Даниэль Дефо: Робинзон Крузо / Robinson Crusoe

I carefully saved the ears of this corn, you may be sure, in their season, which was about the end of June; and, laying up every corn, I resolved to sow them all again, hoping in time to have some quantity sufficient to supply me with bread. [129]But it was not till the fourth year that I could allow myself the least grain of this corn to eat. Then, I spent the whole day on a small meadow near the creek, cultivating the earth for sowing. Among all the goods from the ship there was not a shovel, so I spent about a week to make it. I found a tree of that wood, or like it, which in the Brazils they call the iron-tree, for its exceeding hardness. [130]Of this, with great labour, and almost spoiling my axe, [131]I cut a piece, and brought it home, too, with difficulty enough, for it was exceeding heavy. Of this piece of iron-wood I made that part of a shovel, which is usually made of iron. With this shovel I dug up a little field for barley and rice.

And now, in the managing my household affairs, I found myself wanting in many things, which I thought at first it was impossible for me to make.

For example, I was at a great loss for candles; so that as soon as ever it was dark, which was generally by seven o’clock, I was obliged to go to bed. I remembered the lump of beeswax with which I made candles in my African adventure; but I had none of that now; the only remedy I had was, that when I had killed a goat I saved the tallow, [132]and with a little dish made of clay, which I baked in the sun, to which I added a wick of some oakum, [133]I made me a lamp; and this gave me light, though not a clear, steady light, like a candle.

About the beginning of August, as I said, I had finished my field for sowing, and began to enjoy myself. [134]The 3rd of August, I found the grapes I had hung up perfectly dried, and, indeed, were excellent good raisins of the sun; so I began to take them down from the trees, and it was very happy that I did so, for the rains which followed would have spoiled them, and I had lost the best part of my winter food; for I had above two hundred large bunches of them. No sooner had I taken them all down, and carried the most of them home to my cave, than it began to rain; and from hence, [135]which was the 14th of August, it rained, more or less, every day till the middle of October; and sometimes so violently, that I could not stir out of my cave for several days.

I found now that the seasons of the year might generally be divided, not into summer and winter, as in Europe, but into the rainy seasons and the dry seasons, which were generally thus: [136]– The half of February, the whole of March, and the half of April – rainy, the sun being then on or near the equinox. [137]The half of April, the whole of May, June, and July, and the half of August – dry, the sun being then to the north of the line. The half of August, the whole of September, and the half of October – rainy, the sun being then come back. The half of October, the whole of November, December, and January, and the half of February – dry, the sun being then to the south of the line.

I have not forgotten about my boat, on which I moved all the goods from the ship. I decided to travel around my island, to examine it from all sides. For this reason I closed up the holes, which formed eventually at the bottom of the boat.

When I reached the opposite side of the island, I was very surprised. I found that side of the island where I now was much pleasanter than mine – the open fields sweet, adorned with flowers and grass, and full of very fine woods.

As soon as I came to the sea-shore, I was surprised to see that I had taken up my lot on the worst side of the island, for here, indeed, the shore was covered with innumerable turtles, whereas on the other side I had found but three in a year and a half. Here was also an infinite number of fowls of many kinds, some which I had seen, and some which I had not seen before, and many of them very good meat, but such as I knew not the names of, except those called penguins. I could have shot as many as I pleased, but was very sparing of my powder and shot, and therefore had more mind to kill a she-goat if I could, which I could better feed on; and though there were many goats here, more than on my side the island.

I saw abundance of parrots, and fain I would have caught one, if possible, to have kept it to be tame, [138]and taught it to speak to me. I did, after some painstaking, [139]catch a young parrot, for I knocked it down with a stick, and having recovered it, I brought it home; but it was some years before I could make him speak; however, at last I taught him to call me by name very familiarly.

In this journey I surprised a young kid, and seized upon it; and, running in to take hold of it, caught it. I had a great mind to bring it home if I could, for I had often been musing whether it might not be possible to get a kid or two, and so raise a breed of tame goats, [140]which might supply me when my powder and shot should be all spent. I made a collar [141]for this little creature, and with a string, which I made of some rope-yam, which I always carried about me, I led him along, though with some difficulty, till I came to my fence, and there I enclosed him and left him, for I decided to build a small barn [142]near my barley-field. I spent about four days for this building, and made it with strong sticks, held together by pieces of rope. Over the next two weeks I caught three more kids: one male and two females.

For a long time they refused to take food out of my hands; but I thrown them some sweet corn, it tempted them, and they began to be tame. And now I found that I might have them about my house like a flock of sheep. But then it occurred to me that I must keep the tame from the wild, or else they would always run wild when they grew up; and the only way for this was to have some enclosed piece of ground, well fenced either with hedge or pale, to keep them in so effectually, that those within might not break out, or those without break in.

This was a great undertaking for one pair of hands yet, as I saw there was an absolute necessity for doing it, my first work was to find out a proper piece of ground, where there was likely to be herbage for them to eat, water for them to drink, and cover to keep them from the sun. I found a place very proper for all these (being a plain, open piece of meadow land, or savannah, as our people call it in the western colonies), which had two or three little drills of fresh water in it, and at one end was very woody.

I resolved to enclose a piece of about one hundred and fifty yards in length, and one hundred yards in breadth, which, as it would maintain as many as I should have in any reasonable time, so, as my stock increased, I could add more ground to my enclosure.

I went to work with courage. I was about three months hedging this piece; and, till I had done it, I tethered the four kids in the best part of it, and used them to feed as near me as possible, to make them familiar; and very often I would go and carry them some ears of barley, or a handful of rice, and feed them out of my hand; so that after my enclosure was finished and I let them loose, they would follow me up and down, bleating after me for a handful of corn.

This answered my end, and in about a year and a half I had a flock [143]of about twelve goats, kids and all; and in two years more I had three-and-forty, besides several that I took and killed for my food. After that, I enclosed five several pieces of ground to feed them in, with little pens to drive them to take them as I wanted, and gates out of one piece of ground into another. But this was not all; for now I not only had goat’s flesh to feed on when I pleased, but milk too – a thing which, indeed, in the beginning, I did not so much as think of, and which, when it came into my thoughts, was really an agreeable surprise, for now I set up my dairy, and had sometimes a gallon or two of milk in a day. I, that had never milked a cow, [144]much less a goat, or seen butter or cheese made only when I was a boy, after a great many essays and miscarriages, [145]made both butter and cheese at last.