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Crusoe and his Hut
George Cruikshank
1831
Wood-engraving
6.9 cm high by 6.6 cm wide, vignetted
Illustration for Daniel Defoe's Life and Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, p. 105.
[Click on image to enlarge it.]
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
I cannot express what a satisfaction it was to me to come into my old hutch, and lie down in my hammock-bed. This little wandering journey, without settled place of abode, had been so unpleasant to me, that my own house, as I called it to myself, was a perfect settlement to me compared to that; and it rendered everything about me so comfortable, that I resolved I would never go a great way from it again while it should be my lot to stay on the island.
I reposed myself here a week, to rest and regale myself after my long journey; during which most of the time was taken up in the weighty affair of making a cage for my Poll, who began now to be a mere domestic, and to be well acquainted with me. [Chapter VIII, "Surveys His Position," pp. 104-105]
Crusoe mentions the parrot, another survivor of the wreck on a number of occasions. He is a significant companion until the arrival of Friday because Crusoe has taught him how to speak English, and therefore constitutes a surrogate human. As Crusoe tells the reader, “I was at work, I diverted myself with talking to my parrot, and teaching him to speak, and I quickly learned him to know his own name, and at last to speak it out pretty loud, Poll, which was the first word I ever heard spoken in the island by any mouth but my own” (Chapter IX, "A Boat," p. 112).
Left: Stothard's 1790 realisation of the interior of the hut in a later episode, Robinson Crusoe and Friday making a tent to lodge Friday's father and the Spaniard (copper-plate engraving, [Chapter XVI, "Rescue of the Prisoners from the Cannibals"). Centre: A realisation of the interior of the hut, Robinson Crusoe reading the Bible (1818). Right: Cruikshank's charming interior scene in which Crusoe is teaching Poll the Parrot English, a scene which anticipates Crusoe's lessons with Friday, Crusoe in dialogue with Poll the Parrot (1831). [Click on the images to enlarge them.]
Defoe, Daniel. The Life and Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner, with introductory verses by Bernard Barton, and illustrated with numerous engravings from drawings by George Cruikshank expressly designed for this edition. 2 vols. London: Printed at the Shakespeare Press, by W. Nichol, for John Major, Fleet Street, 1831.
De Foe, Daniel. The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, Written by Himself. Illustrated by Gilbert, Cruikshank, and Brown. London: Darton and Hodge, 1867?].
Defoe, Daniel. The Life and Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe of York, Mariner. (1831). Illustrated by George Cruikshank. Major's Edition. London: Chatto & Windus, 1890.
Patten, Robert L. "Phase 2: "'The Finest Things, Next to Rembrandt's,' 1720–1835." Chapter 20, "Thumbnail Designs." George Cruikshank's Life, Times, and Art, vol. 1: 1792-1835. Rutgers, NJ: Rutgers U. P., 1992; London: The Lutterworth Press, 1992. Pp. 325-339.
Last modified 22 February 2018