"Two of the wolves flew upon the guide" — illustration for Defoe's "Robinson Crusoe" (1891)

Two of the wolves flew upon the guide (See p. 208), signed "Wal Paget" bottom centre. Paget has positioned the second rider (whom initially we take to be Crusoe) well in the background, left; this is Friday, coming to the rescue. From now on, however, Crusoe will be a mere observer of the action rather than the principal actor, so that the composition foreshadows the secondary role he will play throughout most of the adventures in the second part of the novel, originally published as The Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. One-half of page 205, vignetted: 10 cm high by 11 cm wide. Running head: "Preparations for Departure" (page 205).

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: The Dangers of Travelling overland in Winter

We were a little uneasy, however, when we found it snowed one whole day and a night so fast that we could not travel; but he bid us be easy; we should soon be past it all: we found, indeed, that we began to descend every day, and to come more north than before; and so, depending upon our guide, we went on.

It was about two hours before night when, our guide being something before us, and not just in sight, out rushed three monstrous wolves, and after them a bear, from a hollow way adjoining to a thick wood; two of the wolves made at the guide, and had he been far before us, he would have been devoured before we could have helped him; one of them fastened upon his horse, and the other attacked the man with such violence, that he had not time, or presence of mind enough, to draw his pistol, but hallooed and cried out to us most lustily. My man Friday being next me, I bade him ride up and see what was the matter. As soon as Friday came in sight of the man, he hallooed out as loud as the other, “O master! O master!” but like a bold fellow, rode directly up to the poor man, and with his pistol shot the wolf in the head that attacked him.

It was happy for the poor man that it was my man Friday; for, having been used to such creatures in his country, he had no fear upon him, but went close up to him and shot him; whereas, any other of us would have fired at a farther distance, and have perhaps either missed the wolf or endangered shooting the man. [Chapter XIX, "Return to England," page 208]

Commentary: Further Adventures on the Continent

Having returned to England, Crusoe immediately sets out for Lisbon to visit the Portuguese sea-captain who picked him up three decades earlier off the African coast. Defoe's putting his protagonist onto the Continent and into a series of adventures at this late point in the narrative of The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe may strike modern novel-readers as somewhat anticlimactic. However, Defoe was essentially making up the conventions of the new prose narrative form on the fly, and was perhaps already thinking in terms of a sequel, The Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, published almost immediately after the first novel, and subsequently published with itduring the Victorian era as"Part Two." The present illustration continues the visual themes of adventure among foreigners and foreign locales.

Having dealt with financial matters in Lisbon and visited his elderly friend, Crusoe decides to lead a group of merchants overland to Calais, fearing perhaps further mishaps if he takes a sea route. Having used the menace of the cannibals and then that of the mutineers effectively in episodes on the Caribbean island, Defoe must devise another such threat in the civilised lands of Europe through which Crusoe and his party must pass on their way back to England. Consequently, he has his protagonist set out (improbably) in late fall, so that the horsemen can be attacked by ravenous wolves on several occasions in Gascony. The other principal nineteenth-century illustrators of the novel have elected to show only the subsequent attacks on the main party, and particularly on a riderless horse. However, Paget, with a longer program at his disposal, has also elected to depict the initial attack on the party's guide (riding well ahead of the main group), during which Friday behaves with valour. Whether such wolves are indigenous to the region of South America in which Friday grew up is immaterial; the incident gives De Foe the opportunity to demonstrate the Noble Savage's superior knowledge of wild animals.

Immediately, particularly in relation to earlier illustrators' representations of the horse and the wolves, the reader is struck by Paget's sense of dramatic action and the realism of his depiction of the animals; in particular, Paget's predators have luxuriant fur and well muscled, lithe bodies that suggest he studied his subject. The wolves in the Paget illustration have attacked with such celerity that they have caught the guide unawares. Not having had time to draw the long-muzzled pistol in his holster, the rider withdraws his hand from the wolf's reach, even as he kicks him. The second wolf prepares to attack the mount. But Friday, pistol already drawn, is riding to the rescue from the snow-covered slope above, the few fir trees establishing the alpine setting. The third wolf which the narrator mentions is not in evidence, and the guide has yet to be bitten, let alone severely hurt and about to fall off his horse. The illustration prepares the reader both for further wolf attacks and for Friday's timely intervention. Presumably Crusoe exhorted Friday to act on his behalf because his advanced age now prevents him from playing a more dynamic role.

Related Material

Related Scenes from Cruikshank (1831), Cassell's (1863-64), and Phiz (1864)

Above: Phiz's highly dramatic, full-page illustration of the desperate horse attempting to escape a pack of ravenous predators, Horse pursued by Wolves. With a supreme effort, Phiz's sleek, white stallion vaults the brook. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]

Left: Cruikshank's dramatic tailpiece of the riderless horse attempting to escape the wolf-pack, Riderless horse after his rider was attacked by wolves (1831). Right: The Cassell's artist studies the behaviour of the formidable wolves, and relegates the human defenders and their mounts to an inferior position behind a cloud of gun-smoke in The Wolves driven off (1863-64).

Reference

Defoe, Daniel. The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of York, Mariner. As Related by Himself. With upwards of One Hundred Illustrations. London: Cassell, Petter, and Galpin, 1863-64.

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 6 May 2018