The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe - 53

At last, raising my voice, that I might silence him a little, "Barbarous dog!" said I, "what are you doing? I won't have one creature touched more upon pain of death. I charge you upon your life to stop your hands, and stand still here, or you are a dead man this minute."

"Why, Sir," says he, "do you know what you do, or what they have done? If you want a reason for what we have done, come hither;" and with that he shewed me the poor fellow hanging upon a tree, with his throat cut.

I confess I was urged then myself, and at another time should have been forward enough; but I thought they had carried their rage too far, and thought of Jacob's words to his sons Simeon and Levi, "Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel." But I had now a new task upon my hands; for when the men I carried with me saw the sight as I had done, I had as much to do to restrain them, as I should have had with the others; nay, my nephew himself fell in with them, and told me in their hearing, that he was only concerned for fear of the men being overpowered; for, as to the people, he thought not one of them ought to live; for they had all glutted themselves with the murder of the poor man, and that they ought to be used like murderers. Upon these words away ran eight of my men with the boatswain and his crew to complete their bloody work; and I, seeing it quite out of my power to restrain them, came away pensive and sad, for I could not bear the sight, much less the horrible noise and cries of the poor wretches that fell into their hands.

I got nobody to come back with me but the supercargo and two men, and with these I walked back to the boats. It was a very great piece of folly in me, I confess, to venture back as it were alone; for as it began now to be almost day, and the alarm had run over the country, there stood about forty men armed with lances and bows at the little place where the twelve or thirteen houses stood mentioned before, but by accident I missed the place, and came directly to the sea-side; and by that time I got to the sea-side it was broad day: immediately I took the pinnace and went aboard, and sent her back to assist the men in what might happen.

I observed that about the time I came to the boat-side the fire was pretty well out, and the noise abated; but in about half an hour after I got on board I heard a volley of our men's fire-arms, and saw a great smoke; this, as I understood afterwards, was our men falling upon the forty men, who, as I said, stood at the few houses on the way; of whom they killed sixteen or seventeen, and set all those houses on fire, but did not meddle with the women or children.

By the time the men got to the shore again with the pinnace our men began to appear; they came dropping in some and some, not in two bodies, and in form, as they went out, but all in heaps, straggling here and there in such a manner that a small force of resolute men might have cut them all off.

But the dread of them was upon the whole country. The people were amazed and surprised, and so frighted that I believe a hundred of them would have fled at the sight of but five of our men. Nor in all this terrible action was there a man who made any considerable defence; they were so surprised between the terror of the fire, and the sudden attack of our men in the dark, that they knew not which way to turn themselves; for if they fled one way they were met by one party, if back again by another; so that they were every where knocked down. Nor did any of our men receive the least hurt, except one who strained his foot, and another had one of his hands very much burnt.

I was very angry with my nephew the captain, and indeed with all the men, in my mind, but with him in particular, as well for his acting so out of his duty, as commander of the ship, and having the charge of the voyage upon him, as in his prompting rather than cooling the rage of his men in so bloody and cruel an enterprise: my nephew answered me very respectfully, but told me that when he saw the body of the poor seaman whom they had murdered in such a cruel and barbarous manner, he was not master of himself, neither could he govern his passion; he owned he should not have done so, as he was commander of the ship, but as he was a man, and nature moved him, he could not bear it. As for the rest of the men, they were not subject to me at all, and they knew it well enough, so they took no notice of my dislike.

The next day we set sail, so we never heard any more of it. Our men differed in the account of the number they killed; some said one thing, some another; but according to the best of their accounts, put all together, they killed or destroyed about a hundred and fifty people, men, women, and children, and left not a house standing in the town.

As for the poor fellow, Thomas Jeffrys, as he was quite dead, for his throat was so cut that his head was half off, it would do him no service to bring him away; so they left him where they found him, only took him down from the tree where he was hanged by one hand.

However just our men thought this action to be, I was against them in it, and I always after that time told them God would blast the voyage; for I looked upon the blood they shed that night to be murder in them: for though it is true that they killed Thomas Jeffrys, yet it was as true that Jeffrys was the aggressor, had broken the truce, and had violated or debauched a young woman of theirs, who came to our camp innocently, and on the faith of their capitulation.

The boatswain defended this quarrel when we were afterwards on board. He said, it was true that we seemed to break the truce, but really had not, and that the war was begun the night before by the natives themselves, who had shot at us, and killed one of our men without any just provocation; so that as we were in a capacity to fight them, we might also be in a capacity to do ourselves justice upon them in an extraordinary manner; that though the poor man had taken liberty with a wench, he ought not to have been murdered, and that in such a villanous manner; and that they did nothing but what was just, and that the laws of God allowed to be done to murderers.

One would think this should have been enough to have warned us against going on shore among heathens and barbarians; but it is impossible to make mankind wise but at their own experience; and their experience seems to be always of most use to them when it is dearest bought.

We were now bound to the Gulf of Persia, and from thence to the coast of Coromandel, only to touch at Surat; but the chief of the supercargo's design lay at the Bay of Bengal, where if he missed of the business outward-bound he was to go up to China, and return to the coast as he came home.

The first disaster that befel us was in the Gulf of Persia, where five of our men venturing on shore on the Arabian side of the Gulf were surrounded by the Arabs, and either all killed or carried away into slavery; the rest of the boat's crew were not able to rescue them, and had but just time to get off their boat. I began to upbraid them with the just retribution of Heaven in this case; but the boatswain very warmly told me, he thought I went farther in my censures than I could show any warrant for in Scripture, and referred to the thirteenth of St. Luke, ver. 4, where our Saviour intimates that those men on whom the tower of Siloam fell, were not sinners above all the Galileans; but that which indeed put me to silence in this case was, that none of these five men who were now lost were of the number of those who went on shore to the massacre of Madagascar (so I always called it, though our men could not bear the word massacre with any patience:) and indeed this last circumstance, as I have said, put me to silence for the present.

But my frequent preaching to them on this subject had worse consequences than I expected; and the boatswain, who had been the head of the attempt, came up boldly to me one time, and told me he found that I continually brought that affair upon the stage, that I made unjust reflections upon it, and had used the men very ill on that account, and himself in particular; that as I was but a passenger, and had no command in the ship, or concern in the voyage, they were not obliged to bear it; that they did not know but I might have some ill design in my head, and perhaps call them to an account for it when they came to England; and that therefore, unless I would resolve to have done with it, and also not to concern myself farther with him, or any of his affairs, he would leave the ship; for he did not think it was safe to sail with me among them.

I heard him patiently enough till he had done, and then told him that I did confess I had all along opposed the massacre of Madagascar, for such I would always call it; and that I had on all occasions spoken my mind freely about it, though not more upon him than any of the rest; that as to my having no command in the ship, that was true, nor did I exercise any authority, only took the liberty of speaking my mind in things which publicly concerned us all: as to what concern I had in the voyage, that was none of his business; I was a considerable owner of the ship, and in that claim I conceived I had a right to speak, even farther than I had yet done, and would not be accountable to him or any one else; and began to be a little warm with him: he made but little reply to me at that time, and I thought that affair had been over. We were at this time in the road to Bengal; and being willing to see the place, I went on shore with the supercargo, in the ship's boat, to divert myself; and towards evening was preparing to go on board, when one of the men came to me, and told me he would not have me trouble myself to come down to the boat, for they had orders not to carry me on board. Any one may guess what a surprise I was in at so insolent a message; and I asked the man who bade him deliver that errand to me? He told me, the coxswain. I said no more to the fellow, but bid him let them know he had delivered his message, and that I had given him no answer to it.

I immediately went and round out the supercargo, and told him the story, adding, what I presently foresaw, viz. that there would certainly be a mutiny in the ship; and entreated him to go immediately on board the ship in an Indian boat, and acquaint the captain of it: but I might have spared this intelligence, for before I had spoken to him on shore the matter was effected on board: the boatswain, the gunner, the carpenter, and, in a word, all the inferior officers, as soon as I was gone off in the boat, came up to the quarter-deck, and desired to speak with the captain; and there the boatswain making a long harangue, (for the fellow talked very well) and repeating all he had said to me, told the captain in a few words, that as I was now gone peaceably on shore, they were loath to use any violence with me; which if I had not gone on shore, they would otherwise have done, to oblige me to have gone. They therefore thought fit to tell him, that as they shipped themselves to serve in the ship under his command, they would perform it faithfully; but if I would not quit the ship, or the captain oblige me to quit it, they would all leave the ship, and sail no farther with him; and at that word All, he turned his face about towards the main-mast, which was, it seems, the signal agreed on between them, at which all the seamen being got together, they cried out, "One and All, One and All!"

My nephew, the captain, was a man of spirit, and of great presence of mind; and though he was surprised, you may be sure, at the thing, yet he told them calmly he would consider of the matter, but that he could do nothing in it till he had spoken to me about it: he used some arguments with them, to shew them the unreasonableness and injustice of the thing, but it was all in vain; they swore, and shook hands round, before his face, that they would go all on shore unless he would engage to them not to suffer me to come on board the ship.

This was a hard article upon him, who knew his obligation to me, and did not know how I might take it; so he began to talk cavalierly to them; told them that I was a very considerable owner of the ship, and that in justice he could not put me out of my own house; that this was next door to serving me as the famous pirate Kid had done, who made the mutiny in the ship, set the captain on shore in an uninhabited island, and ran away with the ship; that let them go into what ship they would, if ever they came to England again it would cost them dear; that the ship was mine, and that he would not put me out of it; and that he would rather lose the ship, and the voyage too, than disoblige me so much; so they might do as they pleased. However, he would go on shore, and talk with me there, and invited the boatswain to go with him, and perhaps they might accommodate the matter with me.

But they all rejected the proposal; and said, they would have nothing to do with me any more, neither on board nor on shore; and if I came on board, they would go on shore. "Well," said the captain, "if you are all of this mind, let me go on shore, and talk with him:" so away he came to me with this account, a little after the message had been brought to me from the coxswain.

I was very glad to see my nephew I must confess, for I was not without apprehensions that they would confine him by violence, set sail, and run away with the ship; and then I had been stripped naked, in a remote country, and nothing to help myself: in short, I had been in a worse case than when I was all alone in the island.

But they had not come to that length, it seems, to my great satisfaction; and when my nephew told me what they had said to him, and how they had sworn, and shook hands, that they would one and all leave the ship, if I was suffered to come on board, I told him he should not be concerned at it at all, for I would stay onshore; I only desired he would take care and send me all my necessary things on shore, and leave me a sufficient sum of money, and I would find my way to England as well as I could.

This was a heavy piece of news to my nephew; but there was no way to help it, but to comply with it. So, in short, he went on board the ship again, and satisfied the men that his uncle had yielded to their importunity, and had sent for his goods from on board the ship. So the matter was over in a very few hours; the men returned to their duty, and I begun to consider what course I should steer.

I was now alone in the remotest part of the world, as I think I may call it, for I was near three thousand leagues, by sea, farther off from England than I was at my island; only, it is true, I might travel here by land, over the Great Mogul's country to Surat, might go from thence to Bassora by sea, up the Gulf of Persia, and from thence might take the way of the caravans, over the deserts of Arabia, to Aleppo and Scanderoon, and from thence by sea again to Italy, and so overland into France; and this, put together, might be, at least, a full diameter of the globe; but, if it were to be measured, I suppose it would appear to be a great deal more.

I had another way before me, which was to wait for some English ships, which were coming to Bengal, from Achin, on the island of Sumatra, and get passage on board them for England: but as I came hither without any concern with the English East India Company, so it would be difficult to go from hence without their licence, unless with great favour of the captains of the ships, or of the Company's factors; and to both I was an utter stranger.

Here I had the particular pleasure, speaking by contrarieties, to see the ship set sail without me; a treatment, I think, a man in my circumstances scarce ever met with, except from pirates running away with a ship, and setting those that would not agree with their villany on shore: indeed this was the next door to it both ways. However, my nephew left me two servants, or rather, one companion and one servant: the first was clerk to the purser, whom he engaged to go with me; and the other was his own servant. I took me also a good lodging in the house of an English woman, where several merchants lodged, some French, two Italians, or rather Jews, and one Englishman. Here I was handsomely enough entertained; and that I might not be said to run rashly upon any thing, I stayed here above nine months, considering what course to take, and how to manage myself. I had some English goods with me of value, and a considerable sum of money; my nephew furnishing me with a thousand pieces of eight, and a letter of credit for more, if I had occasion, that I might not be straitened, whatever might happen.

I quickly disposed of my goods, and to advantage too; and, as I originally intended, I bought here some very good diamonds, which, of all other things, was the most proper for me, in my circumstances, because I might always carry my whole estate about me.

After a long stay here, and many proposals made for my return to England, but none falling to my mind, the English merchant, who lodged with me, and with whom I had contracted an intimate acquaintance, came to me one morning: "Countryman," says he, "I have a project to communicate to you, which, as it suits with my thoughts, may, for aught I know, suit with yours also, when you shall have thoroughly considered it.

"Here we are posted," says he, "you by accident, and I by my own choice, in a part of the world very remote from our own country; but it is in a country where, by us who understand trade and business, a great deal of money is to be got: if you will put a thousand pounds to my thousand pounds, we will hire a ship here, the first we can get to our minds; you shall be captain, I'll be merchant, and we will go a trading voyage to China; for what should we stand still for? The whole world is in motion, rolling round and round; all the creatures of God, heavenly bodies and earthly, are busy and vibrant: why should we be idle? There are no drones," says he, "living in the world but men: why should we be of that number?"

I liked this proposal very well; and the more because it seemed to be expressed with so much good will, and in so friendly a manner. I will not say, but that I might, by my loose and unhinged circumstances, be the fitter to embrace a proposal for trade, and indeed for any thing else; or otherwise trade was none of my element; however, I might, perhaps, say with some truth, that if trade was not my element, rambling was; and no proposal for seeing any part of the world, which I had never seen before, could possibly come amiss to me.

It was, however, some time before we could get a ship to our mind; and when we got a vessel, it was not easy to get English sailors; that is to say, so many as were necessary to govern the voyage, and manage the sailors which we should pick up there. After some time we got a mate, a boatswain, and a gunner, English; a Dutch carpenter, and three Portuguese foremast-men: with these we found we could do well enough, having Indian seamen, such as they are, to make up.