living, which, it may well be supposed, were not a few.
CHAPTER IV . FIRST WEEKS ON THE ISLAND
Robinson Crusoe
I had a dismal prospect of my condition; for as I was not cast away upon that island without being driven, as
is said, by a violent storm, quite out of the course of our intended voyage, and a great way, viz. some
hundreds of leagues, out of the ordinary course of the trade of mankind, I had great reason to consider it as a
determination of Heaven, that in this desolate place, and in this desolate manner, I should end my life. The
tears would run plentifully down my face when I made these reflections; and sometimes I would expostulate
with myself why Providence should thus completely ruin His creatures, and render them so absolutely
miserable; so without help, abandoned, so entirely depressed, that it could hardly be rational to be thankful
for such a life.
But something always returned swift upon me to check these thoughts, and to reprove me; and particularly
one day, walking with my gun in my hand by the seaside, I was very pensive upon the subject of my present
condition, when reason, as it were, expostulated with me the other way, thus: "Well, you are in a desolate
condition, it is true; but, pray remember, where are the rest of you? Did not you come, eleven of you in the
boat? Where are the ten? Why were they not saved, and you lost? Why were you singled out? Is it better to be
here or there?" And then I pointed to the sea. All evils are to be considered with the good that is in them, and
with what worse attends them.
Then it occurred to me again, how well I was furnished for my subsistence, and what would have been my
case if it had not happened (which was a hundred thousand to one) that the ship floated from the place where
she first struck, and was driven so near to the shore that I had time to get all these things out of her; what
would have been my case, if I had been forced to have lived in the condition in which I at first came on shore,
without necessaries of life, or necessaries to supply and procure them? "Particularly," said I, aloud (though to
myself), "what should I have done without a gun, without ammunition, without any tools to make anything,
or to work with, without clothes, bedding, a tent, or any manner of covering?" and that now I had all these to
sufficient quantity, and was in a fair way to provide myself in such a manner as to live without my gun, when
my ammunition was spent: so that I had a tolerable view of subsisting, without any want, as long as I lived;
for I considered from the beginning how I would provide for the accidents that might happen, and for the
time that was to come, even not only after my ammunition should be spent, but even after my health and
strength should decay.
I confess I had not entertained any notion of my ammunition being destroyed at one blast . I mean my
powder being blown up by lightning; and this made the thoughts of it so surprising to me, when it lightened
and thundered, as I observed just now.
And now being about to enter into a melancholy relation of a scene of silent life, such, perhaps, as was never
heard of in the world before, I shall take it from its beginning, and continue it in its order. It was by my
account the 30th of September, when, in the manner as above said, I first set foot upon this horrid island;
when the sun, being to us in its autumnal equinox, was almost over my head; for I reckoned myself, by
observation, to be in the latitude of nine degrees twenty.two minutes north of the line.
After I had been there about ten or twelve days, it came into my thoughts that I should lose my reckoning of
time for want of books, and pen and ink, and should even forget the Sabbath days; but to prevent this, I cut
with my knife upon a large post, in capital letters . and making it into a great cross, I set it up on the shore
where I first landed . "I came on shore here on the 30th September 1659."
Upon the sides of this square post I cut every day a notch with my knife, and every seventh notch was as long
again as the rest, and every first day of the month as long again as that long one; and thus I kept my calendar,
or weekly, monthly, and yearly reckoning of time.
In the next place, we are to observe that among the many things which I brought out of the ship, in the several
voyages which, as above mentioned, I made to it, I got several things of less value, but not at all less useful to
CHAPTER IV . FIRST WEEKS ON THE ISLAND
Robinson Crusoe
me, which I omitted setting down before; as, in particular, pens, ink, and paper, several parcels in the
captain's, mate's, gunner's and carpenter's keeping; three or four compasses, some mathematical instruments,
dials, perspectives, charts, and books of navigation, all which I huddled together, whether I might want them
or no; also, I found three very good Bibles, which came to me in my cargo from England, and which I had
packed up among my things; some Portuguese books also; and among them two or three Popish
prayer.books, and several other books, all which I carefully secured. And I must not forget that we had in the
ship a dog and two cats, of whose eminent history I may have occasion to say something in its place; for I
carried both the cats with me; and as for the dog, he jumped out of the ship of himself, and swam on shore to
me the day after I went on shore with my first cargo, and was a trusty servant to me many years; I wanted
nothing that he could fetch me, nor any company that he could make up to me; I only wanted to have him talk
to me, but that would not do. As I observed before, I found pens, ink, and paper, and I husbanded them to the
utmost; and I shall show that while my ink lasted, I kept things very exact, but after that was gone I could not,
for I could not make any ink by any means that I could devise.
And this put me in mind that I wanted many things notwithstanding all that I had amassed together; and of
these, ink was one; as also a spade, pickaxe, and shovel, to dig or remove the earth; needles, pins, and thread;
as for linen, I soon learned to want that without much difficulty.
This want of tools made every work I did go on heavily; and it was near a whole year before I had entirely
finished my little pale, or surrounded my habitation. The piles, or stakes, which were as heavy as I could well
lift, were a long time in cutting and preparing in the woods, and more, by far, in bringing home; so that I
spent sometimes two days in cutting and bringing home one of those posts, and a third day in driving it into
the ground; for which purpose I got a heavy piece of wood at first, but at last bethought myself of one of the
iron crows; which, however, though I found it, made driving those posts or piles very laborious and tedious
work. But what need I have been concerned at the tediousness of anything I had to do, seeing I had time
enough to do it in? nor had I any other employment, if that had been over, at least that I could foresee, except
the ranging the island to seek for food, which I did, more or less, every day.
I now began to consider seriously my condition, and the circumstances I was reduced to; and I drew up the
state of my affairs in writing, not so much to leave them to any that were to come after me . for I was likely
to have but few heirs . as to deliver my thoughts from daily poring over them, and afflicting my mind; and as
my reason began now to master my despondency, I began to comfort myself as well as I could, and to set the
good against the evil, that I might have something to distinguish my case from worse; and I stated very
impartially, like debtor and creditor, the comforts I enjoyed against the miseries I suffered, thus:.
Evil: I am cast upon a horrible, desolate island, void of all hope of recovery.
Good: But I am alive; and not drowned, as all my ship's company were.
Evil: I am singled out and separated, as it were, from all the world, to be miserable.
Good: But I am singled out, too, from all the ship's crew, to be spared from death; and He that miraculously
saved me from death can deliver me from this condition.
Evil: I am divided from mankind . a solitaire; one banished from human society.
Good: But I am not starved, and perishing on a barren place, affording no sustenance.
Evil: I have no clothes to cover me.
Good: But I am in a hot climate, where, if I had clothes, I could hardly wear them.
CHAPTER IV . FIRST WEEKS ON THE ISLAND
Robinson Crusoe
Evil: I am without any defence, or means to resist any violence of man or beast.
Good: But I am cast on an island where I see no wild beasts to hurt me, as I saw on the coast of Africa; and
what if I had been shipwrecked there?
Evil: I have no soul to speak to or relieve me.
Good: But God wonderfully sent the ship in near enough to the shore, that I have got out as many necessary
things as will either supply my wants or enable me to supply myself, even as long as I live.
Upon the whole, here was an undoubted testimony that there was scarce any condition in the world so
miserable but there was something negative or something positive to be thankful for in it; and let this stand as
a direction from the experience of the most miserable of all conditions in this world: that we may always find
in it something to comfort ourselves from, and to set, in the description of good and evil, on the credit side of
the account.
Having now brought my mind a little to relish my condition, and given over looking out to sea, to see if I
could spy a ship . I say, giving over these things, I begun to apply myself to arrange my way of living, and to
make things as easy to me as I could.
I have already described my habitation, which was a tent under the side of a rock, surrounded with a strong
pale of posts and cables: but I might now rather call it a wall, for I raised a kind of wall up against it of turfs,
about two feet thick on the outside; and after some time (I think it was a year and a half) I raised rafters from
it, leaning to the rock, and thatched or covered it with boughs of trees, and such things as I could get, to keep
out the rain; which I found at some times of the year very violent.
I have already observed how I brought all my goods into this pale, and into the cave which I had made behind
me. But I must observe, too, that at first this was a confused heap of goods, which, as they lay in no order, so
they took up all my place; I had no room to turn myself: so I set myself to enlarge my cave, and work farther
into the earth; for it was a loose sandy rock, which yielded easily to the labour I bestowed on it: and so when
I found I was pretty safe as to beasts of prey, I worked sideways, to the right hand, into the rock; and then,
turning to the right again, worked quite out, and made me a door to come out on the outside of my pale or
fortification. This gave me not only egress and regress, as it was a back way to my tent and to my storehouse,
but gave me room to store my goods.
And now I began to apply myself to make such necessary things as I found I most wanted, particularly a chair
and a table; for without these I was not able to enjoy the few comforts I had in the world; I could not write or
eat, or do several things, with so much pleasure without a table: so I went to work. And here I must needs
observe, that as reason is the substance and origin of the mathematics, so by stating and squaring everything
by reason, and by making the most rational judgment of things, every man may be, in time, master of every
mechanic art. I had never handled a tool in my life; and yet, in time, by labour, application, and contrivance, I
found at last that I wanted nothing but I could have made it, especially if I had had tools. However, I made
abundance of things, even without tools; and some with no more tools than an adze and a hatchet, which
perhaps were never made that way before, and that with infinite labour. For example, if I wanted a board, I
had no other way but to cut down a tree, set it on an edge before me, and hew it flat on either side with my
axe, till I brought it to be thin as a plank, and then dub it smooth with my adze. It is true, by this method I
could make but one board out of a whole tree; but this I had no remedy for but patience, any more than I had
for the prodigious deal of time and labour which it took me up to make a plank or board: but my time or
labour was little worth, and so it was as well employed one way as another.
CHAPTER IV . FIRST WEEKS ON THE ISLAND
Robinson Crusoe
However, I made me a table and a chair, as I observed above, in the first place; and this I did out of the short
pieces of boards that I brought on my raft from the ship. But when I had wrought out some boards as above, I
made large shelves, of the breadth of a foot and a half, one over another all along one side of my cave, to lay
all my tools, nails and ironwork on; and, in a word, to separate everything at large into their places, that I
might come easily at them. I knocked pieces into the wall of the rock to hang my guns and all things that
would hang up; so that, had my cave been to be seen, it looked like a general magazine of all necessary
things; and had everything so ready at my hand, that it was a great pleasure to me to see all my goods in such
order, and especially to find my stock of all necessaries so great.
And now it was that I began to keep a journal of every day's employment; for, indeed, at first I was in too
much hurry, and not only hurry as to labour, but in too much discomposure of mind; and my journal would
have been full of many dull things; for example, I must have said thus: "30TH. . After I had got to shore, and
escaped drowning, instead of being thankful to God for my deliverance, having first vomited, with the great
quantity of salt water which had got into my stomach, and recovering myself a little, I ran about the shore
wringing my hands and beating my head and face, exclaiming at my misery, and crying out, 'I was undone,
undone!' till, tired and faint, I was forced to lie down on the ground to repose, but durst not sleep for fear of
being devoured."
Some days after this, and after I had been on board the ship, and got all that I could out of her, yet I could not
