After this adventure I was very careful not to go out again without protection from the weather in the shape of a good thick coat and sou’wester, beside which I always put a tin of biscuits and a two-pound tin of preserved meat in the lockers near the stern, in case of emergency, and more than once I had to break bulk when a trip unexpectedly kept me out longer than I anticipated.

I now had all I could desire in the way of comforts and engagements, and not an idle day did I spend, except Sundays, upon which day I never did a stroke of work nor fired a shot.  Even my rabbit gins were neglected that day.  All I did was to feed my animals, walk or doze in my hammock and meditate, and this to me was a great enjoyment.  When the wind was westerly I could hear the Guernsey church bells ringing for service, and when they ceased I knew it was eleven o’clock, and regulated my watch accordingly; that being done I always spent the time between that hour and twelve in going through the church service for the day, and the regulation three hymns, with one or two added, and a chapter or two from the Bible in place of a sermon.  Then I felt comfortable, and contented, and without fear.

One Sunday afternoon, swinging in my hammock in the grove reading a book of poetry, I came across those beautiful verses by Cowper, entitled, “Alexander Selkirk,” and could not but think how true they were to my own lot in many points; in fact, few persons reading the poem could appreciate it as I did in my solitude, with nought but the sea and sky with their teeming creatures around me.  The first half of the first verse fitted me capitally, and I could not get it out of my head all day; it tickled my fancy: 

     “I am monarch of all I survey,
       To my right there is none to dispute;
     From the centre all round to the sea,
       I am lord of both fowl and of brute.”

In the second verse occur the lines: 

     “I am out of humanity’s reach,
       I must finish my journey alone;
     Never hear the sweet music of speech—­
       I start at the sound of my own.”

Certainly it was very seldom I heard a human voice, even in the distance, sometimes not for weeks together; but as to starting at the sound of my own, well, that is not at all correct.  Probably if my friends could have heard the voice of either “Eddy” or myself, when in full song, they would have had a start, if not a severe shock to the system.

Again: 

     “Society, friendship, and love,
       Divinely bestowed upon men;
     Oh, had I the wings of a dove,
       How soon would I taste you again!”

Dove’s wings would not have borne my thirteen stone weight.  Perchance the giant wings of the Albatross would have been more practicable, if less poetical, and with these appendages I might have been tempted to have a peep at my friends in England, despite the supremely ridiculous figure I should have cut in the air, and the chance I should have stood of being shot as a very rara avis.  Fancy me lighting down on our old thatched-roof house, and frightening everyone out of their seven senses, including my darling Priscilla, who, if she were not too frightened, would certainly bring me down with a charge of No. 4 (chilled) shot.