolf or endangered shooting the man but it was enough to have terrified a bolder man than I and indeed it alarmed all our company when with the noise of Friday's pistol we heard on both sides the most dismal howling of wolves and the noise redoubled by the echo of the mountains appeared to us as if there had been a prodigious number of them and perhaps there was not such a few as that we had no cause for apprehension however as Friday had killed this wolf the other that had fastened upon the horse left him immediately and fled without doing him any damage having happily fastened upon his head where the bosses of the bridle had stuck in his teeth but the man was most hurt for the raging creature had bit him twice once in the arm and the other time a little above his knee and though he had made some defense he was just tumbling down by the disorder of his horse when Friday came up and shot the wolf it is easy to suppose that at the noise of Friday's pistol we all mended our pace and rode up as fast as the way which was very difficult would give us leave what was the matter as soon as we came clear of the trees which blinded us before we saw clearly what was the case and how Friday had disengaged the poor guide though we did not presently discern what kind of creature it was he had killed end of chapter 19 this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recorded by Dennis Sayers in Modesto, California winter 2006 Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe 20 fight between Friday and a bear but never was a fight managed so heartily and in such a surprising manner as that which followed between Friday and the bear which gave us all though at first we were surprised and afraid for him the greatest diversion imaginable as the bear is a heavy clumsy creature and does not gallop as the wolf does swift and light so he has two particular qualities which generally are the rule of his actions first as to men who are not his proper prey he does not usually attempt them except they first attack him unless he be excessively hungry which it is probable might now be the case the ground being covered with snow if you do not meddle with him he will not meddle with you but then you must take care to be very civil to him and give him the road for he is a very nice gentleman he will not go a step out of his way for a prince nay, if you are really afraid your best way is to look around another way to go and keep going for sometimes if you stop and stand still and look steadfastly at him he takes it for and a front but if you throw or toss anything at him, though it were but a stick as big as your finger he thinks himself abused and sets all other business aside to pursue his revenge and will have his satisfaction in point of honor that is his first quality the next is if he be once affronted he will never leave you night or day till he has his revenge but follows at a good round rate till he overtakes you my man Friday had delivered our guide and when we came up to him he was helping him off his horse for the man was both hurt and frightened when, on a sudden he aspired the bear come out of the wood and a monstrous one it was the biggest by far that ever I saw we were all a little surprised when we saw him but when Friday saw him it was easy to see joy and courage in the fellow's countenance oh oh oh says Friday three times pointing to him oh master you give me to leave me shake to him me make you good laugh I was surprised to see the fellow so well pleased you fool says I he will eat you up eating me up eating me up says Friday twice over again me eating him up me make you good laugh you all stay here me show you good laugh so down he sits and gets off his boots as we call the flat shoes they were and which he had in his pocket gives my other servant his horse and with his gun away he flew swift like the wind the bear was walking softly on and offered to meddle with nobody till Friday coming pretty near calls to him as if the bear could understand him harky harky says Friday you he followed at a distance for now being down on the gasketing side of the mountains we were entered a vast forest where there was country plain and pretty open though it had many trees in it scattered here and there Friday who had as we say the heels of the bear came up with him quickly and took up a great stone and threw it at him did him no more harm than if he had thrown it against a wall but it answered Friday's end for the rogue was so void of fear that he did it purely to make the bear follow him and show us some laugh as he called it as soon as the bear felt the blow and saw him he turns about and comes after him taking very long strides and shuffling on a strange rate so as he would have put a horse to a middling gallop away rains Friday and takes his course as if he ran towards us for help so we all resolved to fire at once upon the bear and deliver my man though I was angry at him for bringing the bear back upon us when he was going about his own business another way and especially I was angry that he had turned the bear upon us and then ran away and I called out you dog is this making us laugh come away and take your horse that we may shoot the creature he heard me and cried out no shoot, no shoot, stand still and you get much laugh and as the nimble creature read two feet for the bear's one he turned on a sudden on one side of us and seeing a great oak tree fit for his purpose he beckoned us to follow and doubling his pace he got nimbly up the tree laying his gun down upon the ground at about five or six yards from the bottom of the tree the bear soon came to the tree and we followed at a distance the first thing he did he stopped at the gun smelt at it but let it lie and up he scrambles into the tree climbing like a cat monstrous heavy I was amazed at the folly as I thought it of my man and could not for my life see anything especially to laugh at till seeing the bear get up the tree we all rode near to him when we came to the tree there was Friday got out on the small end of a large branch and the bear got out about half way to him and as soon as the bear got out to that part where the limb of the tree was weaker ha says he to us now you see me teach he the bear dance so he began jumping and shaking the bow at which the bear began to totter but stood still and began to look behind him to see how he should get back then indeed we did laugh heartily but Friday had not done with him by a great deal when seen him stand still he called out to him again and as if he had supposed the bear could speak English what you come no farther pray you come farther so he left jumping and shaking the tree and the bear just as if he understood what he said did come a little farther then he began jumping again and the bear stopped again we thought now was a good time to knock him in the head and call to Friday to stand still and we would shoot the bear but he cried out earnestly oh pray oh pray no shoot me shoot by and then he would have said by and by however to shorten the story Friday danced so much and the bear stood so ticklish that we had laughing enough but still could not imagine what the fellow would do and what we thought he depended upon shaking the bear off and we found the bear was too cunning for that too for he would not go out far enough to be thrown down but clung fast with his great broad claws and feet so that we could not imagine what would be the end of it and what the jest of it would be at last but Friday put us out of doubt quickly and the bear clung fast to the bow and that he would not be persuaded to come any farther well well so that Friday you come no farther me go you know come to me me come to you and upon this he went out to the smaller end where it would bend with his weight and gently let himself down by it sliding down the bow till he came near enough to jump down on his feet and he ran to his gun took it up and stood still well said I to Friday what will you do now why don't you shoot him no shoot says Friday, no yet me shoot now, me no kill me stay give you one more laugh and indeed so he did for when the bear saw his enemy gone he came back from the bow where he stood cautiously looking behind him every step and coming backward till he got on to the body of the tree then with the same hinder and foremost he came down the tree grasping it with his claws and moving one foot at a time very leisurely at this juncture and just before he could set his hind foot on the ground Friday stepped up close to him clapped the muzzle of his piece into his ear and shot him dead then the rogue turned about to see if we did not laugh and when he saw we were pleased by our looks he began to laugh very loud so we killed bear in my country says Friday so you kill them says I why you have no guns no says he no gun but shoot great much long arrow this was a good diversion to us but we were still in a wild place and our guide very much hurt and what to do we hardly knew the howling of wolves ran much in my head and indeed except the noise I once heard on the shore of Africa of which I have said something already I never heard anything that filled me with such horror these things and the approach of night called us off or else as Friday would have had us we would certainly have taken the skin of this monstrous creature off which was worth saving but we had near three leagues to go and our guide hastened us so we left him and went forward on our journey the ground was still covered with snow though not so deep and dangerous as on the mountains and the ravenous creatures as we heard afterwards were come down into the plain country pressed by hunger to seek for food and had done a great deal of mischief in the villages where they surprised the country people killed a great many of their sheep and horses and some people too we had one dangerous place to pass and our guide told us if there were more wolves in the country we should find them there and this was a small plain surrounded with woods on every side and a long narrow defile or lane which we were to pass to get through the wood and then we were to come to the village where we were to lodge it was within half an hour of sunset when we entered the wood and a little after sunset when we came into the plain we met with nothing in the first wood except that in a little plain within the wood which was not above two furlongs over five great wolves cross the road full speed one after another as if they had been in chase of some prey and had it in view they took no notice of us and were gone quite out of sight in a few moments upon this our guide who by the way was but a faint-hearted fellow bid us keep in a ready posture for he believed we kept our arms ready and our eyes about us but we saw no more wolves till we came through that wood which was near half a league and entered the plain as soon as we came into the plain we had occasion enough to look about us the first object we met was with a dead horse that is to say a poor horse which the wolves had killed and at least a dozen of them at work we could not say eating him but picking his bones rather for they had eaten up all the flesh before we did not think fit to disturb them at their feast neither did they take much notice of us Friday would have let fly at them but I would not suffer him by any means for I found we were like to have more business upon our hands than we were aware of we had not gone half over the plain when we began to hear the wolves howl in the wood on our left in a frightful manner and presently after we saw about a hundred coming on directly towards us all in a body and most of them in a line as regularly as an army drawn up by experienced officers I scarce knew in what manner to receive them but found to draw ourselves in a close line was the only way so we formed in a moment but that we might not have too much interval I ordered that only every other man should fire and that the others who had not fired should stand ready to give them a second volley immediately if they continued to advance upon us and then that those that had fired at first should not pretend to load their bodies again but stand ready everyone with a pistol for we were all armed with a fusy and a pair of pistols each man so we were by this method able to fire six follies half of us at a time however at present we had no necessity for upon firing the first volley the enemy made a full stop being so terrified as well with the noise with the fire four of them being shot in the head dropped several others were wounded and went bleeding off as we could see by the snow I found they stopped but did not immediately retreat where upon remembering that I had been told that the fiercest creatures were terrified at the voice of a man I caused all the company to go as loud as they all could and I found the notion not altogether mistaken for upon our shout they began to retire and turn about I then ordered a second volley to be fired in their rear which made them to gallop and the way they went to the woods this gave us leisure to charge our pieces again and that we might lose no time we kept going but we had but little more loaded our fuses and put ourselves in readiness when we heard a terrible noise in the same wood on our left only that it was farther onward the same way we were to go the night was coming on and the light began to be dusky which made it worse on our side but the noise increasing we could easily perceive that it was the howling and yelling of those hellish creatures and on a sudden we perceived groups of wolves one on our left one behind us and one in our front so that we seemed to be surrounded with them however as they did not fall upon us we kept our way forward as fast as we could make our horses go which the way being very rough was only a good hard trot in this manner we came in view of the entrance of a wood through which we were to pass at the farther side of the plane but we were greatly surprised when coming near the lane or pass we saw a confused number of wolves standing just at the entrance on a sudden at another opening of the wood we heard the noise of a gun and looking that way out rushed a horse with a saddle and a bridle on him flying like the wind and sixteen or seventeen wolves after him full speed the horse had the advantage of them but as we supposed that he could not hold it at that rate we doubted not that they would get up with him at last no question but they did and here we had a most horrible sight for riding up to the entrance where the horse came out we found the carcasses of another horse and of two men devoured by the ravenous creatures and one of the men found out the same whom we heard fire the gun for there lay a gun just by him fired off but as to the man his head and the upper part of his body was eaten up this filled us with horror and we knew not what course to take but the creatures resolved us soon for they gathered about us presently in hopes of prey and I verily believe there were three hundred of them it happened very much to our advantage that at the entrance into the wood but a little way from it there lay some large timber trees which had been cut down the summer before and I suppose lay there for a carriage I drew my little troop in among those trees and placing ourselves in a line behind one long tree I advised them all to a light and keep that tree before us for a breast work in the middle or three fronts enclosing our horses in the center we did so and it was well we did for never was a more furious charge than the creatures made upon us in this place they came on with a growling kind of noise and mounted the piece of timber which as I said was our breast work as if they were only rushing upon their prey and this fury of theirs seems was principally occasioned by their scene our horses behind us I ordered our men to fire as before every other man and they took their aim so sure that they killed several of the wolves at the first volley but there was a necessity to keep a continual firing for they came on like devils those behind pushing on those before when we fired a second volley of our few seas they stopped a little and I hoped they would have gone off but it was but a moment for others came forward again so we fired two volleys of our pistols and I believe in these four firings we had killed seventeen or eighteen of them and lame twice as many yet they came on again I was loath to spend our shot too hastily so I called my servant not my man Friday he had deployed for with the greatest dexterity imaginable he had charged my few sea and his own while we were engaged but as I said I called my other man and giving him a horn of powder I had him lay a trail all along the piece of timber and let it be a large train he did so and had but just time to get away when the wolves came up to it and some got upon it and I snapping an uncharged pistol close to the powder set it on fire those that were upon the timber were scorched with it and six or seven of them fell or rather jumped in among us with the force and fright of the fire we dispatched these in an instant and the rest were so frightened with the light which the night it was now nearly dark and they drew back a little upon which I ordered our last pistols to be fired off in one volley and after that we gave a shout upon this the wolves turned tail and we salied immediately upon near twenty lame ones that we found struggling on the ground and fell to cutting them with our sword which answered our expectation for the crying and howling was better understood by their fellows so that they all fled and left us we had first and last killed about three score of them and had it been daylight we had killed many more the field of battle being thus cleared we made forward again for we had still near a league to go we heard the ravenous creatures howl and yell in the woods several times and sometimes we fancied we saw some of them but the snow dazzling our eyes we were not certain in about an hour more we came to the town where we were to lodge which we found in a terrible fright and all in arms for it seems the night before the wolves and some bears had broken into the village and put them in such terror that they were obliged to keep guard today but especially in the night to preserve their cattle and indeed their people the next morning our guide was so ill and his limbs swelled so much with the rankling of his two wounds that he could not go further so we were obliged to take a new guide here and go to Toulouse where we found a warm climate a fruitful pleasant country and no snow anything like them but when we told our story at Toulouse they told us it was nothing but what was ordinary in the great forest at the foot of the mountains especially when the snow lay on the ground but they inquired much what kind of guide we had got who would venture to bring us that way in such a severe season he told us it was surprising we were not all devoured when we told them how we placed ourselves in the middle they blamed us exceedingly and told us it was fifty to one but we had all been destroyed for it was the sight of the horses which made the wolves so furious seeing their prey and that at other times they were really afraid of a gun but being excessively hungry and raging on that account the eagerness to come at the horses had made them senseless of danger and that if we had not a continual fire and at last by the stratagem of the train of powder mastered them it had been great odds but that we had been torn to pieces whereas had we been content to have sat still on horseback and fired as horsemen they would not have taken the horses so much for their own when men were on their backs as otherwise and with all if we had stood altogether and left our horses they would have been so eager to have devoured them that we might have come off safe especially having our firearms and our hands being so many a number for my part I never was so sensible of danger in my life for seeing above three hundred devils come roaring and open mouthed for us and having nothing to shelter us or to retreat to I gave myself over for lost and as it was I believe I shall never care to cross those mountains again I think I would much rather go a thousand leagues by sea though I was sure to meet with a storm once a week I have nothing uncommon to take notice of in my passage of experience nothing but what other travelers have given an account of with much more advantage than I can I traveled from Toulouse to Paris and without any considerable stay came to Calais and landed safe at Dover the fourteenth of January after having had a severe cold season to travel in I was now come to the center of my travels all my newly discovered estate safe about me the bills of exchange which I brought with me having been currently paid my principal guide and privy counselor was my good ancient widow who in gratitude for the money I had sent her thought no pains too much nor care too great to employ for me and I trusted her so entirely that I was perfectly easy as to the security of my effects and indeed I was very happy from the beginning and now to the end in the unspotted integrity of this good gentle woman and now having resolved to dispose of my plantation in the Brazils I wrote to my old friend at Lisbon who having offered it to the two merchants the survivors of my trustees who lived in the Brazils they accepted the offer and remitted thirty three thousand pieces of eight to a correspondent of theirs at Lisbon to pay for it in return I signed the instrument of sale in the form which they sent from Lisbon and sent it to my old man who sent me the bills of exchange for thirty two thousand eight hundred pieces of eight for the estate reserving the payment of two hundred Moidoris a year to him the old man during his life and fifty Moidoris afterwards to his son for his life which I had promised them and which the plantation was to make good as a rent charge and thus I have given the first part of a life of fortune and adventure a life of Providence's checker work and of a variety which the world will seldom be able to show the like of beginning foolishly but closing much more happily than any part of it ever gave me leave so much as to hope for anyone would think that in this state of complicated good fortune I was past running any more hazards and so indeed I had been if other circumstances had occurred but I was inured to a wandering life had no family nor many relations nor however rich had I contracted fresh acquaintance and though I had sold my estate in the Brazils yet I could not keep that country out of my head and had a great mind to be upon the wing again especially I could not resist the strong inclination I had to see my island and to know if the poor Spaniards were in being there my true friend the widow earnestly dissuaded me from it and so far prevailed with me that for almost seven years she prevented my running abroad during which time I took my two nephews the children of one of my brothers into my care the eldest having something of his own I bred up as a gentleman and gave him a settlement of some addition to his estate after my decease the other I placed with the captain of a ship and after five years finding him a sensible, bold enterprising young fellow I put him into a good ship and sent him to sea and this young fellow afterwards drew me in as old as I was to further adventures myself in the meantime I in part settled myself here for first of all I married and that not either to my disadvantage or dissatisfaction and had three children two sons and one daughter but my wife dying and my nephew coming home with good success from a voyage to Spain my inclination to go abroad and his importunity prevailed and engaged me to go in his ship as a private trader to the East Indies this was in the year 1694 in this voyage I visited my new colony in the island saw my successors the Spaniards had the old story of their lives and of the villains I left there how at first they insulted the poor Spaniards how they afterwards agreed, disagreed united, separated and how at last the Spaniards were obliged to use violence with them how they were subjected to the Spaniards how honestly the Spaniards used them a history if it were entered into as full of variety and wonderful accidents as my own part particularly also as to their battles with the Caribbean who landed several times upon the island and as to the improvement they made upon the island itself and how five of them made an attempt upon the mainland out of way eleven men and five women prisoners by which at my coming I found about twenty young children on the island here I stayed about twenty days left them supplies of all necessary things and particularly of arms powder, shot clothes tools and two workmen which I brought for them from England that is a carpenter and a smith besides this I shared the land into parts with them reserved to myself the property of the whole but gave them such parts respectively as they agreed upon and having settled all things with them and engaged them not to leave the place I left them there from thence I touched at the Brazils from whence I sent a bark which I bought there with more people to the island and in it besides other supplies I sent seven women being such as I found proper for service or for wives to such as would take them as to the Englishmen I promised to send them some women from England with a good cargo of necessaries if they would apply themselves to planting which I afterwards could not perform the fellows proved very honest and diligent after they were mastered and had their properties set apart for them I sent them also from the Brazils five cows three of them being big with calf some sheep and some hogs which when I came again were considerably increased but all these things with an account of how three hundred caribis came and invaded them and ruined their plantations and how they fought with that whole number twice and were at first defeated and one of them killed but at last a storm destroying their enemies canoes they famished or destroyed almost all the rest and renewed and recovered the possession of their plantation and still lived upon the island all these things with some very surprising incidents and some new adventures of my own for ten years more I shall give a farther account in the second part of my story End of Chapter 20 End of Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe