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I




DANIEL DEFOE
SELECTIONS ARRANGED
BY
A. T. QUILLER-COUCH


OXFORD
AT THE CLARENDON PRESS




INTRODUCTION
DANIEL FOE (he did not change his surname to DEFOE
until some time about his fortieth year) was born in
London in 1659, the year before the restoration of
Charles II. The Foes, an old yeoman family derived
from Elton, a village near Peterborough in Northamptonshire; but Daniel's father, James Foe, was a butcher
of the parish of St. Giles, Cripplegate, and the household worshipped at the meeting-house of the famous
Dr. Annesley (grandfather of John Wesley), whom the
Act of Uniformity drove from his living in 1662. By
Dr. Annesley's advice the boy was destined for the Noiconformist ministry and placed, when about fourteen,
at the Rev. Charles Morton's well-known Academy at
Stoke Newington, where later the father of John Wesley
received his early education. For some reason unknown
the lad renounced the ministry, left Stoke Newington
and is found in 1683 established in a hose-factor's business in Cornhill. Next year, and on New Year's Day,
he married, at St. Botolph's, Aldgate, Mary Tuffley,
aged twenty. He had already started pamphleteering,an
occupation from which-though few men have endured
more pains for it-he could never be weaned * and we
learn that about this time he visited Spain and Portugal
on affairs of business. Charles II died in February,
1685, and in June the Duke of Monmouth made his
invasion at Lyme Regis, to be defeated, on July 11, at
Sedgemoor. Defoe, with many another scholar of
Stole Newington, took part in the rising. Many of his
intimate friends suffered: but Daniel escaped the hands
of Colonel Kirke and Judge Jeffreys-how or by what
means is not known.
Early in 1688 (after a silent interval, during part of
which he may have been in hiding) we find him admitted a liveryman of the City of London. He was
now in residence at Tooting, when he formed a congregation of Dissenters and sometimes preached to
them. In 1688, too, he was one of those who went out
to meet William of Orange and escorted him into
London: but apparently this immersion in public
affairs injured his business; for in 1892 he went bankrupt; but was quickly on his feet again with an appoint967.7




INTRODUCTION


3


ment as Accountant to the Commissioners of the Glass
Duty and another as secretary to a brick and pantile
factory at Tilbury. He now set up a coach, and kept
a pleasure-boat, prefixed a' De' to his name; published
his first important book, an Essay upon, Projects, with
many pamphlets; wrote so much perishable verse that
(said a publisher)' one would think he rhymed in his
sleep'; and put a cap on this passing wave of prosperity
with 7Te True-born Englishrman-a poem  which defended William III from the unpopularity of being a
Dutchman by proving the English breed to be the most
thoroughly mixed in the world. It had a vast success.
King William dying and Queen Anne succeeding, Defoe
achieved another and very different success with A
Short Way with Dissenters, an essay in irony. It
frightened the Dissenters and hugely delighted the high
Tory Churchmen, until both parties discovered the
thing to be a hoaxing parody written by a militant
Nonconformist. Then the Dissenters laughed, and the
Tories (who happened to be in power) prosecuted him
and secured a verdict. He stood three days in the
pillory: and the London mob drank his health and
pelted him with nosegays. From the pillory he was
moved to Newgate, where he dwelt for eighteen months
and wrote as many pamphlets, besides associating with
the jail-birds there and storing his memory full of
material which he afterwards turned to good account
in such novels as Moll Flanders and Colonel Jacque.
Also while in Newgate he composed his ' Hymn to the
Pillory' and started The Reviei, the most voluminous
of his works. During his imprisonment the pantile
factory came to ruin, and he lost ~3,500. Released in
1704 by the good offices of Harley, he repaired to Bury
St. Edmunds for a while, but quickly returned to
London, to journalism and electioneering: rode in 1705
no less than 1.100 miles electioneering in the West, and
in 1706 (the Whigs having won at the polls) was sent
on a secret service mission into Scotland to promote the
Act of Union, in favour of which he wrote at least seven
pamphlets. To this year belong also The Apparition
of Mrs. Veal and an interminable satire entitled Jure
Divino. In 1709 he published a History of the Union,
and in 1710 was attacking Sacheverell. But it is impossible to follow in detail the activities of a man who
in his time published at least 250 works: so let us only
note that 1713 saw him again in Newgate, accused-this
time at the instance of theWhigs-of publishing treason.
He was condemned, but pardoned under the Great Seal.




4


INTRODUCTION


Emerging, he found himself engaged in a libel action
brought against him by Lord Annesley, and, while the
case was pending, suffered from a stroke of apoplexy.
At the trial, in July, 1715, he was cast; but by favour
of the Lord Chief Justice, or through the intervention
of Lord Townshend, escaped a third imprisonment.
He next, under Townshend, became a government spy;
started a monthly paper Mercurius Politicus, and edited
Mist's Journal, a high Tory paper 1717-24. Defoe,
it would seem, was an honest man; but at the best he
ate a great deal of dirt in the course of his irrepressible
career. It is a dingy story on the whole: but now, and
at the age of sixty, at length the man's genius breaks
forth from the squalor with Robinson Crusoe-a book
which, after delighting hundreds of thousands of children and grown men through more than two centuries,
needs no superfluity of praise. Robinson Crusoe, 1719,
preluded a series of masterpieces'-Memoirs of a Cavalier
and Captain Sinqleton, 1720; 1loll Flanders, The Journal
of the Plague Year, and Colonel Jacque, 1722; Roxana,
1724; A New Voyage Round the World, 1725.
Defoe died in 1731 in the seventy-second year of his
age. His political life, so untiringly combative, and
doubtless useful in its pugnacity, may be passed over
now as of small account in comparison with the series
of astonishing fictions he threw off, as if without effort,
after his sixtieth year. He has often been called the
founder of the Enlglish Novel: but his genius, though
many hundreds have followed him, remains unique.
No Englishman-and, for that matter, no writer in any
country-has ever inherited his marvellous gift of
visualizing; that gift whereby, having to describe
an action outside his experience in a place he cannot
possibly have visited, he apprehends both scene and
circumstance down to the minutest detail, so that,
in the face of our certain knowledge that the whole
business is illusion, we find ourselves listening helplessly, almost ready to stake our credit on the faith of
the confident eye-witness.




CONTENTS
1               PAGE
Crusoe visits the Wreck.....        6
~
Crusoe discovers a Footprint......  10
~3
Friday and the Bear.......  15
~4
After Leipsic........   19
~;,
A Pirate's Sea-Fight......       24
6
The Gold Seekers........   28
~7
A Young Thief and his Plunder.....  31
~8
The Plague Pit........  37
~9
A Poor Blackwall Waterman.....  41




SELECTIONS FROM DEFOE


~ i. Crusoe visits the Wreck
A LITTLE after noon I found the sea very calm,
and the tide ebbed so far out that I could come
within a quarter of a mile of the ship; and here
I found a fresh renewing of my grief, for I saw
evidently, that if we had kept on board we had
been all safe, that is to say, we had all got safe on
shore, and I had not been so miserable as to be
left entirely destitute of all comfort and company,
as I now was. This forced tears from my eyes
again; but as there was little relief in that, I resolved, if possible, to get to the ship; so I pulled
off my clothes, for the weather was hot to extremity,
and took the water. But when I came to the ship,
my difficulty was still greater to know how to get
on board; for as she lay aground, and high out of
the water, there was nothing within my reach to
lay hold of. I swam round her twice, and the
second time I spied a small piece of a rope, which
I wondered I did not see at first, hang down by the
fore-chains so low, as that with great difficulty
I got hold of it, and by the help of that rope got up
into the forecastle of the ship. Here I found that
the ship was bulged, and had a great deal of water
in her hold, but that she lay so on the side of a
bank of hard sand, or rather earth, that her stern lay
lifted up upon the bank, and her head low almost to
the water. By this means all her quarter was free,
and all that was in that part was dry; for you may
be sure my first work was to search and to see what
was spoiled and what was free. And first I found
that all the ship's provisions were dry and untouched by the water; and being very well disposed to eat, I went to the bread-room and filled
my pockets with biscuit, and eat it as I went about




CRUSOE VISITS THE WRECK


7


other things, for I had no time to lose. I also
found some rum in the great cabin, of which I took
a large dram, and which I had indeed need enough
of to spirit me for what was before me. Now I
wanted nothing but a boat, to furnish myself with
many things which I foresaw would be very necessary to me.
It was in vain to sit still and wish for what was
not to be had, and this extremity roused my application. We had several spare yards, and two or
three large spars of wood, and a spare top-mast or
two in the ship. I resolved to fall to work with
these, and flung as many of them overboard as
I could manage for their weight, tying every one
with a rope, that they might not drive away. When
this was done I went down the ship's side, and,
pulling them to me, I tied four of them fast together at both ends as well as I could, in the form
of a raft; and laying two or three short pieces of
plank upon them crossways, I found I could walk
upon it very well, but that it was not able to bear
any great weight, the pieces being too light. So
I went to work, and with the carpenter's saw I cut
a spare top-mast into three lengths, and added
them to my raft, with a great deal of labour and
pains; but hope of furnishing myself with necessaries encouraged me to go beyond what I
should have been able to have done upon another
occasion.
My raft was now strong enough to bear any
reasonable weight. My next care was what to
load it with, and how to preserve what I laid upon
it from the surf of the sea; but I was not long
considering this.  I first laid all the planks or
boards upon it that I could get, and having considered well what I most wanted, I first got three
of the seamen's chests, which I had broken open
and emptied, and lowered them down upon my
raft. The first of these I filled with provisions,




8     CRUSOE VISITS THE WRECK
viz., bread, rice, three Dutch cheeses, five pieces
of dried goat's flesh, which we lived much upon,
and a little remainder of European corn, which
had been laid by for some fowls which we brought
to sea with us, but the fowls were killed. There
had been some barley and wheat together, but to
my great disappointment I found afterwards that
the rats had eaten or spoiled it all. As for liquors,
I found several cases of bottles belonging to our
skipper, in which were some cordial waters and,
in all, about five or six gallons of rack. These
I stowed by themselves, there being no need to put
them into the chest, nor no room for them. While
I was doing this, I found the tide began to flow,
though very calm, and I had the mortification to
see my coat, shirt, and waistcoat, which I had left
on shore upon the sand, swim away; as for my
breeches, which were only linen, and open-kneed,
I swam on board in them, and my stockings. However, this put me upon rummaging for clothes, of
which I found enough, but took no more than I
wanted for present use; for I had other things
which my eye was more upon, as first tools to work
with on shore; and it was after long searching
that I found out the carpenter's chest, which was
indeed a very useful prize to me, and much more
valuable than a ship-loading of gold would have
been at that time. I got it down to my raft, even
whole as it was, without losing time to look into
it, for I knew in general what it contained.
My next care was for some ammunition and
arms; there were two very good fowling-pieces in
the great cabin, and two pistols; these I secured
first, with some powder-horns, and a small bag of
shot, and two old rusty swords. I knew there
were three barrels of powder in the ship, but knew
not where our gunner had stowed them; but with
much search I found them, two of them dry and
good, the third had taken water; those two I got




CRUSOE VISITS THE WRECK


9


to my raft with the arms. And now I thought
myself pretty well freighted, and began to think
how I should get to shore with them, having neither
sail, oar, or rudder; and the least capful of wind
would have overset all my navigation.
I had three encouragements. 1. A smooth, calm
sea. 2. The tide rising and setting in to the shore.
3. What little wind there was blew me towards the
land. And thus, having found two or three broken
oars belonging to the boat, and besides the tools
whicli were in the chest, I found two saws, an axe,
and a hammer, and with this cargo I put to sea.
For a mile or thereabouts my raft went very well,
only that I found it drive a little distant fiom the
place where I had landed before, by which I perceived that there was some indraft of the water,
and consequently I hoped to find some creek or
river there, which I might make use of as a port
to get to land with my cargo.
As I imagined, so it was; there appeared before
me a little opening of the land, and I found a strong
current of the tide set into it, so I guided my raft
as well as I could to keep in the middle of the
stream. But here I had like to have suffered a
second shipwreck, which, if I had, I think verily
would have broke my heart; for knowing nothing
of the coast, my raft ran aground at one end of it
upon a shoal, and not being aground at the other
end, it wanted but a little that all my cargo had
slipped off towards that end that was afloat, and so
fallen into the water. I did my utmost by setting
my back against the chests to keep them in their
places, but could not thrust off the raft with all
my strength, neither durst I stir from the posture
I was in, but holding up the chests with all my
might, stood in that manner near half an hour, in
which time the rising of the water brought me a
little more upon a level; and a little after, the
water still rising, my raft floated again, and I thrust




10     CRUSOE VISITS THE WRECK
her off with the oar I had into the channel, and
then driving up higher, I at length found myself in
the mouth of a little river, with land on both sides,
and a strong current or tide running up. I looked
on both sides for a proper place to get to shore, for
I was not willing to be driven too high up the
river, hoping in time to see some ship at sea, and
therefore resolved to place myself as near the coast
as I could.
At length I spied a little cove on the right shore
of the creek, to which with great pain and difficulty I guided my raft, and at last got so near, as
that, reaching ground with my oar, I could thrust
her directly in; but here I had like to have dipped
all my cargo in the sea again; for that shore lying
pretty steep, that is to say, sloping, there was no
place to land but where one end of my float, if it
run on shore, would lie so high and the other sink
lower, as before, that it would endanger my cargo
again. All that I could do was to wait till the tide
was at the highest, keeping the raft with my oar
like an anchor to hold the side of it fast to the
shore, near a flat piece of ground which I expected
the water would flow over; and so it did. As soon
as I found water enough, for my raft drew about
a foot of water, I thrust her on upon that flat piece
of ground, and there fastened or moored her by
sticking my two broken oars into the ground; one
on one side near one end, and one on the other
side near the other end; and thus I lay till the
water ebbed away, and left my raft and all my
cargo safe on shore.
From the Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of
Robinson Crusoe
~ ii. Crutsoe discovers a Footprint
IT would have made a Stoic smile to have seen
me and my little family sit down to dinner. There
was my Majesty, the prince and lord of the whole




CRUSOE DISCOVERS A FOOTPRINT          11
island. I had the lives of all my subjects at my
absolute command-I could hang, draw, give
liberty, and take it away; and no rebels among
all my subjects.
Then to see how like a king I dined, too, all
alone, attended by my servants. Poll, as if lie had
been my favourite, was the only person permitted
to talk to me. My dog-which was now grownv
very old and crazy-sat always at my right hand;
and two cats, one on one side the table and one
on the other, expecting now and then a bit fiom
my hand, as a mark of special favour.
With this attendance, and in this plentiful
manner, I lived; but had any one in England been
to meet such a man as I was, it must either have
frighted them, or raised a great deal of laughter.
And as I fiequently stood still to look at myself,
I could not but smile at the notion of my travelling
through Yorkshire with such an equipage and in
such a dress. Be pleased to take a sketch of my
figure as follows.
I had a great high shapeless cap, made of a
goat's skinl with a flap hanging down behind, as
well to keep the sun from me as to shoot the rain
off from running into my neck-nothing being so
hlurtful in these climates as the rain upon the
flesh under the clothes.
I had a short jacket of goat-skin, the skirts
coming down to about the middle of my thighs;
and a pair of open-kneed breeches of the samethe breeches were made of the skin of an old hegoat, whose hair hung down such a length on
either side, that like pantaloons it reached to the
middle of my legs; stockings and shoes I had
none, but had made me a pair of somethings, I
scarce know what to call them, like buskins, to
flap over my legs and lace on either side like
spatterdashes, but of a most barbarous shape-as
indeed were all the rest of my clothes.




12 CRUSOE DISCOVERS A FOOTPRINT
I had on a broad belt of goat-skin dried, which
I drew together with two thongs of the same,
instead of buckles; and in a kind of frog on either
side of this instead of a sword and a dagger
hung a little saw and a hatchet, one on one side,
one on the other.  I had another belt not so
broad, and fastened in the same manner, which
hung over my shoulder; and at the end of it,
under my left arm, hung two pouches, both made
of goat-skin too-in one of which hung my powder,
in the other my shot. At my back I carried my
basket; on my shoulder my gun; and over my
head a great clumsy, ugly goat-skin umbrella-but
which, after all, was the most necessary thing I
had about me, next to my gun. As for my face,
the colour of it was not really so Mulatto-like as
one might expect from a man not at all careful of
it, and living within nineteen degrees of the
equinox. My beard I had once suffered to grow
till it was about a quarter of a yard long; but as
[ had both scissors and razors sufficient, I had cut
it pretty short, except what grew on my upper
lip, which I had trimmed into a large pair of
Mohammedan whiskers, such as I have seen worn
by some Turks whom I saw at Sallee; for the
Moors do not wear such, though the Turks did.
Of these moustaches or whiskers I will not say
that they were long enough to hang my hat upon
them; but they were of a length and shape
monstrous enough, and such as in England would
have passed for frightful.
You are to understand that I now had, as I may
call it, two plantations in the island: one my little
fortification or tent, with the wall about it under
the rock, with the cave behind me, which by this
time I had enlarged into several apartments, or
caves, one within another.
Besides this I had my country seat, and I had
now a tolerable plantation there also; for first, I




CRUSOE DISCOVERS A FOOTPRINT          13
had my little bower, as I called it, which I kept in
repair-that is to say, I kept the hedge which
circled it in constantly fitted up to its usual height,
the ladder standing always in the inside. I kept
the trees, which at first were no more than my
stakes, but were now grown very firm and tall-I
kept them always so cut that they might spread and
grow thick and wild, and make the more agreeable
shade, which they did effectually to my mind. In
the middle of this I had my tent always standing,
being a piece of a sail spread over poles set up
for that purpose, and which never wanted any
repair or renewing; and under this I had made
me a squab or couch, with the skins of the
creatures I had killed, and other soft things, and
a blanket laid on them, such as belonged to our
sea-bedding, which I had saved, and a great watchcoat to cover me; and here, whenever I had
occasion to be absent from my chief seat, I took
up my country habitation.
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 agreeable only, but physical, wholesome, and nourishing 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, nor scarce 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.




14 CRUSOE DISCOVERS A FOOTPRINT
It happened one day about noon, going towards
my boat, I was exceedingly surprised with the
print of a man's naked foot on the shore, which
was very plain to be seen in the sand. I stood
like one thunderstruck, or as if I had seen an
apparition. I listened, I looked round me; I could
hear nothing, nor see anything. I went up to a
rising ground to look further. 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
very print of a foot, toes, heel, and every part of
a foot;-how it came thither I knew not, nor could
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 shapes affrighted imagination
represented things to me in; how many wild ideas
were 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 at first contrived, or went in at the hole in the rock which
I called a door, I cannot remember; no, nor could
I remember the next morning; for never frighted
hare fled to cover, or fox to earth, with more
terror of mind than I to this retreat.
Froni the Life and Strange Surprising
Adventures of Robinson Crusoe




15


~ iii. Fridaty acnd the Bear
ON a sudden, we spied the bear come out of the
wood, and a vast 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. '0! 0! 0!' says Friday,
three times pointing to him. '0 master! you
give me te leave; me shakee te hand with him;
me make you good laugh.'
I was surprised to see the fellow so pleased.
'You fool,' says I, 'he will eat you up.' 'Eatee
me up! eatee me up!' says Friday, twice over
again; 'me eatee him up; me make you good
laugh; you all stay here, me show you good laugh.'
So down he sits, and gets his boots off in a moment,
and put on a pair of pumps, as we call the flat
shoes they wear, 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, 'Hark ye, hark ye,' says Friday, 'me speakee
wit you.' We followed at a distance; for now
being come down on the Gascoign side of the
mountains, we were entered a vast great forest,
where the country was plain and pretty open,
though 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 takes up
a great stone and throws at him, and hit him just
on the head, but 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.




16       FRIDAY AND THE BEAR
As soon as the bear felt the stone, and saw him,
he turns about, and comes after him, taking devilish
long strides, and shuffling along at a strange rate,
so as would have put a horse to a middling gallop.
Away runs Friday, and takes his course as if he
run 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 heartily for bringing the bear
back upon us, when he was going about his business another way; and especially I was angry that
he had turned the bear upon us, and then run
away; and I called out, 'You dog,' said I, 'is this
your making us laugh? Come away, and take your
horse, that we may shoot the creature.' He hears
me, and cries out, 'No shoot, no shoot; stand
still, you get much laugh.' And as the nimble
creature run two feet for the beast's one, he turned
on a sudden, on one side of us, and seeing a great
oak tree fit for his purpose, he beckoned to us to
follow; and doubling his pace, he gets nimbly up
the tiee, 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 to it, but let it lie, and up he
scrambles into the tree, climbing like a cat, though
so monstrously heavy. I was amazed at the folly,
as I thought it, of my man, and could not for my
life see anything to laugh at yet, till seeing the
bear get up the tree, we all rode nearer to him.
When we came to the tree, there was Friday
got out to the small end of a large limb of the
tree, and the bear got about half-way to him. 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 teachee the bear dance.' So he
falls a-jumping and shaking the bough, at which
the bear began to totter, but stood still, and began




FRIDAY AND THE BEAR


17


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 he
sees him stand still, he calls out to him again, as
if he had supposed the bear could speak English,
'What, you no come farther? pray you come
farther;' so he left jumping and shaking the tree;
and the bear, just as if he had understood what he
said, did come a little farther; then he fell a-jumping again, and the bear stopped again.
We thought now was a good time to knock him
on the head, and I called to Friday to stand still,
and we would shoot the bear; but he cried out
earnestly, '0 pray! 0 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 indeed, but still could not imagine
what the fellow would do; for first 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 clings fast with his great broad claws and feet,
so that we could not imagine what would be the
end of it, and where the jest would be at last.
But Friday put us out of doubt quickly; for
seeing the bear cling fast to the bough, and
that he would not be persuaded to come any
farther, 'Well, well,' says Friday, 'you no come
farther, me go, me go; you no come to me, me go
come to you;' and upon this he goes out to the
smallest end of the bough, where it would bend
with his weight, and gently lets himself down by
it, sliding down the bough till he came near enough
to jump down on his feet, and away he ran to his
gun, takes it up, and stands still.
'Well,' said I to him, 'Friday, what will you do
now9? Why don't you shoot him?' 'No shoot,' says
Friday, 'no yet; me shoot now, me no kill; me
967.7                              A 3




18       FRIDAY AND THE BEAR
stay, give you one more laugh.' And, indeed, so
he did, as you will see presently; for when the
bear sees his enemy gone, he comes back from the
bough where he stood, but did it mighty leisurely,
looking behind him every step, and coming backward till he got into the body of the tree; then
with the same hinder end foremost he comes 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 feet upon the
ground, Friday stepped up close to him, clapped
the muzzle of his piece into his ear, and shot him
dead as stone.
Then the rogue turned about to see if we did
not laugh; and when he saw we were pleased by
our looks, he falls a-laughing himself very loud.
'So we kill 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 indeed 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 so much
horror.
These things, and the approach of night, called
us off, or else, as Friday would have had us, we
should certainly have taken the skin of this
monstrous creature off, which was worth saving;
but we had three leagues to go, and our guide
hastened us; so we left him, and went forward on
our journey.
From the Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of
Bobinson Crusoe




19


~ iv. After Le2ipsicl
As soon as the day began to peep, the trumpets
sounded to horse, and all the dragoons and light
horse in the army were commanded to the pursuit:
the cuirassiers and some commanded musketeers
advanced some miles to make good their retreat,
if need were, and all the foot stood to their arms
for a reserve. But il half an hour word was
brought to the king that the enemy was quite
dispersed; upon which detachments were made
out of every regiment to search among the dead
for any of our friends that were wounded; and
the king himself gave a strict order, that if any
were found wounded and alive among the enemy,
none should kill them, but take care to bring them
into the camp —a piece of humanity which saved
the lives of near a thousand of the enemy.
This piece of service being over, the enemy's
camp was seized upon, and the soldiers permitted
to plunder it; all the cannon, arms, and ammunition, were secured for the king's use; the rest was
given up to the soldiers, who found so much
plunder, that they had no reason to quarrel for
shares.
For my share, I was so busy with my wounded
captain, that I got nothing but a sword, which
I found just by when I first saw him; but my man
brought me a very good horse, with furniture and
a pistol of extraordinary workmanship.
I bade him get upon his back and make the
best of the day for himself, which he did, and I
saw him no more till three days after, when he
found me at Leipsic, but was so richly dressed
Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden, had defeated the
German Imperial forces under Count Tilly, at Leipsic,
Sept. 7, 1631.




20


AFTER LEIPSIC


that I hardly knew him; and, after making his
excuse for being so long absent, gave me a very
pleasant account where he had been.
He told me, that, according to my order, being
mounted on the horse he had brought me, he first
rode into the field among the dead to get some
clothes suitable to the equipage of his horse; and
having seized on a laced coat, a helmet, a sword,
and an extraordinary good cane, was resolved to
see what was become of the enemy, and following
the track of the dragoons, which he could easily do
by the bodies on the road, he fell in with a small
party of twenty-five dragoons, under no command
but a corporal, making to a village where some
of the enemy's horse had been quartered. The
dragoons, taking him for an officer by his horse,
desired him to command them: told him the
enemy was very rich, and they doubted not a good
booty. He was a bold, brisk fellow, and told them
' with all his heart'; but said he had but one pistol,
the other being broke with firing; so they lent
him a pair, and a small piece they had taken, and
he led them on.
There had been a regiment of horse and some
troops of Crabats in the village, but they were fled
on the first notice of the pursuit, excepting three
troops; and these, on sight of this small party,
supposing them to be only the first of a greater
number, fled in the greatest confusion imaginable.
They took the village and about fifty horses, with
all the plunder of the enemy, and with the heat of
the service, he said, he had spoiled my horse, for
which he had brought me two more; for he, passing for the commander of the party, had all the
advantage the custom of war gives an officer in
like cases.
I was very well pleased with the relation the
fellow gave me, and laughing at him, 'Well, captain,' said I, 'and what plunder have you got?'




AFTER LEIPSIC


21


Enough, sir,' said he, 'to make me a captain, if
you please, and a troop ready raised too; for the
party of dragoons are posted in the village, by my
command, till they have further orders.'
In short, he pulled out sixty or seventy pieces
of gold, five or six watches, thirteen or fourteen
rings, whereof two were diamond-one of them
worth fifty dollars; silver, as much as his pockets
would hold; besides that he had brought three
horses, two of which were laden with baggage, and
he had hired a boor to stay with them at Leipsic
till he had found me.
'But I am afraid, captain,' says I, 'you have plundered the village, instead of plundering the enemy.
'No, indeed, not we, sir,' said he; 'but the
Crabats had done it for us, and we lit on them just
as they were carrying it off.'
'Well,' said I, 'but what will you do with your
men? for when you come to give them orders,
they will know you well enough.'
'No, no,' said he, 'I took care of that; for just
now I gave a soldier five dollars to carry them
news that the army was marched to Moersburg,
and that they should follow thither to the
regiment.'
Having secured his money in my lodgings, he
asked me if I pleased to see his horses, and to
have one for myself? I told him I would see them
in the afternoon; but the fellow being impatient,
goes and fetches them. There were three horses,
one a very good one-and, by the furniture, an
officer's horse of the Crabats, and that my man
would have me accept-for the other he had
spoiled, as he said.
I was but indifferently horsed before, so I
accepted of the horse, and went down with him
to see the rest of his plunder. He had three or
four pair of pistols, two or three bundles of officers'
linen and lace, a field-bed and a tent, and several




22


AFTER LEIPSIC


other things of value; but at last coming to a
small fardel, 'this,' says he, 'I took whole from
a Crabat running away with it under his arm;' so
he brought it up into my chamber. He had not
looked into it, he said, but he understood it was
some plunder the soldiers had made, and, finding
it heavy, took it by consent: we opened it, and
found it was a bundle of some linen, thirteen or
fourteen pieces of plate, and in a small cup three
rings, a fine necklace of pearl, and the value of one
hundred rix-dollars in money.
The fellow was amazed at his own good fortune,
and hardly knew what to do with himself. I bade
him go take care of his other things and of his
horses, and come again. So he went and discharged
the boor that waited, packed up all his plunder,
and came up to me in his old clothes again.
'How now, captain,' says I, 'what! have you
altered your equipage already?'
'I am no more ashamed,' answered he, 'of your
livery, than of your service, and nevertheless, your
servant for what I have got by it.'
'Well,' said I to him, 'but what will you do
with all your money?'
'I wish my poor father had some of it,' says he;
'and, for the rest, I got it for you, sir, and desire
you would take it.'
This was spoke with so much honesty and freedom that I could not but take it very kind; but,
however, I told him I would not take a farthing
from him as his master, but I would have him play
the good husband with it, as he had had such good
fortune.
He told me he would take my directions in
everything.
'Why, then,' says I, 'I'll tell you what I would
advise you to do: turn it all into ready money,
and convey it by return home into England, and
follow yourself the first opportunity, and, with




AFTER LEIPSIC


23


good management, you may put yourself in a good
posture of living with it.
The fellow, with a sort of dejection in his looks,
asked me if he had disobliged me in anything?
'Why?' says I. 'That you are willing to turn me
out of your service,' says he.
'No, George,' (that was his name) 'but you may
live on this money without being a servant.'
'I would throw it all into the Elbe,' says he,
'over Torgau-bridge, rather than leave your service; and besides,' says he, 'cannot I save my
money without going from you? I got it in your
service, and I will never spend it out of your service,
unless you put me away. I hope my money will
not make me the worse servant: if I thought so,
I would soon have little enough.'
'Nay, George,' says I, 'I shall not oblige you to
it, for I am not willing to lose you neither;-let
us put all our effects together, and see what they
come to.'
So he laid all on the table, and, by our computation, he had got as much as was worth about fourteen hundred rix-dollars, besides three horses with
their furniture, a tent, a bed, and some wearing linen.
He then took the necklace of pearl, a very good
watch, a diamond ring, and one hundred pieces of
gold, and laid them by themselves, and having
according to our best calculation, valued the
things, he put up all the rest, and, as I was going
to ask him what they were left out for, he takes
them up in his hand, and, coming round the table,
told me that if I did not think him unworthy of my
service and favour, he begged I would give him
leave to make that present to me; that his going
out was my first thought, that he had got it all in
my service, and he should think I had no kindness
for him if I refused it.
I was resolved in my mind not to take it from
him, and yet I could find no means to resist his




24


AFTER LEIPSIC


importunity. At last I told him I would accept
part of his present, and that I esteemed his respect
in that as much as the whole; and that I would
not have him importune me further. So I took the
ring and watch, with the horse and furniture, and
made him turn all the rest into money at Leipsic;
and not suffering him, as before, to wear his livery,
made him put himself into a tolerable equipage,
and taking a young Leipsicker into my service,
he attended me as a gentleman from that time
forward.
From Memoirs of a Cavalier
~ v. A Pirate's Sea-Fight
IN this time the Portuguese had, it seems, given
notice over land to the governor there, that a
pirate was upon the coast; so that, when we came
in view of the port, we saw two men-of-war riding
just without the bar, whereof one we found was
getting under sail with all possible speed, having
slipt her cable on purpose to speak with us: the
other was not so forward, but was preparing to
follow. In less than an hour they stood both fair
after us, with all the sail they could make.
Had not the night come on, William's words had
been made good; they would certainly have asked
us the question what we did there, for we found
the foremost ship gained upon us, especially upon
one tack, for we plied away from them to windward; but in the dark losing sight of them, we
resolved to change our course and stand away
directly for sea, not doubting that we should lose
sight of them in the night.
Whether the Portuguese commander guessed we
would do so or not, I know not; but in the morning, when the daylight appeared, instead of having
lost him, we found him in chase of us about a league
astern; only to our great good fortune, we could




A PIRATE'S SEA-FIGHT


25


see but one of the two. However, this one was
a great ship, carried six-and-forty guns, and an
admirable sailer, as appeared by her outsailing us;
for our ship was an excellent sailer too, as I have
said before.
When I found this, I easily saw there was no
remedy, but we must engage; and as we knew we
could expect no quarter from those scoundrels the
Portuguese, a nation I had an original aversion to, I
let Captain Wilmot know how it was. The captain,
sick as he was, jumped up in the cabin, and would
be led out upon the deck (for he was very weak)
to see how it was. 'Well,' says he, 'we'll fight
them!'
Our men were all in good heart before; but to
see the captain so brisk, who had lain ill of a calenture ten or eleven days, gave them double
courage, and they went all hands to work to make
a clear ship and be ready. William, the Quaker,
comes to me with a kind of a smile. 'Friend,'
says he, 'what does yon ship follow us for?''Why,' says I, 'to fight us, you may be sure.''Well,' says he, 'and will she come up with us,
dost thou think? '' -'Yes,' said I, ' you see she will.'
-' Why, then, friend,' says the dry wretch, 'why
dost thou run from her still, when thou seest she
will overtake thee? Will it be better for us to be
overtaken further off than here?'-' Much as one
for that,' says I; 'why, what would you have us
do? '-' Do!' says lie; 'let us not give the poor
man more trouble than needs must; let us stay
for him and hear what he has to say to us.'-' He
will talk to us in powder and ball,' said I.-' Very
well, then,' says he, ' if that be his country language,
we must talk to him in the same, must we not? or
else how shall he understand us?'-' Very well,
William,' says I, 'we understand you.' And the
Captain, as ill as he was, called to me, 'William's
right again,' says he; 'as good here as a league




26


A PIRATE'S SEA-FIGHT


farther.' So he gave a word of command, 'Haul
up the main-sail; we'll shorten sail for him.'
Accordingly we shortened sail, and as we expected her upon our lee-side, we being then upon
our starboard tack, brought eighteen of our guns
to the larboard side, resolving to give him a broadside that should warm him; it was about half an
hour before he came up with us, all which time we
luffed up, that we might keep the wind of him, by
which he was obliged to run up under our lee, as
we designed him; when we got him upon our
quarter, we edged down, and received the fire of
five or six of his guns. By this time you may be
sure all our hands were at their quarters, so we
clapped our helm hard a-weather, let go the leebraces of the main-top sail, and laid it a-back, and
so our ship fell athwart the Portuguese ship's hawse;
then we immediately poured in our broadside, raking them fore and aft, and killed them a great
many men.
The Portuguese, we could see, were in the utmost
confusion; and not being aware of our design,
their ship having fresh way, ran their bowsprit into
the fore part of our main shrouds, as that they
could not easily get clear of us, and so we lay locked
after that manner. The enemy could not bring
above two or three guns, besides their small arms,
to bear upon us, while we played our whole broadside upon him.
In the middle of the heat of this fight, as I was
very busy upon the quarter deck, the captain calls
to me, for he never stirred from us, 'What the
devil is friend William a-doing yonder?' says the
captain; 'has he any business upon deck?' I
stepped forward, and there was friend William,
with two or three stout fellows, lashing the ship's
bowsprit fast to our main-mast, for fear they should
get away from us; and every now and then he
pulled a bottle out of his pocket, and gave the men




A PIRATE'S SEA-FIGHT


27


a dram to encourage them. The shot flew about
his ears as thick as may be supposed in such an
action, where the Portuguese, to give them their
due, fought very briskly, believing at first they
were sure of their game, and trusting to their
superiority; but there was William, as composed,
and in as perfect tranquillity as to danger, as if he
had been over a bowl of punch, only very busy
securing the matter, that a ship of forty-six guns
should not run away from a ship of eight-andtwenty.
This work was too hot to hold long; our men
behaved bravely: our gunner, a gallant man,
shouted below, pouring in his shot at such a rate
that the Portuguese began to slacken their fire; we
had dismounted several of their guns by firing in
at their forecastle, and raking them, as I said,
fore and aft. Presently comes William up to me.
'Friend,' says he, very calmly, 'what dost thou
mean? Why dost thou not visit thy neighbour in
the ship, the door being open for thee?' I understood him immediately, for our guns had so torn
their hull, that we had beat two port-holes into
one, and the bulk-head of their steerage was split
to pieces, so that they could not retire to their
close quarters; I then gave the word immediately
to board them. Our second lieutenant, with about
thirty men, entered in an instant over the forecastle,
followed by some more with the boatswain, and
cutting in pieces about twenty-five men that they
found upon the deck, and then throwing some
grenadoes into the steerage, they entered there
also; upon which the Portuguese cried quarter
presently, and we mastered the ship, contrary indeed to our own expectation; for we would have
compounded with them if they would have sheered
off, but laying them athwart the hawse at first, and
following our fire furiously, without giving them
any time to get clear of us and work their ship;




28


A PIRATE'S SEA-FIGHT


by this means, though they had six-and-forty guns,
they were not able to point them forward, as I said
above, for we beat them immediately from their
guns in the forecastle, and killed them abundance
of men between decks, so that when we entered
they had hardly found men enough to fight us hand
to hand upon their deck.
From The Life, Adventures, and Piracies of
Captain Singleton
~ vi. The Gold Seekers
AT length, viz., the seventh day, they came to a
river, which was at first small, but having received
another small river or two from the northern part
of the country, began to seem large enough for
their purpose, and as it ran east-south-east they
concluded it would run into the lake, and that
they might float down this river if they could
make anything to carry them.
But their first discouragement was, the country
was all open, with very little wood and no trees,
or very few to be found large enough to make
canoes or boats of any sort; but the skill of their
carpenters, of which they had four, soon conquered
this difficulty, for, coming to a low swampy ground
on the side of the river, they found a tree something like a beech, very firm good sort of wood,
and yet soft enough to work easy; and they went
to work with this, and at first made them some
rafts, which they thought might carry them along
till the river was bigger.
While this was doing (which took up two or
three days) the men straggled up and down; some
with their guns to shoot fowls, some with contrivances to catch fish, some one thing, some
another; when on a sudden one of their fishermen,
not in the river, but in a little brook which afterwards runs into the river, found a little bit of




THE GOLD SEEKERS


29


shining stuff among the sand, or earth, in the
bank, and one cried he had found a piece of gold.
Now it seems all was not gold that glittered, for
the lump had no gold in it, whatever it was; but
the word being given out at first, it immediately
set all our men a-rummaging the shores of every
little rill of water they came at, to see if there was
no gold; and they had not looked long but they
found several little grains of gold, very small and
fine, not only in this brook but in several others.
So they spent their time the more cheerfully
because they made some purchase.
All this while they saw no people, nor any
signals of any, except once on the other side of
the river, at a great distance, they thought they
saw about thirty together, but whether men or
women, or how many of each, they could not tell,
nor would they come any nearer, only stood and
gazed at our people at a distance.
They were now ready to quit their camp and
embark, intending to lay all their baggage on the
rafts, with three or four sick men, and so the rest
to march by the river-side, and as many as could
to ride upon the mules; when, on a sudden, all
their navigation was put to a stop, and their new
vessels, such as they were, suffered a wreck. The
case was thus: they had observed a great many
black clouds to hang over the tops of the mountains, and some of them even below the tops, and
they did believe it rained among the hills; but in
the plain where they lay, and all about them, it
was fair and the weather fine.
But in the night the carpenters and their
assistants, who had set up a little tent near the
river-side, were alarmed with a great roaring noise
(as they thought) in the river, though at a distance upwards; presently after they found the
water begin to come into their tent, when, running
out, they found the river was swelling over its




30


THE GOLD SEEKERS


banks, and all the low grounds on both sides of
them.
To their great satisfaction it was just break of
day, so that they could see enough to make their
way from the water; and the land very happily
rising a little to the south of the river, they immediately fled thither. Two of them had so much
presence of mind with them as to pick up their
working tools, at least some of them, and carry off,
and the water rising gradually, the other two carpenters ventured back to save the rest; but they
were put to it to get back again with them; in
a word, the water rose to such a height that it
carried away their tent and everything that was in
it, and, which was worse, their rafts (for they had
almost finished four large rafts) were all lifted off
from the place where they were framed, which was
a kind of dry dock, and dashed all to pieces, and
the timber, such as it was, all carried away; the
smaller brooks also swelled in proportion to the
larger river, so that, in a word, our men lay, as
it were, surrounded with water, and began to be
in a terrible consternation; for, though they lay
in a hard dry piece of ground, too high for the landflood to reach them, yet had the rains continued in
the mountains they might have lain there till they
hlad been obliged to eat one another, and so there
had been an end of our new discovery.
But the weather cleared up among the hills the
next day, which heartened them up again; and
as the flood rose so soon, so the current, being
furiously rapid, the waters ran off again as easily
as they came onl, and in two days the water was all
gone again. But our little float was shipwrecked,
as I have said, and the carpenters finding how
dangerous such great unwieldy rafts would be,
resolved to set to it and build one large float with
sides to it like a punt or ferryboat. They worked
so hard at this, ten of the men always working with




THE GOLD SEEKERS


31


them to help, that in five days they had her finished.
The only thin ththe wanted was pitch and tar to
make her upper work keep out of the water; and
they made a shift to fetch a juice out of some of
the wood they had cut, by help of fire, that
answered the end tolerably well.
But that which made this disappointment less
afflicting was, that our other llen, hunting about
the small streams where this water had come down
so furiously, found that there was more gold, and
the more for the late flood. This inade them run
straggling up the streams; and, as the captail
said, he thought once they would run quite back
to the mountains again.
But that was his ignorance too, for after awhile,
alnd the nearer they came to the rising of the hills,
the quantity abated; for where the streams were
so furious the water washed it all away, and carried
it down with it, so that by the end of five days the
men found but little, and began to come back
again.
But then they discovered that though there was
less in the higher part of the rivers, there was
more farther down, and they found it so well worth
while, that they went fishing along for gold all the
way towards the lake, and left their fellows and
the boat to come after.
From A NVew Voyage Round the Vo'ild
~ vii. A Young Thief and his Phlnder
NOTHING could be more perplexing than this
money was to me all that night. I carried it in
my hand a good while, for it was in gold, all but
14.s.; and that is to say, it was in four guineas, and
that 14s. was more difficult to carry than the four
guineas. At last I sat down and pulled off one
of my shoes, and put the four guineas into that;




32 A YOUNG THIEF AND HIS PLUNDER
but after I had gone a while, my shoe hurt me
so I could not go, so I was fain to sit down
again and take it out of my shoe, and carry it in
my hand. Then I found a dirty linen rag in the
street, and I took that up and wrapped it all together, and carried it in that a good way. I have
often since heard people say, when they have been
talking of money that they could not get in,
'I wish I had it in a foul clout'; in truth I had
mine in a foul clout; for it was foul, according
to the letter of that saying, but it served me till
I came to a convenient place, and then I sat down
and washed the cloth in the kennel, and so then
put my money in again.
Tell, I carried it homne with me to my lodging
in the glass-house, and when I wvent to go to sleep
I knew not what to do with it. If I had let any
of the black crew I was with know of it, I should
have been smothered in the ashes for it, or robbed
of it, or some trick or other put upon me for it;
so I knew not what to do, but lay with it in my
hand, and my hand in my bosom. But then sleep
went fromn my eyes. Oh, the weight of human
care! I, a poor beggar-boy could not sleep so
soon as I had but a little money to keep, who
before that could have slept upon a heap of brickbats, or stones, or cinders, or anywhere, as sound
as a rich man does on his down bed, and sounder
too.
Every now and then dropping asleep, I should
dream that my money was lost, and start like one
frightened; then, finding it fast in my hand, try to
go to sleep again, but could not for a long while;
then drop and start again. At last a fancy came
into my head that if I fell asleep I should dream
of the money, and talk of it in my sleep, and tell
that I had money, which if I should do, and one of
the rogues should hear me, they would pick it out
of my bosom, and of my hand too, without waking




A YOUNG THIEF AND HIS PLUNDER 33
me; and after that thought I could not sleep
a wink more; so that I passed that night over in
care and anxiety enough; and this, I may safely
say, was the first night's rest that I lost by the
cares of this life and the deceitfulness of riches.
As soon as it was day I got out of the hole we
lay in, and rambled abroad in the fields towards
Stepney, and there I mused and considered what
I should do with this money, and many a time
I wished that I had not had it; for, after all my
ruminating upon it, and what course I should take
with it, or where I should put it, I could not hit
upon any one thing, or any possible method to
secure it, and it perplexed me so that at last, as
I said just now, I sat down and cried heartily.
When my crying was over, the case was the
same; I had the money still, and what to do with
it I could not tell. At last it came into my head
that I would look out for some hole in a tree, and
seek to hide it there till I should have occasion
for it. Big was this discovery, as I then thought
it. I began to look about mie for a tree; but there
were no trees in the fields about Stepney or Mile
End that looked fit for my purpose; and if there
were any that I began to look narrowly at, the fields
were so full of people that they would see if I went
to hide anything there; and I thought the people
eyed me as it was, and that two men in particular
followed me to see what I intended to do.
This drove me further off, and I crossed the
road at Mile End, and in the middle of the towni
went down a lane that goes away to the Blind
Beggar's at Bethnal Green. When I came a little
way in the lane I found a footpath over the fields,
and in those fields several trees for my turn, as
I thought. At last one tree had a little hole in it,
pretty high out of my reach, and I climbed up the
tree to get it, and when I came there I put my
hand in, and found (as I thought) a place very fit;




34 A YOUNG THIEF AND HIS PLUNDER
so I placed my treasure there, and was mighty well
satisfied with it; but, behold, putting my hand in
again to lay it more commodiously, as I thought,
of a sudden it slipped away from me, and I found
the tree was hollow, and my little parcel was fallen
in quite out of my reach, and how far it might go
in I knew not; so that, in a word, my money was
quite gone, irrecoverably lost. There could be no
room so much as to hope ever to see it again, for
'twas a vast great tree.
As young as I was, I was now sensible what
a fool I was before, that I could not think of ways
to keep my money, but I must come thus far to
throw it into a hole where I could not reach it.
Well, I thrust my hand quite up to my elbow, but
no bottom was to be found, or any end of the hole
or cavity. I got a stick of the tree, and thrust it
in a great way, but all was one. Then I cried, nay,
roared out, I was in such a passion. Then I got down
the tree again, then up again, and thrust in my hand
again till I scratched my arm and made it bleed,
and cried all the while most violently.  Then
I began to think I had not so much as a halfpenny
of it left for a halfpenny roll, and I was hungry,
and then I cried again. Then I came away in
despair, crying and roaring like a little boy that
had been whipped; then I went back again to
the tree, and up the tree again, and thus I did
several times.
The last time I had gotten up the tree I happened to come down not on the same side that
I went up and came down before, but on the other
side of the tree, and on the side of the bank also;
and, behold, the tree had a great open place in
the side of it close to the ground, as old hollow
trees often have; and looking into the open place,
to my inexpressible joy, there lay my money and
my linen rag, all wrapped up just as I had put it
into the hole; for the tree being hollow all the




A YOUNG THIEF AND HIS PLUNDER 35
way up, there had been some moss or light stuff,
which I had not judgement enough to know was
not firm, that had given way when it came to drop
out of my hand, and so it had slipped quite down
at once.
I was but a child, and I rejoiced like a child, for
I helloed quite out loud when I saw it; then I ran
to it, and snatched it up, hugged and kissed the
dirty rag a hundred times; then danced and
jumped about, ran from one end of the field to
the other, and, in short, I knew not what; much
less do I know now what I did, though I shall
never forget the thing, either what a sinking grief
it was to my heart when I thought I had lost it,
or what a flood of joy overwhelmed me when I had
got it again.
While I was in the first transport of my joy, as
I have said, I ran about, and knew not what I did;
but when that was over I sat down, opened the
foul clout the money was in, looked at it, told it,
found it was all there, and then I fell a-crying as
violently as I did before, when I thought I had
lost it.
It would tire the reader should I dwell on all
the little boyish tricks that I played in the ecstasy
of my joy and satisfaction when I had found my
money; so I break off here. Joy is as extravagant
as grief, and since I have been a man I have often
thought, that had such a thing befallen a man, so
to have lost all he had, and not have a bit of bread
to eat, and then so strangely to find it again, after
having given it so effectually over-I say, had it
been so with a man, it might have hazarded his
using some violence upon himself.
Well, I came away with my money, and having
taken sixpence out of it, before I made it up again
I went to a chandler's shop in Mile End and bought
a halfpenny roll and a halfpenny worth of cheese,
and sat down at the door after I bought it, and




36 A YOUNG THIEF AND HIS PLUNDER
ate it very heartily, and begged some beer to drink
with it, which the good woman gave me very freely.
Away I went then for the town, to see if I could
find any of my companions, and resolved I would
try no more hollow trees for my treasure. As
I came along Whitechapel I came by a broker's
shop over against the church, where they sold old
clothes, for I had nothing on but the worst of rags;
so I stopped at the shop, and stood looking at the
clothes which hung at the door.
' Well, young gentleman,' says a man that stood
at the door, 'you look wishfully. Do you see
anything you like, and will your pocket compass
a good coat now, for you look as if you belonged
to the ragged regiment?' I was affronted at the
fellow. 'What's that to you,' says I, 'how ragged
I am? If I had seen anything I liked, I have
money to pay for it; but I can go where I shan't
be huffed at for looking.'
While I said this pretty boldly to the fellow,
comes a woman out. 'What ails you,' says she
to the man, 'to bully away our customers so?
A poor boy's money is as good as my Lord Mayor's.
If poor people did not buy old clothes, what would
become of our business?' And then turning to
me, 'Come hither, child,' says she; 'if thou hast
a mind to anything I have, you shan't be hectored
by him. The boy is a pretty boy, I assure you,'
says she to another woman that was by this time
come to her.  'Ay,' says the other, 'so he is,
a very well-looking child, if he was clean and well
dressed, and may be as good a gentleman's son, for
anything we know, as any of those that are well
dressed. Come, my dear,' says she, 'tell me what
is it you would have.' She pleased me mightily
to hear her talk of my being a gentleman's son,
and it brought former things to my mind; but
when she talked of my being not clean and in rags,
then I cried.




A YOUNG THIEF AND HIS PLUNDER 37
She pressed me to tell her if I saw anything
that I wanted. I told her no, all the clothes I saw
there were too big for me. 'Come, child,' says
she, 'I have two things here that will fit you, and
I am sure you want them both; that is, first,
a little hat, and there,' says she (tossing it to me),
'I'll give you that for nothing. And here is a good
warm pair of breeches; I dare say,' says she, 'they
will fit you, and they are very tight and good;
and,' says she, 'if you should ever come to have so
much money that you don't know what to do with
it, here are excellent good pockets,' says she, 'and
a little fob to put your gold in, or your watch in,
when you get it.'
It struck me with a strange kind of joy that
I should have a place to put my money in, and
need not go to hide it again in a hollow tree, that
I was ready to snatch the breeches out of her
hands, and wondered that I should be such a fool
never to think of buying me a pair of breeches
before, that I might have a pocket to put my
money in, and not carry it about two days together
in my hand, and in my shoes and I knew not how;
so, in a word, I gave her 2s. for the breeches,
and went over into the churchyard and put them
on, put my money into my new pockets, and was
as pleased as a prince is with his coach and six
horses.
From The History of Colonel Jctcqule
~ viii. The Plague Pit
I WENT all the first part of the time fieely about
the streets, though not so freely as to run myself
into apparent danger, except when they dug the
great pit in the church-yard of our parish ofAldgate;
a terrible pit it was, and I could not resist my
curiosity to go and see it. As near as I may judge,
it was about forty feet in length, and about fifteen




38           THE PLAGUE PIT
or sixteen feet broad; and at the time I first looked
at it, about nine feet deep; but it was said they
dug it near twenty feet deep afterwards in one part
of it, till they could go no deeper for the water; for
they had, it seems, dug several large pits before
this; for though the plague was long a-comning to
our parish, yet when it did come, there was no
parish in or about London where it raged with such
violence as in the two parishes of Aldgate and
Whitechapel.
They had dug several pits in another ground,
when the distemper began to spread in our parish,
and especially when the dead-carts began to go
about, which was not in our parish till the beginniing of August.  Into these pits they had put
perhaps fifty or sixty bodies each; then they made
larger holes, wherein they buried all that the cart
brought in a week, which, by the middle to the end
of August, came to from 200 to 400 a week; and they
could not well dig them larger, because of the
order of the magistrates, confining them to leave
no bodies within six feet of the surface; and the
water coming on at about seventeen or eighteen
feet, they could not well, I say, put more in one
pit. But now, at the beginning of September, the
plague raging in a dreadful manner, and the number of burials in our parish increasing to more
than was ever buried in any parish about London
of no larger extent, they ordered this dreadful gulf
to be dug, for such it was, rather than a pit.
It was about the 10th of September that my
curiosity led, or rather drove, me to go and see this
pit again, when there had been near 400 people
buried in it; and I was not content to see itin the
day-time, as I had done before, for then there would
have been nothing to have been seen but the loose
earth, for all the bodies that were thrown in were
immediately covered with earth by those they called
the buriers, which at other times were called




THE PLAGUE PIT               39
bearers; but I resolved to go in the night, and see
some of them thrown in.
There was a strict order to prevent people coming to those pits, and that was only to prevent
infection; but after some time that order was more
necessary, for people that were infected, and near
their end, and delirious also, would run to those
pits, wrapped in blankets or rugs, and throw themselves in, and, as they said, bury themselves. I
cannot say that the officers suffered any willingly
to lie there; but I have heard that in a great pit
in Finsbury, in the parish of Cripplegate, it lying
open then to the fields, for it was not then walled
about, some came and threw themselves in, and
expired there before they threw any earth upon
them; and that when they came to bury others,
and found them there, they were quite dead, though
not cold.
This may serve a little to describe the dreadful
condition of that day, though it is impossible to say
anything that is able to give a true idea of it to
those who did not see it, other than this, that it
was indeed very, very, very dreadful, and such as
no tongue can express.
I got admittance into the churchyard by being
acquainted with the sexton who attended, who,
though he did not refuse me at all, yet earnestly
persuaded me not to go, telling me very seriously,
for he was a good, religious, and sensible man, that
it was, indeed, their business and duty to venture
and run all hazards, and that in it they might hope
to be preserved; but that I had no apparent call
to it but my own curiosity, which he said he believed I would not pretend was sufficient to justify
my running that hazard. I told him I had been
pressed in my mind to go, and that perhaps it might
be an instructing sight, that might not be without
its uses. 'Nay,' says the good man, 'if you will
venture upon that score, in the name of God, go




40


THE PLAGUE PIT


in; for depend upon it, it will be a sermon to you,
it may be the best that ever you heard in your life.
It is a speaking sight,' says he, 'and has a voice
with it, and a loud one, to call us to repentance.'
-And with that he opened the door, and said,
'Go, if you will.'
His discourse had shocked my resolution a little,
and I stood wavering for a good while, but just at
that interval I saw two links come over from the
end of the Minories, and heard the bell-man, and
then appeared a dead-cart, as they called it, coming over the streets, so I could no longer resist my
desire of seeing it, and went in; there was nobody,
as I could perceive at first, in the church-yard, or
going into it, but the buriers and the fellow that
drove the cart, or rather led the horse and cart,
but when they came up to the pit, they saw a man
go to and again, muffled up in a brown cloak, and
making motions with his hands under his cloak, as
as if he was in great agony, and the buriers immediately gathered about him, supposing he was
one of those poor delirious or desperate creatures
that used to pretend, as I have said, to bury themselves. He said nothing, as he walked about, but
two or three times groaned very deeply and loud,
and sighed as he would break his heart.
When the buriers came up to him, they soon
found he was neither a person infected and desperate, as I have observed above, nor a person distempered in mind, but one oppressed with a dreadful
weight of grief indeed, having his wife and several
of his children, all in the cart, that was just come
in with him, and he followed in an agony and excess
of sorrow. He mourned heartily, as it was easy to
see, but with a kind of masculine grief, that could
not give itself vent by tears, and calmly desiring
the buriers to let him alone, said he would only
see the bodies thrown in and go away; so they left
importuning him; but no sooner was the cart




THE PLAGUE PIT


41


turned round, and the bodies shot into the pit
promiscuously, which was a surprise to him, for he
at least expected they would have been decently
laid in, though indeed, he was afterwards convinced
that was impracticable; I say, no sooner did he see
the sight, but he cried out aloud, unable to contain
himself; I could not hear what he said, but he
went backward two or three times, and fell down
in a swoon. The buriers ran to him, and took him
up, and in a little while he came to himself, and
they led him away to the Pye Tavern, over against
the end of Houndsditch, where, it seems, the man
was known, and where they took care of him. He
looked into the pit again as he went away, but the
buriers had covered the bodies so immediately with
throwing in the earth, that though there was light
enough, for there was lanterns and candles in them,
placed all night round the sides of the pit upon the
heaps of earth, seven or eight, or perhaps more,
yet nothing could be seen.
From A Journal of the Plague Year
~ ix. A Poor Blackcall IVaternman
MUCH about the same time I walked out into
the fields towards Bow; for I had a great mind to
see how things were managed in the river, and
among the ships; and as I had some concern in
shipping, I had a notion that it had been one of
the best ways of securing one's self from the
infection to have retired into a ship; and musing
how to satisfy my curiosity on that point, I turned
away over the fields from Bow to Bromley, and
down to Blackwall, to the stairs which are there
for landing or taking water.
Here I saw a poor man walking on the bank, or
sea-wall, as they call it, by himself.  I walked
a while also about, seeing the houses all shut up;




42  A POOR BLACKWALL WATERMAN
at last I fell into some talk, at a distance, with
this poor man: first I asked him how people did
thereabouts. 'Alas! sir,' says he, 'almost desolate; all dead or sick. Here are very few families
in this part, or in that village' (pointing at
Poplar), 'where half of them are not dead already,
and the rest sick.' Then he pointing to one house,
'There they are all dead,' said he, 'and the house
stands open; nobody dares go into it. A poor
thief,' says he, 'ventured in to steal something,
but he paid dear for his theft, for he was carried
to the churchyard, too, last night.' Then he pointed
to several other houses:-'There,' says he, 'they
are all dead, the man and his wife, and five
children.  There,' says he, 'they are shut up;
you see a watchman at the door'; and so of other
houses. 'Why,' says I, 'What do you here all
alone?' 'Why,' says he, 'I am a poor, desolate
man; it has pleased God I am not yet visited,
though my family is, and one of my children dead.'
'How do you mean, then,' said I, 'that you are
not visited?' 'Why,' says he, 'that's my house,'
(pointing to a very little, low-boarded house),
'and there my poor wife and two children live,'
said he, 'if they may be said to live, for my wife
and one of the children are visited, but I do not
come at them.' And with that word I saw the
tears run very plentifully down his face; and so
they did down mine too, I assure you.
'But,' said I, 'why do you not come at them?
How can you abandon your own flesh and blood?'
'Oh, sir,' says he, 'the Lord forbid; I do not
abandon them; I work for them as much as I am
able; and, blessed be the Lord, I keep them from
want'; and with that I observed he lifted up his
eyes to heaven, with a countenance that presently
told me I had happened on a man that was no
hypocrite, but a serious, religious, good man, and
his ejaculation was an expression of thankfulness




A POOR BLACKWALL WATERMAN            43
that, in such a condition as he was in, he should be
able to say his family did not want.-' Well,' says
I, 'honest man, that is a great mercy as things go
now with the poor. But how do you live, then,
and how are you kept from the dreadful calamity
that is now upon us all?' 'Why, sir,' says he,
'I am a waterman, and there's my boat,' says he,
'and the boat serves me for a house. I work il
it in the day, and I sleep in it in the night; and
what I get I lay down upon that stone,' says he,
showing me a broad stone on the other side of the
street, a good way from his house; 'and then,'
says he, 'I halloo, and call to them till I make
them hear, and they come and fetch it.'
'Well, friend,' says I, 'but how can you get
any money as a waterman? Does anybody go by
water these times?' 'Yes, sir,' says he, 'in the
way I am employed there does.    Do you see
there,' says he, 'five ships lie at anchor' (pointing
down the river a good way below the town), 'and
do you see,' says he, 'eight or ten ships lie at the
chain there, and at anchor yonder?' (pointing
above the town). 'All those ships have families
on board, of their merchants and owners, and
such like, who have locked themselves up and
live on board, close shut in, for fear of the infection; and I tend on them to fetch things for them,
carry letters, and do what is absolutely necessary,
that they may not be obliged to come on shore;
and every night I fasten my boat on board one of
the ship's boats, and there I sleep by myself, and,
blessed be God, I am preserved hitherto.'
'Well,' said I, 'friend, but will they let you
come on board after you have been on shore here,
when this is such a terrible place, and so infected
as it is?'
'Why, as to that,' said he, 'I very seldom go
up the ship-side, but deliver what I bring to their
boat, or lie by the side, and they hoist it on board.




44 A POOR BLACKWALL WATERMAN
If I did, I think they are in no danger from me,
for I never go into any house on shore, or touch
anybody, no, not of my own family; but I fetch
provisions for them.'
'Nay,' says I, 'but that may be worse, for you
must have those provisions of somebody or other;
and since all this part of the town is so infected,
it is dangerous so much as to speak with anybody, for the village,' said I, 'is, as it were, the
beginning of London, though it be at some distance
from it.'
'That is true,' added he; 'but you do not
understand me right; I do not buy provisions for
them here. I row up to Greenwich and buy fresh
meat there, and sometimes I row down the river
to Woolwich and buy there; then I go to single
farm-houses on the Kentish side, where I am
known, and buy fowls, and eggs, and butter, and
bring to the ships, as they direct me, sometimes
one, sometimes the other.   I seldom come on
shore here, and I came now only to call to my
wife and hear how my little family do, and give
them a little money, which I received last night.'
'Poor man! ' said I; ' and how much hast thou
gotten for then?'
'I have gotten four shillings,' said he, ' which is
a great sum, as things go now with poor men;
but they have given me a bag of bread too, and
a salt fish, and some flesh; so all helps out.'
'Well,' said I, 'and have you given it them
yet?'
'No,' said he; 'but I have called, and my wife
has answered that she cannot come out yet, but
in half-an-hour she hopes to come, and I am waiting for her.  Poor woman!' says he, 'she is
brought sadly down. She has a swelling, and it
is broke, and I hope she will recover; but I fear
the child will die, but it is the Lord '
Here he stopped, and wept very much.




A POOR BLACKWALL WATERMAN           45
'Well, honest friend,' said I, 'thou hast a sure
Comforter, if thou hast brought thyself to be
resigned to the will of God; He is dealing with
us all in judgement.'
'Oh, sir!' says he, 'it is infinite mercy if any of
us are spared; and who am I to repine!'
'Sayest thou so?' said I, 'and how much less
is my faith than thine?'  And here my heart
smote me, suggesting how much better this poor
man's foundation was on which he stayed in the
danger than mine; that he had nowhere to fly;
that he had a family to bind him to attendance,
which I had not; and mine was mere presumption,
his a true dependence, and a courage resting on
God; and yet that lie used all possible caution for
his safety.
I turned a little way from the man while these
thoughts engaged me, for, indeed, I could no more
refrain from tears than he.
At length, after some further talk, the poor
woman opened the door and called, 'Robert,
Robert.' He answered, and bid her stay a few
moments and he would come; so lie ran down the
common stairs to his boat and fetched up a sack,
in which was the provisions he had brought from
the ships; and when he returned he hallooed
again. Then he went to the great stone which he
showed me and emptied the sack, and laid all out,
everything by themselves, and then retired; and
his wife came with a little boy to fetch them away,
and he called and said such a captain had sent
such a thing, and such a captain such a thing, and
at the end adds, 'God has sent it all; give thanks
to Him.' When the poor woman had taken up
all, she was so weak she could not carry it at
once in, though the weight was not much neither;
so she left the biscuit, which was in a little bag,
and left a little boy to watch it till she came
again.




46 A POOR BLACKWALL WATERMAN
'Well, but,' says I to him, 'did you leave her
the four shillings too, which you said was your
week's pay?'
'Yes, yes,' says he; 'you shall hear her own it.'
So he calls again, 'Rachel, Rachel,' which, it seems,
was her name, 'did you take up the money?'
'Yes,' said she. 'How much was it?' said he.
'Four shillings and a groat,' said she.  'Well,
well,' says he, 'the Lord keep you all'; and so he
turned to go away.
As I could not refrain contributing tears to this
man's story, so neither could I refrain my charity
for his assistance. So I called him, ' Hark thee,
friend,' said I, 'come hither, for I believe thou
art in health, that I may venture thee'; so I
pulled out my hand, which was in my pocket
before, 'Here,' says I, 'go and call thy Rachel
once more, and give her a little more comfort
from me. God will never forsake a family that
trust in Him as thou dost.' So I gave him four
other shillings, and bade him go lay them on the
stone and call his wife.
I have not words to express the poor man's
thankfulness, neither could he express it himself,
but by tears running down his face; he called his
wife and told her God had moved the heart of a
stranger, upon hearing their condition, to give them
all that money; and a great deal more such as that
he said to her. The woman, too, made signs of the
like thankfulness, as well to heaven as to me, and
joyfully picked it up; and I parted with no money
all that year that I thought better bestowed.
I then asked the poor man if the distemper had
not reached to Greenwich. He said it had not till
about a fortnight before; but that then he feared
it had; but that it was only at that end of the town
which lay south towards Deptford bridge; that he
went only to a butcher's shop and a grocer's, where
hie generally bought such things as they sent him
for, but was very careful.




A POOR BLACKWALL WATERMAN           47
I asked him then, how it came to pass that those
people who had so shut themselves up in the ships,
had not laid in sufficient stores of all things necessary? He said some of them had; but, on the
other hand, some did not come on board till they
were frighted into it, and till it was too dangerous
for them to go to the proper people to lay in quantities of things; and that he waited on two ships,
which he showed me, that had laid in little or
nothing but biscuit-bread and ship beer; and that
he had bought everything else almost for them. I
asked him if there were any more ships that had
separated themselves, as those had done? He told
me yes; all the way up from the point right against
Greenwich, to within the shores of Limehouse and
Redriff, all the ships that could have room rid two
and two in the middle of the stream, and that some
of them had several families on board. I asked
him if the distemper had not reached them? He
said he believed it had not, except two or three
ships, whose people had not been so watchful as to
keep the seamen from going on shore as others had
been; and he said it was a very fine sight to see
how the ships lay up the pool.
When he said he was going over to Greenwich as
soon as the tide began to come in, I asked if he
would let me go with him, and bring me back, for
that I had a great mind to see how the ships were
ranged, as he had told me. He told me, if I would
assure him on the word of a Christian and of an
honest man, that I had not the distemper, he would.
I assured him that I had not; that it had pleased
God to preserve me; that I lived in Whitechapel,
but was too impatient of being so long within doors,
and that I had ventured out so far for the refreshment of a little air, but that none in my house had
so much as been touched with it.
'Well, sir,' says he, 'as your charity has been
moved to pity me and my poor family, sure you




48  A POOR BLACKWALL WATERMAN
cannot have so little pity left as to put yourself into
my boat if you were not sound in health, which
would be nothing less than killing me, and ruining
my whole family.' The poor man troubled me so
much when he spoke of his family with such a
sensible concern, and in such an affectionate manner, that I could not satisfy myself at first to go at
all. I told him I would lay aside my curiosity
rather than make him uneasy, though I was sure,
and very thankful for it, that I had no more distemper upon me than the freshest man in the world.
Well, he would not have me put it off neither, but,
to let me see how confident he was that I was just
to him, now importuned me to go; so when the
tide came up to his boat I went in, and he carried
me to Greenwich. While he bought the things
which he had in his charge to buy, I walked up to
the top of the hill under which the town stands,
and on the east side of the town, to get a prospect
of the river. But it was a surprising sight to see
the number of ships which lay in rows, two and
two, and some places two or three such lines in the
breadth of the river, and this not only up quite to
the town, between the houses which we call Ratcliff
and Redriff, which they name the Pool, but even
down the whole river, as far as the head of Long
Reach, which is as far as the hills give us leave to
see it.
I cannot guess at the number of ships, but I
think there must be several hundreds of sail; and
I could not but applaud the contrivance, for ten
thousand people, and more, who attended ship
affairs were certainly sheltered here from the
violence of the contagion, and lived very safe and
very easy.
From A Journat of the Plague Year
Oxford: Printed at the Clarendon Press by HORACE HART, M.A.




Select English Classics
EDITED BY A. T. QUILLER-COUCH
Cloth, 4d.; Paper covers, 3d.
ROBIN HOOD. Selection from Old Ballads. 48 pages.
SHAKESPEARE.         Selection from Songs
and Sonnets. 32 pages.
IZAAK WTALTON. Selection from the
Lives and Angler. 32 pages.
MILTON. Selection from Minor Poems.
32 pages.
BUNYAN. Selection from the Pilgrit's
Progress, &c. 48 pages.
DEFOE.     Selection from  Prose WVorks.
48 pages.
COWPER. Selection from       Poems. 32
pages.
BOS WELL. Selection from Life of Johnson. 48 pages.
CRABBE. Selection from Poems. 32 pages.
CHARLES LAMB. Selection from Prose
Works. 48 pages.
HAZLITT. Selection from Prose Works.
48 pages.
KEATS. Selection from Poems. 32 pages.
HOOD. Selection from Poems. 32 pages.
MATTHEW       ARNOLD. Selection from
Poems. 32 pages.
OTIHERS IN PREPARL TIOiV.




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