Defoe was fifty-nine when he published this remarkable book,
in 1720. "Robinson Crusoe" had appeared in the previous year,
and "Moll Flanders" came out in 1722. Shrewdness and wit, the
study of character, vividness of imagination, and, beyond
these, the pure literary style, make "Captain Singleton" a
classic in English literature. William the Quaker, the first
Quaker in English fiction, has never been surpassed in any
later novel, and remains an immortal creation. The clear
common sense of this man, the combination of business ability
and a real humaneness, the quiet humour which prevails over
the stupid barbarity of his pirate companions--who but Defoe
could have drawn such a character as the guide, philosopher,
and friend of a crew of pirates? Bob Singleton himself, who
tells the story with a frankness of extraordinary charm,
confessing his willingness for evil courses as readily as his
later repentance, is no less striking a personality. By sheer
imagination the genius of Defoe makes Singleton's adventures,
including the impossible journey across Central Africa, real
and credible. The book is a model of fine narrative.
_I.--Sailing With the Devil_
If I may believe the woman whom I was taught to call mother, I was a
little boy about two years old, very well dressed, and had a nurse-maid
to attend me, who took me out on a fine summer's evening into the fields
towards Islington, to give the child some air; a little girl being with
her, of twelve or fourteen years old, that lived in the neighbourhood.
The maid meets with a fellow, her sweetheart; he carries her into a
public-house, and while they are toying in there the girl plays about
with me in her hand, sometimes in sight, sometimes out of sight,
thinking no harm.
Then comes by one of those sort of people who make it their business to
spirit away little children, a trade chiefly practised where they found
little children well dressed, and for bigger children, to sell them to
the plantations.
The woman, pretending to take me up in her arms and play with me, draws
the girl a good way from the house, and then bids her go back to the
maid, and tell her that a gentlewoman had taken a fancy to the child.
And so, while the girl went, she carries me quite away.
From that time, it seems, I was disposed of to a beggar woman, and after
that to a gipsy, till I was about six years old.
And this gipsy, though I was continually dragged about with her from one
part of the country to the other, never let me want for anything. I
called her mother, but she told me at last she was not my mother, but
that she bought me for twelve shillings, and that my name was Bob
Singleton, not Robert, but plain Bob.
Who my father and mother really were I have never learnt.
When my gipsy mother happened in process of time to be hanged, I was
sent to a parish school; and then I was moved from one parish to
another, and at Bussleton, near Southampton, the master of a ship took a
fancy to me, and though I was not above twelve years old, he carried me
to sea with him on a voyage to Newfoundland.
I went several voyages with him, when, coming home from Newfoundland
about the year 1695, we were taken by an Algerine rover, which was in
its turn taken by two great Portuguese men-of-war.
We were carried into Lisbon, and there my master, the only friend I had
in the world, dying of his wounds, I was left starving in a foreign
country where I knew nobody, and could not speak a word of the language.
However, an old pilot found me, and, speaking in broken English, asked
me if I would go with him.
"Yes," said I, "with all my heart."
For two years I lived with him, and then he got to be master under Don
Garcia de Carravallas, captain of a Portuguese galleon, which was bound
to Goa in the East Indies. On this voyage I began to get a smattering of
the Portuguese tongue and a superficial knowledge of navigation. I also
learnt to be an arrant thief and a bad sailor.
I was reputed as mighty diligent and faithful to my master, but I was
very far from honest.
Indeed, I had no sense of virtue or religion in me, never having heard
much of either, and was growing up apace to be as wicked as anybody
could be.
Thieving, lying, swearing, forswearing, joined to the most abominable
lewdness, was the stated practice of the ship's crew; adding to it that,
with the most insufferable boasts of their own courage, they were,
generally speaking, the most complete cowards that I ever met with. And
I was exactly fitted for their society.
According to the English proverb, he that is shipped with the devil must
sail with the devil; I was among them, and I managed myself as well as I
could.
When we came to anchor on the coast of Madagascar to repair some damage
to the ship, there happened a most desperate mutiny among the men upon
account of a deficiency in their allowance, and I, being full of
mischief in my head, readily joined.
Though I was but a boy, as they called me, yet I prompted the mischief
all I could, and embarked in it so openly that I escaped very little
being hanged in the first and most early part of my life.
For the captain, getting wind of the plot, brought two fellows to
confess the particulars, and presently no less than sixteen men were
seized and put into irons, whereof I was one.
The captain, who was made desperate by his danger, tried us all, and we
were all condemned to die. The gunner and purser were hanged
immediately, and I expected it with the rest. I do not remember any
great concern I was under about it, only that I cried very much; for I
knew little then of this world, and nothing at all of the next.
However, the captain contented himself with executing these two, and
some of the rest, upon their humble submission, were pardoned; but five
were ordered to be set on shore on the island and left there, of which I
was one.
At our first coming into the island we were terrified exceedingly with
the sight of the barbarous people; but when we came to converse with
them awhile, we found they were not cannibals, as was reported, but they
came and sat down by us, and wondered much at our clothes and arms. Nor
did we suffer any harm from them during our whole stay on the island.
Before the ship sailed twenty-three of the crew decided to join us, and
the captain, not unwilling to lose them, sent us two barrels of powder,
and shot and lead, as well as a great bag of bread.
Being now a considerable number, and in condition to defend ourselves,
the first thing we did was to give everyone his hand that we would not
separate from one another, but that we would live and die together, that
we would be in all things guided by the majority, that we would appoint
a captain among us to be our leader, and that we would obey him on pain
of death.
_II.--A Mad Venture_
For two years we remained on the island of Madagascar, for at the
beginning we had no vessel large enough to pass the ocean.
I never proposed to speak in the general consultations, but one day I
told the company that our best plan was to cruise along the coast in
canoes, and seize upon the first vessel we could get that was better
than our own, and so from that to another, till perhaps we might at last
get a good ship to carry us wherever we pleased to go.
"Excellent advice," says one of them. "Admirable advice," says another.
"Yes, yes," says the third (which was a gunner), "the English dog has
given excellent advice, but it is just the way to bring us all to the
gallows. To go a-thieving, till from a little vessel we come to a great
ship, and so shall we turn downright pirates, the end of which is to be
hanged."
"You may call us pirates," says another, "if you will, and if we fall
into bad hands we may be used like pirates; but I care not for that.
I'll be a pirate or anything, rather than starve here!"