The Solitary of Juan Fernandez, or the Real Robinson Crusoe Part 4

But is he not about to find countrymen at Coquimbo? And if their society should be unpleasing?--if their habits, their mode of life, their persons, should become objects of antipathy to the misanthropic Selkirk, as it is but natural to fear? Well! after all, no engagement binds him to them; he will be always free to enter, in the capacity of a sailor, the first vessel which may leave for Europe.

Determined to act as shall seem good to him,--to make some excursions into the interior of the continent, if an opportunity presents itself, and he will know how to make one,--he casts a first glance at the land of his adoption.

Before him extends a vast sh.o.r.e, studded with groves of trees, covered with fine turf and little flowers joyfully unfolding their petals to the sun: two streams, having their source at the very base of the opposite hills, after having meandered around this immense lawn, unite almost at his feet.

He bends down to one of these streams, fills the hollow of his hand with water, and tastes it, as a libation, and as a toast to the generous land which has just received him; the water is excellent; he plucks a flower, and continues his inspection.

On his left rise high mountains, terraced and verdant, excepting at their summits, on one of which he perceives a goat, with long horns, stationed there immovable like a sentinel, and whose delicate profile is clearly defined on the azure of the sky. On the side towards the sea, the mountains, bending their gray and naked heads, resemble stone giants, watching the movements of the wave which dashes at their feet.

On his right, where the land declines, he sees little valleys linked together with charming undulations; but on the mountains at his left, in the valleys at his right, among the hills in the distance, his eye vainly seeks the vestige of a human habitation.

He sets out in search of one. The boat from which he landed has deposited on the sh.o.r.e his effects--his arms, his nautical instruments, his charts, a Bible, and provisions of various kinds.

Notwithstanding his piratical sentiments, the captain of the Swordfish has not designed to precede exile by confiscation. Selkirk takes his gun, his gourd; but, unable to carry all his riches, he conceals them behind a stony thicket, well defended by the darts of the cactus, and the sword-like leaves of the aloe, not caring to have the first comer seize them as his booty.

As he is occupied with this duty, he feels himself suddenly clasped by two long hairy arms; he turns his head, it is Marimonda, the captain's monkey, a female of the largest species.

How came she there? Selkirk does not know.

Disgusted with her sea-voyages, with the intelligence natural to her race, Marimonda has undoubtedly profited by the moment of the boat's leaving the ship to conceal herself in it and gain the sh.o.r.e along with the prisoner, which she might easily have done, unseen by all, during the transporting of the effects and provisions.

However this may be, Selkirk begins by freeing himself from her grasp, repulses the monkey and sets out: but the latter perseveres in following, and after having, by her most graceful grimaces, sought to conciliate him, marches beside him. Not caring to arrive at Coquimbo escorted by such a companion, which would give him in a city the appearance of a mountebank and showman of monkeys, Selkirk, this time, repulses her rudely, not with his hand, but with the b.u.t.t of his gun.

Struck in the breast by this home thrust, the poor monkey stops, rolls up her eyes, moves her lips, and growling confusedly her complaints and reproaches, crouches beneath a tuft of the sapota, leaving the man to pursue his way alone.

Selkirk has at first directed his steps toward the valleys; after having traversed these, he arrives at the margin of a sandy plain, and as far as the eye can reach, perceives neither city, village, house, tent nor hut, nothing which can indicate the presence of inhabitants.

Nevertheless, a little grove which he has just traversed, seems to have recently, in its princ.i.p.al path, pa.s.sed under the shears of a gardener; the foliage presents a certain symmetry; fragments of branches are strewed, on the ground, which seem to have been freshly cut; he even thinks he sees vestiges of the pa.s.sage of a flock. On the lawn of the sh.o.r.e, he has seen, and still sees around him, trees with tufted heads, which must owe this form to art. He continues his researches.

At last, in the distance, beneath a fog which is just beginning to dissolve, he perceives a vast ma.s.s of white and red houses, some with terraced roofs, others covered with thatch; through the humid veil which envelopes them, he sees the glistening of the gla.s.s in the windows; already he hears at his feet the confused noise of cities; murmuring voices reply; the measured sound of hammers and of mills even reaches his ear.

It is Coquimbo! he cannot doubt it, and shortening his route by a path across the hill, he quickens his pace.

Meanwhile an east wind arises, the fog disappears; when he thinks he has reached the suburbs of the city, Selkirk sees before him only an irregular a.s.semblage of calcareous stones, crowned with dry herbs, or reddish, arid, angular rocks, flattened at their summits, tessellated with fragments of silex and mica, on which the sun is just pouring his rays; a company of goats, which the mist had condemned to a momentary repose, are bounding here and there, startling flocks of clamorous black-birds and plaintive sea-gulls; the fearless and yellow-crested woodp.e.c.k.e.rs alone do not stir, but continue to hammer with their sharp beaks at some old stunted trees.

The disenchantment is painful for our sailor; the fog has deceived him with the semblance of a city, as it has more than once deluded us in the midst of plains and woods, by the appearance of an ocean with its white waves, its great capes, its bold sh.o.r.es, and its vessels at anchor.

Perhaps Coquimbo is still beyond. Fearing to lose himself if he ventures farther in an unknown land, he resolves to explore it first by a look. Returning to the sh.o.r.e upon which he had landed, he scales the mountains on the north, reaches the first platform, and from thence seeks to discover some indications of a city. Nothing! he still ascends, the circle enlarges around him, but with no better result.

Summoning all his courage, through a thousand difficulties, climbing, drawing himself up by the arid and abrupt rocks, piled one upon another, he at last attains a culminating point of the mountain. He can now embrace with his eye an immense horizon, but this immense horizon is the sea! On his right, on his left, before him, behind him, every where the sea!

He is not on the continent, but on an island.

This evening, exhausted with fatigue, he lies down in a grotto at the foot of the mountain, where he pa.s.ses a night full of agitation and anxiety.

Rising with the sun, his first care, the next morning, is to examine his riches and his provisions. He returns to the thicket of cactus and aloes.

Besides two guns, two hatchets, a knife, an iron pot, a Bible and nautical instruments, all articles belonging to him, he finds there a quant.i.ty of nails, a large fragment of a sail, several horns of powder and shot; a bag of ship biscuit, a salted quarter of pork, a little cask of pickled fish, and a dozen cocoa-nuts.

The night before, at sight of these articles, he had supposed a sentiment of justice and humanity to exist in the soul of the corsair.

Just now, he had said to himself that Stradling, deceived by a false reckoning of lat.i.tude, had landed him on an island, perhaps believing it to be a projecting sh.o.r.e of the continent. Now, the abundance of his supplies, this biscuit, these salt provisions, these fruits of the cocoa, all valueless if he had really landed at Coquimbo, lead him to suspect that the vindictive Englishman has designedly chosen the place of his exile.

But this exile, is it complete isolation? Is the island inhabited or deserted? If it is inhabited, as he still believes he has reason to suppose, by whom is it so?

That he may obtain a reply to this double question, he resolves to traverse the country in its whole extent. At the very commencement of his journey, the immobility of a bird suffices to give to the doubt, on which his thoughts vacillate, the appearance almost of a certainty.

This bird is a toucan, of brilliant plumage and monstrous beak.

Selkirk pa.s.ses near it, with his eyes fixed on the branch which serves as a perch, and the toucan, without stirring, looks at him with a species of calm and placid astonishment.

Selkirk stops; he comprehends the mute language of the bird.

'You do not know then what a man is! He is the enemy of every creature to whom G.o.d has given life, the enemy even of his kind! You have then never been threatened by the arms that I bear!'

And with the palm of his hand, striking the b.u.t.t of his gun, he made the hammer click.

At the sound of his voice, as at the noise of the hammer, the bird raised its head, manifesting new and redoubled surprise, but without any other movement. It seemed to think that the man and the gun were one, and that its strange interlocutor possessed two different voices.

At last, by way of reply, it uttered a few shrill and prolonged cries, accompanied by the rattling of its two h.o.r.n.y mandibles. After which, acting the great n.o.bleman, cutting short the audience he has deigned to grant, the toucan is silent, turns its head, proudly raises one of its wings and busies itself in smoothing, with the point of its large beak, its beautiful greenish feathers, variegated with purple.

At some distance from this spot, still following the margin of a wooded hill, Selkirk sees other birds, some in their nests, others warbling in the shade; all manifesting no more alarm at his presence than did the toucan. Crested orioles, hooded bullfinches, alight to pick up little grains or insects almost at his feet; humming-birds, variegated cotingas, red manaquins flutter before him in the sunbeams, pursuing invisible flies; little wood-p.e.c.k.e.rs, black or green, hop around the trunks of the trees, stopping a moment to see him pa.s.s and then resuming their spiral ascent.

The confidence which he inspires is not confined to these winged people. Upon a hillock of turf he perceives an animal, with pointed nose, brown fur enamelled with red spots, and of the size of a hare; seated on its hind paws, longer than those in front, it uses these, after the manner of squirrels, to carry to its mouth some nuts of the maripa, which const.i.tute its breakfast. It is an agouti,[1] a mother, her little ones are near. At sight of the stranger they run to her, but quickly re-a.s.sured, quietly finish their morning repast.

Farther on, coatis,[2] with short ears, and long tails; companies of little Guinea pigs; armadillos, a species of hedge-hog without the quills, but covered with an armor of scales, more compact and impervious than that of the ancient knights of the Middle Ages, arrange themselves along the line of his route, as if to pa.s.s him in review.

[Footnote 1: _Agouti_. An animal of the bigness of a rabbit, with bright red hair, and a little tail without hair. He has but two teeth in each jaw; holds his meat in his forepaws like a squirrel, and has a very remarkable cry: when he is angry, his hair stands on end, and he strikes the earth with his hind feet; and when chased, he flies to a hollow tree, whence he is expelled by smoke.--_Trevoux_.]

[Footnote 2: The _coati_ is a native of Brazil, not unlike the rac.o.o.n in the general form of the body, and, like that animal, it frequently sits up on the hinder legs, and in this position carries its food to its mouth. If left at liberty in a state of tameness, it will pursue poultry, and destroy every living thing that it has strength to conquer. When it sleeps it rolls itself into a lump, and remains immovable for fifteen hours together. His eyes are small, but full of life; and when domesticated, this creature is very playful and amusing. A great peculiarity belonging to this animal is the length of his snout, which resembles in some particulars the trunk of the elephant, as it is movable in every direction. The ears are round, and like those of a rat; the forefeet have five toes each. The hair is short and rough on the back, and of a blackish color; the tail is marked with rings of black, like the wild cat; the rest of the animal is a mixture of black and red.]

Alas! this general quiet does but deepen in the heart of Selkirk the certainty of his isolation.

Nevertheless, yesterday, said he to himself, in this thick wood, did I not see alleys trimmed with the shears, trees shaped by the pruning-knife?

And the little grove which he visited the evening previous, at that instant presents itself before him. He examines the trees; they are myrtles of various heights; but among their glossy branches, he in vain seeks traces of the pruning-knife or shears; nature alone has thus disposed in spheroids or umbels the extremities of this rich vegetation.

The same disappointment awaits him in the underwood. The only pruners have been goats, or other animals, daintily cropping the green shoots.

Then only does the complete and terrible certainty of his disaster fall on him and crush him. Behold him blotted from the number of men, perhaps condemned to die of misery and of hunger! more securely imprisoned, more entirely forgotten by the world than the most hardened criminal plunged in the lowest depths of the Bastile! He at least, has a jailor! Miserable Stradling!

At this moment he hears a noise above his head: it is the monkey.

Marimonda, on her side, has also inspected the island; she has already tasted its productions. Whether she is satisfied with her discoveries, or whether forgiveness and forgetfulness of injuries are natural to her, on perceiving her old companion, wagging her head in token of good-will, she descends towards him from the tree on which she is perched.

But Marimonda is the captain's monkey; she has been his property, his favorite, his flatterer! In the disposition of mind in which Selkirk finds himself, he does not need these thoughts to make him pitiless.

Marimonda reminds him of Stradling; the monkey shall pay for the man!

He lowers his gun, and fires. The monkey has seen the movement and divined his intentions; she has only time to retreat behind her tree, which does not prevent her receiving in her side a part of the charge.

This detonation of fire-arms, the first perhaps which has resounded in this corner of the earth since the creation of the world, as it is prolonged from echo to echo, even to the highest mountains, awakens in every part of the island as it were a groan of distress. Instinct, that sublime prescience, has revealed to all that a great peril has just been born.

To the cries of affright from birds of every species, to the uneasy and distant bleating of the goats, succeeds a plaintive moaning, like the voice of a wailing infant.