NECESSITY THE MOTHER OF INVENTION, 648

shoes after we found him; for, not being used to any so long, his feet swelled
when he came first to wear them again.

After he had conquered his melancholy, he diverted himself sometimes
with cutting his name on the trees, and the time of his being left, and con-
tinuance there. He was at first much pestered with cats and rats, that bred
in great numbers from some of each species which had got ashore from ships
that put in there to wood and water. The rats gnawed his feet and clothes
whilst he was asleep, which obliged him to cherish the cats with his goats’
flesh, by which many of them became so tame that they would lie about him
in hundreds, and soon delivered him from the rats. He likewise tamed
some kids, and, to divert himself, would now and then sing and dance with
them and his cats; so that, by the favour of Providence and vigour of his
youth, being now but thirty years old, he came at last to conquer all the in-
conveniences of his solitude, and to be very easy.

When his clothes were worn out, he made himself a coat and a cap of
goat-skins, which he stitched together with little thongs of the same that he
cut with his knife. He had no other needle but a nail; and when his
knife was worn to the back, he made others, as well as he could, of some
iron hoops that were left ashore, which he beat thin and ground upon stones.
Having some linen cloth with him, he sewed some shirts with a nail, and
stitched them with the worsted of his old stockings, which he pulled out on
purpose. He had his last shirt on when we found him on the island.

At his first coming on board us, he had so much forgot his language, for
want of use, that we could scarce understand him, for he seemed to speak
his words by halves. We offered him a dram, but he would not touch it,
having drunk nothing but water since his being here; and it was some time
before he could relish our victuals. He could give us an account of no other
product of the island than what we have mentioned, except some black
plums, which are very good, but hard to come at, the trees which bear them
growing on high mountains and rocks. Pimento-trees are plenty here; and
we saw some of sixty feet high, and about two yards thick; and cotton-trees
higher, near four fathoms round in the stock. The climate is so good
that the trees and grass are verdant all the year round. The winter lasts
no longer than June and July, and is not then severe, there being only a
small frost and a little hail, but sometimes great rains. The heat of the
summer is equally moderate, and there is not much thunder or tempestuous
weather of any sort. He saw no venomous or savage creature on the island,
nor any sort of beasts but goats, the first of which had been put ashore here,
on purpose for a breed, by Juan Fernandez, a Spaniard, who settled thore
with some families, till the continent of Chili began to submit to the
Spaniards; which, being more profitable, tempted them to quit this island,
capable, however, of maintaining a good number of people, and being made
su strong that they could not easily be dislodged from thence.