forced to pull some of them up again.
In this place also I had my grapes growing, which I principally depended on for my winter store of raisins,
and which I never failed to preserve very carefully, as the best and most agreeable dainty of my whole diet;
and indeed they were not only agreeable, but medicinal, wholesome, nourishing, and refreshing to the last
degree.
As this was also about half.way between my other habitation and the place where I had laid up my boat, I
generally stayed and lay here in my way thither, for I used frequently to visit my boat; and I kept all things
about or belonging to her in very good order. Sometimes I went out in her to divert myself, but no more
hazardous voyages would I go, scarcely ever above a stone's cast or two from the shore, I was so
apprehensive of being hurried out of my knowledge again by the currents or winds, or any other accident. But
now I come to a new scene of my life. It happened one day, about noon, going towards my boat, I was
CHAPTER XI . FINDS PRINT OF MAN'S FOOT ON THE SAND
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exceedingly surprised with the print of a man's naked foot on the shore, which was very plain to be seen on
the sand. I stood like one thunderstruck, or as if I had seen an apparition. I listened, I looked round me, but I
could hear nothing, nor see anything; I went up to a rising ground to look farther; I went up the shore and
down the shore, but it was all one; I could see no other impression but that one. I went to it again to see if
there were any more, and to observe if it might not be my fancy; but there was no room for that, for there was
exactly the print of a foot . toes, heel, and every part of a foot. How it came thither I knew not, nor could I in
the least imagine; but after innumerable fluttering thoughts, like a man perfectly confused and out of myself, I
came home to my fortification, not feeling, as we say, the ground I went on, but terrified to the last degree,
looking behind me at every two or three steps, mistaking every bush and tree, and fancying every stump at a
distance to be a man. Nor is it possible to describe how many various shapes my affrighted imagination
represented things to me in, how many wild ideas were found every moment in my fancy, and what strange,
unaccountable whimsies came into my thoughts by the way.
When I came to my castle (for so I think I called it ever after this), I fled into it like one pursued. Whether I
went over by the ladder, as first contrived, or went in at the hole in the rock, which I had called a door, I
cannot remember; no, nor could I remember the next morning, for never frightened hare fled to cover, or fox
to earth, with more terror of mind than I to this retreat.
I slept none that night; the farther I was from the occasion of my fright, the greater my apprehensions were,
which is something contrary to the nature of such things, and especially to the usual practice of all creatures
in fear; but I was so embarrassed with my own frightful ideas of the thing, that I formed nothing but dismal
imaginations to myself, even though I was now a great way off. Sometimes I fancied it must be the devil, and
reason joined in with me in this supposition, for how should any other thing in human shape come into the
place? Where was the vessel that brought them? What marks were there of any other footstep? And how was
it possible a man should come there? But then, to think that Satan should take human shape upon him in such
a place, where there could be no manner of occasion for it, but to leave the print of his foot behind him, and
that even for no purpose too, for he could not be sure I should see it . this was an amusement the other way. I
considered that the devil might have found out abundance of other ways to have terrified me than this of the
single print of a foot; that as I lived quite on the other side of the island, he would never have been so simple
as to leave a mark in a place where it was ten thousand to one whether I should ever see it or not, and in the
sand too, which the first surge of the sea, upon a high wind, would have defaced entirely. All this seemed
inconsistent with the thing itself and with all the notions we usually entertain of the subtlety of the devil.
Abundance of such things as these assisted to argue me out of all apprehensions of its being the devil; and I
presently concluded then that it must be some more dangerous creature . viz. that it must be some of the
savages of the mainland opposite who had wandered out to sea in their canoes, and either driven by the
currents or by contrary winds, had made the island, and had been on shore, but were gone away again to sea;
being as loath, perhaps, to have stayed in this desolate island as I would have been to have had them.
While these reflections were rolling in my mind, I was very thankful in my thoughts that I was so happy as
not to be thereabouts at that time, or that they did not see my boat, by which they would have concluded that
some inhabitants had been in the place, and perhaps have searched farther for me. Then terrible thoughts
racked my imagination about their having found out my boat, and that there were people here; and that, if so,
I should certainly have them come again in greater numbers and devour me; that if it should happen that they
should not find me, yet they would find my enclosure, destroy all my corn, and carry away all my flock of
tame goats, and I should perish at last for mere want.
Thus my fear banished all my religious hope, all that former confidence in God, which was founded upon
such wonderful experience as I had had of His goodness; as if He that had fed me by miracle hitherto could
not preserve, by His power, the provision which He had made for me by His goodness. I reproached myself
with my laziness, that would not sow any more corn one year than would just serve me till the next season, as
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if no accident could intervene to prevent my enjoying the crop that was upon the ground; and this I thought so
just a reproof, that I resolved for the future to have two or three years' corn beforehand; so that, whatever
might come, I might not perish for want of bread.
How strange a chequer.work of Providence is the life of man! and by what secret different springs are the
affections hurried about, as different circumstances present! To.day we love what to.morrow we hate;
to.day we seek what to.morrow we shun; to.day we desire what to.morrow we fear, nay, even tremble at
the apprehensions of. This was exemplified in me, at this time, in the most lively manner imaginable; for I,
whose only affliction was that I seemed banished from human society, that I was alone, circumscribed by the
boundless ocean, cut off from mankind, and condemned to what I call silent life; that I was as one whom
Heaven thought not worthy to be numbered among the living, or to appear among the rest of His creatures;
that to have seen one of my own species would have seemed to me a raising me from death to life, and the
greatest blessing that Heaven itself, next to the supreme blessing of salvation, could bestow; I say, that I
should now tremble at the very apprehensions of seeing a man, and was ready to sink into the ground at but
the shadow or silent appearance of a man having set his foot in the island.
Such is the uneven state of human life; and it afforded me a great many curious speculations afterwards,
when I had a little recovered my first surprise. I considered that this was the station of life the infinitely wise
and good providence of God had determined for me; that as I could not foresee what the ends of Divine
wisdom might be in all this, so I was not to dispute His sovereignty; who, as I was His creature, had an
undoubted right, by creation, to govern and dispose of me absolutely as He thought fit; and who, as I was a
creature that had offended Him, had likewise a judicial right to condemn me to what punishment He thought
fit; and that it was my part to submit to bear His indignation, because I had sinned against Him. I then
reflected, that as God, who was not only righteous but omnipotent, had thought fit thus to punish and afflict
me, so He was able to deliver me: that if He did not think fit to do so, it was my unquestioned duty to resign
myself absolutely and entirely to His will; and, on the other hand, it was my duty also to hope in Him, pray to
Him, and quietly to attend to the dictates and directions of His daily providence,
These thoughts took me up many hours, days, nay, I may say weeks and months: and one particular effect of
my cogitations on this occasion I cannot omit. One morning early, lying in my bed, and filled with thoughts
about my danger from the appearances of savages, I found it discomposed me very much; upon which these
words of the Scripture came into my thoughts, "Call upon Me in the day of trouble, and I will deliver thee,
and thou shalt glorify Me." Upon this, rising cheerfully out of my bed, my heart was not only comforted, but I
was guided and encouraged to pray earnestly to God for deliverance: when I had done praying I took up my
Bible, and opening it to read, the first words that presented to me were, "Wait on the Lord, and be of good
cheer, and He shall strengthen thy heart; wait, I say, on the Lord." It is impossible to express the comfort this
gave me. In answer, I thankfully laid down the book, and was no more sad, at least on that occasion.
In the middle of these cogitations, apprehensions, and reflections, it came into my thoughts one day that all
this might be a mere chimera of my own, and that this foot might be the print of my own foot, when I came
on shore from my boat: this cheered me up a little, too, and I began to persuade myself it was all a delusion;
that it was nothing else but my own foot; and why might I not come that way from the boat, as well as I was
going that way to the boat? Again, I considered also that I could by no means tell for certain where I had trod,
and where I had not; and that if, at last, this was only the print of my own foot, I had played the part of those
fools who try to make stories of spectres and apparitions, and then are frightened at them more than anybody.
Now I began to take courage, and to peep abroad again, for I had not stirred out of my castle for three days
and nights, so that I began to starve for provisions; for I had little or nothing within doors but some
barley.cakes and water; then I knew that my goats wanted to be milked too, which usually was my evening
diversion: and the poor creatures were in great pain and inconvenience for want of it; and, indeed, it almost
spoiled some of them, and almost dried up their milk. Encouraging myself, therefore, with the belief that this
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was nothing but the print of one of my own feet, and that I might be truly said to start at my own shadow, I
began to go abroad again, and went to my country house to milk my flock: but to see with what fear I went
forward, how often I looked behind me, how I was ready every now and then to lay down my basket and run
for my life, it would have made any one have thought I was haunted with an evil conscience, or that I had
been lately most terribly frightened; and so, indeed, I had. However, I went down thus two or three days, and
having seen nothing, I began to be a little bolder, and to think there was really nothing in it but my own
imagination; but I could not persuade myself fully of this till I should go down to the shore again, and see this
print of a foot, and measure it by my own, and see if there was any similitude or fitness, that I might be
assured it was my own foot: but when I came to the place, first, it appeared evidently to me, that when I laid
up my boat I could not possibly be on shore anywhere thereabouts; secondly, when I came to measure the
mark with my own foot, I found my foot not so large by a great deal. Both these things filled my head with
new imaginations, and gave me the vapours again to the highest degree, so that I shook with cold like one in
an ague; and I went home again, filled with the belief that some man or men had been on shore there; or, in
short, that the island was inhabited, and I might be surprised before I was aware; and what course to take for
my security I knew not.
Oh, what ridiculous resolutions men take when possessed with fear! It deprives them of the use of those
means which reason offers for their relief. The first thing I proposed to myself was, to throw down my
enclosures, and turn all my tame cattle wild into the woods, lest the enemy should find them, and then
frequent the island in prospect of the same or the like booty: then the simple thing of digging up my two
corn.fields, lest they should find such a grain there, and still be prompted to frequent the island: then to
demolish my bower and tent, that they might not see any vestiges of habitation, and be prompted to look
farther, in order to find out the persons inhabiting.
These were the subject of the first night's cogitations after I was come home again, while the apprehensions
which had so overrun my mind were fresh upon me, and my head was full of vapours. Thus, fear of danger is
ten thousand times more terrifying than danger itself, when apparent to the eyes; and we find the burden of
anxiety greater, by much, than the evil which we are anxious about: and what was worse than all this, I had
not that relief in this trouble that from the resignation I used to practise I hoped to have. I looked, I thought,
like Saul, who complained not only that the Philistines were upon him, but that God had forsaken him; for I
did not now take due ways to compose my mind, by crying to God in my distress, and resting upon His
providence, as I had done before, for my defence and deliverance; which, if I had done, I had at least been
more cheerfully supported under this new surprise, and perhaps carried through it with more resolution.
This confusion of my thoughts kept me awake all night; but in the morning I fell asleep; and having, by the
amusement of my mind, been as it were tired, and my spirits exhausted, I slept very soundly, and waked
much better composed than I had ever been before. And now I began to think sedately; and, upon debate with
