S E L 
proceeded round Cape Horn to the island of Juan Fernandez, 
wheuce they were driven by the appearance of two French 
ships of 36 guns each, and left five of Stradling’s men on 
shore, who were taken off by the French. Hence they sailed 
to the coast of America, where Dampier and Stradling quar¬ 
relled, and separated by agreement. This was in the month 
of May 1704; and in the following September Stradling 
came to the island of Juan Fernandez, where Selkirk and 
his captain having a quarrel, he determined to remain there 
alone. But when the ship was ready to sail, his resolution 
was shaken, and he desired to be taken on board; but now 
the captain refused his request, and he was left with his 
Clothes, bedding, a gun and a small quantity of powder and 
ball, some trifling implements, and a few books, with cer¬ 
tain mathematical and nautical instruments. Thus left sole 
monarch of the island, with plenty of the necessaries of life, 
he found himself at first in a situation scarcely support¬ 
able; and such was his melancholy, that he frequently 
determined to put an end to his existence. It was full 
eighteen months, according to his own account, be¬ 
fore he could reconcile himself to his lot. At length his 
mind became calm: he grew happy, employed his 
lime in building and decorating his huts, chasing the 
goats, whom he soon equalled in speed, and scarcely ever 
failed of catching. He also tamed young kids, and other 
animals, to be his companions. When his garments were 
worn out, he made others from the skins of the goats, whose 
flesh served him as food. His only liquor was water. He com¬ 
puted that he had caught, during his abode in the island, about 
1000 goats, half of which he had suffered to go at large, 
having first marked them with a slit in the ear. Commo¬ 
dore Anson, who went there 30 years after, found the first 
goat, which they shot, had been thus marked; and hence 
they concluded that it had been under the power of Selkirk. 
Though he constantly performed his devotions at stated hours, 
and read aloud, yet when he was taken from the island, his 
language, from disuse of conversation, had become scarcely 
Intelligible. In this solitude he remained four years and 
four months, during which only two incidents occurred 
which he thought worthy of record. The first was, that 
pursuing a goat eagerly, he caught at the edge of a pre¬ 
cipice, of which he was not aware, and he fell over to the 
bottom, where he lay some time senseless; but of the exact 
space of time in which he was bereaved of his active powers 
he could not form an accurate estimate, When, however, 
he came to himself, he found the goat lying under him dead. 
It was with difficulty that he could crawl to his habitation, 
and it was not till after a considerable time that he entirely 
recovered from his bruises. The other event was the arrival 
of a ship, which he at first supposed to be French, but 
upon the crew’s landing, he found them to be Spaniards, 
of whom he had too great a dread to trust himself in their 
hands. They, however, had seen him, and he found it ex¬ 
tremely difficult to make his escape. In this solitude Sel¬ 
kirk remained until the 2d of February 1709, when he saw 
two ships come to the bay, and knew them to be English. 
He immediately lighted a fire as a signal, and he found, 
upon the landing of the men, that they were two privateers 
from Bristol, commanded by captains Rogers and Courtney. 
These, after a fortnight’s stay at Juan Fernandez, embarked, 
taking Selkirk with them, and returned by way of the East 
Indies to England, where they arrived on the 1st of October, 
1711; Selkirk having been absent eight years. The public 
curiosity being much excited, he, after his return, gave Steele 
some account of what had occurred during his solitary 
exile, .which the latter published. This Defoe, made the 
foundation of his well-known work, entitled Robinson 
Crusoe. The time and place of Selkirk’s death are not on 
record. It is said, that so late as the year 1798, the chest 
and musquet, which Selkirk had with him on the island, 
were in possession of a grand nephew, John Selkirk, a 
•weaver in Largo, North Britain. The circumstances of 
Selkirk’s seclusion from human society, during his stay on 
the desolate island, have given bjrth to a fine poem by 
\ Vol. XXIII. No. 1551. 
SEE 17 
Mr. Cowper, with which our readers are no doubt well ac¬ 
quainted. Biofr. Brit. 
SELKIRKSHIRE, a county in Scotland, situated between 
55° 21' and 55° 42' north latitude, and between 2° 48' and 
3° 20' west longitude from Greenwich. It has Mid-Lothian; 
or the county of Edinburgh, on the north; Roxburghshire 
on the east and south-east; Dumfries-shire on the south; and 
Peebles-shire, or Tweeddale, on the west. The line which 
separates it from these counties being on all sides, but the 
south, exceedingly irregular, its area has been computed very 
differently; but, according to the latest authorities, it appears 
to be about 269 square miles, or 172,160 English acres. It 
includes only two entire parishes, with five parish churches: 
but seven other parishes belong partly to this, and partly to 
the adjoining counties. 
This is almost entirely a pastoral district, and in mauy 
respects bears a resemblance to the higher parts of the con¬ 
tiguous county of Roxburghshire. Like the latter county, 
its general declivity is towards the north-east and north, 
where all its streams discharge themselves into the Tweed; 
and the surface differs principally, in so far as some of the 
hills are more elevated, its streams smaller, and the valleys 
in which they flow still more contracted. Several of the 
hills are more than 2000 feet high; such as Windlestraw 
Law at the northern extremity, on the confines of Mid- 
Lothian, Blackhouse Heights and Minchmoor on the borders 
of Peebles-shire, and Ettrick-penn on the south-west boun¬ 
dary. The lower hills are for the most part green, and 
afford good pasturage for sheep; but heath prevails on many 
of the higher grounds, especially towards the south-west. 
The lowest land is about 300 feet above the level of the sea, 
and the sites of many of the houses are from 600 to 1000 
feet high and upwards. 
The rivers are the Tweed, which crosses the north side of 
the county in its course from Peebles-shire on the west to 
Roxburghshire on the east; the Gala, which, for some dis¬ 
tance, forms the boundary with Roxburghshire on the north¬ 
east, and falls into the Tweed, from the north, a little below 
the village of Galasheils; the Cador, a beautiful stream, 
which also joins the Tweed from the north; the Ettrick and 
Yarrow, which have their sources on the confines of Dum¬ 
fries-shire, and, flowing north-east, almost parallel to each 
other, join their streams above Selkirk, and afterwards, 
under the name of Ettrick, passing to the west of that town, 
and, for a short distance along the boundary with Rox¬ 
burghshire, enter the Tweed, in which their name is lost, 
and which then becomes the boundary with that county. 
The Ale, which rises in the north-east, soon after passes into 
Roxburghshire, and also the Borthwick, which washes the 
north-eastern boundary. Next to the Tweed, the most con¬ 
siderable waters are the Ettrick and the Yarrow, which re¬ 
ceive, in the first instance, nearly all the other streams that 
traverse this district. Both have been celebrated in song, 
and given their names to some plaintive melodies of great 
beauty and feeling. The scenery on the Yarrow is exceed¬ 
ingly romantic and delightful. Soon after its rise, it passes 
through two lakes, the Loch of the Lows, and St. Mary’s 
Loch ; the latter, which is separated from the former only by 
a narrow neck of level ground, and is three miles long, 
having its banks partly covered with coppice-wood, is the 
finest piece of water in the south of Scotland. From thence 
the Yarrow flows for eight or nine miles, through sheep- 
walks, without wood or cultivation; but afterwards the sides 
of the lofty hills in its course are covered with wood to a 
considerable height, and its valley is embellished with a 
variety of bushes and wild flowers. Ettrick, the larger 
stream, has a wider and more cultivated valley, and a little 
before it receives the Yarrow, natural wood begins to appear 
on its banks. It afterwards flows for four miles through a 
rich tract, sheltered by plantations on the hi'Is, till it loses 
its name in the Tweed. From this river the whole district 
has been sometimes called Ettrick Forest; but the name of 
Forest here, as elsewhere, has long since ceased to denote 
the existence of. extensive woodlands, of. which, whatever 
F may 
