So he took Friday to the place where he kept the small canoe he had made, and quickly he found that he was a very much better boatman than Robinson himself, and could make her go through the water nearly twice as fast as Robinson was able to do.
But when Robinson asked if they might try to go over in that boat, Friday’s face fell. She was too small, he said. Robinson then showed him the first boat he had built, and which had been lying on the sand now for more than twenty-two years. That, Friday said, was big enough. But the heat of the sun by this time had so warped and cracked her that, even if they could have got her into the sea, she would not have floated.
Then Robinson told Friday that he would build him a bigger boat, and send him home in it, but that he himself would remain on the island alone, as he had been before.
The poor lad’s feelings were hurt at this, and he asked, ‘Why you angry mad with Friday? Suppose master go, Friday go! Suppose master no go, Friday no go!’ And he brought a hatchet, and said, ‘You kill Friday; not send him away.’ Robinson was much touched by this devotion, and afterwards always had perfect faith in him.
CHAPTER IX
ROBINSON AND FRIDAY BUILD A LARGE
BOAT; THEY RESCUE TWO PRISONERS
FROM THE CANNIBALS
But still the wish to leave the island was as strong as ever, and together he and Friday went to work to fell a tree from which to build a boat good enough for their voyage to the mainland. Friday soon showed that he knew far better than Robinson the kind of tree best suited for boat-making, though he knew less about hollowing it out; for he had never seen tools suitable for such work. Friday proposed to burn out the inside, but Robinson showed him how to use the tools, and soon he was very handy with them.
It took the two of them little more than a month to finish the boat. And very handsome she looked, and very proud of her they were. But it cost them quite a fortnight of very hard work to get her into the water. Below her they had to put large wooden rollers, and then with strong sticks, inch by inch, they levered and pushed her into the sea, where she floated, very trim and ship-shape, big enough to carry a dozen men.
Robinson was astonished at Friday’s skill in paddling so large a canoe. She seemed to fly through the water, and he could turn her with great ease.
‘Will she do to go over in?’ he asked, and Friday, grinning, said, ‘Yes, even if big wind blow.’
But Robinson did not mean to depend only on paddling. He made Friday cut down a straight young pine-tree for a mast, and amongst the old ship’s sails that he had kept so long he found at last two pieces that were not rotten. From these he made what is called a shoulder-of-mutton sail, and a small foresail. It took him nearly two months to cut and fit them, but when they were finished and hoisted they acted very well, and when a clumsy rudder had been fixed to the boat, he found that she steered nicely, and was quite safe and stiff in a fresh breeze.