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meat turn continually. This Friday admired very much; but when he came to taste the flesh, he took so many ways to tell me how well he liked it, that I could not but understand him: and at last he told me, as well as he could, he would never eat man's flesh any more, which I was very glad to hear.

The next day I set him to work to beating some corn out, and sifting it in the manner I used to do, and he soon understood how to do it as well as I: after that, I let him see me make my bread, and in a little time Friday was able to do all the work for me, as well as I could do it myself.

I began now to consider, that having two mouths to feed instead of one, I must provide more ground for my harvest, and plant a larger quantity of corn; so I marked out a larger piece of land, and began the fence in the same manner as before. Friday worked very willingly and very hard, and I told him that it was for corn to make more bread, because he was now with me, and that I might have enough for him and myself too. He appeared very sensible of that part, and let me know that he thought I had much more labour on his account, than I had for myself; and that he would work the harder for me, if I would tell him what to do.

This was the pleasantest year of all the life I led in this place. Friday began to talk pretty well, and understand the names of almost everything I had occasion to call for, and of every place I had to send him to, and talked a great deal to me; so that, in short, I began now to have some use for

my tongue again. Besides the pleasure of talking to him, I had a singular satisfaction in the fellow himself; his simple, unfeigned honesty appeared to me more and more every day, and I began really to love the creature! and, on his side, I believe he loved me more than it was possible for him ever to love anything before.

I had a mind once to try if he had any inclination for his own country again; and having taught him English so well that he could answer me almost any question, I asked him whether the nation that he belonged to never conquered in battle? At which he smiled, and said, "Yes, yes, we always fight the better;" that is, he meant, always get the better in fight; and so we began the following discourse :

Master-You always fight the better; how came you to be taken prisoner then, Friday?

Friday. My nation beat much for all that.

Master. How beat? If your nation beat them, how came you to be taken?

Friday. They more many than my nation, in the place where me was; they take one, two, three, and me; my nation over-beat them in the yonder place where me no was; there my nation take one two, great thousand.

Master. But why did not your side recover you from the hands of your enemies, then?

Friday. They run one, two, three, and me, and make go in the canoe; my nation have no canoe that time.

Master.-Well, Friday, and what does your

nation do with the men they take? Do they carry them away and eat them, as these did?

Friday. Yes, my nation eat mans too: eat

all up.

Master. Where do they carry them?

Friday. Go to other place, where they think.
Master-Do they come hither?

Friday. Yes, yes, they come hither; come other else place.

Master. Have you been here with them?

Friday. Yes, I have been here (points to the N.W. side of the island, which, it seems, was their side).

By this, I understood that my man Friday had formerly been among the savages who used to come on shore on the farther part of the island, on the same man-eating occasions he was now brought for: and some time after, when I took courage to carry him to that side, he presently knew the place, and told me he was there once, when they eat up twenty men, two women, and one child. He could not tell twenty in English, but he numbered them, by laying so many stones in a row, and pointing to me to tell them over.

After this discourse I had with him, I asked him how far it was from our island to the shore, and whether the canoes were not often lost. He told me there was no danger—no canoes ever lost; but that after a little way out to sea, there was a current and wind, always one way in the morning, the other in the afternoon. This I understood to be no more than the sets of the tide, as going out or coming

in;

He

but I afterwards understood it was occasioned by the great draft and reflux of the mighty river Oroonoko, in the mouth or gulf of which river, as I found afterwards, our island lay; and that this land which I perceived to the W. and N.W. was the great island Trinidad, on the north point of the river. I asked Friday a thousand questions about the country, the inhabitants, the sea, the coast, and what nations were near. told me all he knew, with the greatest openness imaginable. I asked him the names of the several nations of his sort of people, but could get no other name than Caribs: from whence I easily understood that these were the Caribbees, which our maps place on the part of America which reaches from the mouth of the river Oroonoko to Guiana, and onwards to St. Martha. He told me, that up a great way beyond the moon, that was, beyond the setting of the moon, there dwelt white bearded. men, like me, and that they had killed much mans, that was his word; by all which I understood he meant the Spaniards, whose cruelties in America had been spread over the whole country, and were remembered by all the nations from father to son.

I inquired if he could tell me how I might go from this island and get among those white men : he told me, "Yes, yes, you may go in two canoe." I could not understand or make him describe to me what he meant by two canoe, till at last I found he meant a large boat, as big as two canoes. This part of Friday's discourse I began to relish very

well; and from this time I entertained some hopes that one time or other I might find an opportunity to make my escape from this place, and that this poor savage might be a means to help me.

Defoe.

XXIII.

SONGS BY SHAKESPERE.

BLOW, blow, thou winter wind,
Thou art not so unkind

As man's ingratitude;

Thy tooth is not so keen,

Because thou art not seen,

Although thy breath be rude.

Heigh-ho sing, heigh-ho! unto the green holly: Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly : Then, heigh-ho, the holly!

This life is most jolly.

Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky,
Thou dost not bite so nigh
As benefits forgot:
Though thou the waters warp,
Thy sting is not so sharp

As friend remember'd not.

Heigh-ho sing, heigh-ho! unto the green holly: Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly: Then, heigh-ho, the holly!

This life is most jolly.

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