"Two of them seized the fellow and took the camel" — illustration for Defoe's "Robinson Crusoe" (1891)

"Two of them seized the fellow and took the camel." (See p. 388), signed "Wal Paget" (lower right). Crossing through Chinese Tartary, Crusoe's party rout a detachment of Tartar cavalry, but five weeks later, having crossed the desert in Grand Tartary, five of the marauders snatch Crusoe's camel. One-half of page 394, centre, vignetted: 8 cm high by 12 cm wide. Running head: "A Second Encounter" (page 389).

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: Five Tartars swoop in for a theft

I walked it on foot, with my old pilot and a Chinese, being very desirous of a little variety. When we came to the place it was a low, marshy ground, walled round with stones, piled up dry, without mortar or earth among them, like a park, with a little guard of Chinese soldiers at the door. Having bought a camel, and agreed for the price, I came away, and the Chinese that went with me led the camel, when on a sudden came up five Tartars on horseback. Two of them seized the fellow and took the camel from him, while the other three stepped up to me and my old pilot, seeing us, as it were, unarmed, for I had no weapon about me but my sword, which could but ill defend me against three horsemen. The first that came up stopped short upon my drawing my sword, for they are arrant cowards; but a second, coming upon my left, gave me a blow on the head, which I never felt till afterwards, and wondered, when I came to myself, what was the matter, and where I was, for he laid me flat on the ground; but my never-failing old pilot, the Portuguese, had a pistol in his pocket, which I knew nothing of, nor the Tartars either: if they had, I suppose they would not have attacked us, for cowards are always boldest when there is no danger. The old man seeing me down, with a bold heart stepped up to the fellow that had struck me, and laying hold of his arm with one hand, and pulling him down by main force a little towards him, with the other shot him into the head, and laid him dead upon the spot. He then immediately stepped up to him who had stopped us, as I said, and before he could come forward again, made a blow at him with a scimitar, which he always wore, but missing the man, struck his horse in the side of his head, cut one of the ears off by the root, and a great slice down by the side of his face. The poor beast, enraged with the wound, was no more to be governed by his rider, though the fellow sat well enough too, but away he flew, and carried him quite out of the pilot’s reach; and at some distance, rising upon his hind legs, threw down the Tartar, and fell upon him. [Chapter XIV, "Attacked by Tartars," page 388]

Commentary: Crusoe's Party robbed of a camel by Tartars

Almost a constant in the various nineteenth-century programs of illustration for Defoe's eighteenth-century novel are the various artists' interpretations of the fierce and formidable Tartars. Ironically, in Defoe's novel when the nomadic horsemen encounter a much smaller but much better armed body of Europeans and Chinese the Tartars turn and flee at the first whiff of gunpowder. Whereas Thomas Stothard (1790, 1820)shows the Tartars shadowing the merchants' column and Cruikshank depicts the aftermath of a Tartar attack in two separate scenes, Phiz depicts the Europeans standing up to the thieves. Finally, Paget leaves out the Europeans entirely and depicts a Tartar horseman in full retreat, one of the 1891 edition's dozen full-page lithographs. The third Paget illustration of Crusoe's encounter with the nomad horsemen repeats the substance of illustrations by Cruikshank (1831) and Phiz (1864), but Paget has more authentically depicted both the mounted nomads and the Chinese servant, who cringes at the Tartar's spear. In the background, the European and Chinese travellers are encountering resistance from the other three Tartars.

Related Material

Cruikshank's Scenes of Combat with the Tartars (1831)

Left: As Crusoe regains consciousness, he discovers that his companions have driven off the robbers in Crusoe, regaining consciousness, sees the dead Tartar. Right: Cruikshank's dramatic tailpiece for Farther Adventures: Crusoe and his partyy deliver a furious volley from behind a stockade of stacked tree trunks in The Europeans fire a withering volley at the charging Tartar horde in Russia. [Click on the images to enlarge them.]

Phiz's Interpretation of the Tartars' Theft of the Camel (1864)

Above: Phiz's highly dramatic, full-page illustration of the Portuguese pilot's grabbing the Tartar, Robinson Crusoe attacked and robbed by Tartars. [Click on image to enlarge it.]

The Cassell's Interpretations of the Tartar Cavalry (1864)

Above: The Cassell's team produced a pair of highly dramatic, full-page illustrations for Crusoe's adventures in Tartary; particularly dynamic is A Fight with Tartars, in which the Europeans stage a daring charge. [Click on image to enlarge it.]

Above: The second Cassell's full-page composite woodblock engraving shows the Tartars in full retreat as European weaponry results in casualties and fatalities on their side, but none on the other: Flight of the Tartars. [Click on image to enlarge it.]

Stothard's and Paget's Scenes involving the Tartars (1790, 1820; 1891)

Left: As Crusoe and his party cross Tartar territory, the wily horsemen shadow them in Stothard's Robinson Crusoe travelling in Chinese Tartary. Right: Paget's dramatic full-page realisation of the Tartars' retreat, As soon as they saw us, one of them blew a kind of horn. [Click on the images 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 16 April 2018