218 STRAYING FROM THE RIGHT PATH.

less than a month’s time I had so fenced it round that my flock o1
herd—call it which you please—which were not so wild now as at
first they might be supposed to be, were well enough secured in it.
So, without any further delay, I removed ten young she-goats and
two he-goats to this piece: and when they were there I continued
to perfect the fence till I had made it as secure as the other; which,
however, [ did at more leisure, and it took me up more time by a
great deal,

All this labour I was at the expense of purely from my appre-
hensions on the account of the print of a man’s foot which I had
seen; for as yet I never saw any human creature come near the
island, and T had now lived two years under these uneasinesses,
which indeed made my life much less comfortable than it was
before——as may well be imagined by any who know what it is to
live in the constant snare of the fear of man. And this I must
observe with grief, too, that the discomposure of my mind had too
great impressions also upon the religious part of my thoughts; for
the dread and terror of falling into the hands of savages and canni-
bals Jay so upon my spirits that I seldom found myself in a due
temper for application to my Maker—at least, not with the sedate
calmness and resignation of soul which I was wont to do. I rather
prayed to God as under great affliction and pressure of mind, sur-
rounded with danger, and in expectation every night of being
murdered and devoured before morning. And T must testify from
my experience that a temper of peace, thankfulness, love, and
affection, is much more the proper frame for prayer than that of
terror and discomposure ; and that, under the dread of mischief
impending, a man is no more fit for a comforting performance of
the duty of praying to God than he is for repentance on a sick-
bed: for these discomposures affect the mind as the others do the
body; and the discomposure of the mind must necessarily be as
great a disability as that of the body-—-and much greater, praying
to God being properly an act of the mind, not of the body.

But to go on. After I had thus secured one part of my little
living stock, I went about the whole island searching for another
private place to make such another deposit, when, wandering more
to the west point of the island than I had ever done yet, and looking