"We made a splendid feast" — illustration for Defoe's "Robinson Crusoe" (1891)

We made a splendid feast

Wal Paget (1863-1935)

lithograph

17.9 cm high by 12.7 cm wide, framed.

1891

Robinson Crusoe, facing page 292.

Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.

[You may use these images without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the photographer 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 holds a farewell feast for the Colonists

Upon these frank and open declarations of friendship, we appointed the next day to dine all together; and, indeed, we made a splendid feast. I caused the ship’s cook and his mate to come on shore and dress our dinner, and the old cook’s mate we had on shore assisted. We brought on shore six pieces of good beef and four pieces of pork, out of the ship’s provisions, with our punch-bowl and materials to fill it; and in particular I gave them ten bottles of French claret, and ten bottles of English beer; things that neither the Spaniards nor the English had tasted for many years, and which it may be supposed they were very glad of. The Spaniards added to our feast five whole kids, which the cooks roasted; and three of them were sent, covered up close, on board the ship to the seamen, that they might feast on fresh meat from on shore, as we did with their salt meat from on board. [Chapter VI, "The French Clergyman's Counsel," pp. 292-93]

Commentary

In the lengthier programs of illustration across the nineteenth century artists have realised the return of the absent Governor, sixty-one-year-old Robinson Crusoe, to the island south of Trinidad and east of the mouth of the Orinoco — apparently administered jointly by those old enemies, Spain and Britain. Whereas George Cruikshank in 1831 chose to realised the scenes in which Crusoe presents a Bible to the former mutineer, Will Atkins, and agricultural implements and supplies to all the colonists, the Cassell illustrators depict Crusoe holding a kind of town hall discussion with the young men and the middle-aged Governor about the past and future of the colony. The Paget illustration, depicting the male colonists eating and drinking as an aboriginal slave picks up the dinner platters, is more lively — but, again, the illustrator excludes the native women who have married these Europeans. In 1891 as in 1864, the artists construe colonisation as very much a male endeavour whose administrators are experienced, middle-aged, middle-class leaders such as Crusoe, who is seated in the foreground, right, and who is readily identifiable by his more distinguished clothing, as in "'Do you not know me?'". Apparently the diners, serious-minded Sons of Empire, take no notice of the servant, completing the illustrator's notions about the colonizers and the colonized.

Related Material

Parallel Scenes from Stothard (1790), Cruikshank (1831),and Cassell (1864)

Left: Thomas Stothard's study of Crusoe's distributing supplies to the colonists of both nationalities, Robinson Crusoe distributing tools of husbandry among the inhabitants. Centre: George Cruikshank's equivalent scene, Crusoe distributing agricultural implements. Right: The Cassell's parallel scene, a large-scale realisation of Crusoe's dialogue with the colonists prior to his departure, Crusoe and the Spaniard conversing together (1864). [Click on the images to enlarge them.]

Above: Cruikshank's small-scale realisation of Crusoe's generosity, Crusoe distributing agricultural implements (1831). [Click on the image to enlarge it.]

Reference

Defoe, Daniel. The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of York, Mariner. As Related by Himself. With upwards of One Hundred and Twenty Original Illustrations by Walter Paget. London, Paris, and Melbourne: Cassell, 1891.

Last modified 31 March 2018