THE SHIPWRECKED SPANIARDS, 895

The first thing, however, which I inquired into, that I might
begin where I left off, was of their own part; and I desired
he would give me a particular account of his voyage back to his
countrymen with the boat, when I sent him to fetch them over.
He told me there was little variety in that part, for nothing re-
markable happened to them on the way, they having very calm
weather and a smooth sea; for his countrymen it could not be
doubted, he said, but that they were overjoyed to see him. (It
seems he was the principal man among them, the captain of the
vessel they had been shipwrecked in having been dead some time).
They were, he said, the more surprised to see him, because they
knew that he was fallen into the hands of the savages, who, they
were satisfied, would devour him as they did all the rest of the
prisoners; that when he told them the story of his deliverance,
and in what manner he was furnished for carrying them away, it
was like a dream to them; and their astonishment, they said, was
something like that of Joseph’s brethren, when he told them who
he was, and told them the story of his exaltation in Pharaoh’s
court. But when he showed them the arms, the powder, the ball,
and the provisions that he brought them for their journey or
voyage, they were restored to themselves, took a just share of the
joy of their deliverance, and immediately prepared to come away
with him.

Their first business was to get canoes; and in this they were
obliged not to stick so much upon the honest part of it, but to
trespass upon their friendly savages, and to borrow two large
canoes, or periaguas, on pretence of going out a fishing or for
pleasure.

In these they came away the next morning. It seems they
wanted no time to get themselves ready, for they had no baggage,

_neither clothes nor provisions, nor anything in the world but what
they had on them, and a few roots to eat, of which they used to °
make their bread.

They were in all three weeks absent, and in that time, unluckily
for them, I had the occasion offered for my escape, as I mentioned
in my other Part, and to get off from the island, leaving three of
the most impudent, hardened, ungoverned, disagreefble villains