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

Farewell to the Island (page 308) — the volume's seventy-ninth 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 VIII, "Sails from the Island for the Brazils." Half-page, framed: 10.3 cm high x 14.1 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 Farewell to the Island

Having now done with the island, I left them all in good circumstances and in a flourishing condition, and went on board my ship again on the 6th of May, having been about twenty-five days among them: and as they were all resolved to stay upon the island till I came to remove them, I promised to send them further relief from the Brazils, if I could possibly find an opportunity. I particularly promised to send them some cattle, such as sheep, hogs, and cows: as to the two cows and calves which I brought from England, we had been obliged, by the length of our voyage, to kill them at sea, for want of hay to feed them.

The next day, giving them a salute of five guns at parting, we set sail, and arrived at the bay of All Saints in the Brazils in about twenty-two days. . . . [Chapter VIII, "Sails from the Island for the Brazils," page 307]

Commentary

The scene occurs in the later sequence by Wal Paget (1891), but there the illustrator emphasizes the ship, in full sail, firing a broadside, as the spectators on the shore, wave their hats. Here, in the 1864 illustration, Crusoe gallantly raises his hat in farewell, but no cheering colonists line the distant shore, so that Crusoe seems to be bidding the island itself farewell. The small ship here may be the private sloop which Crusoe has just mentioned; certainly this vessel seems much smaller than the three-masted vessel which Paget in the 1891 sequence depicts in "Giving them a salute of five guns." The illustrator has kept Crusoe's figure, like those of the five sailors, quite small, and we cannot judge Crusoe's feelings about this final departure as his face is turned away from us. This moment is Crusoe's rather than the colony's, not a grand exit on the stage of history, but a quiet gesture which the handful of sailors seem not to notice. Since this does not seem to be the large, three-masted, multi-gunned vessel of the next illustration, the artist here seems to be referencing the shallop with which Crusoe, returning from Europe, initially investigated all the islands near his own:

Thus coasting from one island to another, sometimes with the ship, sometimes with the Frenchman’s shallop, which we had found a convenient boat, and therefore kept her with their very good will, at length I came fair on the south side of my island, and presently knew the very countenance of the place: so I brought the ship safe to an anchor, broadside with the little creek where my old habitation was. [Chapter II, "Intervening History of the Colony," page 224]

Realistic nautical details include the fact that one of the rowers has already shipped his oar as the shore-boat approaches the sloop, which has already raised one of its two anchors in preparation for leaving its moorage.

Related Material

Parallel Illustration by Wal Paget (1891)

Above: Paget's nautical vignette of Crusoe's departure, focussing on the three-masted vessel rather than on the island or its denizens, Gave them such a broadside (1891). [Click on the image to enlarge it.]

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 7 April 2018