The Voyage

It being very necessary that we should make land before our food and water were all spent, the men took turns at the paddles, even while the wind held, so that we should proceed with all possible speed. We were five days without sighting land, and our water was all consumed when at last we came to an island; but we could not land, because a great multitude of savages in war-paint came to the shore brandishing clubs and spears, and we had to wait till night, and then some of the men went with me in the Fair Hope to another part of the coast, and landing there unseen, we were able to fill our vessels. I will not tell all the incidents of that voyage, even if I could remember them; but I may tell of one time, when we were chased by a fleet of war-canoes, and should most certainly have been caught, only when the first of the pursuing craft was but a biscuit's throw away, I fired a musket shot, which terrified them so much that they turned their prows and fled away shrieking.

After several weeks, the weather having been fair all the time, we were caught by a storm in mid-ocean, out of sight of any land, and then for the first time my heart sank, and I feared we should go to the bottom. We had little rigging to make us top-heavy, and we managed to get that down before the blast took us; but the waves swept over us with such force that we had much ado to prevent ourselves from being washed out, and had no thought of anything except to cling to the thwarts, and, when each wave had passed, to bale for our lives. The rope by which we towed the Fair Hope was snapped, and she was carried away, and no doubt before long submerged. In the merciful providence of God the storm was quickly over, but then our case was dreadful in the extreme, for all our provisions were ruined or else swept overboard, and the most of our paddles were gone. To make matters worse, the wind dropped, and we had nothing but light airs that scarcely moved the vessel a yard a minute. For two days and nights we lay thus, the wide waste of water all about us, the hot sun above, and neither land nor ship in sight. On the first day not a man of us ate, and at night we sought to moisten our parched lips by sucking the dew from our shirts; but on the second day some of the men gnawed the sodden fish and flesh that remained, which did but increase their thirst, so that in the night they began to rave, and in the morning Pumfrey and Hoskin were dead. We committed their bodies to the deep with great awe and trembling, none knowing but he might be the next. But not long after a strong breeze sprang up in the east, and carried our vessel along at so round a pace that hope revived in our sad hearts, and Billy mounted the gunwale and, clinging to the supports of the canopy I have mentioned, he looked out eagerly for land. When he saw none after a while he came down again, feeling very weak and dizzy, and had not the heart or the strength to try again, and so we sped on almost blindly, having just care enough to keep the vessel's head to the west. And then, when we were again on the point of despairing, some one cried that he saw land ahead, and when I looked, I saw a long dark shape upon the water, above which a huge bank of clouds seemed to rest. We fixed our longing eyes thereon, and as we drew nearer the clouds broke slowly apart, and we saw the sides of stupendous mountains, ten times as lofty as the mountain on Palm Tree Island, even in the part we saw, for their tops were wrapped in mist. It was many hours, I am sure, before we drew near to the coast, which we saw was very precipitous, so that we despaired of finding a safe landing; but we steered north, skirting it, and came by and by to a part where the cliffs fell away, and there, being perfectly reckless now, for we could but die, we drove our vessel ashore, and it struck on a ridge of rock very like the lava beach of Palm Tree Island. By great good fortune there was no depth of water on it, and we were able to wade ashore, which we reached more dead than alive.

When we had rested somewhat we looked about for food, the inland parts being very well wooded, and we were inexpressibly thankful when we found both bread-fruit and bananas, and cocoa-nuts too, of which we made a meal, some eating so ravenously that they were very ill, and I feared Billy would die. But he and the others recovered, to my great joy, and we camped there, and slept so heavily that if any savages had come upon us we should have been killed without being able to lift a hand to defend ourselves. However, we saw no savages during the week we stayed there, and at the end of that time, being marvellously refreshed and invigorated, we towed our vessel off the ridge (she had suffered no hurt, the sea being calm) with ropes, some we had with us, and others we made with creepers, swimming out into the sea with them. Then we plaited baskets, and carried in them as much food as we could load into the vessel, and once more set sail.

We found that our passage westward was barred by this island, which extended in a north-westerly direction for many miles, at least a hundred, I should think.[[1]] When we arrived at the northern extremity of it, we drew in, so as to get more food, but perceiving a strange black smoke arising from the earth, we were afraid to approach nearer, nor indeed did the land appear very fertile; so we sailed past, hoping to discover another island before our provisions, of which we had a great store, were exhausted. But day after day went by without our seeing any, and though we were very sparing with our food, it was at last all gone, and we again suffered the torturing pangs of hunger and thirst. And when we woke one morning after a terrible night, we did not think we should live through the day, and the wild look in the eyes of some of the men made me fear they would go mad, or even propose to eat one another. I had already observed them gazing ravenously at Little John, but I held him constantly at my side, being determined to keep him as a memento of our sojourn on Palm Tree Island. I do not know but I might have been prevailed on at last to consent to his death, but towards evening Billy, using his little remnant of strength to climb on to the gunwale, cried out that he saw a sail, and called to me in a very hoarse voice to make a signal. I took up my musket at once, and fired a shot, and then another, and then saw with great agony that I could fire no more, for there was no more powder in my horn, and the little that was in the others had been spoiled by the sea water. But by and by we heard a shot, and Billy cried that the vessel was clapping on more sail, and was coming towards us. We were in terrible dread lest she should not come up with us before night, for she might pass us in the dark, and then we must have died. But she came up apace, and heaving to, hailed us in a tongue I did not understand, though the vessel was of European make. Clums, however, told me she was Dutch, and he answered the hail in that tongue, though his mouth was so parched that his voice was nothing but a croak. He said we were famishing, whereupon the skipper lowered a boat, sending food and water to us. When we were somewhat revived, I told the officer in the boat, by the interpretation of Clums, something of my story, at which he marvelled greatly, especially at our strange vessel, and would have heard more, only the skipper shouted for him to come back. I asked whether the skipper would not take us aboard, assuring him that my uncle would pay our charges very willingly, and when he returned to his vessel the skipper consented to this, saying, as I heard afterwards, that none but Englishmen, who were all mad, would have ventured to sea in such a crazy craft.

Accordingly we went on board the Dutch vessel, some of us having to be hauled up the side in slings, we were so weak. We left the poor Elizabeth Jane derelict, and Billy shed bitter tears, being still very much of a child at heart, and taking this as a sad omen, portending the death of the Elizabeth Jane he had known. As for me, having nothing of this kind to be superstitious about, I was so joyful at falling in with a friendly vessel, and at the hope this engendered in me, that I did not spare a sigh upon the Elizabeth Jane, being indeed much more sorrowful at the loss of the Fair Hope, much as a father might feel the loss of his firstborn.

I said a "friendly vessel," but it was not so friendly neither. She was a Dutch Indiaman bound for Java, and the skipper, though humane enough to pick us up (after a promise of pay), never looked on us very kindly, because we were English, and the Dutch were exceeding jealous at the presence of English mariners in those waters, seeming to think that the ocean was their highway by right. (I have observed that the French and the Spanish, as well as ourselves, hold the same opinion, or did hold it until that late gallant gentleman Lord Nelson taught them better.) However, the Dutch skipper brought us to the island of Java, whither he was bound, and handed us over to the Governor, who put me through a very strict interrogation, with the aid of one of his officers that knew English, a clerk sitting by and writing all I said. He did the same afterwards with Billy and Mr. Bodger, each by himself, and Billy was mightily indignant when the Governor, having had read out some parts of my story, asked him if they were true.

I do not know what would have happened to me but that the Governor's wife, who had lived in England and spoke English, was greatly interested when she heard of our strange adventures: and it chancing that I fell ill of a low fever, she had me brought to her house, and tended me with great kindness, as much as Billy would let her, for he was very jealous, and would not leave me. When I was recovered, and this kind benefactress asked me what I would do, I said I must go home, and though I had no money, my uncle would right willingly pay my charges. Accordingly, by her kind interest I was provided with money, and clothes of a Dutch cut, and took passage in a Dutch Indiaman that was returning to Holland with a freight of sugar, in which Java is very prolific, and Billy was to go with me as my servant, and Little John too. I learnt that Mr. Bodger and Colam were dead, being carried off by a fever like mine; but the rest of the men, all but two, had found berths on the same Indiaman, she being short-handed owing to an epidemic fever that had broken out aboard on her way out. The two last of our party remained at Batavia for some time, being ill and unfit to work; but afterwards they worked their way to Calcutta, and thence on a British vessel to London, as they did not fail to inform me when they arrived. As for me and Billy and the dog, we went on the Dutchman, which touched at the Cape of Good Hope, and thence sailed direct for Amsterdam, and from there we got a passage to London, where we arrived on April 2, 1783, eight years and seven months after we departed on the ill-fated Lovey Susan.

Billy's Stepmother

I wrote a letter to my uncle that same day, telling him of my return, for I thought if I went home too suddenly the shock might do him an injury, especially if he had the gout. Billy went to see his old dad, promising to come back next day, since I had resolved to take him home with me, and show my uncle the good companion of my solitude. He was true to his word, and when I asked him how his people fared, he said his father was the same as ever, only not quite so spry, and his mother-in-law (as he called her) was fatter, but no less ill-tempered. Her first words when she saw him were, "Back again like a bad penny!" and after he had told her and his father somewhat of his strange life since he left them, all she said was, "Well, you've growed a lot, and big enough to work the smithy, and me and your father can take that little public we've had our eyes on." "Not if I knows it," says Billy to me; "I know what it 'ud be. She'd always be in the bar, a-taking a little drop here and a little drop there, and she's a tartar when she's had two glasses. Dad's a deal better off as he is, and he knows it." I asked him whether he had made any inquiry for Elizabeth Jane, and he looked at me very seriously, and said, "I knowed it meant something when that there boat of ours went down. They don't know what's become of her, but her dad was hanged for house-breaking a year or two ago, so I reckon I've had a lucky escape. I'll go and see Clums when I get back."