"Crusoe's Farewell Advice" for Daniel Defoe's "Adventures of Robinson Crusoe" (1863-64)

Crusoe's Farewell Advice (page 273) — the volume's seventy-first 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). Part II, The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, Chapter VI, "The French Clergyman's Counsel." Half-page, framed: 12.1 cm high x 14 cm wide.

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.]

Passage Illustrated: Crusoe's Fatherly Advice to the Young Colonists

Having thus given a view of the state of things as I found them, I must relate the heads of what I did for these people, and the condition in which I left them. It was their opinion, and mine too, that they would be troubled no more with the savages, or if they were, they would be able to cut them off, if they were twice as many as before; so they had no concern about that. Then I entered into a serious discourse with the Spaniard, whom I call governor, about their stay in the island; for as I was not come to carry any of them off, so it would not be just to carry off some and leave others, who, perhaps, would be unwilling to stay if their strength was diminished. On the other hand, I told them I came to establish them there, not to remove them; and then I let them know that I had brought with me relief of sundry kinds for them; that I had been at a great charge to supply them with all things necessary, as well for their convenience as their defence; and that I had such and such particular persons with me, as well to increase and recruit their number, as by the particular necessary employments which they were bred to, being artificers, to assist them in those things in which at present they were in want.

They were all together when I talked thus to them; and before I delivered to them the stores I had brought, I asked them, one by one, if they had entirely forgot and buried the first animosities that had been among them, and would shake hands with one another, and engage in a strict friendship and union of interest, that so there might be no more misunderstandings and jealousies. [Chapter VI, "The French Clergyman's Counsel," page 272]

Commentary

The scene occurs, as Crusoe explains, in the Spanish capital of the island. The Cassell illustrator, like Cruikshank before him, has depicted the colonists as a rough-and-ready group of young men rather than as the impeccably dressed young Europeans of Thomas Stothard's illustrations Robinson Crusoe's first interview with the Spaniards, The plantation of the two Englishmen, A View of the Plantation of the three Englishmen, and Robinson Crusoe distributing tools of husbandry among the inhabitants. These goatskin-clad youths are indeed the logical heirs of the former castaway, now dressed in topcoat and topboots.

Related Material

Relevant illustrations from other 19th century editions, 1831-1891

Left: The Wehnert engraving of the same scene, Crusoe giving Bible to Will Atkins (1862). Centre: Cruikshank's realisation ofAtkins entertainingCrusoe, Crusoe presents a Bible to Will Atkins and his native wife (1831).Right: Wal Paget's much more fashionably dressed young colonists at Crusoe's farewell banquet, "We made a splendid feast." (1891). [Click onimages to enlarge them.]

References

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.

Defoe, Daniel. The Life and Strange Exciting Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner, as Related by Himself. With 120 original illustrations by Walter Paget. London, Paris,and Melbourne: Cassell, 1891.

Last modified 1 April 2018