VOYAGE OF THE ROEBUCK 333 



in the same year (1702), war broke out against Spain and 



France, a syndicate of London merchants was formed, 



as syndicates had been formed in the days of Elizabeth, 



to gain big dividends by " privateering " in the South 



Sea ; and they chose Dampier to sail as captain in a -ship 



named the St. George, with a commission from the Lord 



High Admiral, who was the Queen's own husband. The 



story was a tenth-rate pirate story not worth the telling, 



save for one incident. Dampier hunted the Spaniards 



in consort, for a time, with a tiny ship called the Cinque 



Ports, whose captain was a ruffian named Stradling, and 



whose mate was named Alexander Selkirk. According Robinson 



to our modern critic, Selkirk was "on the whole about s e the 



Third. 



as troublesome a seaman as ever stepped a deck " ; but 

 Dampier thought him " the best man in the ship " ; and 

 possibly both statements are true. After quarrelling with 

 Dampier, Stradling called at Juan Fernandez, the island 

 in which already in our story two men had played the 

 part of Robinson Crusoe. Here Selkirk chose to land, 

 partly because he hated Stradling with good reason, and 

 partly because, again with good reason, he was convinced 

 that the Cinque Ports would shortly go to the bottom. 

 Here for four years he lived the life of Robinson Crusoe 

 the Third. 1 



Meanwhile Dampier was cruising in the St. George, 

 fighting French and Spanish ships; taking some small 

 prizes, but on the whole giving little satisfaction to his 

 greedy and quarrelsome crew. Two parties of malcontents, 

 one after the other, got possession of barks, and made the 

 perilous voyage to the East Indies. Dampier was left 

 in the St. George, with twenty-eight men and boys, " to 

 make war upon a whole nation." Moreover the St. George 

 was a ship whose bottom was like that of the Roebuck. 



1 It is likely that Defoe had read all these three Robinson Crusoe 

 stories. It is curious that he placed his hero, not in Juan Fernandez, 

 but in an island in the estuary of the Orinoco. He describes " the 

 great draft and reflux of the mighty river Oroonoko, in the mouth or 

 gulf of which river, as I found afterwards, our island lay ; and this 

 land, which I perceived to the W. and N.W., was the great island 

 Trinidad." Friday was a Carib from Trinidad. 



