鲁宾孙飘流记 英文版 Robinson Crusoe
丹尼尔.笛福 Daniel Defoe
CHAPTER XV - FRIDAY'S EDUCATION Page 2
I continued in this thankful frame all the remainder of my time;and the conversation which employed the hours between Friday and mewas such as made the three years which we lived there togetherperfectly and completely happy, if any such thing as completehappiness can be formed in a sublunary state. This savage was nowa good Christian, a much better than I; though I have reason tohope, and bless God for it, that we were equally penitent, andcomforted, restored penitents. We had here the Word of God toread, and no farther off from His Spirit to instruct than if we hadbeen in England. I always applied myself, in reading theScripture, to let him know, as well as I could, the meaning of whatI read; and he again, by his serious inquiries and questionings,made me, as I said before, a much better scholar in the Scriptureknowledge than I should ever have been by my own mere privatereading. Another thing I cannot refrain from observing here also,from experience in this retired part of my life, viz. how infiniteand inexpressible a blessing it is that the knowledge of God, andof the doctrine of salvation by Christ Jesus, is so plainly laiddown in the Word of God, so easy to be received and understood,that, as the bare reading the Scripture made me capable ofunderstanding enough of my duty to carry me directly on to thegreat work of sincere repentance for my sins, and laying hold of aSaviour for life and salvation, to a stated reformation inpractice, and obedience to all God's commands, and this without anyteacher or instructor, I mean human; so the same plain instructionsufficiently served to the enlightening this savage creature, andbringing him to be such a Christian as I have known few equal tohim in my life.
As to all the disputes, wrangling, strife, and contention whichhave happened in the world about religion, whether niceties indoctrines or schemes of church government, they were all perfectlyuseless to us, and, for aught I can yet see, they have been so tothe rest of the world. We had the sure guide to heaven, viz. theWord of God; and we had, blessed be God, comfortable views of theSpirit of God teaching and instructing by His word, leading us intoall truth, and making us both willing and obedient to theinstruction of His word. And I cannot see the least use that thegreatest knowledge of the disputed points of religion, which havemade such confusion in the world, would have been to us, if wecould have obtained it. But I must go on with the historical partof things, and take every part in its order.
After Friday and I became more intimately acquainted, and that hecould understand almost all I said to him, and speak prettyfluently, though in broken English, to me, I acquainted him with myown history, or at least so much of it as related to my coming tothis place: how I had lived there, and how long; I let him into themystery, for such it was to him, of gunpowder and bullet, andtaught him how to shoot. I gave him a knife, which he waswonderfully delighted with; and I made him a belt, with a froghanging to it, such as in England we wear hangers in; and in thefrog, instead of a hanger, I gave him a hatchet, which was not onlyas good a weapon in some cases, but much more useful upon otheroccasions.
I described to him the country of Europe, particularly England,which I came from; how we lived, how we worshipped God, how webehaved to one another, and how we traded in ships to all parts ofthe world. I gave him an account of the wreck which I had been onboard of, and showed him, as near as I could, the place where shelay; but she was all beaten in pieces before, and gone. I showedhim the ruins of our boat, which we lost when we escaped, and whichI could not stir with my whole strength then; but was now fallenalmost all to pieces. Upon seeing this boat, Friday stood, musinga great while, and said nothing. I asked him what it was hestudied upon. At last says he, "Me see such boat like come toplace at my nation." I did not understand him a good while; but atlast, when I had examined further into it, I understood by him thata boat, such as that had been, came on shore upon the country wherehe lived: that is, as he explained it, was driven thither by stressof weather. I presently imagined that some European ship must havebeen cast away upon their coast, and the boat might get loose anddrive ashore; but was so dull that I never once thought of menmaking their escape from a wreck thither, much less whence theymight come: so I only inquired after a description of the boat.
Friday described the boat to me well enough; but brought me betterto understand him when he added with some warmth, "We save thewhite mans from drown." Then I presently asked if there were anywhite mans, as he called them, in the boat. "Yes," he said; "theboat full of white mans." I asked him how many. He told upon hisfingers seventeen. I asked him then what became of them. He toldme, "They live, they dwell at my nation."
This put new thoughts into my head; for I presently imagined thatthese might be the men belonging to the ship that was cast away inthe sight of my island, as I now called it; and who, after the shipwas struck on the rock, and they saw her inevitably lost, had savedthemselves in their boat, and were landed upon that wild shoreamong the savages. Upon this I inquired of him more criticallywhat was become of them. He assured me they lived still there;that they had been there about four years; that the savages leftthem alone, and gave them victuals to live on. I asked him how itcame to pass they did not kill them and eat them. He said, "No,they make brother with them;" that is, as I understood him, atruce; and then he added, "They no eat mans but when make the warfight;" that is to say, they never eat any men but such as come tofight with them and are taken in battle.
It was after this some considerable time, that being upon the topof the hill at the east side of the island, from whence, as I havesaid, I had, in a clear day, discovered the main or continent ofAmerica, Friday, the weather being very serene, looks veryearnestly towards the mainland, and, in a kind of surprise, falls ajumping and dancing, and calls out to me, for I was at somedistance from him. I asked him what was the matter. "Oh, joy!"says he; "Oh, glad! there see my country, there my nation!" Iobserved an extraordinary sense of pleasure appeared in his face,and his eyes sparkled, and his countenance discovered a strangeeagerness, as if he had a mind to be in his own country again.This observation of mine put a great many thoughts into me, whichmade me at first not so easy about my new man Friday as I wasbefore; and I made no doubt but that, if Friday could get back tohis own nation again, he would not only forget all his religion butall his obligation to me, and would be forward enough to give hiscountrymen an account of me, and come back, perhaps with a hundredor two of them, and make a feast upon me, at which he might be asmerry as he used to be with those of his enemies when they weretaken in war. But I wronged the poor honest creature very much,for which I was very sorry afterwards. However, as my jealousyincreased, and held some weeks, I was a little more circumspect,and not so familiar and kind to him as before: in which I wascertainly wrong too; the honest, grateful creature having nothought about it but what consisted with the best principles, bothas a religious Christian and as a grateful friend, as appearedafterwards to my full satisfaction.
While my jealousy of him lasted, you may be sure I was every daypumping him to see if he would discover any of the new thoughtswhich I suspected were in him; but I found everything he said wasso honest and so innocent, that I could find nothing to nourish mysuspicion; and in spite of all my uneasiness, he made me at lastentirely his own again; nor did he in the least perceive that I wasuneasy, and therefore I could not suspect him of deceit.
One day, walking up the same hill, but the weather being hazy atsea, so that we could not see the continent, I called to him, andsaid, "Friday, do not you wish yourself in your own country, yourown nation?" "Yes," he said, "I be much O glad to be at my ownnation." "What would you do there?" said I. "Would you turn wildagain, eat men's flesh again, and be a savage as you were before?"He looked full of concern, and shaking his head, said, "No, no,Friday tell them to live good; tell them to pray God; tell them toeat corn-bread, cattle flesh, milk; no eat man again." "Why,then," said I to him, "they will kill you." He looked grave atthat, and then said, "No, no, they no kill me, they willing lovelearn." He meant by this, they would be willing to learn. Headded, they learned much of the bearded mans that came in the boat.Then I asked him if he would go back to them. He smiled at that,and told me that he could not swim so far. I told him I would makea canoe for him. He told me he would go if I would go with him."I go!" says I; "why, they will eat me if I come there." "No, no,"says he, "me make they no eat you; me make they much love you." Hemeant, he would tell them how I had killed his enemies, and savedhis life, and so he would make them love me. Then he told me, aswell as he could, how kind they were to seventeen white men, orbearded men, as he called them who came on shore there in distress.
From this time, I confess, I had a mind to venture over, and see ifI could possibly join with those bearded men, who I made no doubtwere Spaniards and Portuguese; not doubting but, if I could, wemight find some method to escape from thence, being upon thecontinent, and a good company together, better than I could from anisland forty miles off the shore, alone and without help. So,after some days, I took Friday to work again by way of discourse,and told him I would give him a boat to go back to his own nation;and, accordingly, I carried him to my frigate, which lay on theother side of the island, and having cleared it of water (for Ialways kept it sunk in water), I brought it out, showed it him, andwe both went into it. I found he was a most dexterous fellow atmanaging it, and would make it go almost as swift again as I could.So when he was in, I said to him, "Well, now, Friday, shall we goto your nation?" He looked very dull at my saying so; which itseems was because he thought the boat was too small to go so far.I then told him I had a bigger; so the next day I went to the placewhere the first boat lay which I had made, but which I could notget into the water. He said that was big enough; but then, as Ihad taken no care of it, and it had lain two or three and twentyyears there, the sun had so split and dried it, that it was rotten.Friday told me such a boat would do very well, and would carry"much enough vittle, drink, bread;" this was his way of talking.