Friday's father used all the arguments he could to persuade our people to lie close, and not be seen; he told them their safety consisted in it, and that they had nothing to do but lie still, and the savages would kill one another to their hands, and then the rest would go away; and it was so to a tittle. But it was impossible to prevail, especially upon the Englishmen ; their curiosity was so importunate upon their prudentials, that they must run out and see the battle: however, they used some caution too, viz. they did not go openly, just by their own dwelling, but went farther into the woods, and placed themselves to advantage, where they might securely see them manage the fight, and, as they thought, not be seen by them; but it seems the savages did see them, as we shall find hereafter. The battle was very fierce; and, if I might believe the Englishmen, one of them said he could perceive that some of them were men of great bravery, of invincible spirits, and of great policy in guiding the fight. The battle, they said, held two hours before they could guess which party would be beaten; but then that party which was nearest our people's habitation began to appear weakest, and, after some time more, some of them began to fly; and this put our men again into a great consternation, lest any one of those that fled should run into the grove before their dwelling for shelter, and thereby involuntarily discover the place; and that, by consequence, the pursuers would do the like in search of them. Upon this they resolved that they would stand armed within the wall, and whoever came into the grove, they resolved to sally out over the wall and kill them: so that, if possible, not one should return to give an account of it; they ordered also that it should be done with their swords, or by knocking them down with the stocks of their muskets, but not by shooting them, for fear of raising an alarm by the noise.

As they expected, it fell out: three of the routed army fled for life, and crossing the creek, ran directly into the place, not in the least knowing whither they went, but running as into a thick wood for shelter. The scout they kept to look abroad gave notice of this within, with this addition, to our men's

great satisfaction, viz. that the conquerors had not pursued them, or seen which way they were gone; upon this, the Spaniard governor, a man of humanity, would not suffer them to kill the three fugitives, but sending three men out by the top of the hill, ordered them to go round, come in behind them, and surprise and take them prisoners, which was done. The residue of the conquered people fled to their canoes, and got off to sea: the victors retired, made no pursuit, or very little, but drawing themselves into a body together, gave two great screaming shouts, which they supposed was by way of triumph, and so the fight ended; and the same day, about three o'clock in the afternoon, they also marched to their canoes. And thus the Spaniards had their island again free to themselves; their fright was over, and they saw no savages in several years after.

After they were all gone, the Spaniards came out of their den, and viewing the field of battle, they found about two and thirty men dead on the spot: some were killed with great, long arrows, some of which were found sticking in their bodies; but most of them were killed with great wooden swords, sixteen or seventeen of which they found in the field of battle, and as many bows, with a great many arrows. These swords were strange, great, unwieldy things, and they must be very strong men that used them: most of those men that were killed with them had their heads mashed to pieces, as we may say, or, as we call it in English, their brains knocked out, and several their arms and legs broken; so that it is evident they fight with inexpressible rage and fury. We found not one man that was not stone dead, for either they stay by their enemy till they have quite killed him, or they carry all the wounded men that are not quite dead away with them.

This deliverance tamed our Englishmen for a great while; the sight had filled them with horror, and the consequences appeared terrible to the last degree, especially upon supposing that some time or other they should fall into the hands of those creatures, who would not only kill them as enemies, but kili them for food, as we kill our cattle; and they professed to me,

that the thoughts of being eaten up like beef or mutton, though it was supposed it was not to be till they were dead, had something in it so horrible, that it nauseated their very stomachs, made them sick when they thought of it, and filled their minds with such unusual terror, that they were not themselves for some weeks after. This, as I said, tamed even the three English brutes I have been speaking of, and, for a great while after, they were tractable, and went about the common business of the whole society well enough; planted, sowed, reaped, and began to be all naturalized to the country. But some time after this, they fell into such simple measures again, as brought them into a great deal of trouble.

They had taken three prisoners, as 1 observed; and these three being lusty, stout young fellows, they made them servants, and taught them to work for them; and, as slaves, they did well enough; but they did not take their measures with them as I did by my man Friday, viz. to begin with them upon the principle of having saved their lives, and then instruct them in the rational principles of life; much less of religion, civilizing, and reducing them by kind usage and affectionate arguings; but as they gave them their food every day, so they gave them their work too, and kept them fully employed in drudgery enough; but they failed in this by it, that they never had them to assist them, and fight for them, as I had my man Friday, who was as true to me as the very flesh upon my bones.

But to come to the family part. Being all now good friends, for common danger, as I said above, had effectually reconciled them, they began to consider their general circumstances; and the first thing that came under their consideration was, whether, seeing the savages particularly haunted that side of the island, and that there were more remote and retired parts of it equally adapted to their way of living, and manifestly to their advantage, they should not rather move their habitation, and plant in some more proper place for their safety, and especially for the security of their cattle and corn. Upon this, after long debate, it was concluded that they

would not remove their habitation; because that, some time or other, they thought they might hear from their governor again, meaning me; and if I should send any one to seek them, I should be sure to direct them to that side; where, if they should find the place demolished, they would conclude the savages had killed us all, and we were gone; and so our supply would go too. But as to their corn and cattle, they agreed to remove them into the valley where my cave was, where the land was as proper for both, and where, indeed, there was land enough; however, upon second thoughts, they altered one part of their resolution too, and resolved only to remove part of their cattle thither, and plant part of their corn there; and so if one part was destroyed, the other might be saved. And one part of prudence they used, which it was very well they did, viz. that they never trusted those three savages, which they had prisoners, with knowing any thing of the plantation they had made in that valley, or of any cattle they had there, much less of the cave there, which they kept, in case of necessity, as a safe. retreat; and thither they carried also the two barrels of powder which I had sent them at my coming away. But, however, they resolved not to change their habitation; yet they agreed, that as I had carefully covered it first with a wall or fortification, and then with a grove of trees, so, seeing their safety consisted entirely in their being concealed, of which they were now fully convinced, they set to work to cover and conceal the place yet more effectually than before. For this purpose, as I planted trees, or rather thrust in stakes, which in time all grew up to be trees, for some good distance before the entrance into my apartments, they went on in the same manner, and filled up the rest of that whole space of ground, from the trees I had set, quite down to the side of the creek, where, as I said, I landed my floats, and even into the very ooze where the tide flowed, not so much as leaving any place to land, or any sign that there had been any landing thereabouts; these stakes also being of a wood very forward to grow, as I have noted formerly, they took care to have them generally much larger and taller than

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those which I had planted; and as they grew apace, so they planted them so very thick and close together, that when they had been three or four years grown, there was no piercing with the eye any considerable way into the plantation; ant, as for that part which I had planted, the trees were grown as thick as a man's thigh, and among them they placed so many other short ones, and so thick, that, in a word, it stood like a palisado a quarter of a mile thick, and it was next to impossible to penetrate it, but with a little army to cut it all down for a little dog could hardly get between the trees, they stood so close.

But this was not all; for they did the same by all the ground to the right hand and to the left, and round even to the top of the hill, leaving no way, not so much as for themselves to come out, but by the ladder placed up to the side of the hill, and then lifted up, and placed again from the first stage up to the top; and when the ladder was taken down, nothing but what had wings, or witchcraft to assist it, could come at them. This was excellently well contrived; nor was it less than what they afterwards found occasion for; which served to convince me, that as human prudence has the authority of Providence to justify it, so it has doubtless the direction of Providence to sct it to work; and if we listened carefully to the voice of it, I am persuaded we might prevent many of the disasters which our lives are now, by our own negligence, subjected to: but this by the way.

I return to the story.-They lived two years after this in perfect retirement, and had no more visits from the savages. They had indeed an alarm given them one morning, which put them into a great consternation; for some of the Spaniards being out early one morning on the west side, or rather end of the island (which was that end where I never went for fear of being discovered), they were surprised with seeing above twenty canoes of Indians just coming on shore. They made the best of their way home, in hurry enough; and giving the alarm to their comrades, they kept close all that day and the next, going out only at night to make their observation: but