"Crusoe discovers the Barley" for Daniel Defoe's "Adventures of Robinson Crusoe" (1863-64)

Crusoe discovers the Barley (p. 49) — the volume's fifteenth composite wood-block engraving for Defoe's The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe of York, Mariner. Related by himself (London: Cassell, Petter, and Galpin), 1863-64. Chapter 5, "Builds a House — The Journal." In these earlier plates, the team of artists emphasize Crusoe's isolation by depicting him alone, struggling to survive. Half-page, framed: 11.5 cm high x 14.1 cm wide, including a frame of leaves and barely, signifying the native plant species and the invasive. Running head: "He Commences His Journal" (p. 47). [Click on image to enlarge it.]

Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham. [You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned the image and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]

The Passage Illustrated: Crusoe accidentally invents agriculture

In the middle of all my labours it happened that, rummaging my things, I found a little bag which, as I hinted before, had been filled with corn for the feeding of poultry — not for this voyage, but before, as I suppose, when the ship came from Lisbon. The little remainder of corn that had been in the bag was all devoured by the rats, and I saw nothing in the bag but husks and dust; and being willing to have the bag for some other use (I think it was to put powder in, when I divided it for fear of the lightning, or some such use), I shook the husks of corn out of it on one side of my fortification, under the rock.

It was a little before the great rains just now mentioned that I threw this stuff away, taking no notice, and not so much as remembering that I had thrown anything there, when, about a month after, or thereabouts, I saw some few stalks of something green shooting out of the ground, which I fancied might be some plant I had not seen; but I was surprised, and perfectly astonished, when, after a little longer time, I saw about ten or twelve ears come out, which were perfect green barley, of the same kind as our European — nay, as our English barley.

It is impossible to express the astonishment and confusion of my thoughts on this occasion. I had hitherto acted upon no religious foundation at all; indeed, I had very few notions of religion in my head, nor had entertained any sense of anything that had befallen me otherwise than as chance, or, as we lightly say, what pleases God, without so much as inquiring into the end of Providence in these things, or His order in governing events for the world. But after I saw barley grow there, in a climate which I knew was not proper for corn, and especially that I knew not how it came there, it startled me strangely, and I began to suggest that God had miraculously caused His grain to grow without any help of seed sown, and that it was so directed purely for my sustenance on that wild, miserable place.

This touched my heart a little, and brought tears out of my eyes, and I began to bless myself that such a prodigy of nature should happen upon my account; and this was the more strange to me, because I saw near it still, all along by the side of the rock, some other straggling stalks, which proved to be stalks of rice, and which I knew, because I had seen it grow in Africa when I was ashore there. [Chapter V, "Builds a House — The Journal," pp. 52-53]

Commentary

To Crusoe, brought up in a strict Dutch Puritan household, the sprouting of the English barley on the tropical island is no mere accident or coincidence; rather, it is a sign from Providence that he is the subject of God's special care. The illustration in which the curious hunter-gatherer examines the heads of barley carefully occurs several pages ahead of the text realised, leading the reader to wonder about the significance of this latest discovery on the island: Crusoe has been given his daily bread, exactly according to "The Lord's Prayer." Against a backdrop of tall-growing trees in a tropical jungle, the young European discovers a plant not native to the island flourishing — a sign, perhaps, that he, too, as a transplant may flourish.

The particular moment captured by the illustration reinforces Crusoe's status for much of the first half of the story as the solitary castaway on a desert island south of Trinidad off the mouth of the Orinoco River. Crusoe, as one would expect, dominates the entire narrative-pictorial program: he occurs in fifty-five of the illustrations, and is prominent (in cameos and closeups) in thirty-five. Active and curious for the most part, although occasionally melancholy, the protagonist appears in some twenty-three capacities: as a son, a slave, a businessman and planter, a salvager, a builder, a diarist, a hunter-gatherer, an explorer, a patient, a basket-weaver, a goat-herd, a sower, a teacher, a boat-builder, a sailor, a tailor, a goat-milker, a woodsman, a soldier, a military strategist, a diplomat, a religionist, as a destroyer of idols, and as Friday's companion. Necessarily, given his age and the story's shift in setting and action in part two, Crusoe is less present in The Farther Adventures. In these earlier plates, however, the artists emphasize Crusoe's isolation by depicting him alone, struggling to survive in a series of twenty-five illustrations that begins with Crusoe loading his raft, and climaxes with Crusoe's rescuing a young aboriginal from the cannibals, Crusoe and Friday. The illustrator presents a convincing image of Crusoe "at work," as he describes his exploration of the island, as if he were Adam in the Garden of Eden in Paradise Lost (1667).

Related Material

Parallel Scenes from Stothard (1790), a Children's Book (1818), Cruikshank (1831), and Gilbert (1860s)

Left: Stothard's 1790 realisation of the solitary and reflective protagonist, Robinson Crusoe at work in his cave (Chapter IV, "First Few Weeks on the Island," copper-engraving). Centre: The children's book frontispiece that exemplifies Crusoe's attempts to replicate European constructs upon the tropical island, Robinson Crusoe's Calendar (1818). Right: Sir John Gilbert, Robinson Crusoe in his Tent(1860s). [Click on image to enlarge it.]

Above: Cruikshank's version of Crusoe's record-keeping, Robinson Crusoe's Calendar (1831). [Click on image to enlarge it.]

Bibliography

De Foe, Daniel. The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe of York, Mariner. Related by himself. With upwards of One Hundred Illustrations. London: Cassell, Petter, and Galpin, 1863-64.

Last modified 10 March 2018