An American Robinson Crusoe for American Boys and Girls, Page 2

  All at once he drew himself together and shrank back. He heard a bushrustle and the thought came like a flash, "That is a wild animal thatwill pounce upon me and tear my flesh with his teeth and claws. Howshall I save myself? Where shall I fly for safety? Where shall I turn? Ihave nothing but my clothes and my life saved from the water. All that Ihad the waves have swallowed up."

  And then hunger and thirst began to trouble him. He had eaten nothingthe whole day and the salt water had made him sick.

  In the meantime the night had come on. Robinson was very tired.Everything was new and strange. He did not know which way to move. Hewas in the greatest terror.

  He expected to hear the roar of wild beasts from every secluded spot.Lions and tigers and dreadful serpents filled his thoughts. He must findshelter from them. But where should he pass the night? Not a house, ahut or a cave was to be seen. He stood a long time hesitating and didnot know what to do. Finally he thought, "I will do as the birds do andget into a tree." He very soon found a tree which had such thickbranches that it would hold him up.

  Robinson climbed up into the tree, made himself as comfortable aspossible, said his prayers, and as he was thoroughly exhausted, he soonfell asleep. When he awoke the sun was high in the sky. At first hecould not remember where he was. Then the truth burst upon him. He triedto move. He was stiff and sore. His flesh was bruised from being thrownagainst the rocks and beaten by the waves.

  He was dreadfully thirsty. His mouth and throat were dry and parchedfrom the salt water. His tongue was thick and swollen. He said, "I mustfind some water to drink or I shall die!"

  It was hard work to get down from the tree. His limbs and back achedfrom sitting in the tree all night. At last he slipped down and fell onthe ground. He clasped his hands in prayer and thanked God for keepinghim through the night.

  Then he got up and tried to walk. He was so weak he could not stand.

  He threw himself down on the ground and began to sob and cry, "O Lord,do not let me die! Do not let me die!" As he lay there he heard a queersound. He listened. It sounded like water running over rocks. He triedto get to the place from which the sound came. He tried to walk. When hefell he crawled on his hands and knees. At last the sound was close by.He dragged himself up on the rocks. Yes, there was a spring of clear,cool, sparkling water bubbling up and trickling over the stones.Robinson was so thirsty he put his face into the water and drank anddrank.

  Then he sat down, and after a while he drank again and again.

  After Robinson had satisfied his thirst and rested awhile, he felt muchbetter. He said, "I must try to walk and see whether I can findsomething to eat." He found many kinds of fruits and berries all aroundhim, but he was afraid to eat them, as they were strange to him and hefeared they might be poisonous.

  As he was walking along, all at once he spied a tall plant in thedistance which had a familiar look. It looked like corn. He said tohimself, "I wonder if it can be corn." At last he came near enough torecognize it. Yes, it was corn. It did not look exactly like the cornthat he saw at home, but still he knew it would be safe to eat it. Hebroke off an ear and eagerly ate the kernels raw. Oh, how good it was!Robinson could not remember anything that tasted half so good.

  He ate as much as he wanted and then filled his pockets with ears ofcorn for his supper. Then he went back to the spring to get anotherdrink.

  VIII

  ROBINSON ON AN ISLAND

  After his hunger and thirst were satisfied, Robinson thought he wouldtry to find another dwelling place. "My legs are stiff and sore fromsitting so uncomfortably last night, and there is so much danger offalling," he said. "I will climb yonder hill and look around and see onwhich side the houses are. I will find me a stick to help me on my way."

  He broke a stick from a dry bush and climbed up the steep sides of thehill. After a half hour's climb he was on top. What a sight met hiseyes! There were no houses, no huts to be seen, no smoke arose from theforest, no field could be seen. Nothing but trees and bush, sand androck.

  "I am then upon an island alone, without food, without shelter, withoutweapons! What will become of me?" he cried. "I am a prisoner. The islandis my prison, the waves are the guards which will not allow me to getaway. Will no ship ever come to set me free?"

  He stretched his gaze out to the sea till his eyes ached, but he saw noship.

  Robinson came down and seated himself on a stone and considered what heshould do. It was not yet noon, yet he feared greatly the next night. "Imust find me a better bed," was his first clear thought.

  IX

  ROBINSON'S SHELTER

  Robinson saw at a little distance what seemed to be a cleft or anopening in a huge rock. "If I could only get inside and find room tostay over night. The rock would protect me from rain, from the wind andwild animals better than a tree."

  He long sought in vain for a place wide enough to allow him to get intothe opening in the rock. He was about to give up, when he seized hold ofa branch of a thorn tree growing on the side of the rock. He lookedcloser and saw that it grew out of the cleft in the rock. He saw, too,that at this point the opening was wider and that he had only to removethe tree in order to get in. "The hole shall be my dwelling," he said."I must get the thorn tree out so that I can have room."

  That was easily said. He had neither axe nor saw, nor knife nor spade.How could he do it? He had nothing but his hands. He tried to pull itout by the roots, but in vain. He wasn't strong enough.

  "I must dig it out," said Robinson.

  He scratched with his nails, but the earth was too hard. What should hedo? He sought a stick with a fork in it and dug in the earth, but it wasslow work. Then he found a clam-shell. He did better with it, but it washard work, and Robinson was not used to hard work. The sweat ran downhis face and he had often to stop and rest in the shade. The sun burnedso hot and the rock so reflected the heat that he was all but overcome.But he worked on. When evening came, he would sleep in the tree and nextmorning he would go at it again. On the third day the roots were alllaid bare.

  But the roots were fast in the clefts of the rock and he could notloosen it, try ever so hard. What would he not have given for an axe, orat least a knife. And yet he had never thought of their value when athome. He attempted to cut one root through with his clam-shell, but theshell crumbled and would not cut the hard wood.

  He stood for a long time thinking, not knowing what next to do. He madeup his mind that he must have something harder than the shell to cutwith. Then he tried a stone with a sharp edge, but soon found he neededanother one, however. He found one. Then he set the sharp one on thewood and struck it with the heavy one. In this way he slowly cut theroots in two.

  On the fifth day there was yet left one big root, bigger than any of theothers. Robinson got up early in the morning. He worked the whole day.Finally it gave a crack and it, too, was broken.

  Robinson had only now to remove the loose earth inside the cleft. Hefound the opening could be made large and roomy. It was choked up withdirt. He dug out enough to allow him room enough to make a place to liedown. "In the future," he thought, "I will take out all the dirt andthen I shall be comfortable."

  It was then dark and the moon shone bright in the heavens. Robinsongathered a heap of dry grass and made himself a safe bed. But as he laythere he saw the moonbeams shining into his cave. He sprang up. "Howeasy," he thought, "for wild animals to creep in here upon me."

  He crawled out and looked around. Not far from the cave he saw a largeflat stone. With great trouble he rolled it to the opening of his cave,but before this the morning began to dawn. He went inside the shelter,seized the stone with both hands and rolled it into the opening till italmost closed it. "I have now a closed home. I can again stretch mylegs. Wind and rain cannot get at me, nor wild animals."

  X

  ROBINSON MAKES A HAT

  Refreshed and with renewed strength, Robinson awoke late the nextmorning, but he had a bad headache. The day before the hot tropic sunhad beat down on his bare head
, as he worked at his cave. He was so busythat he forgot to go into the shade from time to time in order to shieldhimself from the scorching sunshine. He felt a new need.

  "I must make me a hat," said Robinson to himself. "But how?" He had nostraw, no thread and no needle. He looked around for a long time, butfound nothing. The sun mounted even higher in the heavens, and shonehotter and hotter. He went to seek shelter at last in the deep shade ofa nearby tall plant.

  As he stood there he examined the plant more carefully. "Out of theseleaves," he said, "I might make a hat." He climbed up the short stem ofthe plant and saw that it had not only leaves as long as himself, butbetween the leaves were big bunches of long, thin fruit, as thick asthree fingers and similar in shape to a cucumber.

  He plucked the leaves and fruit and was about to eat some of the fruitwhen he heard near him a light stir as of some animal. He rolled theleaves and fruit together and hastened back to the cave.

  THE BANANA TREE]

  The bananas, for that is what the fruit proved to be, were sweet andrefreshing. After he had eaten enough he set immediately about makinghis hat. He broke off a couple of reeds. He bent one into a hoop. Butthe hoop would not hold without thread. Sometimes it was too large andsometimes too small. But it must fit his head. He pulled up grass andbound its ends together, but the grass stalks were not strong enough. Hehunted until he found a tree whose inner bark was soft and came out inlong fibres. He bound his reed with this. This, too, made the hoop softso that it did not hurt his head.

  When the hoop was ready and fitted to his head he found the bananaleaves could not be used. Their veins ran straight out from the midrib.This made them easily torn, and besides, they were too large. They werenot the best shape. He saw that leaves about a foot long with broad andtapering points would be best. He saw too, that if the leaves had theirveins running parallel with the midrib they would be stronger. He madesearch and at length found leaves that seemed made for his purpose. Theywere thick and leathery and tapered from base to apex like a triangle.

  He now proceeded with his hat-making. He would take a leaf and lay it onthe ground with the base toward him. Then he laid the hoop on the baseof the leaf, wrapped it around the hoop and fastened it with thorns. Hedid the same with the other leaves. The thorns were his pins. At lasthe pinned the tips of the leaves together at the top and the hat wasready. It looked just like a big cone, but it kept out the heat of thesun.

  Robinson now had corn and bananas and when he was thirsty he drank ahandful of water from the spring. He had been now nine days on theisland. Every day he looked out on the sea until his eyes ached to seeif he might discover a ship.

  He could not understand why no ship came his way. "Who knows how long Imust wait here?" said he sorrowfully. Then the thought came to him: "Youwill not be able to keep track of the days unless you write it down."

  XI

  ROBINSON'S CALENDAR

  The matter of keeping track of time puzzled Robinson very much. It wasgetting more difficult every day to keep it in his memory. He must writedown the days as they slip by, but where and how? He had neither pen,ink, nor paper. Should he mark every day with a colored stone on thesmooth side of the huge rock wall within whose clefts he had dug out hiscave? But the rain would wash off the record and then he would lose allhis bearings. Then he thought of the beach, but there the wind and waveswould soon also erase it.

  He thought a long time. "I must find something," he said to himself onwhich to keep a record. "I must also know when Sunday is. I must restone day in the week. Yes, I must find something," he said, "on which towrite." And finally he found it. He chose two trees standing near eachother and then sought for a small sharp stone, which he could makestill sharper by striking it on another. When he had got this pen readyhe cut into the bark of one tree:

  _Shipwreck, Sunday, 10th of September, 1875._

  He made seven cuts in a row for the seven days in the week. The firstcut was longer than the others. This was to represent the Sunday. Atsundown every day he made a new cut in the bark.

  The other tree he called the month tree. On its stem he was to cut amark every time his week tree told him a month had passed. But he mustbe careful, for the months were not of equal length. But he rememberedthat his teacher had once said in school that the months could becounted on the knuckles and hollows of the hand, in such a way that thelong and short months could be found easily and he could tell in thisway the number of days in each.

  Robinson worked at enlarging his shelter a little every day. He wassorely at loss to find something in which to carry the dirt away fromthe entrance, or enough so that it would not choke up the opening. Alarge clam shell was all he could think of at present. He would carrythe dirt to the entrance and some distance away, and then throw it.Fortunately the ground sloped away rapidly, so that he needed a kind ofplatform before his door.

  He was careful to open the cleft at some distance above the largeopening. For the air was damp and impure in the shelter. But with theopening made high above, fresh air was constantly passing into, andimpure air out of, his cave. Light, too, was admitted in this way.

  XII

  ROBINSON MAKES A HUNTING BAG

  Several days passed with Robinson's hat-making and his calendar-makingand his watching the sea. Every day his corn and bananas became moredistasteful to him. And he planned a longer journey about the island tosee if something new to eat could be found.

  But he considered that if he went a distance from his cave and foundsomething it would really be of little use to him. "I could eat myfill," he said, "but that is all. And by the time I get back to my caveI will again be hungry. I must find something in which I can gather andcarry food." He found nothing.

  "The people in New York," he said, "have baskets, or pockets, or bagsmade of coarse cloth. Of them all, I could most easily make the net,perhaps, of vines. But the little things would fall out of the net. Iwill see whether I can make a net of small meshes."

  But he soon saw that the vines did not give a smooth surface. Hethought for a long while. In his garden at home his father had sometimesbound up the young trees with the soft inner bark of others. He wonderedif he could use this. He stripped away the outer bark from the tree,which before had yielded him a fibre for his hat, and pulled off thelong, smooth pieces of the inner bark. He twisted them together. Then hethought how he could weave the strands together. He looked at his shirt.A piece was torn off and unravelled. He could see the threads go up anddown. He saw that some threads go from left to right (woof), otherslengthwise (the warp).

  From his study of the woven cloth, Robinson saw he must have a firmerthread than the strips of bark gave alone. He separated his bark intolong, thin strips. These he twisted into strands of yarn by rollingbetween his hands, or on a smooth surface. As he twisted it he wound iton a stick. It was slow, hard work. Of all his work, the making of yarnof thread gave him the most trouble. He learned to twist it by knottingthe thread around the spindle or bobbin on which he wound it andtwirling this in the air. He remembered sadly the old spinning wheel hehad seen at his grandmother's house.

  His next care was something to hold the threads while he wove them inand out. He had never seen a loom.

  After long study Robinson set two posts in the ground and these he boundwith seventy-two strands horizontally under each other. Then he tied inthe top at the left another thread and wove it in and out through theseventy-two threads. So he tied seventy-two vertical strands and wovethem in and out. Thus he had a net three times as long as his foot andas wide as long. He tied the four corners together. He made a wovenhandle for it and put it on his shoulder like a sack, saying gleefully,"This shall be my hunting bag."

  ROBINSON'S LOOM]

  XIII

  ROBINSON EXPLORES THE ISLAND

  After Robinson made his hunting bag he was anxious to set off on hisjourney of exploring the island. So he arose very early next morning."Before it is hot," thought he, "I will be quite a distance on myjourney." He ate a couple
of bananas, scooped up a few handfuls of waterfrom the spring, stuck a few ears of corn in his hunting bag, took hisstick in his hand and went forth. As he left his cave the thought struckhim: "What if I could not find my cave again? How can I manage so that Ican come back to it? I will go away in one direction and return the sameway; but suppose I were to lose the way?"

  Then he noticed his shadow pointing like a great finger from the seatoward the land. He could direct himself by that. He kept his shadow infront of him. He had noticed, too, that the wind always blew north ofthe point where the sun rose. This helped him. But sometimes the winddied down.

  COCOANUT PALM TREE]

  He had to climb over many rocks and pierce many thickets. At each stephe saw a rich growth of plants, stems, leaves, flowers, but nothing toeat, no fruits, or nuts. At length he came to a tree as high as a smallchurch steeple. Then he thought of what his father had once said aboutthe trees in strange countries. "Many are as tall as a church steepleand the nuts are as big as one's head." He looked again. Yes, therethey hung among the leaves, concealed high above in the crown! But sohigh, it was well that Robinson had learned to climb while on board theship. He quickly laid down his hunting bag and clambered up the smoothstem of the high tree, a palm. He picked off a nut and threw it down andthen several more, and climbed down again.

  But the nuts were very hard. How should he open them? He had broughtalong his sharp stone with which he had stripped off the inner bark.With this he forced off the thick outer shell. But now came the hard nutwithin, and how hard it was! Striking it was of no use.