144 CRUSOE'S ISLAND. 



In tlie first place, let iis inquire how it all came 

 about. In the words of our hero : " It happen'd one 

 Day about Noon. Going towards my Boat I was ex- 

 ceedingly surpriz'd with the print of a Man^s naked 

 Foot on the Shore, which was very plain to be seen 

 in the Sand. . . . When I was come down the Hill to 

 the Shore, I was perfectly amaz'd ; nor is it possible 

 for me to express the horror of my Mind at seeing 

 the Shore spread with Skulls, Hands, Feet, and other 

 Bones of humane Bodies ; and particularly I observ'd 

 a Place where there had been a Fire made and a 

 Circle dug in the Earth like a Cock-pit, where it is 

 suppos'd the savage Wretches had sat down to their 

 inhumane Feasting upon the Bodies of their fellow 

 Creatures." 



Crusoe made this disquieting discovery after he 

 had been on his island eighteen years, and as a conse- 

 quence he was thrown into convulsions of terror ; he 

 fled to his cave, where he remained self-prisoned for 

 weeks, and when he did come out it was only after 

 taking most extraordinary precautions against sur- 

 prise and capture. Without commenting on the emo- 

 tions of Crusoe, the frequent frights he was thrown 

 into, and his mental disturbances thereat, let us now 

 try to find out who these savages were that had in- 

 vaded his domain. They were Indians, of course — 

 that is, red men — discovered and named by Columbus, 

 on his first voyage to America, in 1492. 



The next year (1493) Columbus sailed still far- 

 ther southward, and in the islands of Dominica and 

 Guadeloupe he found the fierce Caribs, people be- 



