In the mean time, I advanced towards the two that followed. Rushing at once upon the foremost, I knocked him down with the stock of my piece. I was loth to fire because I would not have the rest hear, tho’ at that distance they would not have known what to make of it. Having knock'd this fellow down, the other who pursued him stopped as if he had been frightened and I advanced apace towards him. As I came nearer, I perceived he had a bow and arrow and was fitting it to shoot at me. I was then necessitated to shoot at him first, which I did, and killed him at the first shot.
The poor savage who fled, tho’ he saw both his enemies fallen and killed, was so frightened with the fire and noise of my piece he stood stock-still and neither came forward nor went backward. He seemed rather inclined still to fly. I hallooed again to him and made signs to come forward, which he understood and came a little way. Then stopped again. And then a little farther, and stopped again. I could then perceive he stood trembling, as if he had been taken prisoner just to be killed, as his two enemies were. I beckoned to him again to come to me and gave him all the signs of encouragement I could think of. He came nearer and nearer, kneeling down every ten or twelve steps in token of acknowledgment for saving his life. I smiled at him and looked pleasantly and beckoned to him to come still nearer. At length he came close to me. He kneeled down again, kissed the ground, and laid his head upon the ground, and taking me by the foot, set my foot upon his head. This, it seems, was in token of swearing to be my slave for ever. I took him up, and made much of him, and encouraged him all I could.
But there was more work to do yet. I perceived the savage whom I knocked down was not killed but stunned with the blow, and began to come to himself. I pointed to him and showed my savage he was not dead. Upon this he spoke some words to me, and tho’ I could not understand them, I thought they were pleasant to hear, for they were the first sound of a man's voice I had heard for above twenty-five years.
But there was no time for such reflections now. The savage who was knocked down recovered himself so far as to sit up upon the ground and I perceived my savage, for so I call him now, began to be afraid. When I saw that, I presented my other piece at the other man as if I would shoot him. Upon this my savage made a motion to me and took up the other savage's great wooden sword, which had fallen when I struck him. My savage no sooner had it but he ran to his enemy and, at one blow, cut off his head so cleverly no executioner in Germany could have done it sooner or better. When he had done this, he came laughing to me in triumph and brought me the sword again and, with abundance of gestures which I did not understand, laid it down just before me with the head of the savage he had killed.
I turned to go away, and beckoned him to follow me, making signs to him more might come after them. Upon this, he made signs to me he should bury the bodies with sand, that they might not be seen by the rest if they followed. I made signs to him again to do so. He fell to work and in an instant he had scraped a hole in the sand with his broad hands big enough to bury the first in, then dragged him into it and covered him, and did so by the other also. I believe he had buried them both in a quarter of an hour. Then calling him away, I carried him, not to my castle, but quite away to my cave, on the farther part of the island. So I did not let my dream come to pass in that part, viz. that he came into my grove for shelter.
Here I gave him bread and a bunch of raisins to eat and a draught of water, which I found he was indeed in great distress for, by his running. Having refreshed him, I made signs for him to go and lie down to sleep, showing him a place where I had laid some rice-straw and a blanket upon it which I used to sleep upon myself sometimes. The poor creature lay down and went to sleep.
He was a comely fellow, oddly made, with long straight limbs, not too large or tall, well shaped despite the hunch to his back, and, as I reckon, about twenty-six years of age. The smell of fish did hang about him like a cloud, as if it were his only sustenance. His hands were long and flat, with fingers as long again, and I bethought myself that he could wrap his whole head within them. Likewise were his feet and toes long, and broad, with a tiny claw on each rather than a toenail, yet as I examin'd them more I was amaz'd to see a thin web of skin twixt each splayed toe, as one would see on the feet of a duck.
He had a very good countenance, not a fierce and surly aspect, but seem'd to have something very manly in his face. Yet he had all the sweetness and softness of an European in his countenance too, especially when he smiled. His hair was long and black, not curled like wool. His forehead very high and large. A great vivacity and sparkling sharpness in his large, dark eyes, 'tho not as wide apart as those of the other savages. The colour of his skin was, again, not quite the slick grey of the other savages, but very dusky. And yet not an ugly, mottled, nauseous dusky, but of a bright kind of a polished slate colour that had in it something very agreeable, tho’ not very easy to describe. His face was round and plump, his nose small and thin, not flat like the Negroes, yet with long slits. A very good mouth, thin lips, and his long, thin teeth well set, and as white as ivory.
I left him sleeping and went to tend my businesses.
My new servant, many lessons,
two monsters