Daniel DeFoe, the author of "Robinson Crusoe" (from which these selections
are adapted), was born in London, England, in 1661, and died in 1731. He
wrote a number of books; but his "Robinson Crusoe" is the only one that
attained great notoriety.
1. I have already described my habitation, which was a tent under the side
of a rock, surrounded with a strong pale of posts and cables, but I might
now rather call it a wall, for I raised a kind of wall up against it of
turf, about two feet thick on the outside; and, after some time (I think
it was a year and a half) I raised rafters from it, leaning to the rock,
and thatched or covered it with boughs of trees and such things as I could
get to keep out the rain, which I found at some times of the year very
violent.
2. I have already observed how I brought all my goods into this pale, and
into the cave which I had made behind me; but I must observe, too, that at
first this was a confused heap of goods, which, as they lay in no order,
took up all my place, so that I had no room to turn myself. So I set to
work to enlarge my cave and work farther into the earth; for it was a
loose, sandy rock, which yielded easily to the labor I bestowed upon it.
3. And so when I found that I was pretty safe as to beasts of prey, I
worked sideways into the rock; and then, turning to the right again,
worked quite out, and made me a door to come out on the outside of my pale
or fortification. This gave me not only egress and regress, as it was a
back way to my tent and to my storehouse, but gave me room to stow my
goods.
4. And now I began to apply myself to make such necessary things as I
found I most wanted, particularly a chair and a table; for without these I
was not able to enjoy the few comforts I had in the world. I could not
write or eat, or do several things with so much pleasure without a table.
5. So I went to work. I had never handled a tool in my life; and yet in
time by labor, application, and contrivance, I found that I wanted nothing
but I could have made it, especially if I had had tools; however, I made
abundance of things, even without tools, and some with no more tools than
an adz and a hatchet, which perhaps were never made that way before, and
that with infinite labor.
6. For example, if I wanted a board, I had no other way but to cut down a
tree, set it before me, and hew it flat on either side with my ax till I
had brought it to be as thin as a plank, and then dub it smooth with my
adz.
7. It is true, by this method I could make but one board out of a whole
tree; but this I had no remedy for but patience, any more than I had for
the prodigious deal of time and labor which it took me to make a plank or
board; but my time or labor was little worth, and so it was as well
employed one way as another.
8. However, I made me a table and a chair, as I observed above; and this I
did out of the short pieces of boards which I brought on my raft from the
ship; but when I had wrought out some boards, as above, I made large
shelves, of the breadth of a foot and a half, one over another, all along
one side of my cave, to lay all my tools, nails, and ironwork on, and, in
a word, to separate everything at large in their places, that I might come
easily at them.
9. I knocked pieces into the wall of the rock to hang my guns and all
things that would hang up. So that, had my cave been seen, it would have
looked like a general magazine of all necessary things; and I had
everything so ready at my hand that it was a great pleasure to me to see
all my goods in such order, and especially to find my stock of all
necessaries so great.
DEFINITIONS.--l. Hab-i-ta'tion, a dwelling place. Pale, a fence. Ca'bles,
large ropes. Turf, sod. 3. For-ti-fi-ca'tion, a place built for defense
against attack. E'gress, going out. Re'gress, coming back, return. Stow,
to arrange compactly. 4. Ap-ply', to employ diligently. 6. Dub, to cut
down or bring to an even surface. 7. Pro-di'gious, very great. Deal, part,
amount. 9. Mag-a-zine', a storehouse,
EXERCISES.--How did Robinson Crusoe make a house? Of what did he make a
chair and table? How did he obtain boards? What does this lesson teach us
in regard to perseverance?