One night, when he had put himself almost into a fever with the trouble of his mind, he had lain long awake, tossing and moaning, but at last he had fallen asleep.  And he dreamed, not as he had usually done of late, that he was sailing to the mainland, but that as he was leaving his castle in the morning he saw on the shore two canoes and eleven savages landing, and that they had with them another man, whom they were just about to kill and eat, when suddenly the prisoner jumped up and ran for his life.  And in his dream Robinson fancied that the man came running to hide in the thicket round the castle, and that thereupon he went out to help him.  Then in the dream, the savage kneeled down, as if begging for mercy, and Robinson took him over the ladder into the castle, saying to himself, “Now that I’ve got this fellow, I can certainly go to the mainland, for he will show me what course to steer, and where to go when we land.”  And he woke, with the joyful feeling that now at last all was well.  But when he was wide awake, and knew that it was only a dream after all, poor Robinson was more cast down than ever, and more unhappy than he had been during all the years he had lived on the island.

The dream had, however, this result; that he saw his only plan to get away was, if possible, to rescue some day one of the prisoners whom the cannibals were about to kill, and in time get the man to help him to navigate his canoe across the sea.

With this idea, he set himself to watch, more closely than ever he had done before, for the savages to land, and during more than a year and a half he went nearly every day to his lookout-place, and swept the sea with his telescope, in the hope of seeing canoes coming.  But none came, and Robinson was getting terribly tired of the constant watch.  Still he did not give up, for he knew that sooner or later the savages would land again.

Yet many months passed, and still they did not come, till one morning, very early, almost to his surprise, he saw no fewer than five canoes hauled up on the shore on his own side of the island.  The savages who had come in them were nowhere to be seen.  Now, he knew that always from four to six men came in each canoe, which meant that at least twenty, and perhaps as many as thirty men had landed.

This was a greater number than he cared to face, so he kept inside his castle, in great doubt what to do, but ready to fight, in case they should attack him.

When he had waited a long time and still could hear nothing of the savages, he climbed up his ladder and got to the top of the rock, taking great care not to show himself against the skyline.  Looking through his glass, he saw that there were at least thirty savages, dancing wildly round a fire.

As he looked, some of the men left the others, and going over to the canoes dragged from’ them two prisoners.  One of these almost at once fell forward on his face, knocked down from behind, as it seemed to Robinson, with a wooden club, and two or three of the cannibals at once cut him open to be ready for cooking, while for a moment or two they left the other prisoner standing by himself.