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ROBINSON CRUSOE. ~ 383

apprehensions of them ; but they went their own way, and we
heard no more of them,

I shall not pester the reader with a tedious description of
places, journals of our voyages, variations of the compass,
latitudes, trade winds, &c. ; it is enough to name the ports and
places which we touched at, and what occurred to us upon our
passage from one to another. We touched first at the Island
of Madagascar, where, though the people are fierce and treach-
erous, and very well armed with lances and bows, which they
use with inconceivable dexterity, yet we fared very well with
them awhile; they treated us very civilly ; and for some trifles
which we gave them, such as knives, scissors, &c., they brought
us eleven good fat bullocks, of a middling size, which we took
in partly for fresh provisions for our pieces spending, and the
rest to salt for the ship’s use.

We were obliged to stay here some time after we had fur-
nished ourselves with provisions ; and I, who was always too
curious to look into every nook of the world wherever I came,
went on shore as often as I could. It was on the east side of
the island that we went on shore one evening: and the people,
who, by the way, are very numerous, came thronging about us,
and stood gazing at us at a distance: but as we had treated freely
with them, and had been kindly used, we thought ourselves in no
danger ; but when we saw the people, we cut three boughs out of
a tree, and stuck them up at a distance from us ; which, it seems,
is a mark in that country, not only ofa truce and friendship, but
when it is accepted, the other side set up three poles or boughs,
which is a signal that they accept the truce too ; but then thisis a
known condition of the truce, that you are not to pass beyond their
three poles towards them, nor they to come past your three
poles, or boughs, towards you ; so that you are perfectly secure
within the three poles, and all the space between your poles and
theirs is allowed like a market for free converse, traffic, and
commerce. When you go there, you must not carry your
weapons with you: and if they come into that space, they stick
up their javelins and lances all at the first poles, and come on
unarmed ; but if any violence is offered them, and the truce
thereby broken, away they run to the poles, and lay hold of
their weapons, and the truce is at an end. :

It happened one evening, when we went on shore, that a
greater number of their people came down than usual, but afl
very friendly and civil ; and they brought several kinds of pro-
visions, for which we satisfied them with such toys as we had;
the women also brought us milk and roots, and several things

wie OS,
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