About ten days afterwards, as I was steering out to double a cape, I came in sight of a Portuguese ship.  On coming nearer, they hailed me, but I understood not a word.  At last a Scotch sailor called to me, and I answered I was an Englishman, and had made my escape from the Moors of Salee.  They then bade me come on board, and very kindly took me in, with all my goods.

We had a very good voyage to the Brazils, and when we reached our destination the captain recommended me to an honest man who had a sugar plantation.  Here I settled down for a while, and learned the planting of sugar.  Then I took a piece of land, and became a planter myself.  My affairs prospered, and had I continued in the station I was now in, I had room for many happy things to have yet befallen me; but I was still to be the agent of my own miseries.

II.—­Lord of an Island and Alone

Some of my neighbours, hearing that I had a knowledge of Guinea trading, proposed to fit out a vessel and send her to the coast of Guinea to purchase negroes to work in our plantations.  I was well pleased with the idea; and when they asked me to go to manage the trading part, I forgot all the perils and hardships of the sea, and agreed to go.  A ship being fitted out, we set sail on September 1, 1659.

We had very good weather for twelve days, but after crossing the line, violent hurricanes took us, and drove us out of the way of all human commerce.  In this distress, one morning, there was a cry of “Land!” and almost at the same moment the ship struck against a sandbank.  We took to a boat, and worked towards the land; but before we could reach it, a raging wave came rolling astern of us, and overset the boat.  We were all thrown into the sea, and out of fifteen who were on board, none escaped but myself.  I managed, somehow, to scramble to shore, and clambered up the cliffs, and sat me down on the grass half-dead.  Night coming on me, I took up my lodging in a tree.

When I waked, it was broad day, the weather clear, and the storm abated.  What surprised me most was that in the night the ship had been lifted from the bank by the swelling tide, and driven ashore almost as far as the place where I had landed.  I saw that if we had all kept on board we had been all safe, and I had not been so miserable as to be left entirely destitute of all company as I now was.

I swam out to the ship, and found that her stern lay lifted up on the bank.  All the ship’s provisions were dry, and, being well disposed to eat, I filled my pockets and ate as I went about other things, for I had no time to lose.  We had several spare yards and planks, and with these I made a raft.  I emptied three of the seamen’s chests, and let them down upon the raft, and filled them with provisions.  I also let down the carpenter’s chest, and some arms and ammunition—­all of which, after much labour, I got safely to land.

My next work was to view the country.  Where I was I yet knew not, but after I had with great labour got to the top of a hill which rose up very steep and high, I saw my fate, to my great affliction—­viz., that I was in an island, uninhabited except by wild beasts.