"The Mutineers Overpowered" for Daniel Defoe's "Adventures of Robinson Crusoe" (1863-64)

The Mutineers Overpowered (page 177) — the volume's forty-seventh 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 XVII, "The Visit of the Mutineers." The conventional chapter title on the page following merely confirms what the illustration asserts, namely that "The Mutineers Capitulate" (p. 179). What is surprising about the illustration is that it features neither Crusoe nor Friday. Full-page, framed: 10.5 cm high (including caption) x 14 cm wide. The extremely plain framing border creates the effect of an historical painting, and is markedly different from kost of the other borders in the Cassell's volume.

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

[The captain] gave me all the assurances that the invention or faith of man could devise that he would comply with these most reasonable demands, and besides would owe his life to me, and acknowledge it upon all occasions as long as he lived. “Well, then,” said I, “here are three muskets for you, with powder and ball; tell me next what you think is proper to be done.” He showed all the testimonies of his gratitude that he was able, but offered to be wholly guided by me. I told him I thought it was very hard venturing anything; but the best method I could think of was to fire on them at once as they lay, and if any were not killed at the first volley, and offered to submit, we might save them, and so put it wholly upon God’s providence to direct the shot. He said, very modestly, that he was loath to kill them if he could help it; but that those two were incorrigible villains, and had been the authors of all the mutiny in the ship, and if they escaped, we should be undone still, for they would go on board and bring the whole ship’s company, and destroy us all. “Well, then,” says I, “necessity legitimates my advice, for it is the only way to save our lives.” However, seeing him still cautious of shedding blood, I told him they should go themselves, and manage as they found convenient.

In the middle of this discourse we heard some of them awake, and soon after we saw two of them on their feet. I asked him if either of them were the heads of the mutiny? He said, “No.” “Well, then,” said I, “you may let them escape; and Providence seems to have awakened them on purpose to save themselves. Now,” says I, “if the rest escape you, it is your fault.” Animated with this, he took the musket I had given him in his hand, and a pistol in his belt, and his two comrades with him, with each a piece in his hand; the two men who were with him going first made some noise, at which one of the seamen who was awake turned about, and seeing them coming, cried out to the rest; but was too late then, for the moment he cried out they fired—I mean the two men, the captain wisely reserving his own piece. They had so well aimed their shot at the men they knew, that one of them was killed on the spot, and the other very much wounded; but not being dead, he started up on his feet, and called eagerly for help to the other; but the captain stepping to him, told him it was too late to cry for help, he should call upon God to forgive his villainy, and with that word knocked him down with the stock of his musket, so that he never spoke more; there were three more in the company, and one of them was slightly wounded. By this time I was come; and when they saw their danger, and that it was in vain to resist, they begged for mercy. The captain told them he would spare their lives if they would give him an assurance of their abhorrence of the treachery they had been guilty of, and would swear to be faithful to him in recovering the ship, and afterwards in carrying her back to Jamaica, from whence they came. They gave him all the protestations of their sincerity that could be desired; and he was willing to believe them, and spare their lives, which I was not against, only that I obliged him to keep them bound hand and foot while they were on the island. [Chapter XVII, "The Visit of the Mutineers," pp. 172-73]

Commentary

The realistic Cassell's treatment of the mutineers juxtaposes the humbled and utterly terrified ordinary seamen grovelling on the ground and the agressive Captain and his mates, threatening instant death from their firearms. The illustrator, Matt Somerville Morgan, provides only a generalized island setting as a flat theatrical backdrop in order to focus the reader's attention on the agressive captain and the pleading leader of the mutineers.

Things turn out rather badly for these mutineers, in contrast to the relative success of Fletcher Christian and his confederates aboard the H. M. S. Bounty, with which Victorian readers would have been familiar through three books which John Barrow published about the Bounty Mutiny in 1833, 1836, and 1838. Many Victorians such as Charles Dickens (whose own version of the Bounty mutiny occurs in the Captain Boldheart section of A Holiday Romance, 1868) would have also read Bligh's own account, A Narrative of the Mutiny on Board His Majesty's Ship The Bounty, and the subsequent voyage of part of the crew in the ship's boat from Tofoa, one of the Friendly Islands, to Timor, a Dutch Settlement in the East Indies, illustrated with charts (London: George Nicol, 1790). At the time of Cassell's publication of this book, public sentiment in Great Britain, owing to the 1857 Bengal Mutiny (Sepoy Rebellion), would not have favoured the side of the mutineers, whom the Cassell house artists depict as both bullies (in the previous illustration) and craven cowards here. The subsequent scene, Death of the Rebel Captain is one of the most violent in this edition.

Related Material

Relevant illustrations from other 19th century editions, 1790-1891

Left: Paget's intensely dramatic realisation of the conclusion of the mutiny, Shot the New Captain through the Head (Chapter X VIII, "Recovery of the Ship," full-page lithograph). Centre: In the children's book illustration, the Captain offers Crusoe his ship without any reference to quelling the mutiny first, The Captain offers a Ship to Robinson Crusoe (1818). Right: In the 1820 children's book illustration, The poor man, with a gush of tears, answered, "Am I talking to a man or an angel?", Crusoe (in oversized goatskin hat) and Friday (marginalised) encounter the victims of the mutiny. [Click on the images to enlarge them.]

Bibliography

Defoe, 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 20 March 2018