[Hayy is driven by the tide to another Island.]
With these words she committed the little ark with the child into the sea, and the waters swelling with the tide carried it in the same night to the shore of another Island whereof we have just made mention.
It so happened that there was such a powerful current of the high water—as it does happen there once a year—that the ark was carried right to the shore, and by its force cast into a shady grove, thick set with trees,—a very pleasant place, well sheltered from wind and rain, and secured from the sun, which at its rising and setting receded from it.
Then when the waters subsided, the ark wherein the infant peacefully slumbered was left stranded, banked up by sands, safely aground, sheltered from blustering wind or in-coming tide. For when the wind blew, the sands were heaped together and obstructed the passage to the grove, and thus prevented the coming of any water into it so that the flood could not reach it.
[Hayy is found by a Roe, which takes care of him.]
Now it came to pass that the nails of the ark and its joints became loosened by the violence of the waves. The child, feeling hungry, began to cry bitterly, seeking relief and moving about in the ark. Fortunately it so happened that its cry was heard by a roe that was wandering about in search of her fawn, which, having ventured out of its den, had been carried off by an eagle.
When she heard the cry, she at first took it to be the cry of her fawn; so she followed it quickly up, until she came to the ark. She at once started to break it open with her hoofs, and, aided by the struggling child within, she at last forced a board covering the upper part of the ark.
Whereupon, beholding the dear child, she took pity on him, and being moved with tender affection towards him, she suckled him. Thus she fully satisfied him with milk, and, while he was weak and helpless, did come and guard him, defending him from evil and keeping him from all harm. And this is the tale that is told by those who refuse to believe that a man can come into the world without parents. But we shall explain later on how it grew and how it progressed until it reached unto great perfection.
[Spontaneous Generation.]
Those, however, who think he was born out of the earth, without father or mother, say that, in a low piece of ground in that Island, it happened that in the course of years a certain mass of clay so fermented that the four qualities heat and cold, moisture and dryness, agreed in equal mixture and in equal strength; and there was a great bulk of this clay in which some parts excelled the others, being more equally tempered and therefore fitter for the generation (of a mixed body); the middle portion of the clay being of the most perfect temper, and most closely approaching the human temper. The matter being in a state of fermentation, bubblings arose by reason of its great clamminess; and it came to pass that there was some clammy thing in the midst of it with a small bubbling, being divided with a thin partition into two parts, full of a spirituous and airy body, of the most equal temper. Thereupon, at the command of the most high God, a spirit was infused into it and joined so closely thereto that it could scarcely be separated therefrom either by sense or thought; this spirit constantly flowing out from God, as is manifest in the light of the sun which constantly influenceth the world . . . and creates.