Ocean's Story; or, Triumphs of Thirty Centuries / Maritime Adventures, Achievements, Explorations, Discoveries and Inventions; and of the Rise and Progress of Ship-Building and Ocean Navigation, from the Ark to the Iron Steamships

by Frank B. Goodrich

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

THE VOYAGE OF WOODES ROGERS—DESERTION CHECKED BY A NOVEL CIRCUMSTANCE—A LIGHT SEEN UPON THE ISLAND OF JUAN FERNANDEZ—A BOAT SENT TO RECONNOITRE—ALEXANDER SELKIRK DISCOVERED—HIS HISTORY AND ADVENTURES—HIS DRESS, FOOD, AND OCCUPATIONS—HE SHIPS WITH ROGERS AS SECOND MATE—TURTLES AND TORTOISES—FIGHT WITH A SPANISH TREASURE-SHIP—PROFITS OF THE VOYAGE—THE SOUTH SEA BUBBLE—ITS INFLATION AND COLLAPSE—MEASURES OF RELIEF.

A company of merchants of Bristol fitted out two ships in 1708—the Duke and Duchess—to cruise against the Spaniards in the South Sea. The Duke was commanded by Woodes Rogers, the Duchess by Stephen Courtney. William Dampier, whose name had long been a terror to the Spaniards, was pilot to the larger ship. They left Bristol on the 14th of July, with fifty-six guns and three hundred and thirty-three men, and with double the usual number of officers, in order to prevent the mutinies so common in privateers.

Nothing of moment occurred till the vessels anchored at Isola Grande, off the coast of Brazil. Here two men deserted, but were so frightened in the night by tigers, as they supposed, but in reality by monkeys and baboons, that they took refuge in the sea and shouted till they were taken on board. The two ships passed through Lemaire's Strait and doubled Cape Horn, and, on the 31st of January, 1709, made the island of Juan Fernandez. During the night a light was observed on shore, and Captain Rogers made up his mind that a French fleet was riding at anchor, and ordered the decks to be cleared for action. At daylight the vessels stood in towards the land; but no French fleet—not even a single sail—was to be seen. A yawl was sent forward to reconnoitre. As it drew near, a man was seen upon the shore waving a white flag; and, on its nearer approach, he directed the sailors, in the English language, to a spot where they could best effect a landing. He was clad in goat-skins, and appeared more wild and ragged than the original owners of his apparel. His name has long been known throughout the inhabited world, and his story is familiar in every language. We need hardly say that his name was Alexander Selkirk, and that his adventures furnished the basis of the romance of Robinson Crusoe.

Alexander Selkirk was a Scotchman, and had been left upon the island by Captain Stradling, of the Cinqueports, four years and four months before. During his stay he had seen several ships pass by, but only two came to anchor at the island. They were Spaniards, and fired at him; but he escaped into the woods. He said he would have surrendered to them had they been French; but he chose to run the risk of dying alone upon the island rather than fall into the hands of Spaniards, as he feared they would either put him to death or make him a slave in their mines. "He told us," says Rogers, "that he was born in Largo, in the county of Fife, and was bred a sailor from his youth. The reason of his being left here was a difference with his captain, which, together with the fact that the ship was leaky, made him willing to stay behind; but when at last he was inclined to go with the ship the captain would not receive him. He took with him his clothes and bedding, with a firelock and some powder and bullets, some tobacco, a knife, a kettle, a Bible, with other books, and his mathematical instruments. He diverted himself and provided for his sustenance as well as he could, but had much ado to bear up against melancholy for the first eight months, and was sore distressed at being left alone in so desolate a place. He built himself two huts of pimento-trees, thatched with long grass and lined with goat-skins,—killing goats as he needed them with his gun, as long as his powder lasted. When that was all spent, he procured fire by rubbing two sticks of pimento wood together. He slept in his large hut and cooked his victuals in the smaller, and employed himself in reading, praying, and singing psalms,—so that, he said he was a better Christian during his solitude than he had ever been before, or than, he was afraid, he should ever be again.

"At first he never ate but when constrained by hunger,—partly from grief, and partly for want of bread and salt. Neither did he go to bed till he could watch no longer,—the pimento wood serving him both for fire and candle, as it burned very clear and refreshed him by its fragrant smell. His fish he sometimes boiled, and at other times broiled, as he did his goats' flesh, of which he made good broth; for they are not as rank as our goats. Having kept an account, he said he had killed five hundred goats while on the island, besides having caught as many more, which he marked on the ear and let them go. When his powder failed, he ran them down by speed of foot; for his mode of living, with continual exercise of walking and running, cleared him of all gross humors, so that he could run with wonderful swiftness through the woods and up the hills and rocks.

SELKIRK AND HIS FAMILY.

"He came at length to relish his meat well enough without salt. In the proper season he had plenty of good turnips, which had been sowed there by the crew of the ship and had now spread over several acres of ground. The cabbage-palm furnished him with cabbage in abundance, and the fruit of the pimento—the same as Jamaica pepper—with a pleasant seasoning for his food. He soon wore out his shoes and other clothes by running in the woods; and, being forced to shift without, his feet became so hard that he ran about everywhere without inconvenience, and could not again wear shoes without suffering from swelled feet. After he had got the better of his melancholy, he sometimes amused himself with carving his name on the trees, together with the date of his arrival and the duration of his solitude. At first he was much pestered with cats and rats, which had bred there in great numbers from some of each species which had got on shore from ships that had wooded and watered at the island. The rats gnawed his feet and clothes when he was asleep, which obliged him to cherish the cats, by feeding them with goats' flesh, so that many of them became so tame that they used to lie beside him in hundreds, and soon delivered him from the rats. He also tamed some kids, and, for his diversion, would sometimes sing and dance with them and his cats. So that by the favor of Providence and the vigor of youth—for he was now only thirty years of age—he came at length to conquer all the inconveniences of his solitude, and to be quite easy in his mind.