I came as near them undiscovered as I could, and then, before any of them saw me, I called aloud to them in Spanish, “What are ye, gentlemen?”
They started up at the noise, but were often times more confounded when they saw me, and the uncouth figure that I made. They made no answer at all, but I thought I perceived them just going to fly from me, when I spoke to them in English. “Gentlemen,” said I, “do not be surprised at me; perhaps you may have a friend near you, when you did not expect it.” “He must be sent directly from heaven, then,” said one of them very gravely to me, and pulling off his hat at the same time to me, “for our condition is past the help of man.” “All help is from heaven, sir,” said I. “But can you put a stranger in the way how to help you, for you seem to me to be in some great distress? I saw you when you landed; and when you seemed to make applications to the brutes that came with you, I saw one of them lift up his sword to kill you.”
The poor man, with tears running down his face, and trembling, looking like one astonished, returned, “Am I talking to God, or man? Is it a real man, or an angel?” “Be in no fear about that, sir,” said I. “If God had sent an angel to relieve you, he would have come better clothed, and armed after another manner than you see me in. Pray lay aside your fears; I am a man, an Englishman, and disposed to assist you, you see. I have one servant only; we have arms and ammunition; tell us freely, can we serve you? What is your case?”
“Our case,” said he, “sir, is too long to tell you while our murderers are so near; but in short, sir, I was commander of that ship; my men have mutinied against me, they have been hardly prevailed on not to murder me; and at last have set me on shore in this desolate place, with these two men with me, one my mate, the other a passenger, where we expected to perish, believing the place to be uninhabited, and know not yet what to think of it.”
“Where are those brutes, your enemies?” said I. “Do you know where they are gone?” “There they lie, sir,” said he, pointing to a thicket of trees. “My heart trembles for fear they have seen us, and heard you speak. If they have, they will certainly murder us all.”
“Have they any fire-arms?” said I. He answered they had only two pieces, and one which they left in the boat. “Well then,” said I, “leave the rest to me, I see they are all asleep; it is an easy thing to kill them all; but shall we rather take them prisoners?” He told me there were two desperate villains among them that it was scarce safe to show any mercy to; but if they were secured, he believed all the rest would return to their duty. I asked him which they were. He told me he could not at that distance describe them, but he would obey my order in anything I would direct. “Well,” says I, “let us retreat out of their view or hearing, lest they awake, and we will resolve further.” So they willingly went back with me, till the woods covered us from them.
“Look you, sir,” said I, “if I venture upon your deliverance, are you willing to make two conditions with me?” He anticipated my proposals by telling me that both he and the ship, if recovered, should be wholly directed and commanded by me in everything; and if the ship was not recovered he would live and die with me in what part of the world soever I would send him; and the two other men said the same.
“Well,” says I, “my conditions are but two. 1. That while you stay on this island with me, you will not pretend to any authority here; and if I put arms into your hands, you will, upon all occasions, give them up to me, and do no prejudice to me or mine upon this island; and in the meantime be governed by my orders. 2. That if the ship is, or may be, recovered, you will carry me and my man to England, passage free.”
He gave me all the assurances that the invention and faith of man could devise that he would comply with these most reasonable demands; and, besides, would owe his life to me, and acknowledge it upon all occasions, as long as lived.
“Well then,” said I, “here are three muskets for you, with powder and ball; tell me next what you think is proper to be done.” He showed all the testimony of his gratitude that he was able, but offered to be wholly guided by me. I told him I thought it was hard venturing anything; but the best method I could think of was to fire upon them at once, as they lay; and if any was not killed at the first volley, and offered to submit, we might save them, and so put it wholly upon God’s providence to direct the shot.
He said very modestly that he was loth to kill them if he could help it, but that those two were incorrigible villains, and had been the authors of all the mutiny in the ship, and if they escaped, we should be undone still; for they would go on board and bring the whole ship’s company, and destroy us all. “Well then,” says I, “necessity legitimates my advice, for it is the only way to save our lives.” However, seeing him still cautious of shedding blood, I told him they should go themselves, and manage as they found convenient.
In the middle of this discourse we heard some of them awake, and soon after we saw two of them on their feet. I asked him if either of them were of the men who he had said were the heads of the mutiny. He said, “No.” “Well then,” said I, “you may let them escape; and Providence seems to have wakened them on purpose to save themselves. Now,” says I, “if the rest escape you, it is your fault.”
Animated with this, he took the musket I had given him in his hand, and a pistol in his belt, and his two comrades with him, with each man a piece in his hand. The two men who were with him going first made some noise, at which one of the seamen who was awake turned about, and seeing them coming cried out to the rest; but it was too late then, for the moment he cried out they fired, I mean the two men, the captain wisely reserving his own piece. They had so well aimed their shot at the men they knew, that one of them was killed on the spot, and the other very much wounded; but not being dead, he started up upon his feet, and called eagerly for help to the other. But the captain stepping to him, told him It was too late to cry for help, he should call upon God to forgive his villainy; and with that word knocked him down with the stock of his musket, so that he never spoke more. There were three more in the company, and one of them was also slightly wounded. By this time I was come; and when they saw their danger, and that it was in vain to resist, they begged for mercy. The captain told them he would spare their lives if they would give him any assurance of their abhorrence of the treachery they had been guilty of, and would swear to be faithful him in recovering the ship, and afterwards in carrying her back to Jamaica, from whence they came. They gave him all the protestations of their sincerity that could be desired, and he was willing to believe them, and spare their lives, which I was not against, only I obliged him to keep them bound hand and foot while they were upon the island.
While this was doing, I sent Friday with the captain’s mate to the boat, with orders to secure her, and bring away the oars and sail, which they did; and by and by three straggling men that were (happily for them) parted from the rest, came back upon hearing the guns fired; and seeing their captain, who before was their prisoner, now their conqueror, they submitted to be bound also, and so our victory was complete.
It now remained that the captain and I should inquire into one another’s circumstances. I began first, and told him my whole history, which he heard with an attention even to amazement; and particularly at the wonderful manner of my being furnished with provisions and ammunition; and, indeed, as my story is a whole collection of wonders, it affected him deeply. But when he reflected from thence upon himself, and how I seemed to have been preserved there on purpose to save his life, the tears ran down his face, and he could not speak a word more.
After this communication was at an end I carried him and his two men into my apartment, leading them in just where I came out, viz., at the top of the house, where I refreshed them with such provisions as I had, and showed them all the contrivances I had made during my long, long inhabiting that place.
All I showed them, all I said to them, was perfectly amazing; but above all, the captain admired my fortification, and how perfectly I had concealed my retreat with a grove of trees, which, having been now planted near twenty years, and the trees growing much faster than in England, was become a little wood, and so thick that it was unpassable in any part of it but at that one side where I had reserved my little winding passage into it. I told him this