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第7章 旧账

　　About half-an-hour afterwards they all came up in a body astern ofus, and so near that we could easily discern what they were, thoughwe could not tell their design; and I easily found they were someof my old friends, the same sort of savages that I had been used toengage with. In a short time more they rowed a little farther outto sea, till they came directly broadside with us, and then roweddown straight upon us, till they came so near that they could hearus speak; upon this, I ordered all my men to keep close, lest theyshould shoot any more arrows, and made all our guns ready; butbeing so near as to be within hearing, I made Friday go out uponthe deck, and call out aloud to them in his language, to know whatthey meant. Whether they understood him or not, that I knew not;but as soon as he had called to them, six of them, who were in theforemost or nighest boat to us, turned their canoes from us, andstooping down, showed us their naked backs; whether this was adefiance or challenge we knew not, or whether

　　When the Spaniards came, the two Englishmen were so encouraged,that they could not satisfy themselves to stay any longer there;but taking five of the Spaniards, and themselves, with four musketsand a pistol among them, and two stout quarter-staves, away theywent in quest of the savages. And first they came to the treewhere the men lay that had been killed; but it was easy to see thatsome more of the savages had been there, for they had attempted tocarry their dead men away, and had dragged two of them a good way,but had given it over. From thence they advanced to the firstrising ground, where they had stood and seen their camp destroyed,and where they had the mortification still to see some of thesmoke; but neither could they here see any of the savages. Theythen resolved, though with all possible caution, to go forwardtowards their ruined plantation; but, a little before they camethither, coming in sight of the sea-shore, they saw plainly thesavages all embarked again in their canoes, in order to be gon

　　THE greater weight the anxieties and perplexities of these thingswere to our thoughts while we were at sea, the greater was oursatisfaction when we saw ourselves on shore; and my partner told mehe dreamed that he had a very heavy load upon his back, which hewas to carry up a hill, and found that he was not able to standlonger under it; but that the Portuguese pilot came and took it offhis back, and the hill disappeared, the ground before him appearingall smooth and plain: and truly it was so; they were all like menwho had a load taken off their backs. For my part I had a weighttaken off from my heart that it was not able any longer to bear;and as I said above we resolved to go no more to sea in that ship.When we came on shore, the old pilot, who was now our friend, gotus a lodging, together with a warehouse for our goods; it was alittle hut, with a larger house adjoining to it, built and alsopalisadoed round with canes, to keep out pilferers, of which therewere not a few in that country: however, the mag

　　CHAPTER X - HE IS LEFT ON SHORE

ere he sold hiscargo very well. Here, having made a good acquaintance at Manilla,he got his ship made a free ship, and the governor of Manilla hiredhim to go to Acapulco, on the coast of America, and gave him alicence to land there, and to travel to Mexico, and to pass in anySpanish ship to Europe with all his men. He made the voyage toAcapulco very happily, and there he sold his ship: and havingthere also obtained allowance to travel by land to Porto Bello, hefound means to get to Jamaica, with all his treasure, and abouteight years after came to England exceeding rich.

ncreaseand recruit their number, as by the particular necessaryemployments which they were bred to, being artificers, to assistthem in those things in which at present they were in want.

e women (who, it seems, proved very faithful to them) tolead them, with their two wives, and whatever they could carry awaywith them, to their retired places in the woods, which I havespoken of above, and there to bind the two fellows hand and foot,till they heard farther. In the next place, seeing the savageswere all come on shore, and that they had bent their coursedirectly that way, they opened the fences where the milch cows werekept, and drove them all out; leaving their goats to straggle inthe woods, whither they pleased, that the savages might think theywere all bred wild; but the rogue who came with them was toocunning for that, and gave them an account of it all, for they wentdirectly to the place.

　　We were now on shore in China; if I thought myself banished, andremote from my own country at Bengal, where I had many ways to gethome for my money, what could I think of myself now, when I wasabout a thousand leagues farther off from home, and destitute ofall manner of prospect of return? All we had for it was this:that in about four months' time there was to be another fair at theplace where we were, and then we might be able to purchase variousmanufactures of the country, and withal might possibly find someChinese junks from Tonquin for sail, that would carry us and ourgoods whither we pleased. This I liked very well, and resolved towait; besides, as our particular persons were not obnoxious, so ifany English or Dutch ships came thither, perhaps we might have anopportunity to load our goods, and get passage to some other placein India nearer home. Upon these hopes we resolved to continuehere; but, to divert ourselves, we took two or three journeys intothe country.

　　In passing this frightful wilderness we saw, two or three times,little parties of the Tartars, but they seemed to be upon their ownaffairs, and to have no design upon us; and so, like the man whomet the devil, if they had nothing to say to us, we had nothing tosay to them: we let them go. Once, however, a party of them cameso near as to stand and gaze at us. Whether it was to consider ifthey should attack us or not, we knew not; but when we had passedat some distance by them, we made a rear-guard of forty men, andstood ready for them, letting the caravan pass half a mile orthereabouts before us. After a while they marched off, but theysaluted us with five arrows at their parting, which wounded a horseso that it disabled him, and we left him the next day, poorcreature, in great need of a good farrier. We saw no more arrowsor Tartars that time.