THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSO Southern Branch . of the University of California Los Angeles LOS ANGELES STATE NORMAL SCHOOL 311 APR 2 4 AN 3 NOV 7 1324 ocTsc : OCT 15 1926 OCT 2 9 im NOV . 1 im ^^^T 2 3 ^336 WAR 29 19^ i THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE A Manual for Primary Teachers THE STORY REWRITTEN, MODERNIZED AND ADAPTED, WITH ADDITIONAL INCIDENTS FOR USE IN THE LATER PRIMARY GRADES AS A CENTER AND MATERIAL FOR ORAL AND WRITTEN LANGUAGE, NATURE STUDY, SOCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL HISTORY, ETHICS, DRAWING AND THE MANUAL ARTS a <^ ^5-4^ THE ADAPTATION, WITH ADDITIONAL INCIDENTS, INTRODUCTION AND SUGGESTIVE TREATMENTS OF THE TEXT SAMUEL B. ALLISON, Ph.D. Principal of the Walsh School, Chicago, III. % EDUCATIONAL PUBLISHING COMPANY BOSTON New York Chicago San Francisco Copyright, 1910 BY EDUCATIONAL PUBLISHING COMPANY V", \ H3 De5icate5 to tbc G:eacbcr0 of XLbe Maldb Scbool» wbosc ftfn&ls and intelligent appreciation bae made tbe development of tbe dublect poBBible. CONTENTS I Robinson with His Parents - 25 II Robinson as an Apprentice 28 III Robinson's Departure .... - 32 IV Robinson Far from Home - 36 V The Shipwreck - 39 VI Robinson Saved 42 VII The First Night on Land .... . 44 VIII Robinson on an Island .... 49 IX Robinson's Shelter - 52 X Robinson Makes a Hat .... . 56 XI Robinson's Calendar .... . 60 XII Robinson Makes a Hunting Bag 64* XIII Robinson's Shoes and Parasol . . 68 XIV Robinson Explores the Island 72 XV Robinson as a Hunter .... - 76 XVI Getting Fire ..... 79 XVII Robinson Makes Some Furniture . 82 XVIII Robinson Becomes a Shepherd - 85 XIX Robinson Builds a Home for His Goats . 89 XX Robinson Gets Ready for Winter 93 XXI How Robinson Lays up a Store of Food . - 97 XXII Robinson's Diary ..... lOI XXIII Robinson is Sick ..... . 106 XXIV Robinson's Bower ..... 109 XXV Robinson Again Explores His Island . 114 XXVI Robinson and the Birds .... - "7 6 CONTENTS XXVII Robinson Gets Fire . 122 XXVIII Robinson Makes Baskets 126 XXIX Robinson Becomes a Farmer . - 131 XXX Robinson as Potter .... . • 137 XXXI Robinson as Baker . 141 XXXII Robinson as Fisherman . 145 XXXIII Robinson Builds a Boat . 151 xxxrv Robinson as a Sailor . 150 XXXV A Discovery ..... . . 165 XXXVI The Landing of the Savages . . 166 XXXVII Robinson as Teacher . 172 XXXVIII Another Shipwreck 176 xxxrx Saving Things from the Ship . 180 XL The Return of the Savages . . 187 XLI Deliverance at Last .... • 193 XLII Robinson at Home .... . 197 INTRODUCTION I THE TEXT Nothing need here be said about the merit of the Robinson story. The fact that it has fascinated and still is fascinating generations, proves its intrinsic worth. It is owing to its deep and perennial in- terest that an attempt is here made to use it as a means of instruction. It is here attempted to bring within the focus of this interest the language or expressive skill and to some extent the manual work in the school — to use it as a content to be expressed in these different ways. The purpose is to furnish a content not only rich and worth while in itself but to use it for the purpose of getting skill in all oral and written language, illustration, and the manual arts. The text here given is a very free adaptation of the original story. The main departure is that Robinson gets nothing from the wrecked ship. It is years afterward that he obtains tools from another ship wrecked off the island. Incidents have been added and departures made wherever it was thought best to do so. Robinson, in the adapted version, lived in New York. This gives the story a more familiar air and adapts it better to primary work. Indeed any other city could as well be used. For Chicago children he could better perhaps be placed in that city. In this way the normal direction of education instruction would be conserved. The idea of such an adapted Robinson Crusoe was first obtained from a German version of the story by William Rein. A translation was made of this version and used for some years in Chicago. This version may be considered as the starting point for the present one. It has been almost entirely rewritten, however, as it was meagre in detail, inaccurate, and unsatisfactory in many other respects. This rewriting has been done with especial reference to accurate details of the animal and plant life of the island which Defoe undoubtedly had in mind when he wrote the immortal story, and to invention and 7 8 INTRODUCTION evolution in the several industrial arts and pursuits. The ethical and social values have also been emphasized. II THE VARIOUS VALUES On the informing side the Robinson has been considered as pos- sessing a threefold value, (i) It has value as nature-study and geographical material. (2) As a social-industrial history. (3) As a medium of ethical instruction. (i) Its Nature Stxtdy Value. The very best way to study nature is of course to give opportunity for actual sensuous contact on the part of the learner. But if our knowledge of the world were con- fined to such actual sensuous contact it would include a very small number of objects of which we really have intelligent comprehension. Most of our knowledge-objects belong to the Universe of Discourse rather than to the Universe of things material. Education is and must be always an introduction into the Universe of Discourse. It is granted that his progress therein and its value to the child depends upon the range of his actual sensuous contact, or the breadth of his direct experience. If the learner has a fair measure of direct experi- ence or interpretive material, his knowledge, secondary it may be, may be built out in all directions. He may be introduced into the world of words and make progress therein under skillful teaching. It is a matter of widening the range of concepts by the inclusion of new material under them in the form of symbols or words. Good ft,> teaching will of course always keep well within the child's range of '" interpretive material. It will not advance faster than the rate at which the old meanings can assimilate the new. Skillful instruction will always use whatever objects there are at hand to aid in forming adequate ideas. Pictures are invaluable aids. Careful planning will get together illustrative materials. Zoological and anthropological exhibits are available in Museums. Thus it is possible to start with the child's present stock of direct experience and gradually go out to the more and more remote. Each step taken should be used as an instrument for further advance. The Robinson is rich in nature study suggestions; plants, animals and materials of a new world and remote zone are presented radiant with the interest reflected from the hero of the tale. (2) The Robinson as Industrial History. The version here INTRODUCTION 9 presented aims to be an epitomized industrial history. Robinson begins with nothing but his hands and at length wins from inhospi- table nature food and shelter, clothing and comforts. In doing this he reinvents the appliances of primitive industry and makes a begin- ning in each industrial art. In his struggle, experimenting, failures and successes, racial history is recapitulated and the arduous path of progress revealed. Much is said now-a-days about making the school an ideal social community. It is contended that it should reproduce or stand for the highest projection of the social ideal. The school should be a real living, not a make believe. But how can the school be the ideal social unit or group unless the relative values and worth of social activities be maintained in the school. How can a real social life be maintained within it unless it is centered in the real social way? On this view it is clear, that the school should be centered around those social functions that arc the center and core of the community life. It will be readily agreed that the industrial arts in the social life are the most fundamental. They are, largely at least, the bonds that hold society together. Society is a superstructure built upon them. Every member of society has some relation to these fundamental activities. A large majority of citizens is actually engaged in them. But so far has the division of labor gone that the industries have lost sight of their mutual interdependence. The workers in one field do not see the real imjxirtance of their specialty in relation to the whole. And thus labor loses the sustaining power of social and emotional reactions. As the isolation of the different occupations increases, the more marked is the loss of sympathy and solidarity that are so essen- tial to the social welfare. Now from this standpoint education may be defined as the bringing the child into complete and sympathetic understanding of all the parts of our complex social life. As the years of maturity come, the sense of the unity of the whole should strengthen. The social, ethical and aesthetic values that come from a wide outlook and broad sym- pathies should uplift and ennoble the worker in whatever field, c^ Each must be brought into a sympathetic participation of all difficulties, hardships and pleasures of all the groups and divisions of the social organization. But at the outset the school meets with almost insuperable ob- stacles in any attempt to realize such an end. The first difficulty is the complex nature of the social life taken at lo INTRODUCTION its present level of development. So far has the separate occupa- tions diverged that they seem at casual view to run parallel — to be independent. So that the whole of which they are the parts, is ob- scured. Among so many apparently isolated parts, no unity can be found. Over against this specialized content we have the weak, unorganized powers of comprehension of the child. This is the first problem. The second difficulty is that such an emotional or sympathetic attitude toward the elements of the social life cannot be given by formal instruction. It may do something but not much. The difficulties of each must be real problems to the child before he can have any real valuable social experience — before he can feel really the meaning of the different social situations. We have not here an intellectual problem wholly, but an emotional or ethical one as well. A mere contemplative knowledge of social affairs, however broad and complete, will not fill the requirements of the end set up. This knowledge must have emotional reaction. The efficient social factor is active as well as contemplative. Social problems are to him something more than problems of the intellect. These are the difficulties. How may they be overcome? It is plain that to begin with a cross section of the intricate network of the social life at its present level as a content and attempt to comprehend it as a whole and in its manifold relations, is a task far beyond the feeble grasp of the child. Equally hopeless would be the attempt, to start with any special factor of the industrial life. Wherever one might penetrate, one would find parts and ends of the industrial processes whose unraveling and reconstruction would be just so far beyond the child. The solution of this difficulty is not far to seek. A cross section of the social life must be taken farther down in the stream of develop- ment at a point of departure where the divergence has hardly begun and where the mutual interrelation and interdependence is manifest because of the simplified form. That is, the presentation must be historical. From crude undifferentiated beginnings the various occu- pations have emerged into an apparent freedom or independence. Go back far enough and we find them all contained within the circle of the simplest living. To start at this level, get a grasp of the various lines and follow them into greater and greater divergence and freedom will not necessarily mean to lose sight of their interconnec- tion and functional unity. So much for the intellectual problem. INTRODUCTION 1 1 The solution of the emotional problem seems to lie in the direction of making the difliculties attending the social advance from crude beginning to specialization of function, real ones for the child — at the same time emphasizing the importance of the solution of the prob- lem in its relation to further advance. This participation by the child in the social life must be an active one. He must actually meet and solve the difficulties as they arise if he is to get social experience and the proper emotional reaction. Of course, at no time does the child lose sight of his own identity or the fact of his looking down from a greater social height. There is then both sociological and physiological warrant for interrelating the industrial arts with a historical content which shall put them in their relation to human advance and advancement and shall make them a means of wider social view and deeper social feelings. It is just this aspect of the present Robinson that will commend itself to thoughtful teachers. It is a social study. It is a study in the social life in its simpler primitive form. It is a cross section of life back in its crude beginning. Each occupation and invention is seen with reference to human need and in its relation to the whole. It is seen how each trade grows out of a need, what has been its struggles and problems and triumphs. Such a content affords opportunity to present the industrial hand works as problems of satisfying desires, whose solutions are of the utmost importance and value. Thus a motive and setting is given to each step forward. Even if the reinvention of primitive tools and weapons cannot be completely carried out, yet the industries are seen in their proper and ethical relationship to the community life. Little opportunity is given for work in the thin woods. This comes from the nature of the case. Industries using the less resisting mediums first developed, such as basketry, clay moulding, pottery, spinning and weaving. These handworks all will admit are best suited to the primary grades. These occupations are best presented as problems, the solution of which involves the invention or improve- ment of the tools or implements used. (3) The Robinson as Ethical. Nothing is so evident as the fact that our schools are not performing their full social function and duty in the way of moral training; in so far as this is a matter of conscious instruction in the results of different lines of conduct and 12 INTRODUCTION in so far as it is a matter of giving opportunity for exercise of moral judgment in concrete cases. The Robinson aims to depict the consequence of a certain typical kind of juvenile conduct. It finds Robinson in a loving home with every comfort. His parents are kind to indulgence. Nevertheless Robinson develops waywardness. He becomes a truant. Despite all correction and advice, he continues his wayward course of action. He becomes idle. He cannot apply himself to serious affairs. He breaks off his home ties and seeks freedom from parental restraint on board ship. His subsequent troubles are a direct consequence of his misdeeds at home, the direct result of idleness, disobedience and evil companions. He is thrown into a situation where he must either work or starve. Through pressure of his needs Robinson gradually acquires industrious habits. Though lacking in all kinds of skill from having neglected his schooling, he gradually acquires ability to cope with the most discouraging circumstances with inferior tools and implements. Having been selfish and neglectful of his home and opportunities Robinson suffers the penalty of being deprived of the companionship of his kind, and opportunity for satisfying the ordinary ambitions and aspirations. Hardships, however, are corrective. They not only make him industrious but soften his heart and fill him with anguish and remorse for his past wasted youth. He becomes thoughtful and kind to all living creatures. He knows now the value of all sentient comradeship. Life to him becomes sacred. Having been deprived of the fellowship of his kind, he feels the value for himself of all moving things, at the same time he instinctively recognizes the in- herent right of each thing to its own life and way of living. He is the friend and benefactor of animals and treats with kindness even savages that are entirely in his power. After atoning for his early sins, by becoming an industrious, thoughtful, kind, sympathetic, useful man, he is placed at last back into the comforts and values of countrymen and home. Thus the story furnish us a complete dramatic cycle. A home and a place in society is lost through idleness and regained through industry. The story is thus a typical ethical situation. It affords abundant oppor- tunity for the exercise of the ethical judgment in concrete cases. Character is not much affected by wise ethical saws. The moral judgment fashions habits of conduct only by use in ethical situations. INTRODUCTION 13 With children the need is not so much to learn precepts as to actually make and give ethical judgment upon conduct. Instruction that consciously enforces the moral aspect of every action will also miss its end if such aspect is forced and thrust to the front. With children the dramatic element occupies the center of interest. Other aspects borrow interest from this. So that the moral of a tale con- sciously and openly enforced is instructive energy misapplied. The ethical value of the Robinson is one of its strongest appeals to good teaching. It will fill a very evident lack in our instruction. It furnishes an excellent ethical content and cannot fail to be hailed with delight by the judicious teacher. The suggestive questions are all fashioned on the plan of giving opportunity for moral judgment on part of the child. It is not the plan to consciously enforce a moral. That may well be left to take care of itself as the story proceeds. Ill THE ROBINSON AS A MEANS OF GETTING LIN- GUISTIC AND EXPRESSIVE SKILLS But the content value of the Robinson is but half its worth. Infor- mation as such in school or elsewhere, avails nothing. Unless infor- mation works out into skill it is mere lumber and a waste of time. Each particular content has its skill side. Unless the teaching brings out this skill through the medium of the content, it is poor teaching, or not teaching at all. In telling a story and leaving to chance whether it is used in obtaining linguistic or other skills, teaching is losing its most pregnant opfxirtunity. For with primary children all skills should come indirectly, as the expression of a content suited to the demands of their stage of development. The problems of skill or technique may be centered around the discussion of the question! Should there be formal exercises from the first years of school life whose end is skill without reference to the purpose, need or interest that controls the child in such ex- ercises? Or should skill wait upon and grow out of activity, which is the expression of the pupil's ovm present needs or purposes? In all controversy over this problem there is either implicit or explicit recognition of two factors or aspects involved in adult effi- ciency. One is that side or elficiency shown in the mere mechanical ability to perfonn acts skillfully, such as a skillful copyist shows. 14 INTRODUCTION The other factor is that side or aspect of efficiency which is more than skill in this sense, to which attaches moral worth, initiative independence, individuality — in short, intelligent will. These two factors being aspects of all efficiency, must be factors in the educational process that makes for efficiency. Hence their reaction and relations are of extreme interest. On the psychological side, these two factors are referred to when we speak of the idea to be expressed and the expression of it. Dr. Dewey points out here that we have not here a spiritual and physical factor, but the whole matter is a relation between two kinds of images. The idea to be expressed is related to the motor images that express it as end to means. He further says that we have not the idea and its expression, but that the expression, the technique, is a part of the full play of the idea itself. These two factors appear then as phases of the concrete fact. Their relation is vital or organic. They are phases of the develop- ment of the volitional act. They are both necessary in the growth of efficiency. The doing (habit skill or technique) reacts upon the image (idea being expressed) makes it more definite; that is, reveals its parts and relations. At the same time this growth in definition of the images makes clear the sequence in means of expression (motor images). Now if a separation is made between these two necessary sides of the educational process, before the emergence in consciousness of the value and importance of skill as a means of expression there occurs a break in the educational process which has as a result the following consequences. This separation between ideas to be expressed and means of ex- pression (technique) — as in all formal set exercises and drills, before consciousness of their value and relation — cuts oflf interest from the technique side and leaves it without propulsion. The attitude toward it is indifference, repugnance or open rebellion. The in- terest is always in the end as expression of the self. The means get interest from this source. They (the technique) become valuable only because they express the end. Separated from the end or true purpose, such exercises have to substitute some other external motive, such as fear of punishment, rivalry or reward. That is they become really immoral besides largely ineffectual in getting the skill. Skill in any line with children is to be arrived at through interests in content, that is indirectly. The more instruction in- INTRODUCTION 15 sists on skill for skill's sake the less there will be obtained except at cost of the idea. On the side of the idea a separation of the two, as in formal drills, results in mental stagnation. The image is cut off from normal conditions of growth. There is vagueness, dreaminess, lack of concentration. The real mental life is not connected up with execution. The question of technique is one of the questions of most frequent debate among teachers. The older practice was dominated by the dictum "Form first and content afterward." The more recent aphoristic pedagogical imperative is, "Learn to do by doing." We have in these two dicta the whole controversy placed in sharp contrast. In the first there is conscious separation of the image and its expression. The pupil must know how before doing. He must learn to swim before getting into the water. Teaching is a drill, method is a mechanism. The argument that a child cannot do a thing until he knows how, seems irresistible. It is an open ad- mission to the principle, that knowing is prior to the doing and really independent of it. The second principle makes knowing dependent on doing. Form or the how must wait on the doing. The pupil must learn to swim without guidance. The extreme of this position looks askance at all directed or required work. The problem reduces in its last analysis to the question of priority of knowing and doing. In this abstract form the crux is unsolvable. Any presupposition of a division of conduct into two abstract factors renders the case hopeless. It could never be determined whether knowing precedes doing or doing precedes knowing because they are simply two aspects of one and the same concrete whole of conduct. And as such there can be no question of priority between them as already shovm. They are a whole either for the knowing or the doing. From the psychological side, therefore, they can be no prefer- ence given to either side of the question. In fact at the bottom for {pedagogy the problem is not a psychologi- cal one at all but an ethical one. In adult life the technique is of such transcendent importance economically, as to overshadow the moral and intellectual aspect of the matter. A livelihood depends upon skill. This may give it such an interest and importance as to compel its pursuit independent of other considerations. i6 INTRODUCTION But with children of school age the ethical aspect of the problem should be prominent. Learn to do by doing, expresses this ethical import. It sees in this procedure, activity working free from fixed motor habits at an age when such fixed habits would operate to im- pede mental and physical growth and hence moral growth. It contemplates a gradual control of muscular co-ordinations as the needs of child's living make them urgent. Skill is like happiness; if aimed at directly, we miss it. To get skill we must emphasize the content. To get content systematized, understood, to make it practical and worth while, the technique side must be given opportunity for development. (i) Language. The greatest need of the primary school to-day is some positive content or subject-matter of instruction. The popular conception of such a school is that its main function is to teach the young child to read, write, and cipher. That is, that it has to do mainly with the formal aspects of language and numbers. So long as a certain amount of facility is gained in these formal arts, there is little disposition to demand anything more. When we consider what the child at the age of six or seven really is; when we consider his love of story, his hunger for the concrete material of knowledge, his deep interest in the widening of his ex- perience — it is evident that such a course is out of all harmony with his real nature. It is the giving of stones when the cry is for bread. It is even worse than the proverbial making of bricks without straw. It is attempting to make bricks with straw alone. It will be granted that the mastery of a printed and a written vocabulary is of the utmost importance. As a subordinate end, the ability to interpret the printed page and to express thought in correct form is the most imperative demand upon the school. But these acquirements are not a content in themselves. They are not the material of instruction. In themselves, they do not enlarge the understanding or furnish the food which the young mind hungers for, and must have, if it is maintained in a condition of health. They are mere forms, and the dwelling upon them during the impression- able years of childhood results in a deadening of his interest and dwarfing of his powers, so that the over emphasis of this phase of education to the exclusion of content defeats it ovm ends. Laying the foundation for a future character edifice, keeping ac- tive the developing interests, the widening of his experience, the for- mation of interpretative concepts — these are of greater value from INTRODUCTION 17 the point of view of language mastery, even of its spoken and written forms, than the persistent drill in its formal elements. Language teaching must be approached from the content side if we are to get any genuine interest in the overcoming of difficulties on the part of the child. There is no interest for the child in the language forms themselves when presented in abstraction and em- phasized as such. He may be drilled into proficiency, but the in- terest does not come from the relation of these formal elements to his own needs or activity. The interest has been external and it flags as soon as the external excitement is withdrawn. A genuine interest, and intrinsic one growing out of his own needs and nature, can be fostered only by supplying a subject matter adapted to the various levels of thought through which its development leads him. If this is furnished, it is no partial, intermittent attention that the pupil gives. While dealing with such a content he is not forming the habit of mind-wandering and inattention so frequently seen when children are kept closely to word drill and to reading for elocutionary purposes. The early forcing of technique is not a real gain in the child's education, however much may be apparently accomplished. Im- mediate results are not a safe guide for instruction in the primary grades. They are, many times, a positive loss in time, and are gained at the expense of dwarfing the mental and physical powers. There is no real need of forcing the process of learning to read if the teacher is ready with a subject-matter which the child is already going out to meet. What has been said with regard to the relation of reading to a content is equally true with regard to what is known as language teaching. It is a hopeless task to endeavor to give skill in the use of language independent of a content which is not in accord with the pupil's own stage of development. The interest to be genuine, and productive of self-effort, must always be in the content. An en- richment of his vocabulary, a proper use of words, correct form of oral and written speech must come, not for themselves, but as re- sults of an effort to the adequate expression of something which the pupil is interested to communicate. The widespread criticism directed against the results of language teaching in our schools no doubt has something of justification. This defect does not come from lack of attention to the matter, or from indifference on the part of the teachers, but largely from the over- i8 INTRODUCTION emphasis of the purely formal aspects of language. The matter is approached from the wrong side. In early years, to get form we must emphasize content. In the primary grades, formal insist- ence on correct technique should be at the minimum, while richness and variety of subject-matter should be at the maximum. (2) Correlation. There cannot be much question but that the kind of correlating center that the Robinson offers is the only practical one. Such a center or material must or should be one about which both manual and linguistic exercises may without absurd stretching be grouped. The content of such a center must flow out naturally with the various manual and linguistic skills. Such a center is the Robinson. Without violence to its form or content the entire work of the school may be grouped around its fascinating story. It is offered as material to be used, not merely be given as something whose form it is sacrilege to alter. The tell- ing children stories for the purpose of amusing or entertaining them very easily degenerates into imaginational dissipation, and should be indulged in but rarely. Certainly the nature study, the social and industrial history with- out which manual art is just one thing more to teach, finds in the Robinson an easy and natural center. It gives to the manual work a setting and connection, makes it understandable, gives it mean- ing. In the light which the story and good teaching throws around it the hand work is not just for the purpose of keeping mischievous hands busy. It is not something else to be taught. It is given vital connection in the life of the school. Each step in advance a prob- lem whose solution throws light on what the child sees going on around him. The same may be said for the ethical aspect. Ethical teaching flows out of the content without any far fetched application. To talk about the conduct of the hero in this light seems easy and natural. To praise or to blame seems the natural attitude to take. The con- tent takes the ethical form as naturally as it takes the social or his- torical. In any case, there can be no question but that it is a natural content for the centering of the language arts. The same may be said for drawing and illustrating. These activities are usually cut oflF from all setting that lends in- terest or shows value. Drawing is simply something else to learn. It is without present meaning. Es Schwebt in der Lujt. It is the most difficult thing in the world to get continuous and develop- INTRODUCTION 19 mental application to it, just because it is one thing more, without any vital relation to what is already going on. The Robinson gives it such a setting. It borrows interest from the story. It gives some- thing to jxirtray, over which the child lingers fondly. His drawing ceases to be abstract and just because the teacher demands it, and be- comes another and cherished mode of expressing the content of the story. It becomes a mode of expressing the content in many respects superior to language for the child, because the child life is a series of pictures. He has not reached the level where his thought gives on in words for the most part, as with adults. For the primary grades the Robinson furnishes an excellent point of departure for hand work. As already said, it places hand work in a setting of meaning. It is not advisable, perhaps, to follow slavishly the order or projects of the texts. In any case the ideal connection, tlie meaning, is there, without which the hand work loses half its value. Nothing is truly informing that does not work out in some kind of skill or technique either linguistic or otherwise, and nothing Is really worth while in skill that does not analyze, systematize, and give form and personal value to content. IV SUGGESTIONS (i) The story should be told, not read to pupils. The teachers that fail to do this are not living up to their high privileges. The difference between reading and telling it is just the difference be- tween a dry mechanical performance and one instinct with life and expression. It is not meant that the teacher should memorize the words of the text. She should master the details and depend upon inspiration for the form in which it is given. This story is divided into short dramatic units. It is not meant that they should be taken as lessons and administered one a day until exhausted. There is abundance of material for a year's work or more. The material is to be used. (2) Oral Reproduction. Children should never be required to repeat a portion on once hearing it. Many teachers read a story and then call upon someone to give it back. Such a method misses the aim. With children long drilled in reproduction this might occasionally be done. But for the most part great care should be exercised in familiarizing the children with details until the slowest 20 INTRODUCTION is ready to say something. The Germans call this process "deepen- ing" — a good word. This "deepening" may be done in many ways. The teacher at first may not tell the story at all consecutively, but develop it by means of questions, adding parts not guessed out by the children. She may tell it on two or three consecutive days. She may tell it and then bring out and enforce details by questioning for two or three days. She should make each object of interest mentioned a subject of conversation, explanation, or a peg on which the chil- dren hang their experiences. But when the deepening process has been completed or thought sufficient, the children should be then thrown upon their own re- sources. Each one should tell the portion designated without help from suggestions or questions. The exercise should be conducted as any other school recitation. Each child should be called upon as often as possible. Volunteers should not be called for, but each one should be called out as a matter of course. If any distinction is made, it should always be the slow child that is called oftener than his more brilliant mate. The tempta- tion is to let the good talker tell the story. This will discourage the poorer talkers. When once a child begins his story he should not be interrupted by corrections. Everything should be subordinated to spontaneity and easy flow of language construction. Anything making the child unduly conscious of the means of expression will defeat the end. Many incorrections and speech defects will correct themselves in time. After the child has made his attempt or said all he can, or has been superseded by someone else, corrections can be made on the board or otherwise. (3) Preparation. Before telling the new topic, preparation should always be made for it. This is simply good teaching. Be- fore the new is given, the ideas necessary to assimilate it, to under- stand it, or give it meaning should be in the fore of consciousness. There should be an active fringe of related or similar ideas. The experience of the children should be gone over carefully to find a familiar point on which to hang the new story. Not only this, but each important step should always be put as a problem for the children to work out, either orally or in written fonn. INTRODUCTION 21 Many teachers may object to reproduction exercises as not giving scope for originality and invention. Abundant opixjrtunity may be given for original comix)sition if tiic new matter is first placed be- fore the child in the form of a problem to be worked out. Indeed all learning is the solution of problems. Skillful teaching will present even history as a series of problems. The beginning of wisdom is the question. The question always locates a problem. But in the form of a problem the new part or movement may be anticipated by the children either orally or in writing. In this way opportunity is afforded for originality and invention. There is much td commend this practice. In this way the child is active according to his present ability. He is nothing if not im- aginative. His originality and invention should be exercised on this level. (4) Written Language. The written work in connection with the Robinson may consist of two kinds as above. After the story is well started those that have not read the story may anticipate what is coming. Or the particular problem involved in the new chapter may be given for a written solution. Children will show great ingenuity in such work. And in many ways this form of written work is superior to reproduction, although reproduction should never be in the words of the story given by the teacher. The ante-solution, so to speak, of Robinson's problems in oral or written form should not, however, wholly displace written repro- duction of the story. There will always be pupils that find them- selves better in this form of language exercise than the other. It is always wise to have each child keep each part of the story anticipated and reproduced and use them for reading exercises so that motive for the written exercises may be strengthened. Port- folios for this purpose may be easily made. For a number of years the following plan for spelling has been found to bring good results. No formal spelling work in the primary grades is required. At the time or period of written work the teacher gives to it her entire at- tention. When a child wishes to use a word he does not know how to spell he asks the teacher for the spelling. Usually the teacher spells it orally, then writes it on the board, either erasing it quickly, or if an unusual word, allowing it to remain for the information of others. Written work in the higher primary grades should take place not more than once or twice a week or after the whole chapter has been as INTRODUCTION thoroughly exhausted in all its other possibilities. The written exercise crowns the work, cements together its various parts, gives it form and portability. The suggestions under the heads, "Things to Think and Talk About" and "Problems to Work Out," are mere suggestions. They are intended as examples of the way the story may be utilized as a carrier or medium of school activity — as a center for correlat- ing the work of the day. They are not meant to trench on the legitimate province of the teacher. Her own working over, her own points of stress and of view are always best. Her high privilege it is to be thus self contained. It is not a duty; it is a privilege. The teacher that does not rise to the mastery of her subject matter to the extent of being able to use it as a sculptor uses clay to accomplish her educative purposes is not living up to her h?gh privilege of feeling her work a joy — a high calling rather than a business or drudgery. (5) Nature Study. It is not to be supposed that the knowledge of the children unsupplemented by the teacher will be adequate to illuminate all the nature study topics that are suggested. The teacher must prepare himself to explain and describe by pictures, drawings, objects, visits to collections and museums. This work should show itself in the drawings and illustrations. The teacher can test her thoroughness in getting the details of objects and en- vironment into mental circulation by watching the drawings and illustrations by the children. Robinson goes out from tolerably familiar surroundings of the temperate zone and in all excursions that the instruction takes it should go out from this familiar environ- ment and come back to it so that instruction may always keep foot- ing within the child's experience. The remote should be illumined by the near and familiar. Patiently a fair idea of a tropical en- vironment and climate should be built up with considerable detail of typical trees, vines, insects, shrubs, flowers, animals, birds, and weather. In doing this the usual province of nature study vv^ill of course be somewhat transcended and the instruction will be geo- graphical in its nature rather. Indeed, as a preparation for formal geographical and scientific work this side of the story will prove in- valuable. (6) The Industrial and Social History. The social and industrial history will probably be the most diflficult to handle. It is here that most teachers need especial preparation. But the INTRODUCTION 23 means of becoming well infonncd on these points are easily at hand. Frederick Starr's "First Steps in Human Progress," in Joly's "Man Before Metals" and "Evolution in Art," by C. Haddon, will be found to contain all the information needed along the line of the history of invention, manners and customs of savage and primitive peoples. Children usually know something about Indians and Eskimo life and this should be used as a point of departure for under- standing savage and primitive people. The extent to which this line of work should be carried would depend entirely upon the age and ability of the class. In third and fourth grades it could be made a considerable feature. In any case its point of departure should be the present and its return to the same point. (7) Ethical Treatment. In the suggestions for ethical treat- ment the aim has been to give opportunity for children to give their own judgment on alternative courses of conduct. This is far different from consciously enforcing a moral. Children are very quick to respond to ethical situations in simple cases. In many cases, however, the fault disapproved or the virtue extolled can be used to emphasize some particular remissness in some members of the class. (8) Drawing. The means of expression called drawing falls into three parts, as a school discipline. Object drawing, illustrative drawing, and design. Illustrative drawing or pictorial representa- tion seems to come first in development. The drav/ing of an ob- ject was made not for the purpose of making an exact copy, but for the purpose of using it for the end in view. So long as the draw- ing answered this purpose that was all that was required. Accuracy of representation was never an end. It is likewise with the child. Accuracy of drawing is not the end aimed at, but the delineation of some event or happening. It is a movement, not a detail, that the child is interested in portraying. For this reason illustrative drawing may well serve as the starting point. The teacher can get accuracy and detail in the objects portrayed best by borrowing interest from the larger whole in which the child is interested. When Robinson gets the dog from the ship is the time to make dogs the special topic of the formal drawing lesson. When it is cocoanut trees with which the young artist wants to characterize his tropical landscape, that is the time to study to draw cocoa palm trees. The child's ability to illustrate truly and characteristically the scenes and incidents of the story in free or undirected occasions 34 INTRODUCTION is a good measure of the success, not only of the formal drawing lesson but of the nature-study work as well. Object drawing is for the pictorial or illustrative work and apart from it has little meaning or attraction for primary children. Points of technique should be taken up in formal lessons, as need for them is felt by the learner. Gradual progress should be made toward more and more typical and characteristic detail in illustrative compositions. The merely aesthetic is not felt as a propulsion toward delinea- tion at early stages. Figures, animal and human life, types of vegetation should be emphasized rather than mere landscape effects. Both teachers and pupils show a tendency to avoid the human figure in the later primary grades. A stereotyped Robinson that does not change from the beginning to the end of the story should be avoided. The drawing of Robin- son should respond strictly to each change of dress noted. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE I ROBINSON WITH HIS PARENTS PREPARATION We are going to hear the story of a boy who did not love school and wished to go away on the ocean in a ship. The story tells how he finally ran away from home and was ship-wrecked on an island, where he remained alone for many years. Where were the ships that you have seen? Did they go to a strange country? In what country would you find many wild animals and black men? Do you know any boy that does not go to school ? PRESENTATION There once lived in the city of New York, a boy by the name of Robinson Crusoe. He had a pleasant home. His father and mother were kind to him and sent him to school. They hoped that he would study hard and grow up to be a wise and useful man, but he loved rather to run idle about the street than to go to school. He was fond of playing along the River Hudson, for he there saw the great ships come and go. They were as big as houses. 25 a6 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE He watched them load and unload their cargoes and hun- dreds of people get off and on. His father had told him that the ships came from far distant lands, where lived many large animals and black men. His father told him too, that in these faraway countries the nuts on the trees grew to be as large as one's head and that the trees were as high as church steeples. When Robinson saw the ships put out to sea, he would watch them till they would disappear below the horizon far out in the ocean and think, "Oh, if I could only go with them far away to see those strange countries!" Thus he would linger along the great river and wish he might find an opportunity of making a voyage. Often it would be dark before he would get home. When he came into the house his mother would meet him and say in a gentle voice, "Why, Robinson, how late you are in getting home! You have been to the river again." Then Robinson would hang his head and feel deeply ashamed, and when his father, who was a merchant, came home from the store, his mother would tell him that Robinson had again been truant. This would grieve his father deeply and he would go to the boy's bedside and talk earnestly with him. "Why do you do so?" he would say. "How often have I told you to go to school every day?" This would for a time win Robinson back to school, but by the next week it had been forgotten and he would again be loitering along the river in spite of his father's remonstrances. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE aj THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT* (a) Rivers, the Hudson, cities, New York, wharves, ocean vessels, old and modem. What nuts and what trees did Robin- son's father refer to? (b) Home life, school life, different occupations one might see at the wharf. Study different kinds of ships, so that you may draw one well. (c) Did Robinson do right in staying away from school ? What do you think of Robinson forgetting so soon his father's command? How old a boy do you think him? Do you like the wharf? When should boys go to the wharf ? PROBLEMS TO WORK OUTf (a) Picture Robinson at the wharf watching the ships, his home, etc. KOBINSON WATCHING THE SHIPS ♦(a) designates science; (b), social history, industry, etc.; (c), ethics. t(a) designates the graphic; (b), the plastic medium (c), the hard. II ROBINSON AS AN APPRENTICE PREPARATION Do you know what an apprentice is ? How do men earn money ? How do boys learn trades? Do you know anyone having a trade? What trade would you like to follow when you grow up? How many trades can you name? Does one have to learn store-keeping? Everyone should learn to do some useful thing. What trade do you think Robinson best fitted for? PRESENTATION In this way one year after another slipped by. Robin- son was not more diligent. He was now almost sixteen years old and had not learned anything. Then came his birthday. In the afternoon his father called him into his room. Robinson opened the door softly. There sat his father with a sad face. He looked up and said, "Well, Robinson, all your schoolmates have long been busy try- ing to learn something, so that they may be able to earn their own living. Paul will be a baker, Robert a butcher, Martin is learning to be a carpenter, Herman a tailor, Otto a blacksmith, Fritz is going to high school, because he is going to be a teacher. Now, you are still doing nothing. This will not do. From this time on I wish you to think of becoming a merchant. In the morning 28 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 29 you will go with mc to the store and begin work. If you are attentive and skillful, when the time comes you can take up my business and carry it on. But if you remain careless and continue to idle about, no one will ever want you and you must starve because you will never be able to earn a living." So the next morning Robinson went to the store and be- gan work. He wrapped up sugar and coffee, he weighed out rice and beans. He sold meal and salt, and when the dray wagon pulled up at the store, loaded with new goods, he sprang out quickly and helped to unload it. He carried in sacks of flour and chests of tea, and rolled in barrels of coffee and molasses. He also worked some at the desk. He looked into the account books and saw in neat writing, "Goods received" and ''Goods sold." He noticed how his father wrote letters and reckoned up his accounts. He even took his pen in hand and put the addresses on the letters and packages as well as he could. But soon he was back in his careless habits. He was no longer attentive to business. He wrapped up salt in- stead of sugar. He put false weights on the scales. He gave some too much and others too little. His hands were in the business only, his mind was far away on the ocean with the ships. When he helped unload the wagons, he would often let the chests and casks drop, so that they were broken and their contents would run out on the ground. For he was always thinking, "Where have these casks come from and how beautiful it must be there!" And many times packages came back because Robinson had written the name of the place or the county wrong. For when he was writing the address, he was always thinking, "You will be laid upon a wagon and will 30 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE then go into the ship." One day he had to write a letter to a man far over the sea. He could stand it no longer. His father had gone out. He threw down the pen, picked up his hat and ran out to the Hudson to see the ships, and from that time on he spent more time loitering along the river than he did in the store. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (o) Sugar, coffee, rice, when and how grown ? Trace them from plantation to Robinson's store. Tea — where does it come from ? (b) Industries and Trades. How each works for each. Trades known to children. (c) Why couldn't Robinson go to High school? Did he have education enough to make a good business man ? Why was he care- less and forgetful ? Could he have made a great merchant like his father? Did Robinson's parents love him? BLACKSUIXH THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 31 PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Draw or cut from paper, Robinson in store, carpenter at his work, blacksmith shoeing horses. Show each kind of tradesman at work. (b) Model in clay some of the animals Robinson wished to see. Mould in sand harbor and surroundings. Ill ROBINSON'S DEPARTURE PREPARATION Do you wonder what became of the idle, truant Robinson ? Do you think he became better and mended his bad habits ? What is likely to happen to a boy such as Robinson ? Tell what you think he did and what happened to him. PRESENTATION Robinson's father soon noticed that his son was no longer attending to his work, and one morning sent for him to come to his ofiEice, When Robinson came in his father arose from his chair and looked him long and earnestly in the face. Then he said, "I am very sorry, Robinson, that you seem determined to continue your evil ways. If you do not do better you will grow up to be a beggar or worse. Robinson cast his eyes down and said, "I do not want to be a merchant, I would rather sail in a ship around the world." His father answered, "If you do not know anything you cannot be of use on a ship, and no one will want you. In a strange land you cannot live without working. If you run away from your parents you will come to be sorry for it." Robinson wept, for he saw that his father was right, and he promised to obey. After two or three weeks, Robinson went to his mother and said, "Mother, won't you go to father and tell him 32 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 33 that if he will only let me take one voyage and it proves to be unpleasant, I will come back to the store and work hard?" But the mother cried. With tears in her eyes, she said: "Robinson, your brothers are both dead. You are the only child left to us and if you go away, wc shall be entirely alone. How easy it would be to be drowned in the sea, or torn to pieces by wild animals away there in a foreign country. Both your father and myself are getting along in years and who will take care of us when we are sick? Do not cause us the grief we must suffer if you go away so far amid so many dangers. I cannot bear to have you speak of it again." Robinson did not speak of it again, but he did not for- get it. He was now nineteen years old. It was one day in August that Robinson stood at the wharf looking longingly after the departing ships. As he stood there, someone touched him on the shoulder. It was a ship captain's son. He pointed to a long ship and said, "My father sails to-day in that ship for Africa and takes me with him." "O, if I could only go with you!" cried Robinson. " Do come along," cried his comrade. "But I have no money," said Robinson. "That doesn't make any difference," returned the captain's son. "We will take you anyway." Robinson, without thinking for a moment, gave his friend his hand and promised to go with him. So without saying " Good-bye" to his parents, Robinson went immediately on board the ship with his friend. This happened on the loth of August. 34 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE ROBINSON AND THE CAPTAIN'S SON THE SHIP IN THE HARBOR THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 35 TmNGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (c) What do you think of Robinson's conduct? Did he treat his parents right? Did he consider the matter carefully? Did he honor his father and mother? What should he have said to the captain's son? What words best describe his conduct? What are the duties of children to their parents? Talk of Obedience at home and school. Broken promises. Idleness and work. (b) Ship's captain, the sailors, their life and duties. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (o) Cut in paper or draw in charcoal Robinson as he talks to his mother. Robinson and the captain's son. The ship in the harbor. ROBINSON AND Ulb MOTHER IV ROBINSON FAR FROM HOME ROBINSON'S VOYAGE PREPARATION What happened on the ship ? The children talk about the manner of his departure, of what he could have seen and heard, the farewells, the commands and numerous possibilities of the outcome. What happened to Robinson ? Where did he go ? What dangers are there on the ocean ? PRESENTATION Once on board, Robinson watched the preparations for departure. At command the sailors clambered up into the rigging and loosened the sails. Then the cap- tain from his bridge called out, "Hoist the anchor!" Then the great iron hooks that held the ship fast were lifted up, a cannon sounded a final farewell. Robinson stood on the deck. He saw the great city shimmer in the sunshine before him. Very fast now the land was being left behind. It was not long until all that could be seen of his native city was the tops of the highest towers. Then all faded from sight. Behind, in front, right and left, he saw nothing but waters. He became a little afraid. At noon there arose a strong wind and the ship rocked to and fro. He became dizzy 36 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 37 and had to hold fast to something. The masts and rigging began to dance. It seemed to him as if all was turning around. Suddenly he fell full length on the deck and it was impossible for him to get up. He was seasick. He wailed and cried, but no one heard him, no one helped him. Then he thought of his home, his parents whom he had so ungratefully left. He had been on the water about two weeks, when one day as he lay in his room, Robinson heard people over his head running about and crying, "A storm is coming!" The ship's sides trembled and creaked. The ship was tossed like a nutshell. Now it rolled to the right, now to the left. And Robinson was thrown from one side to the other. Every moment he expected the ship to sink. He turned pale and trembled with fear. "Ah, if I were only at home with my parents, safe on the land," he said. "If I ever get safe out of this, I will go home as quickly as I can and stay with my dear parents!" The storm raged the whole day and the whole night. But on the next morning the wind went down and the sea was calm. By evening the sky was clear and Robinson was again cheerful. He ran about the ship. He looked at the glittering stars and was contented and happy. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (b) Getting ship ready. Sailors, rigging, swelling of the sails, cannon shot, storms. (c) The relatives and friends gather at the wharf to see one of their number depart. They wave their handkerchiefs, etc. Did any one come down to see Robinson off? Why? What did Robin- son's parents do when he did not come home ? Did he know whether he would ever see his parents again ? Had he entirely forgotten his love for his parents? How did Robinson's sickness affect him? 38 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE What was the first thing he thought of? He knew then how good his dear mother had been when he was sick at home. He no doubt felt guilty. He felt he had been ungrateful and thoughtless. He promised himself to go back as soon as he could; but as soon as danger was over, how did he feel ? Did his good resolutions last? PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) In water color, colored chalk, charcoal or pencil represent Robinson talking to the ship captain's son. Study how best to draw a ship. Study the different kinds, and practice unril you can draw one well. Practice drawing sailors in their peculiar clothes. Can you represent a ship in a storm ? THE SHIPWRECK PREPARATION What further happened to Robinson on the ship? The children tell what might happen to Robinson. May have arrived in Africa, South America. Perhaps he has again thought of the promise. Perhaps strong wind has blown again. A storm? What is that? What can happen to a ship when it is driven by a storm near a rocky coast? Is it safer near or far from land in a storm? What becomes of the people on a ship that strikes a rock? Tell about a wreck of Robinson's ship and how he was saved. PRESENTATION Several weeks went by. Robinson haxi forgotten his resolutions to return home long ago. It was very hot. The glowing sun beat down upon the ship. The wide surface of the sea glistened. No breeze stirred. The sails hung loose on the top of the mast. But far away on the shore could be seen a black bank of clouds. All at once the ship was thrown violently to one side by a fierce gust of wind. Robinson threw himself on the deck. The sea began to rise and fall. The waves were as high as mountains. Now the ship was borne aloft to the skies, and now it would seem that it must be over- whelmed in the sea. When it sank down between the great waves of water, Robinson thought it would never again rise. 39 40 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE The waves beat violently on the ship's side. Robinson went down the steps into his little room, but he came back full of anxiety. He believed every minute he would meet death in the waves. The night at last came on. The lightning flashed. The storm howled. The ship trembled. The water roared. So the night wore on. The storm raged for six days. Then on the seventh day it was somewhat abated. But the hope was soon dashed. The storm had abated but to get new strength. Sud- denly it bore down with frightful power on the doomed vessel, struck it, and shot it like an arrow through the water. Then Robinson felt a fearful crash. The ship groaned as if it would fall into a thousand pieces. It had struck a rock and there held fast. At the same moment the sailors raised the cry, "The ship has sprung a leak!" The water surged into the ship. All called for help. Each one thought only of himself. There was only one boat. The others had all been torn away. It was soon let down into the sea. All sprang in. For a moment the sailors forgot the waves, but all at once a wave, mountains high, struck the boat and swallowed it up. Robinson shut his eyes. The water roared in his ears. He sank into the sea. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Storms at sea, wind, waves, thunder, lightning, shipwreck, strength of waves. (b) Life saving stations, lighthouses, life boats, fear, selfishness in times of danger. Bravery, '' Story of Grace Darling. " (c) Obedience at home and school. Promises, keeping them. Bad companions. Idleness and work. Had Robinson been obedi- ent? Had he kept his promise ? Did he love good ? THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (b) Model in clay or make in wood a ship's anchor. (a) Picture the ship in the storm. 41 TUE ANCUOR THE SHIP IN THE STOHU VI ROBINSON SAVED PREPARATION What has become of Robinson ? Perhaps he was drowned in the sea. Perhaps he was thrown up on the land. Have you seen the shore of the ocean ? Can you tell in what water the storm occurred? Near what continent? Or what zone? What direction did the ship sail ? Tell how Robinson might be saved. PRESENTATION Robinson was borne down far, far into the ocean. He attempted to work himself up, so that he could see light and breathe the air. But again and again the waves carried him down. Finally a wave threw him up and he saw, for a moment, the light of day and got a breath of air, but the next instant he was deep under the water. Then another wave bore him on its crest. He breathed a deep breath and at the same time saw land not far g^ away. He bent all his strength toward reaching the land. He got almost to it, when a wave caught him and hurled him on a jutting rock. With all his strength he seized the rock with both hands and held on. Presently he worked himself up a little and at last got a foothold. But, scarcely had he done so, when his strength left him and he fell on the ground as one dead. But he soon re- 42 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 43 vived. He opened his eyes and looked around. Ik- saw above him the blue sky, and under him the solid brown earth and before him the gray angry sea. He felt to see if he still breathed. The storm had destroyed the ship. The waves had overwhelmed the boat. The water wished to draw him into the deep. The rocks seemed to want to hurl him back, but storm and wave and rock had accomplished nothing. There was One who was stronger than they. Then Robinson sank on his knees and folded his hands. Tears came to his eyes. He breathed hard. At last he said, " Dear Father in Heaven, I live. Thou hast saved me. 1 thank Thee." THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Waves, their course, height, nature and power. Winds, their effects in a storm, ships' danger when near shore in a storm. Cliffs, sandy beach. (b) History of Hghthouses. Some famous Hghthouses, life- saving crews, their method of work. Means taken to save lives of those on a sinking ship, etc. (c) Do you think Robinson deserved the trouble he fell into? Had he thought before that he might be caught in a storm? How could he have saved this trouble? Do you think he is punished enough for his being so ungrateful and disobedient to his parents ? VII THE FIRST NIGHT ON LAND PREPARATION The waves had cast Robinson on land. What do you think was the name of the land ? Did he know what land he was on ? Did he know that all his companions had perished ? What do you think was the first thing he did ? Do you suppose he thought about the danger of the wild animals ? Do you think he was afraid ? How long had Robinson been now from home? What did Robinson most need now ? Tell how he passed the first night. PRESENTATION "Where are my companions?" That was his first thought. He began to call and halloo: "Where are you?" "Come here!" But no one answered. Then he wished to see if anyone lived on the land, and he cried, "Is there no one here? Hello!" but all remained still. All at once he drew himself together and shrank back. He heard a bush rustle and the thought came like a flash, "That is a wild animal that will pounce upon me and tear my flesh with his teeth and claws. How shall I save myself? Where shall I fly for safety? Where shall I turn? I have nothing but my clothes and my life saved from the water. All that I had the waves have swallowed up." 44 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 45 And then hunger and thirst began to trouble him. He had eaten nothing the whole day and tlie salt water made him sick. In the meantime the night had come on. Robinson was very tired. Everything was new and strange. He did not know which way to move. He was in the greatest terror. He expected to hear the roar of wild beasts from every secluded spot. Lions and tigers and dreadful serpents filled his thoughts. He must find shelter from them. But where should he pass the night? Not a house, a hut or a cave was to be seen. He stood a long time hesitating and did not know what to do. Finally he thought, "I will do as the birds do and get into a tree. " He very soon found a tree which had such thick branches that it would hold him up. Robinson climbed up into the tree, made himself as comfortable as possible, said his prayers, and as he was thoroughly exhausted, he soon fell asleep. When he awoke the sun was high in the sky. At first he could not remem- ber where he was. Then the truth burst upon him. He tried to move. He was stiff and sore. His flesh was bruised from being thrown against the rocks and beaten by the waves. He was dreadfully thirsty. His mouth and throat were dry and parched from the salt water. His tongue was thick and swollen. He said, "I must find some water to drink or I shall die!" It was hard work to get down from the tree. His limbs and back ached from sitting in the tree all night. At last he slipped down and fell on the ground. He clasped his hands in prayer and thanked God for keeping him through the night. 46 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE Then he got up and tried to walk. He was so weak he could not stand. He threw himself down on the ground and began to sob and cry, "O Lord, do not let me die! Do not let me die!" As he lay there he heard a queer sound. He listened. It sounded like water running over rocks. He tried to get to the place from which the sound came. He tried to walk. When he fell he crawled on his hands and knees. At last the sound was close by. He dragged himself up on the rocks. Yes, there was a spring of clear, cool, sparkling water bubbling up and trickling over the stones. Robin- son was so thirsty he put his face into the water and drank and drank. Then he sat down, and after a while he drank again and again. After Robinson had satisfied his thirst and rested awhile he felt much better. He said, " I must try to walk and sec whether I can find something to eat." He found many kinds of fruits and berries all around him, but he was afraid to eat them, as they were strange to him and he feared they might be poisonous. As he was walking along, all at once he spied a tall plant in the distance which had a familiar look. It looked like corn. He said to himself, "I wonder if it can be corn." At last he came near enough to recognize it. Yes, it was corn. It did not look exactly like the corn that he saw at home, but still he knew it would be safe to eat it. He broke off an ear and eagerly ate the kernels raw. Oh, how good it was! Robinson could not remember any- thing that tasted half so good. He ate as much as he wanted and then filled his pockets with cars of corn for his supper. Then he went back to the spring to get another drink. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 47 THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Springs, corn plants — kinds, history, uses and cultivation. Uses of parts. (See "Com Plants. Their Uses and Ways of Life," by Frederick Leroy Sargent.) (b) Trees as Homes (see "The Tree Dwellers," by Katherine Dopp) — homes of birds, animals, insects. Different animals using trees as homes. What objection could Robinson make to a tree as a home ? Could he have slept on the ground ? (c) Robinson is on land. What did he bring with him? Has he now a thankful heart? He is thankful for life alone. He is thankful, yet he lacks the necessities of life even. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (o) Represent Robinson in his tree. Study the com plant and leam to draw it accurately in all stages of growth. Make a design for a book cover or border, using some part of the plant as unit of design. (b) Mould in clay the corn ear. Make of paper strips the young com plants and plant a model field in your sand table. 48 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Represent in pencil, crayon or water color, Robinson on deck of ship. Robinson praying on the rock. ROBINSON PRAYING ON THE ROCK VIII ROBINSON ON AN ISLAND PREPARATION Does Robinson yet know on what land he has been thrown? Whether on mainland or on an island ? Does he know whether it is inhabited or not ? How can he find out ? Tell what Robinson does and what he finds. PRESENTATION After his hunger and thirst were satisfied, Robinson thought he would try to find another dweUing place. "My legs are stiff and sore from sitting so uncomfortably last night, and there is so much danger of falling," he said. "I will climb yonder hill and look around and see on which side the houses are. I will find me a stick to help me on my way." He broke a stick from a dry bush and climbed up the steep sides of the hill. After a half hour's climb he was on top. What a sight met his eyes! There were no houses, no huts to be seen, no smoke arose from the forest, no field could be seen. Nothing but trees and bush, sand and rock. "I am then upon an island alone, without food, without shelter, without weapons! What will become of me?" he cried. "I am a prisoner. The island is my prison, the waves are the guards which will not allow me to get away. Will no ship ever come to set 49 5© THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE me free?" He stretched his gaze out to the sea till his eyes ached, but he saw no ship. Robinson came down and seated himself on a stone and considered what he should do. It was not yet noon, yet he feared greatly the next night. " I must find me a better bed," was his first clear thought. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) What is an island ? Have you an idea where the island is on which Robinson has been thrown? Is it in the Atlantic Ocean? The Pacific? Is it in the Arctic zone? The temperate or the hot? Near what mainland is it? (The island on which Robinson is supposed to be thrown is undoubtedly the island called Tobago near Trinidad, at the mouth of the Orinoco River, South America. This island has been very fully and interestingly described by Fred- erick H. Ober in his book, " Crusoe's Island, " published by D, Apple- ton and Company). All teachers should read this book. (b) Can you imagine how one would feel cast alone on a strange, uninhabited island? He is certainly in a sad plight. He has lost everything at once, home, friends, comforts. He is like an animal. He has lost his civilized ways of living. (c) What is it to be a prisoner? Did Robinson deserve punish- ment of this kind? Do you suppose he now regretted his leaving home? THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT 5» (a) Draw the scene you imagine Robinson saw from tlic top of the hill. ib) Mould in sand the hill and island with rocks and spring. IX ROBINSON'S SHELTER PREPARATION What now do you suppose Robinson will do? He can certainly not remain long in his tree? Will he build a shelter? Tell the diflferent kinds of shelter he might provide himself. Did you ever read about the Tree Dwellers? What natural shelters are there besides trees ? Tell what Robinson did to provide himself a shelter without tools. PRESENTATION Robinson saw at a little distance what seemed to be a cleft or an opening in a huge rock. "If I could only get inside and find room to stay over night. The rock would protect me from rain, from the wind and wild animals better than a tree." He long sought in vain for a place wide enough to allow him to get into the opening in the rock. He was about to give up, when he seized hold of a branch of a thorn tree growing on the side of the rock. He looked closer and saw that it grew out of the cleft in the rock. He saw, too, that at this point the opening was wider and that he had only to remove the tree in order to get in. "The hole shall be my dwelling," he said. "I must get the thorn tree out so that I can have room." That was easily said. He had neither axe, nor saw, nor 52 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 53 knife nor spade. How could he do it? He had nothing but his hands. He tried to pull it out by the roots, but in vain. He wasn't strong enough. "I must dig it out," said Robinson. He scratched with his nails, but the earth was too hard. What should he do? He sought a stick with a fork in it and dug in the earth, but it was slow work. Then he found a clam-shell. He did better with it, but it was hard work, and Robinson was not used to hard work. The sweat ran down his face and he had often to stop and rest in the shade. The sun burned so hot and the rock so reflected the heat that he was all but over- come. But he worked on. When evening came, he would sleep in the tree and next morning he would go at it again. On the third day the roots were all laid bare. But the roots were fast in the clefts of the rock and he could not loosen it, try ever so hard. What would he not have given for an axe, or at least a knife. And yet he had never thought of their value when at home. He attempted to cut one root through with his clam-shell, but the shell crumbled and would not cut the hard wood. He stood for a long time thinking, not knowing what next to do. He made up his mind that he must have something harder than the shell to cut with. Then he tried a stone with a sharp edge and soon found he needed another one, how- ever. He found one. Then he set the sharp one on the wood and struck it with the heavy one. In this way he slowly cut the roots in two. On the fifth day there was yet left one big root, bigger than any of the others. Rob- inson got up early in the morning. He worked the whole day. Finally it gave a crack and it too was broken. Robinson had only now to remove the loose earth inside the cleft. He found the opening could be made large and roomy. It was choked up with dirt. He dug out 54 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE enough to allow him room enough lo make a place to lie down. "In the future," he thought, "I will take out all the dirt and then I shall be comfortable." It was then dark and the moon shone bright in the Heavens. Robinson gathered a heap of dry grass and made himself a safe bed. But as he lay there he saw the moonbeams shining into his cave. He sprang up. "How easy," he thought, "for wild animals to creep in hereupon me." He crawled out and looked around. Not far from the cave he saw a large flat stone. With great trouble he rolled it to the opening of his cave, but before this the morning began to dawn. He went inside the shelter, seized the stone with both hands and rolled it into the opening till it almost closed it. "I have now a closed home. I can again stretch my legs. Wind and rain cannot get at me, nor wild animals," THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) What kind of shelters or homes do the various animals have? What animals build homes? What have no shelter? What build or have shelter in trees? In the ground? How do birds build? How do other animals make shelters? Does any animal use a tool in building? (b) Why was not Robinson's tree shelter satisfactory? Did he suffer from cold ? Were there any animals that might disturb him ? Was it comfortable ? What other uses has a dwelling besides afford- ing protection to our bodies? It also protects our property and serves as a store house for goods. Do savage people store up food ? Do animals? Where do animals store food? Birds? Squirrels? Why did not Robinson construct a shelter of logs? Would not this have been better suited to his needs ? What simple cutting tool would have enabled him to do this? It is easier to move earth than to cut the tough fibers of wood. Caves are natural shelters for men and animals. Men — early or primitive men — used to live in caves. This was before men THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON] CRUSOE 55 had tools with which they could build in wood. Many things men used when they lived in waves are now found there. As with Robinson, early man's first tools were of stone. Why did men use stone instead of metals ? Do stones furnish a good cut- ting edge? What kinds of stones or rocks afford the best cutting edge? How many different kinds of stone tools have you seen? Many such tools may be seen at museums. Many such tools, some of them brightly polished, are found all over the world. Men first made cutting tools of stone. (c) Robinson sees he is on an island and is again discouraged. "What will become of me?" Why did he say that? Because he was afraid. Because he must remain alone. Was he brave and manly? Had he reason to be thankful? He had been saved from the wreck. He had found water, food and shelter. But he quailed before each new danger. Did Robinson now think back and re- member how many comforts he had at home? Are we thankful for the many comforts we have? Robinson at last has to work and work hard. Did he like to work at home ? Every one should do some kind of work. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Study a thorn tree and practice drawing it. Represent Robinson a t work to remove the tree from the cleft or opening in the rock. (c) Study different kinds of rock in order to find one best suited for use, as to material out of which to make tools. Find out how early men made arrows and knives of stone. How they made hammers. How were they fastened to handles? SOME OF Robinson's tools X ROBINSON MAKES A HAT PREPARATION Have you thought about Robinson's clothes? Just what articles of clothing did he save from the wreck? Did he need clothing to keep him warm? Why do men need clothing in hot or tropical countries ? They need it to protect the body from the hot rays of the sun. Do you suppose Robinson saved his hat? Did he need one ? How can he supply himself with one ? Out of what materials and in what manner can he make one? Describe a hat that you suppose he made and tell exactly how he made it. PRESENTATION Refreshed and with renewed strength, Robinson awoke late the next morning, but he had a bad headache. The day before the hot tropic sun had beat down on his bare head, as he worked at his cave. He was so busy that he forgot to go into the shade from time to time in order to shield himself from the scorching sunshine. He felt a new need. "I must make me a hat," said Robinson to himself. "But how?" He had no straw, no thread and no needle. He looked around for a long time, but found nothing. The sun mounted even higher in the heavens, and shone hotter and hotter. He went to seek shelter at last in the deep shade of a nearby tall plant. As he stood there he examined the plant more carefully. 56 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 57 "Out of these leaves," he said, "I might make a hat." He climbed up the short stem of the plant and saw that it had not only leaves as long as himself, but between the leaves were big bunches of long, thin fruit, as thick as three fingers and similar in shape to a cucumber. He plucked the leaves and fruit and was about to eat some of the fruit when he heard near him a light stir as of some animal. He rolled the leaves and fruit together and hastened back to the cave. The bananas, for that is what the fruit proved to be, were sweet and refreshing. After he had eaten enough he set immediately about making his hat. He broke off a couple of reeds. He bent one into a hoop. But the hoop would not hold without thread. Sometimes it was too large and sometimes too small. But it must fit his head. He pulled up grass and bound its ends together, but the grass stalks were not strong enough. He hunted until he found a tree whose inner bark was soft and came out in long fibers. He bound his reed with this. This, too, made the hoop soft so that it did not hurt his head. When the hoop was ready and fitted to his head he found the banana leaves could not be used. Their veins ran straight out from the midrib. This made them easily torn, and besides, they were too large. They were not the best shape. He saw that leaves about a foot long with broad and tapering points would be best. He saw too, that if the leaves had their veins running parallel with the midrib they would be strongest. He made search and at length found leaves that seemed made for his purpose. They were thick and leathery and tapered from base to apex like a triangle. He now proceeded with his hat-making. He would take a leaf and lay it on the ground with the base toward him. 5ft THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE Then he laid the hoop on the base of the leaf, wrapped it around the hoop and fastened it with thorns. He did the same with the other leaves. The thorns were his pins. At last he pinned the tips of the leaves together at the top and the hat was ready. It looked just like a big cone, but it kept out the heat of the sun. Robinson now had corn and bananas and when he was thirsty he drank a handful of water from the spring. He had been now nine days on the island. Every day he looked out on the sea until his eyes ached to see if he might discover a ship. He could not understand why no ship came his way. "Who knows how long I must wait here?" said he sorrow- fully. Then the thought came to him: "You will not be able to keep track of the days unless you write it down." THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Why do the sun's rays appear hotter in tropical countries than elsewhere? Have you seen a banana plant growing? De- scribe its leaves? What material do we use to make hats? Men's? Women's? What plants are used for reeds? (b) Do savage or uncivilized men wear hats ? Think of Indians, Africans, Eskimos? What materials if any do these people wear in the manufacture of head coverings? What tools do they need or use? Do you know how hats are now made? Straw hats? Silk hats? Hats of felt? What things are used to decorate hats? Did Robinson think of decorating his hat? Why not? Are flowers or birds the better decorations? Was not Robinson's hat an ex- ceedingly clumsy affair? Could he not have done better even without tools had he learned to work at home with his hands? Suppose he had learned to weave baskets in the schools, could he not have woven a more suitable and serviceable hat out of long grasses or plant stems and branches? (b) Where do the bananas you buy come from ? Roinson was indeed fortunate in finding this fruit. He now had com and fruit for food? Does the banana grow wild in tropical America, or THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 59 had it been brought to Robinstm's island by man? Where is the native home of the banana? Of com? (c) Did Robinson learn to work at home? Did he do well in his father's store ? Is it right not to learn how to work ? Every one should know how to work, how to do and make things. Robin- son now has to work. Did you feel sorry for him working so hard making his shelter and hat? He will be a better and more useful man for learning how to make things and provide for his own wants. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Draw Robinson in such clothing as he had left after the shipwreck. Study from nature or pictures and descriptions to draw a banana plant accurately. Represent Robinson standing beneath the banana plant, with his rock and shelter in the background. Make drawing of Robinson's hat and with Robinson's weaving it. (c) Construct Robinson's hat from drawings in paper, using reeds for the head band. KOBIMSON'S BAT BANANA TREE XI ROBINSON'S CALENDAR PREPARATION How do we keep track of the day, month, and year? We count them off on a printed calendar. How is Robinson to keep track of time with no ink or pen or pencil ? Do you think Robinson would want to know the day of the week and month ? Why ? How can Robinson know the time of day ? Would the time of the day be as useful to him as the day of the week and month ? Describe the calddar you think Robinson could make without paper or pens. PRESENTATION The matter of keeping track of time puzzled Robinson very much. It was getting more difficult every day to keep it in his memory. He must write down the days as they slip by, but where and how ? He had neither pen, ink, nor paper. Should he mark every day with a colored stone on the smooth side of the huge rock wall within whose clefts he had dug out his cave? But the rain would wash off the record and then he would lose all his bearings. Then he thought of the beach, but there the wind and waves would soon also erase it. He thought a long time. "I must find something," he said to himself on which to keep a record. "I must also know when Sunday is. I must rest one day in the week. Yes, I must find something," he said, "on which 60 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 6i to write." And finally he found it. He chose two trees standing near each other and then sought for a small sharp stone, which he could make still sharper by striking it on another. When he had got this pen ready he cut into the bark of one tree. Shipwreck^ Sunday., loth oj September, 1875. He made seven cuts in a row for the seven days in the week. The first cut was longer than the others. This was to represent the Sunday. At sundown every day he made a new cut in the bark. The other tree he called the month tree. On its stem he was to cut a mark every time his week tree told him a month had passed. But he must be careful, for the months were not of equal length. But he remembered that his teacher had once said in school that the months could be counted on the knuckles and hollows of the hand, in such a way that the long and short months could be found easily and he could tell in this way the number of days in each. Robinson worked at enlarging his shelter a little every day. He was sorely at loss to find something in which to carry the dirt away from the entrance, or enough so that it would not choke up the opening. A large clam shell was all he could think of at present. He would carry the dirt to the entrance and some distance away, and then throw it. Fortunately the ground sloped awdy rapidly, so that he needed a kind of platform before his door. He was careful to open the cleft at some distance above the large opening. For the air was damp and impure in the shelter. But with the opening made high above, 62 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE fresh air was constantly passing into, and impure air out of, his cave. Light, too, was admitted in this way. THINGS TO TALK AND THINK ABOUT (a) In connection with measuring and reckoning time the ro- tation and revolution of the earth, sunrise and set. The length of the day. What kind of trees do you think Robinson would be likely to find on his island? Were there changes of seasons on Robinson's island ? Winter and summer. Would one be more likely to lose track of time in a country where there was not marked seasonal changes? The sun dial is an instrument used to show the time of day. Have you seen one ? It will tell the hour of the day when the sun shines only. We use a machine called a clock or watch for telling time of day. Can you tell time of day from the clock ? (b) From what event do we reckon time? What does A. D. mean? Name the months of the year. Does each have the same number of days? Which is the shortest? It was lucky for Robinson that he remembered a rule for telling the long and short months. Do you know the one beginning: Thirty days hath September, April, June and November? (b) What other machines are used for measuring time? The Greeks used a water clock. Have you seen an hour-glass? What fixes the length of the month? The Indians reckoned time in moons. Our word month comes from an old word meaning moon. How do uncivilized people keep track of time? Why did Robinson wish to keep a record of the time? Do you think his scheme a good one ? Do you think of any better way? Was Robinson wise in providing for fresh air in his cave? What sickness comes from impure air? Do you always have fresh air in your sleeping rooms? THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT 63 (a) Make a drawing of the kind of tree you think Robinson used as calendars. Represent Robinson at work at his calendar. Show as many different kinds of plants and trees as you know grew on the island. (c) Construct in paper or cardboard clock face and mark thereon the hours. Make a sun dial or shadow stick. ROBINSON S CALENDAR XII ROBINSON MAKES A HUNTING BAG PREPARATION Will not Robinson grow tired of com and bananas? Will he not need to store food? Will he not wish for meat? Will he not hunt for animals fit for food? What animals will he find? How will he bring food from a distance? He will need something in which to carry it. Tell how you would provide a vesse' for this purpose. How did Robinson meet this need ? PRESENTATION Several days passed with Robinson's hat-making and his calendar- making and his watching the sea. Every day his corn and bananas become more distasteful to him. And he planned a longer journey about the island to see if something new to eat could be found. But he considered that if he went a distance from his cave and found something it would really be of little use to him. "I could eat my fill," he said, "but that is all. And by the time I get back to my cave I will again be hungry. I must find something in which I can gather and carry food." He found nothing. "The people in New York," he said, "have baskets, or pockets, or bags made of coarse cloth. Of them all, I could most easily make the net, perhaps, of vines. But 64 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 65 the little things would fall out of the net. I will see whether I can make a net of small meshes." But he soon saw that the vines did not give a smooth surface. He thought for a long while. In his garden at home his father had sometimes bound up the young trees with the soft inner bark of others. He wondered if he could use this. He stripped away the outer bark from the tree, which before had yielded him a fiber for his hat, and pulled off the long, smooth pieces of the inner bark. He twisted them together. Then he thought how he could w^eave the strands together. He looked at his shirt. A piece was torn off and unravelled. He could see the threads go up and down. He saw that some threads go from left to right (woof), others lengthwise (the warp). From his study of the woven cloth, Robinson saw he must have a firmer thread than the strips of bark gave alone. He separated his bark into long, thin strips. These he twisted into strands or yarn by rolling it between his hands, or on a smooth surface. As he twisted it he wound it on a stick. It was slow, hard work. Of all his work, the making of yarn or thread gave him the most trouble. He learned to twist it by knotting the thread around the spindle or bobbin on which he wound it and twirling this in the air. He remembered sadly the old spinning wheel he had seen at his grandmother's house. His next care was something to hold the threads while he wove them in and out. He had never seen a loom. After long study Robinson set two posts in the ground and these he bound with seventy-two strands horizontally under each other. Then he tied in the top at the left another thread and wove it in and out through the seventy- two threads. So he tied seventy-two vertical strands and 66 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE wove them in and out. Thus he had a net three times as long as his foot and as wide as long. He tied the four corners together. He made a woven handle for it and put it on his shoulder like a sack, saying gleefully, "This shall be my hunting bag." THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Do you know any tree with a tough inner bark? What plants furnish a fibrous inner bark? Do you know the flax plant or hemp? Name plants giving us fiber for making cloth? What part of the plant is cotton fiber? (b) What do Indians use in making baskets ? Have you woven baskets? Was Robinson skillful in his work? He did not learn to weave and make baskets in school. How is flax prepared for weaving? Describe spinning. Would Robinson have to spin his strands? Can you think of a better loom than Robinson made? It was a very simple loom. Have you seen the great looms used in factories for weaving cloth? Have you used looms in school? Name as many kinds of cloth as you can. What part did the spin- ning wheel play in making cloth? How do you suppose Robinson obtained the posts and set them in the ground ? ROBINSON WEAVING A BASKET THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT 67 (a) Picture Robinson at work wcnving the stuff for his hunting bag or basket. (6) Can you make a loom that would weave as large a piece as did Robinson's? (c) Weave out of raffia a mat of the dimensions of Robinson's and fasten it as you think Robinson did. KUBI.\SC>f»'a LOOM .'^Nb MAI XIII ROBINSON EXPLORES THE ISLAND PREPARATION Does Robinson yet know all about his island? Will he not want to explore it? He may not find inhabitants? Will he not wish to find other kinds of food? Now that he has his bag he can bring fruit and all kinds of food from a distance. What kinds of fruits and nuts will Robinson be likely to find on his island? Tell how Robinson explored the island and what he found. PRESENTATION After Robinson made his hunting bag he was anxious to set off on his journey of exploring the island. So he arose very early next morning. "Before it is hot," thought he, "I will be quite a distance on my journey." He ate a couple of bananas, scooped up a few handfuls of water from the spring, stuck a few ears of corn in his hunting bag, took his stick in his hand and went forth. As he left his cave the thought struck him. "What if I could not find my cave again? How can I manage so that I can come back to it ? I will go away in one direction and return the same way; but suppose I were to lose the way?" Then he noticed his shadow pointing like a great finger from the sea toward the land. He could direct himself by that. He kept his shadow in front of him. He had 68 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 69 noticed, too, that the wind always blew north of the point where the sun rose. This helped him. But sometimes the wind died down. He had to climb over many rocks and pierce many thickets. At each step he saw a rich growth of plants, stems, leaves, flowers, but nothing to eat, no fruits, or nuts. At length he came to a tree as high as a small church steeple. Then he thought of what his father had once said about the trees in strange countries. "Many are as tall as a church steeple and the nuts are as big as one's head." He looked again. Yes, there they hung among the leaves, concealed high above in the crown! But so high, it was well that Robinson had learned to climb while on board the ship. He quickly laid down his hunting bag and clambered up the smooth stem of the high tree, a palm. He picked off a nut and threw it down and then several more, and climbed down again. But the nuts were very hard. How should he open them ? He had brought along his sharp stone with which he had stripped off the inner bark. With this he forced off the thick outer shell. But now came the hard nut within, and how hard it was! Striking it was of no use. Then he threw a great stone on the nut. The shell was crushed and a snow-white kernel lay before him. It tasted like almond. With astonishment Robinson saw in the middle of the nut a large empty space which must have been filled with fluid as the inside was wet. He wished that he had the juice to drink for he was very thirsty. With this in view he examined another and riper nut, and the outside came off more easily. But how could he break it and at the same time save the juice. He studied the hull of the cocoanut, on all sides. At the ends were three little hollows. He attempted first to bore 70 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE in with his fingers, but he could not. "Hold!" he cried. "Maybe I can cut them there with the point of my stone knife." This was done without trouble and out of the hole flowed the sweet, white juice. Robinson put a couple of nuts in his hunting bag, and also the shells from the broken nuts. "Now," he thought, "I shall no longer have to drink from my hand." With this thought he went on his way. As Robinson came to a rock in his path, out jumped what Robinson took to be a hare. He ran after him to catch him, but the hare was much the swifter. So Robinson hastened home, but before he reached it the stars were shining with their lustrous light. Tired Robinson stretched his limbs on his bed of grass and leaves and slept soundly. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (c) On which side of the island was Robinson, the east or west? What direction did he travel away from home? Ex- plain how his shadow would finally bring him back home. How could he tell when it was noon by his shadow? Name if you can some of the plants and trees Robinson saw. (See Crusoe's Island.) Tell about the cocoanut palm. What purpose does the outer corky husk serve? How do monkeys break them? When do the nuts grow on the trees? What is the purpose or use of the three soft places at the cocoanut's end ? (6) How do men find their way through forests? How on the sea? Have you seen a compass? Its needle always points to the magnetic pole of the North. Tell about a magnet. The magnetic North Pole is near the North Pole. Could Columbus have dis- covered America without a compass? The great explorers. Stories of "Geographical Discovery" by Joseph Jacobs. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE n PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT {a) Study from pictures the form and leaves of the cocoanut palm and represent an island landscape with hill, rock, cocoanut palms, and banana plants. (c) Construct a compass by running a magnetized needle through a cork and placing it in water. COCOANUT PALM TREE XIV ROBINSON AS A HUNTER PREPARATION Will not Robinson remember the hare or rabbit? Will he not be hungry for meat? We do not like to live entirely on fruits and cereals. How can Robinson manage to catch a rabbit? He has no weapon. Tell how you would catch one, the first time you tried. PRESENTATION All the time Robinson was confined to the cave he kept thinking about the rabbit he had seen and how he might catch one. Finally, he determined to make a spear. He broke down a thin, young sapling, stripped off its branches and in one end fastened a sharp stone. He then went to bed, for he wanted to be up early for his first hunting trip on the morrow. With a large umbrella he had made, his hunting sack, and spear, Robinson crept lightly through the under- brush. But he did not go far before he saw a lot of rabbits feeding peacefully on the soft leaves and grass. He drew back and threw his spear with all his might. But the spear did not reach the rabbits. It fell far short and the rabbits sprang up and ran quickly away. He tried it several times with the same result. Then Robinson, discouraged, turned back home and ate his com, bananas, and cocoanuts without meat. In the 72 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 73 meantime he found a new kind of food. He discovered a nest of eggs. How good they tasted to him! But his longing for meat was still very great. "I will try to make a bow and arrow," he said. No sooner said than done. He bent a long piece of tough, young wood and stretched between the ends a cord twisted out of the fiber taken from the cocoanut shell. He then sought for a piece of wood for arrows. He split the ends with his flint knife and fastened in splinters of stone. At the other end he fastened on some feathers found on the ground. The arrows flew through the air with great swiftness. "They will go far enough," thought Robinson, " if I could only hit anything." He practised shooting. He stuck his stone knife in a tree and shot at it the whole day long. At first he could not hit it at all. The arrows flew far from the mark. After a while he could hit the tree, but not the knife. Then as he practised, his arm grew ever surer until at last he could hit the knife at almost every attempt. After a few days he again went rabbit hunting. He thought that the rabbit did not offer a mark so high as his knife, so he stuck a stone in the ground and practised shooting at that. He gradually increased the distance until he could hit the mark at twenty or thirty yards. The next morning Robinson took his bow and arrows and went out to hunt. He aimed at a rabbit, shot, and it fell, pierced by the arrow. His very first shot was successful. He hastened up and took the dead rabbit on his shoulder, carried it to his cave and skinned it. Then he cut off a nice, large piece of meat and was going to roast it, but alas, he had no fire! 74 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Hares are not the same as rabbits. What Robinson saw were probably agouti. The rabbit isa burrowing animal and lives in Europe. We call our hares rabbits. (b) When men first began to hunt they probably hunted with spears and javelins. These were thrown at the animal. It was a great task for primitive man to make a shaft and set a stone shaped with a sharp point in it. When thus thrown they were liable to be lost. Spears were afterwards made with loose shafts so that they might be recovered. Finally when barbed heads were used these were tied to the shaft with a string. (See the "Later Cave Men," by Katherine Dopp.) Robinson has to invent and make things just as savage men did. Why was not Robinson successful with his spear? Tell what he would have to do in order to become successful. What weapon did the Indians use? Is the bow and arrow a better weapon than the spear? Tell in what way it is better. Do you suppose the Indians were skillful at first with the bow and arrow? Did the boys have to practice? What kinds of wood are best for bows ? For arrows? There is a shrub growing in the parks called arrow wood. Have you seen the stone arrow heads made and used by the Indians? How were they made? They were flaked out. Small bits of stone were clipped out of the pieces from which the head was to be fashioned by pressure, until the required form was obtained. Robinson's work on the shafts, heads, bow and arrow was no doubt very clumsy and awkward. He was not skillful. He did not know how to work. He had not learned when at home. Primitive men were very skillful. They made beautifully shaped and polished spear heads. Many such are now found in caves. ("Man before Metals, " Joly.) (c) Did Robinson do right in killing the rabbit? How should we treat animals? For what purposes is it right to take their lives. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT 75 Study (a) Picture Robinson as he started on his first hunt, carefully his clothes and belongings. (c) Try to make a better spear and a better bow and arrow than Robinson did. BOW AND QIJIVEK OF ABJtOWS XV ROBINSON'S SHOES AND PARASOL PREPARATION How about the covering of Robinson's feet. Had he shoes? Will not his feet become sore from walking through thick tangles of plants and over rough ground? Was Robinson used to going barefoot? What will he do? How he can get covering and pro- tection for his feet ? The sun, too, is it not hot on his island ? Can he make further protection from its great heat? Should not Robinson have some way to tell the time of day? Can you think of a way Robinson may make covering for his feet? PRESENTATION The next morning Robinson could not get up. His feet were swollen and sore in consequence of walking without shoes over thorns and stones. He must remain the whole day in his cave. Before him, in the sun, his walking stick stuck in the ground. He thought how he had been troubled yesterday to find his way and about the shadow. He had now time to study it. He watched it the whole day through. In the morning it pointed toward the land. In the evening toward the sea. This comes from the daily movement of the sun. He determined to study the matter more care- fully. Robinson got up and with great effort walked to the 76 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 77 spring. There he cooled his burning feet, and gathered some large leaves, which he bound on them. He de- cided to remain in his cave a few days, for he had enough food stored up to last him some length of time. He planned how he might make himself a pair of shoes. As soon as his feet were well, he sought out some thick bark and put fastenings of tough, strong fiber on it. These served very well to protect his feet. But he must have some further protection from the sun. It beamed so hot that his hat was not enough. He made a parasol out of leaves like his hat. He took a stick and bound the stems of the long leaves at one end and let their ends hang down. Then he took reeds and bent them into a large circle. On the beach he found skeletons of fish and used the needle-like bones to fasten the leaves together. He then tied six thick ribs to the hoop and the end of the stick. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Was not Robinson mistaken about the shadow pointing toward the cave at noon? Can you think how the time of day might be told on a clear day by the fact Robinson noticed ? Would the shadow of the stick make a complete circle or only a semicircle. What is the name applied to this kind of clock ? Is the sun really hotter in tropical countries? (b) Do uncivilized people tell the time of day? A clock is a machine for telling or measuring time? Besides clocks run by machinery there are water clocks, shadow clocks, and hour glasses. Hours, minutes and seconds are parts of the time it takes the earth to turn around once or make a rotation. (c) What do you think of Robinson's shoes? Can you think of a better way to protect his feet or of more suitable material ? Of what materials are shoes made — in Holland? China? By the Indians? Was it not because Robinson had not learned to work that he made such clumsy things ? Would people not have laughed 78 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE at him had he been seen with his clumsy hat, shoes, and parasol ? Would he not have been ashamed ? (d) Robinson must have presented a sorry figure with his tattered clothes — his awkward hat, his clumsy shoes and para- sol. Even primitive men were better clothed. The dress of Indians compared to that of Robinson. Decorative and pro- tective. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Study to draw Robinson in his clothes, cap, shoes, and with his parasol, true to description and in proportion. (c) Construct a shadow stick and sun dial with scale for telling hours. "Shoemaking song." XVI GETTING FIRE PREPARATION Will not Robinson try to get fire in order to cook his game? How can he do it? How do men get fire without matches? Robinson will have to invent a way to get fire if he has roasted rabbit. Maybe he will not succeed. How would you go about it? PRESENTATION Now Robinson had heard that savages take two dry pieces of wood and rub them so long on each other that they at length begin to bum. He tried it. The sweat ran down his cheeks, but every time the wood was about to catch fire his strength would give out, and he was obliged to rest, and when he began again the wood was cold. "How will it be in winter," he cried, "when it is cold, and I have no fire ?" He must try other ways of preparing meat for his table. He must think of some other way of getting fire. He remembered that once, when a boy at home, he had in playing with a stick made it hot by twirling it on end on a piece of wood. "I will try this," he thought. He searched for a good hard stick and a piece of wood upon which to turn or twirl it with his hands. Having found the best materials at hand, he began to twirl the stick. He made a little hollow 79 8o THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE in the block of wood in which to turn his upright stick. There was heat but no fire. He twirled and twirled, but he could not get the wood hot enough to blaze up or ignite. He had not skill. Besides his hands were not used to such rough treatment. Soon they blistered and this method had to be given up. "I must have fire," he still thought, and recalled the sparks that flew from the stone pavements of the streets when the iron shoes of the horses struck them as they slipped and strained at their cruel loads. Why may I not get fire by striking together two stones? He sought out two hard stones and with great diligence kept striking them together until his strength gave out, and he was obliged again to acknowl- edge failure. He remembered that sometimes travelers put the meat underneath the saddle and ride on it until it is soft. He tried it with pounding. He laid some of the meat on a flat stone and pounded it. It became quite soft and tasted very well. He then tried hanging it in the sun and finally wrapped it in leaves and buried it for a few hours in the hot sand. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) If Robinson had gone to school would he have worried about the coming of winter? Are there winters in the tropics? (b) Did you ever think that someone at some time must have discovered fire or the way to produce and keep it? (Man has not always had fire. It was a great step forward when the first man learned how to produce it at will. He placed at once between him and the animals an insurmountable distance. Fire gives control over climates and refractory metals, increases man's power incalculably.) Cannot fire be produced by friction or rubbing, as Robinson THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 8i tried to produce it? Why did he fail? Was it owing to lack of skill or poor and imperfect materials? Why did he fail by twirl- ing the stick? Can fire be produced by striking two stones to- gether? Does it not need a stone and steel or iron? Two flint stones when struck may produce a spark. Iron pyrites, a very com- mon stone, will, with flint, readily give a spark. How when this method is used is the spark made to ignite? What is used for this purpose? Dried moss, punk, rotten wood, thoroughly dry, some kinds of fungus. Had Robinson produced a spark in this way could he have succeeded in igniting wood without punk or some receptive material ? Why did Robinson fail to get a spark? How do we produce fire? Have men long had matches? What is a match? Getting fire by rubbing or twirling is called producing it by friction, by striking iron or steel or stones together, percussion. In using matches are we obtaining fire by friction or percussion? Tell the different parts of a match. Which part ignites? Why does it ignite? See Chapter I "Starr's First Steps in Human Progress." PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (c) Represent Robinson trying to produce fire by friction ? (c) Get proper material and try to produce fire in the ways that Robinson attempted to produce it. XVII ROBINSON MAKES SOME FURNITURE PREPARATION We have furniture in our houses. We make ourselves com- fortable. We have chairs, tables, and beds. We have not yet learned how Robinson managed to live in his cave — what furni- ture he had. How might he have made a chair? A bed ? A table ? Out of what materials ? PRESENTATION One thing troubled Robinson ver}' much. He could not sit comfortably while eating. He had neither chair nor table. He wished to make them, but that was a big job. He had no saw, no hammer, no auger and no nails. Robinson could therefore make no table of wood. Not far from his cave he had seen a smooth, flat stone. "Ay," thought he, "perhaps I can make me a table out of stone." He picked out the best stone and built up four columns as high as a table and on these he laid his large, flat stone. It looked like a table, sure enough, but there were rough places and hollows in it. He wanted it smooth. He took clay and filled up the holes and smoothed it off. When the clay dried, the surface was smooth and hard. Robinson covered it with leaves and decked it with flowers till it was quite beautiful. 82 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 83 When the table was done, Robinson began on a chair. He made it also of stone. It had no back. It looked like a bench. It was uncomfortable to sit on. Robin- son covered it with moss. Then it was an easy seat. Table and chair were now ready. Robinson could not move them from one corner to another, nor when he sat on the chair could he put his feet under the table, and yet he thought them excellent pieces of furniture. Every day Robinson went hunting and shot a rabbit, but the meat would not keep. At home they would have put it in the cellar. If only he had a cellar! He saw near his cave a hole in the rock. He dug it out a little with his mussel shell and found that it led back under a rock. From much bending over in digging, Robinson's back, unused to severe toil, ached wretchedly. He decided to make a spade. With his flint he bored four holes in a great, round mussel shell. They formed a rectangle as long as a little finger and as wide. Through these holes he drew cocoanut fiber and bound the shell to a handle fast and strong. With his spade he dug a hole so deep that he could stand in it upright. Then he put in a couple of shelves made of flat stones. In this cellar he put his hare meat and his eggs. Then he laid branches over it and finally covered the whole with leaves. 84 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (c) Out of the lazy good-for-nothing boy you see a sober in- dustrious man has been made. How has this happened? Was it then necessary for him to be diligent and active? Here no one would see him, and no one would shame him. He could live as he chose. But Robinson had learned that diligence gives food and that idleness brings to want and that he by his lazy, shiftless ways of living could get nothing to eat or nothing to wear, or no place to live. Robinson had learned a great lesson. He now worked continuously, never stopping from morning till night. He had made himself a parasol, a hat, some shoes, a knife, a net, a cave, a cellar, bow and arrows, a chair, and table. He now knew the satisfaction that comes to one who well uses his time. XVIII ROBINSON BECOMES A SHEPHERD PREPARATION What is the business of a shepherd ? Have you seen a shepherd dog? Do sheep Hve in cold or warm countries? Would you ex- pect to find sheep in Robinson's Island? Why? What could there be for Robinson to be shepherd of? PRESENTATION With his bow and arrow, Robinson went hunting every day. The rabbits soon learned to know him and let them- selves be seldom seen. As soon as they saw him, they took alarm. They became timid and shy. One day Robin- son went out as usual to shoot rabbits. He found none. But as he came to a great rock he heard from behind a new sound, one he had not heard before in the island. Baa-ait sounded. "A kid, "thought Robinson, "like that with which I have so often played at home." He slipped noiselessly around the rock and behold, really there stood a kid. He tried to call it, but the kid sought safety in flight. He hastened after it. Then he noticed that it was lame in one fore foot. It ran into some brush, where Robinson seized it by the horns and held it fast. How Robinson rejoiced! He stroked it and fondled it. Then he thought, how could it come into this wilder- ness on this lonesome island? "Has your ship been cast 85 86 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE upon the rocks too, and been broken to pieces?" You dear thing, you shall be my comrade." He seized the goat by the legs, and no matter how it kicked, carried it to his cave. Then he fetched quickly a cocoanut shell full of water and washed and bathed the goat's wounded leg. A stone had rolled down from the hill and had inflicted a severe wound on his left fore leg, or perhaps she had stepped into a crack in the rocks. Robinson tore oif a piece of linen from his shirt, dipped it in water and bound it with shreds of the cocoanut upon the wound. Then he pulled some grass and moss and made a soft bed near the door of the cave. After he had given it water, it looked at him with thankful eyes and licked his hand. Robinson could not sleep that night. He thought continually of his goat and got up time and again to see if it was safe. The moon shone clear in the heavens. As Robinson sat before the goat's bed he looked down on his new possession as lovingly as a mother on her child. The next morning Robinson's first thought was, " I am no longer alone. I have a companion, my goat." He sprang up and looked for it. There she lay on her side, still sleeping. As he stood and considered, the thought came to him that perhaps the goat had escaped from its keeper. There must then be some one living on the land. He quickly put on his shoes and his hat, took his parasol, and ran to the rock where he had found the goat. He called, he sought, he peered about to see if some shepherd were there somewhere. He found nothing. He found no trace of man. There was no road, no bridge, no field, no logs, not even a chip or shaving to show that the hand of man had been there. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 87 But what was that? In the distance ran a herd of goats over the rocks. But no dog followed them and no shepherd. They ran wild on the island. They had perhaps been left there by some ship. As he came home he noticed the goat sorrowfully. The bandage had be- come dry. The goat might be suffering pain. Robinson loosened the bandage, washed the wound again and bound it up anew. It was so trustful. It ran after him and he decided always to protect it. "I will always be your shepherd and take care of you," he said. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Sheep and goats. (b) Why do sheep need the constant care if a shepherd? Do cattle need a herder? What useful material do we get from sheep? From goats? Tell how wool is cut from sheep, and prepared for spinning and weaving. How had Robinson heretofore obtained food. Has he sowed seed and raised food — cultivated the soil ? Has he had flocks and herds? Has he not been a hunter? Has he not supplied all his needs by finding his food and clothing and shelter, just as savage men do ? Did the Indians cultivate the soil or live by hunting and fishing? Is it not good to depend upon hunting alone for food? Why is it better to have sheep, goats, horses and cattle — tame, domesticated animals ? Will Robinson feel safer when he has a flock of goats? Do you know of any people or country that makes a business of herding sheep and cattle? Robinson with his goats will not have to work so hard for his food and clothing and he will be more sure of having food and clothing. (c) Why did Robinson feel so glad on finding the goat ? He was lonely and wished for companions. What was the first thing he did on finding himself alone on land? He had idled away his time with worthless fellows. Now he has no human face to look upon and is glad to have the company of even a goat. Do you like Robin- son's kindness to the goat? What sheep picture have you seen that you liked? 88 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Represent Robinson carrying home his wounded kid. KOBINSON CARRYING HOME THE KID XIX ROBINSON BUILDS A HOME FOR HIS GOAT PREPARATION How do you suppose Robinson will protect his goat, shelter it and provide food for it? What kind of shelter will he build for it ? Will he need to protect it from cold ? From what will he need to protect it. From heat? Animals? Will he need to keep it tied, tethered or fenced in to prevent its wandering away and joining the flock of wild goats ? How will Robinson build such a fence ? PRESENTATION But the goat was a new care. Wild animals could come and kill, and carry Robinson's goat away while he slept, and if the goat got frightened while he was hunting it would run away. "I will have to make me a little yard in front of my cave," he said, "for my goat to live in." But from whence must come the tools? He had neither hatchet nor saw. Where then were the stakes to come from ? He went in search of something. After hunting for a long time he came upon a kind of thistle about two feet higher than himself, having at its top a red torch-like blossom. There were a great many of them. "Good!" thought Robinson, "if I could only dig up enough of them and plant them thick around the door of my cave, I would have just the thing. No one could get at me, nor at the 89 go THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE goat, either. The thorns would keep anything from creeping through, peeping in or getting over." So he took his mussel-shell spade and went to work. It was pretty hard, but at length he succeeded in laying bare the roots of quite a number. But he could not drag them to his cave on account of the thorns sticking him. He thought a long time. Finally, he sought out two strong poles or branches which were turned up a little at one end and like a sled runner. To these he tied twelve cross-pieces with bark. To the foremost he tied a strong rope made from cocoa fiber. He then had some- thing that looked much like a sled on which to draw his thistle-like brush to his cave. But for one day he had done enough. The transplanting of the thistles was hard work. His spade broke and he had to make a new one. In the afternoon he broke his spade again. And as he made his third one, he made up his mind that it was no use trying to dig with such a weak tool in the hard ground. It would only break again. "If I only had a pick." But he had none. He lound a thick, hard, sharp stone. With it he picked up the hard earth, but had to bend almost double in using it. "At home," he thought, "they have handles to picks." The handle was put through a hole in the iron. He turned the matter over and over in his mind, how he might put a hole through the stone. But he found no means. He searched out a branch with a crotch at one end. He tied the stone to this with strong cocoa fiber and bark. How his eye glis- tened as he looked at the new tool! Now he began to work. He first loosened up the earth with his pick, then he dug it out with his spade and planted in a high thistle. Many days he had to work, but finally one evening the hedge was ready. He had a row in a semi-circle in front THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE gi of his cave. He counted the marks on his calendar tree. The day on which he had begun to make his hedge he had especially marked out. He had worked fourteen days. He had completed his hedge with the exception of a small hole that must serve for a door. But the door must not be seen from without. As Robinson thought, it came to him that there was still place for two thistles on the outside. He could easily get in, but the entrance was difficult to find from the outside. Robinson looked on his hedge from without. It was not yet thick enough. For this reason he planted small thistles between the larger ones. With the digging them out and transplanting them he was a whole week longer. Finally, the hedge and the yard were ready. Now Robinson could rest without fear and sleep in his cave, and could have his goat near him all the time. It delighted him greatly. It ran after him continually like a dog. When he came back from an absence, it bleated for joy and ran to meet him as soon as he got inside the hedge. Robinson felt that he was not entirely alone. He had now a living being near him. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) What animals need Robinson fear on his island? Does he know what animals he will or might find? Has he explored his island thoroughly ? Had he gone to school would he not have known more about the climate and animals of the island ? Of what do we make hedges ? Name some hedge plants. Are thistles good hedge plants? Why? Have you seen thistles growing? What animals in our country trouble sheep and goats? (6) Can you think of some other way that Robinson might have 92 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE made a shelter for his goat? Do you remember how his mussel- shell spade was made? Why did not Robinson plant the seeds of the plant and thus avoid the labor of transplanting the thistles ? (b) What tools now has Robinson invented ? He has invented them as he needed them. Don't you think he could have made a hole through the stone had he known better how to work? Could the Indians bore holes through stone? Have you seen the stone tools in the museum with holes in them? Do you know how they were bored? How did the Indians fasten stone tools on handles. De- scribe the tools you have seen in the museum. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (c) Represent Robinson's cave in the hillside with the hedge in front. (c) Select a suitable stone and try to make a hole in it. Try to fasten a handle on to some stone tool you have made. XX ROBINSON GETS READY FOR WINTER PREPARATION When, at what time in the year, did Robinson arrive in the island ? Does Robinson yet know in what zone he is? Or maybe he does not know about hot and cold places on the earth. Did he study his geography? Does he know about the changes of seasons at the place he now is? What were the seasons at the place he came from? Would he not naturally suppose that he would have the same changes in the island? Would he not worry about the com- ing of winter? Is Robinson now in shape for winter coming? Has he warm clothing? Is his shelter warm enough to protect him? Has he a good supply of food? Do you know whether or not there is really winter in Robinson's Island? PRESENTATION There was one thing that troubled Robinson greatly. "What will become of me when the winter comes? I will have no fire to warm me. I have no clothing to pro- tect me from the cold, and where shall I find food when snow and ice cover all the ground and when the trees are bare and the spring is frozen ? It will be cold then in my cave ; what shall I do ? It is cold and rainy already. I believe this is harvest time and winter will soon be here. Winter and no stove, no winter clothing, no winter store of food and no winter dwelling. What shall I do?" He 93 94 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE considered again the project of making fire. He again sought out two pieces of wood and sat down and rubbed them together. The sweat rolled down his face. When the wood began to get warm his hand would become tired, and he would have to stop. When he began again the wood was cold. He worked for an hour or two, then he laid the wood aside and said, "I don't believe I can do it. I must do the next best thing. I can at least get warm clothing to protect me from the rain and snow." He looked down at his worn, thin clothing, his trousers, his shirt, his jacket; they had become so thin and worn that they were threadbare. "I will take the skins of the hares which I have shot and will make me some clothing," he thought. He washed and cleaned them, but he needed a knife and he set about making one. He split one end of a tough piece of wood, thrust his stone blade in it and wound it with cocoa fibre. His stone knife now had a handle. He could now cut the skins quite well. But what should he do for needle and thread ? Maybe the vines would do. "But they are hardly strong enough," he thought. He pulled the sinews from the bones of the rabbit and found them hard. Maybe he could use them. He found fish skeletons on the sea- shore and bored a hole in the end of the small, sharp rib bones. Then he threaded his bone needle with the rab- bit sinews and attempted to sew, but it would not go. His needle broke. The skin was too hard. He bored holes in the edge of the pieces of skin and sewed through the holes. This went very well. He sewed the skins together with the hair side inward, made himself a jacket, a pair of trousers, a hat, and finally covered his parasol with rabbit skin, for the rain had already dripped through the leaves of it. All went well, THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 95 only the trousers did not fit. He loosened them and puckered them to no purpose. "Anyway," he thought, "I am now well protected from the cold, when it does come." THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Where on the earth's surface is it coldest ? Where warmest ? Do you know about the zones? Do you know about the Frigid, the Torrid, and the Temperate Zones? What changes of seasons are there in the Temperate Zones? In the Torrid or hot zone? Do plants shed their leaves and rest in the hot zone? Do you know any plant at home that does not shed its leaves during the winter? Do you know any plant that bears fruit continuously? When does our harvest time come? Does winter follow our grain harvest? It follows our com and apple harvest. Is it cold in the rainy season in the hot zones? (b) How do savages dress? Out of what do they make their clothes? The Indians? The Eskimos? The Savages? Have you seen the Indian and Eskimo clothing in the Museum? How was it put together? What do Indians and Eskimos use for thread ? For needles? Does their sewing show skill and care? Is rabbit skin good for clothing? Do you think Robinson found the same kind of rabbits there, that we have ? Would they have thick fur like ours? Would ours furnish good material for making clothing for the hot zone? Have you seen stone knives in the museum? The Indians used stone knives. Do you know about making thread, yam, and cloth ? Why did not Robinson continue his weaving and make some cloth for his clothes ? Could he not have spun yam for the cloth out of cocoanut fiber? See if you cannot weave from this fibre on your looms. (c) Had Robinson been thankful for good things at home, for food, clothing, friends? Do you suppose he appreciated them now? Do you suppose that he ever thinks of old times and wishes that the past might be wiped out? Who gives you food and clothing? Who prepares for you food and clothing for winter and a warm house to live in ? Is Robinson now lazy ? What has made him better ? Do you like the way he works now? Does he have time to loiter away? Has he his time filled with work? 96 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (o) You will now need to study Robinson's appearance in his new suit and make careful drawings of him. Draw his stone knife with handle. (c) Try to make a needle out of bone. Would it not be diffi- cult for you to make a stone knife as Robinson did ? KOBINSON IN HIS NEW SUIT XXI HOW ROBINSON LAYS UP A STORE OF FOOD PREPARATION Can you think what foods Robinson could store up for use at a time when none could be gathered? What do we use to pre- serve meats? How are fruits preserved ? How are grains kept? PRESENTATION Now for the food. Could Robinson preserve the meat? He had often heard his mother tell about preserving meat in salt. He had even eaten salt meat, pickled meat. But where could he get salt? One day when the wind blew hard the water was driven upon the shore and filled a little hollow. After a few days the ground glistened white as snow, where the water had been. Was it snow? Robinson took it in his hands and put it in his mouth. It was salt. The sun had evaporated the water in the hollow — had vaporized it — and the air had drunk it up. What was left behind ? Salt. Now he could get salt as long as he needed it. He took cocoanut shells and strewed salt in them. Then he cut the rabbit meat in thin strips, rubbed them with salt, and laid them one on the other in the salt in the shells. He covered it over with a layer of salt. He put over each shell the half of a larger one and weighted it 97 98 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE down with stones. After a period of fourteen days he found the meat quite red. It had pickled. But he did not stop here. He gathered and stored in his cellar cocoanuts and com in such quantities that he would be supplied for a whole winter. It seemed best to catch a number of rabbits, build a house for them and keep them. Then he could kill one occasionally and have fresh meat. Then it came to him that goats would be much better, for they would give milk. He determined immediately to have a herd of goats. He made a string or lasso out of cocoa fibre. Then he went out, slipped up quietly to a herd of goats and threw the lasso over one. But the lasso slipped from the horns and the goat ran away. The next day he had better luck. He threw the lasso, drew it tight and the goat was captured. He brought it home. He rejoiced when he saw that it gave milk. He was happy when he got his first cocoa shell full of sweet rich milk. His goat herd grew. He soon had five goats. He had no more room in his yard. He could not provide food enough. He must let them out. "I must make another hedge around my yard so that the goats can get food and yet be kept from going away. He got stakes from the woods and gathered them before his cave. He sharpened them and began to drive them in the earth. But it rained more and more each day. He was wet through as he worked. He had finally to stop work, for the rain was too heavy. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (b) How do we obtain salt? Do we get any by evaporating salt water? What is it to evaporate? Could he not have dried his meat? Would this not have been better? Why did he not do this? THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 99 Is not dried meat better tlian salt or pickled meat? Do you think Robinson could have succeeded in taming or keeping his rabbits? Which kind of life is better — hunting or being a shepherd? Which is safer? At which does one have to work the harder? Robinson was now both a hunter and a shepherd. Did Robinson know what this rain meant? Do animals make preparation for winter in our climate ? Do they in tropic climates? For what do they make preparation ? How many seasons in tropic countries? Tell of the winter preparations of some animals you know of? Do plants prepare for winter? Do they in the same way as plants? How do animals prepare for winter? How do plants ? ROBINSON UILEING HIS GOAT loo THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Picture Robinson lassoing a goat. Don't forget Robinson's new clothes. Make landscape drawing, putting in all the plants you know in Robinson's Island. XXII ROBINSON'S DIARY PREPARATION How do you suppose we know what Robinson did while he was alone on the island? Has he yet fcund a way to write anything down ? Do you suppose he will ? What is needed in order for him to write down things as they happen from day to day? He needs paper, ink and pens. Do you think of anything that could be used instead of paper? Anything instead of our ink? Instead of our steel and gold pens? Write a story telling how Robinson finally got together the things needed to write with. PRESENTATION Robinson was much disturbed because he had no means of keeping a record of things as they happened from day to day. He had his calendar, it is true. He would not lose track of the time. But he wished for some way to write down his thoughts and what happened. So he kept up keen search for anything that would serve him for this purpose. Every time he journeyed about the island he kept care- ful watch for something that he might write upon. He thought of the leaves of the palm tree, the white under surface of the shelf fungus. But these he found would not do. He tried many kinds of bark and leaves. There was a kind of tall reed or grass growing in the marshes I02 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE whose rind scemtd good when dried. He examined the inner bark of many trees. He at last found that the inner bark of a tree which resembled our elm tree worked best. He would cut through the bark with his stone knife around the tree. At about one foot from this he would cut an- other ring. He then would cut through the bark length- wise from one circular cut to the other. He could then peel off the section easily. While it was yet full of sap he would separate the soft, tough, thin inner layer of the bark. This usually came off in sheets without a break. When these sheets of bark were stretched and dried they could be used very nicely instead of paper. Robinson next searched for something that would serve him as ink, and this was much easier to find than paper. He had noticed many kinds of galls of many different colors growing on trees. He did not know what they were, or how they grew, but he had learned in his father's store that ink was often made from galls gathered from trees. "Anyway," he thought, "I can get ink from the cuttle-fish." He had watched this animal get away from its enemies by sending out a cloud of purplish fluid, in which to hide as it darted away. He had learned also that indigo is made from the leaves of a plant. He had noticed a plant growing in the open places in the forest whose leaves turned black when dried. Robinson gathered a quantity of gall-nuts and soaked them in water. To the black fluid thus obtained he added a little rice water to make it flow well, and this served very well as an ink. He kept his ink in a cup made from a cocoanut shell. He was not long in getting a pen, though the lack of a good sharp knife made it hard to make a good one. In going about he had gathered a quantity of large feathers. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 103 He saved these for the time when he should have his paper and ink ready. Now, he cut away a quill to a point and split it up a little way. He was now supplied with writing materials. "It it not wonderful," he thought, "how all our wants are tilled ? We have only to want a thing badly enough and it comes." Robinson began at once to write down the date for each day and the main thing he did or that happened on it. He called this his diary. He had now a better way of keeping time than on his tree calendar. He did not need it any more. You have no doubt wondered how Robinson could work in his cave, especially at night without a light. The truth is, it was a great source of discomfort to him. At sunset he was in total darkness in his cave. During the daylight enough streamed in from the open doorway. To be alone in total darkness is not pleasant. "If I only had fire!" he said again and again. He watched the many large beetles and fire-flies flash their light in the dark of the evening as he sat in front of his shelter. The thought came to him that if he only had some way of keeping together a number of them, they would serve very well for a candle in his cave at night. How he longed for a glass bottle such as he had so often wantonly broken when at home! Back of his shelter there was a hill where the rock layers jutted out. He had noticed here several times the thin transparent rock that he had seen in his father's store. It is called isinglass. "I will make a living lantern," he said aloud in his eagerness. He soon had a suitable piece pried loose. He cut a part of a cocoanut shell away and in its place he put a sheet of isinglass. That evening at dark he gathered several handfuls of the great fire beetles and I04 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE put them in his lantern. What joy their glow gave him in his cave, at night. It was almost as much comfort as a companion. But while it lighted up the deep dark of the cave and enabled him to move about, he was unable after all to write in his diary at night. Every morning he set his captives free. In the evening he would go out and capture his light. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) The bark of trees, uses, etc. Bark of birches and elm trees. Galls on plant, causes and uses. The squid or cuttle fish. The firefly — the reason for its light — the way it makes it. (b) Our books were first made of bark, probably of the birch tree. What did the Indians use on which to write? Many people have stone books. Papyrus, paper. Could Robinson have made paper? How do the Eskimos light their igloos? Why did not Robinson get some tallow from his goat meat and make a "tallow dip?" (c) What does Robinson's success in doing things teach us? ROBINSON WRITING IN HIS DIARY THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 105 PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Picture Robinson sitting before his shelter writing in his diary. Show that it is near the close of day. (b) The children may fasten together loose leaves of writing paper and bind them into a book for a diary. Write down each day some interesting or important thing that happened. XXIII ROBINSON IS SICK PREPARATION What will Robinson do for someone to help him if he gets sick? Will he not die without care ? What do we do for help, when sick ? Poor Robinson has no one upon whom he may call in time of need. PRESENTATION One evening Robinson went to bed sound and well. The next morning he was sick. Before he had only the heat of the day to complain of. To-day he was freezing. He wanted to go to work to get warm, but even this did not break his chill. It increased till his teeth chattered with the cold. "Perhaps," thought he, "if I can sleep a little I will get better." But he could not sleep. He was burning with fever and then shaking with cold by turns. He felt a strong thirst, but he was so weak that he could scarcely get the goat's milk. He had no sooner drank the milk than his tongue was as dry as before. He felt better after a night of sleep, but the next day his fever and chills were worse than before. Then he bethought him of his parents. How kindly his mother had taken care of him! Now no one was near that could assist him. "Ah," he sighed, io6 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 107 "must I die here? Who would bury mc? There is no one to miss me." At this the tears came to his eyes. His sickness increased with each day. Occasionally the fever would go down sufficiently to allow him to get something to eat. Then it would be worse than before. In his dire need he wanted to pray, but he was so weak that he could only slammer, "Dear God, help me, or I shall die!" One night he had a strange dream. He thought he saw his good old father standing before him calling to him. He spread out his arms and cried aloud, "Here I am, here I am!" He tried to get up, but he was so weak that he fell back fainting. He lay there a long time, but finally came to. He felt a burning thirst, but no one reached him a drop of water. He prepared to die. He folded his hands and prayed to God that he would be merciful to him. He prayed for- giveness from his parents. Once more he raised his head and gazed wildly around, then he sank back and knew no more. When he again awoke he felt better. His hot fever had gone. He attempted to walk. He had just enough strength to crawl to the table and fetch a shell of water. W^hen he tried to walk he had to sit down at every two or three steps. From this he recovered gradually, growing better and better, and he thanked God inwardly for his recovery. His sickness had continued from June 18 to July 3. io8 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (c) Does not Robinson miss the many comforts of his home? Who had nursed him when at home? Did he not have a fine, soft bed to sleep in ? Do you not wonder what kind of bed he now has ? Will he not now recall the kindness of his mother and father? Can you think of anything more pitiable than Robinson's condition? One in prison has companions and a nurse and a doctor when one is ill. Is it not sad to think of Robinson lying long weeks at the point of death with no one near? XXIV ROBINSON'S BOWER PREPARATION What was Robinson's reason for making his home in the cave? Has he found any animals he needs to fear? Is it healthful to live in a cave? Maybe Robinson's sickness was brought on because he lived under ground. Tell how he may remedy this and get a better place to sleep. PRESENTATION Robinson's sickness set him thinking about his home. He had been so afraid of animals when he came to the island that he thought of nothing but protection from them. He had been now a year on the island and had seen nothing more dangerous than a goat. The fear of animals had practically faded away. In thinking over his sickness he made up his mind that it was caused by sleeping in his cave where the sun never shone. The ventilation seemed good, but the walls were damp, especi- ally in the rainy season. Then the water would trickle down through the cleft in spite of all he could do. He resolved to build, if possible, a little cottage, or, as he called it, a bower, in the yard in front of his shelter. The hedge of thistles was growing and formed a fence that an animal could not get through. His screen of willows on the outside of this would soon hide him from view 109 HO THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE from the sea. He had the wall of rock and the hill be- hind him. He planned out his way of building it very carefully. "It must be done," he said (Robinson formed the habit of talking to himself, so that he would not forget how to talk), "without hammer, nails or saw." He first sought out four posts, as large as he could well handle. There were always broken trees and branches in the forest. If he searched long enough he could find posts just suited to his need. He wanted four of the same thickness and height and with a fork at the end. After long searching he found what he wanted. He was careful to get those that he could drag to his shelter. He placed these in the ground, forming the corners of a square about ten feet long. In the forks he placed poles running around about eight feet from the ground. At about every three feet he fastened others, running in the same way, with heavy cords made of fibre. He found his greatest trouble with the roof. It must be sloped to shed rain. He had to find two more forked posts, three or four feet longer than the others. These he placed opposite each other in the centers of two sides. Upon these he placed a ridge pole. He then laid other poles lengthwise from ridge-pole to the edge of the frames. His frame was now done. His plan was now to cover this frame with straw or grasses tied in bundles. He had seen the barns in the country thatched in this way by the Dutch farmers in New York State. He gathered the straw of the wild rice. It was long, straight and tough. It was easily tied into flat bundles. These he bound securely on to the frame work with cords. He began at the bottom so that the ends of the row would lap over the tops of the last one put on. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE in In this way he built a very comfortable and rainproof bower. It was easy to make a bed of poles covered with straw. A table and bench were added and shelves of poles. Robinson felt great joy over this new home. "I will not now be sick any more," he said. "In case of danger I can get into my cave. But at all other times I will live in my bower." He had use still for his cave. He could use it to store some things in. But he had to be careful about the dampness in wet weather. Robinson was getting to feel at home. He was no longer so sad. He did not grieve so much for home. He looked upon his home with great delight. It was secure. He had his herd of goats always in his sight. At evening he would do his milking. He found he could keep the milk for some time in the cave. He was tempted to try making some butter from the good, rich cream. "But," said Robinson, "I have neither vessels to make it in nor bread to eat it on." He planned many things to do. " I will make a hammock some day for my bower and some vessels to use in my work," he thought. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (b) Do you think Robinson was right about the reason for his sickness? Is it not strange that Robinson did not build a bower sooner? Why didn't he? It was really easier to make without tools than his cave. How is your home given fresh air and sunshine? How is your school-room given fresh air? Have you an engine in the base- ment forcing fresh air in? Find where the fresh air comes in and where the foul air goes out. (c) Do you like Robinson for feeling a pride in his home and 112 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE the work of his own hands ? Do we not like him for being cheerful and happy, and for learning to do so many things? Fresh air and sunshine are necessary to health. Had Robinson gone to school, he would have learned this. He would have known, too, that there are no dangerous animals in the part of the world where he was. His teachers would have taught him how the bad blood is purified by fresh air. Robinson had felt the need of fresh air. He had opened the cleft above, but this had not been enough. It is Robinson's duty to keep well. ONE or ROBINSON S GOATS THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT "3 (a) Draw the framework to Robinson's Bower. Show it with the thatch of straw on it. Make a landscape showing Robinson's home, his bower, the yard with goats, the rock wall in the back- ground. (b) Construct a model of Robin.son's bower. Drawings can best be made from your model. Robinson's bower XXV ROBINSON AGAIN EXPLORES HIS ISLAND PREPARATION Does Robinson yet know all about his island? Do you remem- ber his first exploration of it? Will he not wish to know all about it? Maybe that inhabitants may yet be found? Maybe other kinds of fruits, grains and animals are still undiscovered on the island. It may be there are better caves for him to live in and better pasture lands for his goats. Maybe he will find wild cattle and horses. How long has Robinson now been on the island? Has he been there a whole year? We use the word anniversary to name the completion of a year. Name some fruit and grains that you think Robinson may discover if he explores his island thoroughly? Can you tell why Robinson has not explored his island? Do you sup- pose he was afraid ? Of what ? PRESENTATION When Robinson recovered his strength he had a strong desire to see more of the island. At first he had been in constant fear of wild animals, but now he thought he would like to see all there was to see in the island. On the 15th of July he started out. First he went to a brook which ran into the sea near his cave. Its water was clear and pure; along its shore lay beautiful meadows. As he came to the upper course of the brook the meadow gave way to forest. On the border of the forest he found melons and grapes. 114 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE] 115 The night came on and he slept again in a tree. The next morning he went farther and came to a clear rivulet. Here the region was wonderfully beautiful. The flowers bloomed as in a garden, and near the flowers stood the most splendid a[)ple and orange trees. He took as much of the fruit as he could carry and went on his way. This journey continued three days. 7/he grapes which he had carried he dried in the sun and made raisins. The loth of September came, one year had passed on the island. He was many hundred miles from home, alone on an island. With tears he cried out, "Ah! what are my dear parents saying? They have no doubt long given me up as dead. If I could only send them a message to comfort them and let them know how much I love them!" The day was celebrated as a holiday. He thanked God that He had given him so many good things. Often he had lived the whole day in care and anxiety. Now he tried to be more cheerful and to meet the troubles of each day w^ith courage. But Robinson was not yet satisfied. He longed to know more of the island and prepared himself for a greater journey. He slung his hunting pouch over his shoulder, filled it full of food, took his bow and arrows, stuck his stone hatchet in his belt and started on his way. He traveled over meadows, through beautiful forests in which were hundreds of birds. He was delighted as they sang and fluttered about. The journey was beautiful and pleasant to Robinson. In the forests he often saw small wild creatures, but he shot nothing. After the first night he slept under a tree in the soft grass, for he had now no fear of wild animals. Along the shore he saw great groves of palms with ii6 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE their great nuts. He saw, too, many goats in all parts of the island. Now he was ready to take the shortest way home. He had not gone far before he came into a dark forest. He became confused and wandered about for several days. On the fourth day he came to a little pile of stones, which he had made to mark the way as he was going out. From this place the way was easy to find. On this trip he was gone already two weeks. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (o) What animals has Robinson found up to this time? Is it not strange that he has not said more about birds ? Are not there many birds no doubt on his island ? Maybe Robinson does not care for birds or think them worth his notice. Could they be of any use to him? Has Robinson yet found any dangerous animals? Are there none in this island? The butterflies, too, and moths, Robin- son has not said anything about. Do you think Robinson loved the beautiful things of nature, the birds, flowers, butterflies, and moths? He seems to notice only those animals and plants that he can eat. Is this not because he did not go to school and leani about all the wonderful and beautiful things of nature ? Do melons and grapes grow wild? On what kind of plants do these grow? Is the melon a fruit or vegetable? (c) Do you not like Robinson because he now remembers his parents and grieves for them? Do you not think his parents would like to hear from him? Robinson, too, was now grateful and thank- ful. He was cheerful and happy. He thanked God for the many good things he had found. Robinson is growing thoughtful. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Study the pictures of forests in hot countries in your geo- graphies and make a landscape that you think would represent some- thing like that Robinson saw on his journey. Can you draw an orange tree or show the difference between an apple and an orange tree ? X: XXVI ROBINSON AND HIS BIRDS PREPARATION Would you not like to have Robinson tell about the birds he saw on his trip? Can you tell of any birds he would be likely to see? Did you ever see a bird whose home is in the warm zone ? Tell a story about Robinson catching and taming a parrot. PRESENTATION Of all the things he saw on his journey Robinson was most delighted with the birds. They were of the most beautiful colors. The forest was full of them. They gleamed like jewels in the deep masses of foliage. In the morning their singing filled the air with sound. Robinson had never taken much notice of the birds at home. But now every living thing attracted him. He loved to see them happy. He would watch often by the hour and learn the habits of nesting and getting food of nearly every bird on the island. Robinson did not know the names of many of the birds he saw on the island. He had to make names for them. The strangest thing he saw on his journey was the nest of what he called the yellow-tail. This bird lives in colonies and makes its nest at the ends of the long leaves of the mountain palm. When he first saw these queer looking 117 ii8 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE sacks hanging from ihc kaves he was amazed. He had never seen so strange a sight. From the end of each great leaf hung a long, closely woven nest. Robinson could not make out at first what they were. Soon, however, he saw the birds come out of the mouths of the nests. Here, one hundred feet from the ground, they hung their nests. But they were perfectly safe. He had not gone far from the tree in which the yellow- tails had their nests when he was suddenly startled by a voice crying, "Who, who are you?" Robinson was greatly frightened and hid beneath the drooping branches of a cedar tree. He feared every moment that the owner of the voice would make his appearance. But it kept at a distance. Every few minutes from the depths of the forest would come the doleful cry, "Who, who are you?" Robinson did not dare to stir from his hiding place. He remained there over night. After the night came on he heard the strange voice no more. The next day he renewed his journey. He saw many birds that were wholly strange to him. There was a kind of wild pigeon that built its home in a hole in the rock. It was a most beautiful bird with long, slender, graceful feathers in its tail. He saw the frigate bird soaring high aloft above the island. The numbers and beauty of the humming-birds amazed Robinson. They were of all colors. One had a bill in the shape of a sickle. The most brilliant of them all was the ruby-crested humming- bird. Near noon, while Robinson was shielding himself from the scorching heat of the sun in a deep, shaded glen, he was startled again by the strange voice crying, "Who, who, who are you?" He lay quite still, determined if possible to allow the voice to come, if it would, within sight. He THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 119 heard it slowly coming up the glen. Each time it repeated the cry it sounded nearer. At last he saw spying at him through the boughs of the tree under which he was lying a large bird with soft, silky feathers of green and chest- nut. "Who, who, who arc you?" said the bird. Rob- inson could not help but laugh. He had been frightened at the cry of a bird. But the bird that interested Robinson most was the parrot. There were several kinds of them. They flew among the trees with great noise and clatter and shriek- ing. Robinson determined if possible to secure one for a pet. "T can teach it to talk," he said, "and I will have something to talk to." As soon as he returned home he set about catching one. He noticed that a number were in the habit of visiting an old tree near the shelter every morning. He planned to snare one and tried several mornings, but lie could not get one into the snare. He tried to hit one with his bow and arrow. He at last suc- ceeded in hitting one and stunning it so that it fell to the ground. He ran rapidly to pick it uj), but before he could get to where it lay in the bushes it had disappeared. After thinking the matter over he concluded that it would be much better to get a pair of young birds and raise them. The old ones would be hard to tame and difficult to teach. It was easy enough to find a nest in a hollow tree. He secured from the nest two birds just ready to fly. He made a cage for them out of willow rods. He placed the cage at the entrance of his cave and studied how he would feed them, ]\Iuch to his surj)rise the parent birds discovered their \'oung ones and brought them food and fed them through the open work of the cage. When the birds were grown they rapidly learned to talk. Robinson took great delight in teaching them. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE He taught them to call his name and when he came near they would call out, "Poor old Robinson Crusoe!" These birds remained for many years with Robinson. In fact, he was never afterward without a parrot. They helped him to pass away very pleasantly many hours that without them would have been sad. Another bird that Robinson loved was the little house wren. This bird was exceedingly tame and friendly. It was a very sweet and strong singer. It loved to make its nest in or near his shelter. There it would build and rear its young, within reach of his hands, while its throat was always bursting with melody. The mocking bird, too, always nested near and awakened him in the morning with its wonderful song. Robinson became a great friend and favorite of the bird inhabitants of the island. They seemed to know him and showed no fear when near him. This pleased him very much. THE BIRD CAGE ROBINSON AND THE PARROT THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 121 THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Birds known to children talked about. Different kinds of birds. Bird families. {b) Uses of birds to farmers. Food of birds. Bird habits, nesting, rearing young. Immigrations. Song birds. (c) Treatment of birds. Harmless and defenseless. They should be protected by all. They are always friendly if not harmed. Robinson loved them. They were his companions. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Make a drawing of Robinson's bird cage from model, to draw a parrot and represent Robinson with his parrot. (b) Make model of Robinson's cage. Study THE PARROT XXVII ROBINSON GETS FIRE PREPARATION Do you think Robinson still wishes for fire? How many ways has Robinson tried to get fire ? Should he not try again ? Do you think of any other way in which he might get fire? How will he keep it when he does get it? How will fire help him? Is not the climate warm? What changes will it make in his way of life? Tell how Robinson finally gets fire. PRESENTATION Robinson was now pretty comfortable. He had his bower with its chair and table. He had his cave in case of danger. He had his cellar in which to keep his meat. He would sit in the shade near the door of his bower and think of the many things he should be thankful for. But there was one hardship that Robinson could not get used to and that was the eating of raw food. "How fine it would be if only I could parch a few grains of corn in the fire! I could live hke a prince," thought he, "if I had fire. I would grind some of my corn into flour and make some corn bread or cakes and cook rice." He did so long for roasted meat and determined to again make the attempt to get fire. Robinson was fast losing his idle, thoughtless ways of doing things. He had become a thoughtful and diligent THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 123 man in the short timu that he had been on the island. Trouble and hardship had made a man of him. "1 must think the whole matter of getting fire over carefully," he said. He had failed twice and was now resolved to succeed. "If the lightning would only strike a tree," he thought, "and set it on fire. But he could not wait for such a thing to happen, and how could he keep it when once thus obtained ? It was clear he must have some way of producing fire when he wanted it, just as they did at home? He thought over the ways he had tried and the one most likely to be successful. He re- solved to make a further trial of the method by twirling a stick in his hands. He selected new wood that was hard and dry. He carefully sharpened a stick about eighteen inches long and, standing it upright in a hollow in the block of wood, began to roll it between his hands. By the time Robinson's hands were well hardened, it seemed that he was going to succeed at last. But he lacked the skill to be obtained only by long practice. "If I could only make it go faster," he said. There must be some way of doing this. I believe I can do it. I used to make my top spin round with a cord ; I wonder if I can use the cord here." The only cord he had was attached to his bow. He was going to take it off when a thought struck him. He loosened the string a bit and twisted it once about his spindle. Then he drew the bow back and forth. The spindle was turned at a great rate. He saw he must hold one end with his left hand while the other rested in the hollow in the block. With his right, he drew the bow back and forth. How eagerly he worked! He had twirled but a few minutes when the dust in the hollow burst into fire from the heat produced by the rapidly twirling spindle. 124 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE Robinson was too overjoyed to make any use of it. He danced and capered about like one gone mad until the fire had gone out. But that was of no matter now, since he could get fire when he wanted it. He hastened to make him a rude fireplace and oven of stones. He hollowed out a place in the ground and lined and covered it with large flat stones. On one side he built up a chimney to draw up the smoke and make the fire burn brightly. He brought wood and some dry fungus or mushroom. This he powdered and soon had fire caught in it. He kindled in this way the wood in his stove and soon had a hot fire. The first thing he did in the way of cooking was to roast some rabbit meat on a spit or forked stick held in his hand over the fire. Nothing Robinson had ever eaten was to be compared to this. "I can do many things now," thought Robinson. "My work will not be nearly so hard. My fire will be my ser- vant and help me make my tools as well as cook my food. I can now cook my corn and rice." THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Lightning. (b) How Indians produced fire. The Eskimos. The primitive or early men. Name the uses of fire to men. What use besides melting metals, warmth, and cooking food did primitive men make of it ? Why are animals afraid of fire ? Can you think of ways of improving Robinson's method of getting fire ? Do you know whether any races of men now use Robinson's method? THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE "S PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Represent the scene when Robinson succeeds in getting fire. (b) Make Robinson's tools for producing fire and try to get it in the manner described. KOBINSON's tools for UAKiNU FUtK XXVIII ROBINSON MAKES BASKETS PREPARATION Now that Robinson is making ready for a time when he can not get food, how or in what can he store his com and other grains? Will they not spoil if put on the floor of the cave? How do you think Robinson will meet this new need? In what kind of vessels do we store away our grains and vegetables? What kind of vessels would be easiest for Robinson to make? Out of what materials can he best make vessels? Could he make them of stone? Would shells of cocoanut be large enough ? PRESENTATION Robinson still continued anxious about his food supply when he could no longer gather it fresh from the fields and forest. Corn had again become ripe. He had found in a wet marshy place some wild rice-plants loaded with ripened grain. As he now had fire he only had to have some way of storing up grains and he would not lack for food. He knew that grain stored away must be kept dry and that he must especially provide against dampness in his cave or in his bower. If he only had some baskets. These would be just the thing. But how was he to get them? Robinson had never given a thought to either material or the method of making them. He, however, was gradually acquiring 126 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 127 skill and confidence in himself. So far he had managed to meet all his wants. He had invented tools and made his own clothes and shelter, and, "Now," said he to him- self, "I will solve the new problem. I must first study the materials that I have at hand." He remembered the splint market baskets in which his father took vegetables home from the store. He recalled how the thin splints were woven. "They went over and under," he said. "That is simple enough if I had the splints." He set himself, diligently to work to find a plant whose bark or split; branches could be used for splints. He tried to peel off the rough outer bark of several trees in order to examine the inner layers of soft fibrous material. He found several trees that gave promise of furnishing abundance of long, thin strips, but the labor of removing the bark with his rude imperfect tools was so great that he resolved that he would have to find some other kind of material. "Why need the strips be flat?" he thought. "I believe T could weave them in the same way if I used the long, thin, tough willow rods I saw growing by the brookside, when I was returning from my journey." He found on trial that the weaving went very well, but that he must have strong, thick rods or ribs running up and down to give strength and form to his basket. He worked hard, but it was slow work. It was three days before his first basket was done. He made many mis- takes and was obliged many times to undo what he had accomplished in order to correct some error. And at last when he had woven the basket as large as he thought was suitable for his purpose, he did not know how to stop or finish the top so as to keep the basket from un- raveling. At last he hit upon the plan of fastening two 128 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE stout rods, one outside, the other inside, the basket. These he sewed firmly, over and over, to the basket with a kind of fibre ?rom a plant he had discovered that looked almost to be what he had heard called the century plant in the parks at home. On attempting his next basket he thought long how he might improve and save time. He must hasten, or the now almost daily rains would destroy his ripened wild corn and rice. "If I could use coils of that long grass, I saw growing in the marsh beside the rice," he thought, " I could make twice the progress. He gathered an armful, twisted it into cables about an inch thick and wove it into his frame of upright rods instead of the horizontal layer of willow canes. This answered his purpose just as well and rendered the making of large baskets the work of a few hours. He found, however, that the willow rods or osiers were not pliant enough to work well in fastening his coils of grass cables together. He tried several things and at last succeeded best when he used the long thread-like fibre of the century-like plant. He had, however, to make a stout framework of rods. He would first coil his grass rope into this frame and then sew it together with twine or thread made from this fibre. He afterwards tried making smaller and finer baskets out of the fibre that he had discovered, which could be easily had from the thick-leaved plant he thought he had seen at home. He first used long, tough, fine roots he had seen when digging up the tree at the mouth of his cave. Afterwards he discovered some tall, tough reeds growing near by. He laid in a supply of these. He found that when he wanted to use them, a good soaking in water made them as pliable and tough as when first cut. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 129 The making of the baskets and storing up grains made it possible for Robinson to become a farmer and thus make himself independent. This thought was a great relief to him. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Do you know the agave plant ? It is a native of Mexico and the tropics. From it we get sisal, a long, coarse fibre out of which we make twine and coarse cloths. Maybe it was a species of the agave that Robinson found yielding a fibre. Do you know from what plant v/e get raffia? (b) Do we use willow rods for making baskets ? Have you seen baskets made of them ? Name the diflferent materials you have seen in baskets and let us write them down. Have you seen Indian baskets? What material do they use ? Are they not skillfully woven? Some Indians weave baskets in the same manner that Robinson did and weave them so carefully that they will hold water. Indian women make beautiful baskets. They ornament them in many ways. They weave in plants and animal forms by using different colored fibres. Do you think the making of baskets an important event in Robin- son's island life? Tell the use of baskets and the changes it made possible in his ways of living. The carrying and storing up food stufl^, nuts and grains, vegetables and roots are of the greatest im- portance to good living. What animals store up foods? How is it carried ? See " First Steps in Human Progress," Chapter V. I30 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Can you make an accurate drawing of the kind of basket Robinson wove? Try it. Represent Robinson at work on his baskets. (b) Make a basket after Robinson's first pattern. Try one using twisted fibre grasses or rafiia or bark. kobinson's baskets XXIX ROBINSON BECOMES A FARMER PREPARATION Tell what changes Robinson will now make in his getting food. How do we get our food ? Does the com and grain we use for food grow wild? Wild plants did not yield very much for Robinson nor did he always know where to find it. PRESENTATION Robinson had now been on the island long enough to know how the seasons changed. He found that there were two kinds of weather there, wet weather and dry weather. There were two wet seasons in each year and two dry ones. During the wet seasons, which lasted nearly three months, Robinson had to remain pretty closely at home, and could not gather grain, for the plants were then start- ing from the seeds. It ripened in the dry seasons. Rob- inson soon found that he must have a store of corn and wild rice for food during the rainy seasons. He, however, knew nothing about planting and harvesting, nor prepar- ing the ground for seed. He had it all to learn with no teacher or books to in- struct him. He found a little space near his dwelling free from trees and thought he would plant some corn seed here. He did not know the proper time for plant- 131 132 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE ing. He thought because it was warm seed would grow at any time. It happened his first seed was put in at the beginning of the dry season. He watched and waited to rejoice his eyes with the bright green of sprouting corn, but the seed did not grow. There was no rain and the sun's heat parched the land till it was dry and hard on the up- land where his corn was planted. "Very well," thought Robinson, " I will plant it at the be- giiming of the wet season, either in March or September." He did so, the seed quickly sprouted up. But the weeds, shrubs and vines sprouted as quickly and before Robin- son was aware, his corn was overgrown and choked out by a rank growth of weeds and vines. "I see," said Robinson, "that I must thoroughly prepare the soil be- fore planting my seed." But he had no spade and no other tool that would stand the strain of digging among tough matted roots. But he must succeed. He put a new handle in the stone hoe or pick he had already made. His mussel shell spade was worn out. He must set him- self to fashion out another. He decided to make one from the tough heavy wood of a tree that grew plentifully in the forest. He was lucky enough to find a tree of this kind whose bole had been split lengthwise by the falling of an old rotten tree near it. With his stone tools and the help of fire he managed after several days' work to make a wide sharpened tool out of one of the large pieces split off. It was a little over three feet long. He had trimmed one end small and cut notches in the sides about one foot from the flat end. He could place his foot in the notch and thrust his wooden spade into the earth. With his rude tool he dug up and turned the soil of a small space of ground several times to kill the vines and weeds. His THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 133 corn quickly sprouted after this attempt and outstripped the weeds and vines which Robinson constantly had to hold in check by pulling and hoeing. He was rejoiced at his growing crop and went each morning to feast his eyes on the rapidly expanding leaves and ears. One morning as he came in sight of the little clearing he thought he saw something disappearing in the low brush on the other side as he approached. Alas, his labor had been in vain! A herd of wild goats had found out the place and had utterly destroyed his crop. Robinson sat down nearby and surveyed the ruin of his little field. "It is plain," thought he, *'I will have to fence in the field or I will never be able to harvest my crop. I cannot watch it all the time." He had already learned from his experience in making the fence around the goat pasture that the branches of many kinds of shrubs and trees, when broken off and thrust into the ground, will send out roots and leaves and at length if planted close together in a line, will form a thick hedge which no kind of beast can get through or over. He found out some willow trees where branches broke easily and soon had enough to thrust into the ground about six inches apart around the entire edge of his little field, which contained about one eighth of an acre. After this hedge had grown so as to be a fair protection to his crop he tried planting again at the proper season. He spaded up the ground and pulled out the matted roots as best he could and with great pains and care planted his corn in straight even rows. To make them straight and each hill of corn the same distance from its neighbors, he first marked off the ground in squares whose sides were about three and one half feet long. 134 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE "Now," thought he, "I will reap the reward of my labor." The corn grew rapidly, and toward the end of the first dry season was filling out and ripening its ears. But to Robinson's dismay a new danger threatened his crop against which he could not fence. He was in de- spair. The birds were fast eating and destroying his partially ripened corn. He could not husk it yet. It was not ripe enough. He thought how easy it would be to protect his field if he had a gun. But he had learned that it is useless to give time to idle dreaming. He must do something and that quick. "If I could catch some of these rascals," he thought. "I would hang them up on poles, dead, as a warning to the rest." It seemed almost a hopeless task, but he went about it. It was in vain he tried to kill some of them by throw- ing rocks and sticks. He could not get near enough to them. At length he laid snares and succeeded in snaring three birds. He had learned to weave a pliable, strong thong out of cocoa and other fibre that he was now ac- quainted with. The birds thus caught he fastened on broken branches of trees which he stuck into the earth in different parts of his field. The birds heeded the warning and visited his corn field no more that season. At the end of the season he gathered or husked his corn and after it was thoroughly dry he shelled it from the cob with his hands. He used his baskets in which to carry his husked ears from the field to his cave and in which to store it when shelled. He found that the ears were larger and better filled and plumper than when the plants grew wild. He selected the largest and best filled ears for his seed the next time. In this way his new crop of corn was always better in kind and yielded more than the old one. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 13S At first he grew two crops a year, but by experimenting he found out about how much he needed for his own use and planted once a year enough to give him a liberal sup- ply. He observed that the wild rice grew in swampy lands, so that he did not make the mistake of trying to raise it upon the upland where the corn grew best. He saw at once that the planting of rice on low, marshy or wet land was beyond his present strength and tools. "Some time in the future," he thought, "I may try it." Robinson also found wild grapes in abundance. These he dried by hanging them on the branches of trees. He thus had a store of raisins for each rainy season. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) The seasons and changes in occupations. Do we have regular seasons of wet and dry weather? Do the winds always blow from one direction ? They blow from one direction in the hot zones. Keep a daily weather record. (b) Name the grains that farmers plant. How does the farmer plant com and the grains? Wheat, rye, oats? How does he pre- pare the soil ? He almost always puts in the soil some kind of plant food. Robinson's soil was rich with plant food. Have you seen corn gathered or harvested ? Sometimes it is husked as it is gathered. How are wheat and other grains gathered from the field? Robin- son probably gathered the heads of rice and rubbed out the grains from among the chaffy covering in his hands. Farmers have great machines run by steam for threshing out grain from the straw and chaflf. Different ways of threshing in historical series, etc. (c) Is not Robinson to be commended for keeping at his work of raising com until he succeeded? Was he discouraged? Did he give up? We call keeping at a thing until it is done perseverance. How many times did Robinson try before he succeeded? He had to work hard and try again. Motto: "Jf at first you don't suc- ceed, try, try again." 136 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Make a landscape showing Robinson at work in his field with his spade. (b) Find by putting com on damp blotting paper, how long it is in sprouting. XXX ROBINSON AS POTTER PREPARATION Do you think of anything Robinson now must have before he can cook his food? What kind of vessels do we use in which to boil water and cook foods ? Can Robinson make vessels of iron ? Do you think of any way he can get vessels in which to boil water and cook food ? PRESENTATION Robinson was now anxious to cook his food, to boil his rice and vegetables and bake bread, but he could do noth- ing without cooking vessels. He had tried to use cocoa- nut shells, but these were too small and there was no way to keep them from falling over and spilling the contents. He determined to try to make some clay vessels. He knew where he could get a kind of clay that had the ap- pearance of making good ware. It was fine grained and without lumps or pebbles. He was much perplexed to mould the clay into right shapes. He tried taking a lump and shaping it into a vessel with his hands. He tried many times, but each time the clay broke and he was forced to try some other way. He recalled how he had made his basket out of strands of twisted grass and wondered whether he could not make his pots in the same way. 137 ijS THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE He spun the clay out into a long rope and began to coil it around a small basket forming the layers together with his hands. This was easy, but he did not see clearly how he was going to get the basket out from the inside of the pot. He found he could copy in this way any form he wished, but he finally hit upon the plan of making a form of wicker work and coiling the clay rope inside it, for he saw that whether he succeeded or not in getting the clay free from the basket he could use the pot, and besides if the pot would stand the fire the basket would burn off. To dry the pots Robinson stood them in the sun a few days. When they were dry he tried to cook some soup in one of them. He filled it with water and put it on his stove or oven, but how sadly had he deceived himself. In a short time the water soaked into the clay and soon the pot had fallen to pieces. "How foohsh I am!" said Robinson to himself; "the pots have to be fired before they can be used." He set about this at once. He found two stones of equal size placed them near each other and laid a third across these. He then placed three large pots upon them and made a hot fire under them. No sooner had the flame shot up than one of the pots cracked in two. "I probably made the fire too hot at first," thought Robinson. He drew out some of the coals and wood, but afterwards gradually increased the fire again. He could not, how- ever, get the pots hot enough to turn red. He brought the dryest and hardest wood, but could not succeed in getting them hot enough to turn red. At length he was tired out and was compelled to give it up. When the pots were cool he tried to boil water in one. It' was no better than the sun dried one. He saw that he must provide some way to get the pots THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 139 mudi holier ihaii hv could in ihc open air. He resolved to make an oven of stones large enough to take in the wood as well as the pots. It must be above ground so that there might be plenty of draught for the fire. With great labor, he pried up and carried together flat stones enough to make an oven about four feet high with a chimney at one side. He had put in the center a stone table on which he could place three quite large pots. He left an opening in one side that could be partially closed by a large, flat stone. He worked eagerly and at the end of the second day he was ready to fire his oven. He first carried together a good quantity of dry wood, then he put in his pots and laid the wood around them. In a short time he had a very hot fire. He kept this up all day and until late at night. The next morning he went to his oven and found his pots were a beautiful red . He drew out the fire and allowed them to cool slowly. Then he filled one with water and set it over the fire to heat it. Before many minutes the water was boiling and Robinson had another reason to be thankful. He wept for joy. His patient labors had brought their rewards. No prince could feel as happy as Robinson now. He had overcome all difficulties. Start- ing with nothing but his hands, he was now able to supply all his wants. "If I only had a companion now," he thought, "I would have nothing further to wish as long as I stay on the island." 140 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (b) What kind of clay is used in making dishes? Have you seen a potter's wheel? Potters shape their pots and earthen vessels on a moving wheel. Have you tried shaping vessels with your hands alone? Have you seen a potter's kiln? In this he fires his vessels. He can tell by Ihe color when they are hot enough. Did the Indians make burnt clay vessels? How did they cook food? Do the Eskimos have earthen -ware vessels? Primitive men made pots and vessels. We find broken parts of them in caves and in river sands. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Make a drawing of Robinson's oven or kiln. (b) Try to shape in clay a vessel as Robinson at first did. Try the coil method. SOME OF ROBINSON S DISHES XXXI ROBINSON AS BAKER PREPARATION How has Robinson prepared his com and rice up to this? Will he not now try to bake some bread ? How will he prepare his com for making bread ? Will he not need a mill for grinding his com ? Can you tell how to make one? Out of what material would you think Robinson might make a mill? Describe the simplest mill for making flour, and tell how Robinson finally makes flour and bread. PRESENTATION Now that Robinson had fire, he determined to try to make bread. He had seen the servants at home make bread many times, but he had not observed closely and knew next to nothing about the way bread is made. He knew he must in some way grind the corn into flour, but how could he do this? He had no mill nor any tools with which to crush the corn. He first tried to find a stone large and hard enough out of which he might hollow a vessel or kind of mortar. He thought he could put the corn into this mortar and grind it by means of another stone or pestle. It was with great difficulty that he could get a stone of suitable size and form. After several days' trial he at last got one cut out from some layers of rock near the shore. He made 141 142 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE a hollow place in it. Then he took a smaller oblong shaped rock for his pestle. He took great pride in these new tools. "I shall soon be a stone-cutter," he said to himself, "as well as a farmer and potter." But his stone mortar was a failure. The rock was too soft. Every time he thrust the pestle down, it loosened small pieces of the stone vessel. These mixed with the ground corn or flour and made it unfit to eat. There was no way to separate the sand from the crushed grain. He resolved then to try to make a mortar and pestle of hard wood. Now that he had fire, he could do this, though it cost him many a hard day's work. He found not far away a log of very hard wood. By building a fire at the right distance from one end he was able to separate a piece of the log. He rolled this to his cave and made a good-sized hollow in it by burning. This pestle was not so difficult to make. He took a limb or branch of an iron wood tree, burned it in two at the place to make it the right length. By burning also he rounded one end and then he was ready for the grinding. After cleaning his mortar and pestle carefully he placed some corn in the hollow and soon had some fine yellow meal or flour without any grit or sand in it. His next care w^as to separate the coarse outer husk or covering of the kernel from the finer parts that make the meal. He had no sieve. His net was too coarse. It let both bran and meal go through. "I must make a net or cloth fine enough to sift or bolt my flour," said he. Such was now his skill in spinning and weaving that this was not hard to do. He had soon woven in his loom a piece of fine netting which allowed the meal to shake through, but held back the coarse bran or outer husk of THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 143 the kernel. Out of the dry corn that he had stored up he now made quite a quantity of flour. This he kept tightly covered in a large earthen pot or jar that he had made for this purpose. "I must keep all my food clean and protect it from the ants and other insects as well as dust and damp," he thought. His preparations were now nearly made. He had al- ready his stove of flat stones. On this he could set his pots to boil water, cook rice, and meat, but it would not do for baking a loaf of bread of any thickness. He must have an oven or enclosed place into which he could put the loaf to bake it. By the use of flat stones he soon re- built his stove so as to have an oven that did fine service. Now it was mixing the dough that claimed his attention. He had of course no yeast to make raised or light bread. He poured goats' milk on the flour and kneaded it into a thick dough. He did not forget to add salt. He placed his loaf into a shallow earthen pan he had made for this purpose. After the fire had heated the stones of his oven through, he put in his loaf and soon was en- joying a meal of corn bread and meat stew. Robinson soon tried to make cocoa from the beans of the cocoa palm that grew in the island. This with good rich goats' milk in it he thought the best drink in the world. He often thought of making sugar from the sugar cane plant he had discovered in the island. But the labor of squeezing out the juice was too great. He could think of no way to do this without the help of horses or oxen. 144 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (b) From what do we get our chocolate and cocoa ? Tell about the source of sugar. Have you seen a flour mill? How is the grain ground? How the Indians ground corn. What the parts of the ground kernel are called. Meal and flour. How mills are run. Water, steam pwwer. Why yeast is used in making bread. Would we think Robinson's bread good? Why could not Robinson bake a loaf by putting it on the flat top of his stove ? PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (c) Make a drawing of Robinson's stove or oven. Show Robin- son at work grinding com with his mortar and pestle. -. a ROBINSON'S FIRE AND OVEN XXXII ROBINSON AS FISHERMAN PREPARATION Can you think why Robinson has never caught fish for food? Would not they be more easily caught than goats and rabbits? Will not Robinson now think of catching fish? Can you imagine how Robinson might catch fish? Can he make a hook? Can we catch fish without a hook? Can one make a bone hook? Could Robinson make a line strong enough to catch fish? Will Robin- son fish in salt or fresh water? PRESENTATION Robinson was now eager to use his fire and cooking vessels. He had noticed with hungry eyes fine large fish in the creek near his cave. But he had never taken the trouble to catch any. What is the use?" he thought. "I cannot eat them raw." It was difi"erent now and he be- gan to devise ways of making a catch. How he longed for a fish-hook, such as he had so often used when loiter- ing along the Hudson River! "But a fish-hook is not to be thought of," he said to himself, "unless I can make one of bone." He went down to the brook and searched long for a fish-bone that he might make use of for this purpose. He found nothing. "I must try something else," he thought. He remem- bered the nets he used to see along the Hudson and won- 145 146 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE dered if he could not make a small one to pull through the water and thus catch the fish. He had now a better source of fibre for weaving and for spinning into lines and ropes. He had discovered this when he was trying to find a good strong thread or yarn with which to bind the coils of his grass-made baskets together. He obtained fibre in great abundance from the century-like plant. He found if he broke oft" the long leaves of this plant and allowed them to decay there remained a long, tough fibrous substance out of which strong cords could be twisted or yam made for weaving a coarse cloth or netting. Out of this he spun yarn thread to make a net about three or four feet by two feet. He fastened cords to the four ends of this, tied them to a long pole, and was now pre- pared to test his plan for catching fish. The brook he found was too shallow for him to catch fish in this way. At the sight of him and his net, they scurried away to deep water. Neither could he succeed in the shallow water along the shore. "I must wade out as far as I can," he said to himself," and draw the net through the water." As he did this he was surprised at the many forms of sea life, new to him, that he saw. He, however, was careful and watchful. He walked along near the shore to a point where some rocks showed aboye the surface. As he looked ahead he saw the single eye of a giant cuttle fish glaring at him from among the rocks. It was thrust- ing out its long arms towards him. He drew back quickly, but as he did so he was terrified to hear the snap of some huge creature's jaws near him. A great shark had seen him and had thrown himself on his back to seize him in his rows of sharp teeth, but was prevented reaching him by the shallowness of the water. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 147 Robinson was too much terriiicd to continue longer his attempt at fishing. He went back to his cave with only a few small ones, not worth the trouble of dressing for his dinner. The next day undismayed he tried again. He suc- ceeded in drawing in some very beautiful large fish. Their sides shone as burnished gold and silver. "Now," he thought, "I will have a feast." He carried them home, carefully cleaned and dressed them, seasoned them with his salt, and broiled them over his fire. Imagine his dis- appointment when they proved unfit to eat. Their flesh was coarse and tough and ill-tasting. He saw that the catching of fish for his table was a more difficult thing than he thought it. He must not only catch fish, but catch ones that could be eaten. He could only tell the good from the bad by trying them. He was more fortunate in his next venture. He was going along the shore at the mouth of the creek which ran near his cave when he noticed a group of fishes, dark bluish above with silvery sides. The largest of them were about two feet long. They were feeding on the bottom in the brackish water at the mouth of the creek, which at its mouth opened out into quite a little bay or inlet. They would take up a mouthful of earth from the bottom and let it wash through their mouths, keeping all the bits of food that happened to be in it. When one fish got a good place to feed the others swam around it and tried to get some of the food. Robinson watched his chance and slipped his net under a group, while each one was busy trying to get the best mouthful of mud. He drew up three quite large fish, but just as he was about to lift them from the water, one of the cords which bound the net to the poles broke and 148 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE he saw his catch fall back into the creek and dart away in the deepest water. But Robinson was not to be dis- couraged. He soon mended his net and at last was suc- cessful. He soon drew out another catch of two fish. These proved excellent food and were so abundant as to furnish Robinson with all the fish he wanted as long as he stayed on the island. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Have you seen the century plant? Have you seen sisal twine and fibre? It is used in making binding, twine. Have you seen pictures of the giant cuttle fish or squid? Their arms are sometimes eight feet long. They abound in the rocks around Robinson's Island. It is probable that it was on account of the sharks that Robinson did not bathe in the surf of the sea. Describe the shark and cuttle-fish. The fish Robinson caught and found excellent food was a kind of mullet common in West Indian waters. Described by David Starr Jordan. (b) What did the Indians use with which to catch fish ? Did they have fish hooks? Did they use nets? How do Eskimos catch fish? Describe the different instruments for catching fish you can see in the museum. (c) Is not Robinson getting skillful? He can now do things. He knows how to get along and provide for his own wants. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 149 PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Make a drawing of Robinson's fishing net showing how it was attached to the handle. Show Robinson fishing along the shore. Make a drawing of the fish, the cuttle-fish, and the shark. (6) Searchoutaproperboneand try to makea fish-hook. Weave a net and attach it to a handle. ROBINSON FISHING WITH HIS NET XXXIII ROBINSON BUILDS A BOAT PREPARATION Do you see any way Robinson can build or make a boat ? Do you not suppose he has wished for one? Could he make a sail-boat? Can he weave a sail? Is his loom large enough? Can he make a loom large enough ? Can he weave a cloth heavy and firm enough for a sail? Do you see other trouble in the way? Can he make a boat with his stone tools? To make a boat, will he not have to fell trees, hew out boards of the proper thickness? Will this not be almost impossible? Do you think of any other way Robinson might make a boat? How will he make it go? Can he make it on the water? How will he get it to the water when made? Describe the way Robinson makes a boat and uses it on the water. PRESENTATION Robinson had wished for a boat many times. He wished to explore the shore of his island. He wanted to go clear around it so that he might see it on every side. But he knew the work of making a boat would be great if not wholly impossible. The shaping of boards to build a boat with his rude tools was not to be thought of. He knew how the In- dians made boats out of bark of trees. But he saw that for his purpose so light a boat would not do. He finally remembered a second Indian way of making a ISO THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 151 boat by hollowing out a large log. The forest was full of the boles of trees that had been blown down. But they were far away from the shore. At first he did not think of this very much. He had overcome so many difficulties that he thought, "Never mind, I will get my boat to water, no matter where I make it, in some way." So he selected a tree trunk some distance from the bank of the little creek near his cave and began work. He had first to burn out his log the proper length and hack it into boat shape with his stone tools. This was very slow and tedious work. He had to handle the fire with great care for there was always the danger of spoiling the shape of the slowly forming boat. Both ends must be sharpened, but one more than the other to form the prow or forward going end. After he had shaped his boat, he began hol- lowing it out. This he did also by burning for the most part. He used the branches of pitch bearing trees for this purpose. But it was so slow. He worked at his boat all the time he could spare from his regular duties in attending to his goats, his garden and his cave. He was always making his cave larger. Every time he made a piece of furniture or stored away grain he must make more room in his cave by digging away the earth and carry- ing it out. He had made a large strong wicker basket for this purpose. He had had a vague idea that when he got his boat done he would dig a trench back from the bank of the creek and thus float his boat. But he had not thought it out clearly. "Or anyway," he thought, "I can in some way manage to roll it to the water." He must now actually plan to put some of these ideas into effect. He first went over the ground and found that to dig a trench from the water to the boat, so that the water would come to the 15a THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE boat, he would have to dig it twenty feet deep. "I can never do this," he said, "with my poor tools." He next tried his rolling plan. But he had been so anxious to have a large boat that he had overlooked everything else. Try as hard as he might he could not stir his boat from the spot. After many trials with the longest levers he could handle the boat still stuck fast. It would not budge an inch. He at last gave it up." "It will lie here," he thought, "to remind me how foolish it is to attempt to do anything without first having thought it out carefully." There was nothing to do but to choose another tree trunk. This time he selected a much smaller one, and one that lay at the top of the little slope or incline from the bank of the creek. After another weary six months of work he had his second boat ready for launching. With a good stout lever he gave it a start, when it rolled quickly down into the water. Robinson again wept for joy. Of all his projects this had cost him the most work and pains and at last to see his plans successful filled him with delight. The next problem was how to make it go. He had no certain knowledge how far it was around the island, but he knew it was farther than he wanted to row or paddle his boat. Yet he knew from the way the wind blew that he could not always depend upon a sail to help him. He must become skillful in paddling his boat. A sail too would be very helpful at times. He imagined how pleasant it would be sitting in the boat sailing along with a gentle wind. " When the wind is favorable," he thought, "I will only have to steer with my paddle." So he set about weaving a sail of his sisal fibre. To do this he had to make a much larger loom than he had THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 153 yet used. His sail must be at least four feet square. He was now so skilled in weaving that this was soon finished. He then made plenty of string, cord, and rope, put in a mast and was ready to sail. But he did not venture far away until he had spent weeks and weeks in learning to steer, sail, and paddle his boat. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Docs the wind always blow here from the same direction? It does in that part of the world where Robinson's Island is. It blows from the northeast. On which side of the island is Robin- son's shelter? On which side of the island would his ship be blown by the wind? Have you any idea of the shape of the island? (b) How the Indians made boats or canoes, Hiawatha. The different materials used. Canoes of birch bark, of hollowed out logs. What tools they used. How they propelled them. Parts of a boat, rudder, prow, stern. Different ways of propulsion, row- ing, paddling, sailing. Names of different kinds of boats. Modem t)oats, rowboats, launches, ships, steamers, etc. Did the Indians use sails? (c) What is the word that tells how Robinson acted about his first boat? Yes he was heedless, thoughtless, rash, careless. He did not sit down and think his work out carefully. He was not thought- ful and careful. Robinson has shown this from the first. Had he not been rash and heedless he would not have been there. How are you going to show that you have learned to be thoughtful from Robinson's failure ? Tell one thing you are going to be more care- ful about. 1S4 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Make a drawing of Robinson's canoe. Study pictures of canoes or may be you have seen little birch bark canoes bought from the Indians. Picture Robinson sailing his boat near the shore. Make a careful drawing of the island and locate Robinson's shelter and bower on it. (b) Take a piece of wood about four inches square and eight inches long and try to make a miniature canoe. Weave a sail and cordage. Make a mast and set it. ROBINSON SAILING HIS BOAT XXXIV ROBINSON AS A SAILOR PREPARATION What do you think Robinson will now do with his boat? When will he go? What would you do with it? Do you think he has any notion of escaping from the island? Would it be safe to start out for the nearest land in so small a boat? What danger would there be? If Robinson's shelter is on the southeast comer which way should he go to sail around his island, so that he may have the help of the wind ? Is there danger of being blown out to sea ? Will he not need to be careful of that ? Will he start North or South ? What will he see on a journey? Will the shore be high and rocky all the way? Or low with sandy beaches? Will not the shore be lower and the wind more gentle on the West side of the Island ? Write a description of Robinson's journey around the island. PRESENTATION Ever since Robinson had finished his boat he had been eager to make a tour of his island. He had indeed made a journey by land. But the deep forests and tangled vines made it very difficult to travel. His journeys had shown him but a small part of the land. He wished to know all about the land of which he, so far as he knew, was the sole master. His first care was to fit up his boat with provisions. 155 156 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE He made some large baskets in which to carry food and a large covered jar for water. These he stored in the bow and the stem of his boat. He fastened his parasol on the stern for a shelter from the sun. He baked up a quantity of cakes or loaves of bread and packed them in his bas- kets. He had woven these so carefully that they would almost hold water. At last all was ready. It was on the sixth day of November in the sixth year of his life on the island that Robinson hoisted his sail and set out upon his voyage of discovery. He had waited until the wind was gentle and blowing as far easterly as it does at that place. He scudded along bravely running with the land toward the East and North. All went well until he came to a low reef or ledge of rocks nmning far out to sea in a north- easterly direction. When Robinson observed this he went on shore and climbed to a high point to see if it was safe to venture. He was afraid of hidden currents, or streams of water. These might carry him away from the shore and prevent him from getting around the point. He did indeed observe that there was a current running out to sea past the ledge, but he thought he could by care- ful paddling keep his boat from striking the rock. If he could once get beyond the ledge, the wind would help him double or get around the point. Indeed the danger was that the wind would blow him on to the rocks. He waited for two days for a gentle wind. At last without sail he pushed his boat into the current and was born swiftly seaward. He found the current much stronger than he thought it would be. It rushed his frail boat on past the point of the rocks and out into the sea. Try as best he might he could not change its THE TEACHER'S .ROBINSON CRUSOE 157 course. He was steadily going out to sea. He gave himself up for lost. He reproached himself for being so rash and foolhardy as to trust his fortunes in so frail a craft. How dear at this time seemed the island to him! The wind which he had depended on to help him at this point had died down so that it was at the mercy of the current. He kept urging his boat to the westward as much as possible with all his strength hoping that a breeze would fmally spring up. He struggled on bravely until about noon. He had been carried out a great distance into the sea, but not so far as to lose sight of the land. All at once he felt the breeze freshening up. It caught his sail and soon his boat was cutting across the current. He did not have to go far before he was free from it and making headway for the island, which he reached about four o'clock in the after- noon. He found himself on the northern shore of the island, but before long the shore ran away to the southward again. He ran briskly along the west side until he found a Uttle bay or cove. He determined to enter this, draw up his boat on shore and make his way back home across the island on foot. He was almost exhausted with his great labor and worn out with anxiety. In the centre of the arms of the cove he found a little creek entering the sea. He paddled into this and found a good place to hide his boat. As soon as Robinson was again on land he fell on his knees and with tears in his eyes thanked God for his de- liverance. The island which had seemed to him a prison now seemed the fairest and dearest place in the world. Having made his boat safe he started back toward his shelter. But he was too tired to go far. He soon came IS8 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE to a little grove of trees beneath which he laid himself down and soon was fast asleep. You can imagine with what surprise Robinson was awakened out of his sleep by a voice calling his name. "Robinson, Robinson Crusoe," it said, "poor Robin- son Cruose! Where are you Robinson, where have you been?" He was so fast asleep that he did not at first rouse up entirely and thought he was dreaming. But the voice kept calling, "Robinson, Robinson, poor Robinson Crusoe!" He was greatly frightened and started up. But no sooner were his eyes opened then he saw his parrot sitting on a branch of a tree. He knew at once the source of the voice. Polly had missed her master and was also exploring the island. It was a pleasant surprise. She immediately flew to him and lit on his shoulder. She showed in many ways how glad she was to see him and kept saying, "Poor Robinson, poor Robinson Crusoe!" Robinson remained here over night and the next morn- ing made his way back to the shelter. Up to this time Robinson had never seen any dangerous animals on the island. He had grown used to life there and went about without fear of animals. But as he was returning across a little opening, he saw a clump of palms in the centre of the opening, swaying about. He did not at first see what caused this, but soon there was thrust out the head of a great serpent. Its jaws were open and its eyes were fixed on a poor terrified little rabbit. The rabbit seemed rooted to the spot. It could not stir a muscle and was soon caught in the folds of the great snake. This sight made Robinson greatly afraid. He wanted to rush to the rescue of the rabbit, but what could he do THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 159 against such a foe? He resolved in the future to keep a more careful watch and always to sleep in his bower. Robinson had enough of exploring for some time. He was contented to remain at home. He made many things he needed. He had saved all the skins of the goats he had killed for meat and all that had died from any cause. These he made into rugs for his bed. He kept at his loom too, for he was anxious to weave enough of his coarse cloth to make him a suit of clothes. He learned how to braid mats and rugs out of his fibre, and finally replaced his awkward hat and parasol with others braided very skillfully from the long grasses that grew so abundantly in the marshy places. Another thing that Robinson was now able to make or weave out of his fibre was a hammock. He had slept all this time on a bed made of poles laid lengthwise and thickly covered with the skins of goats and rabbits. Now he could have a comfortable place to sleep. He did not stop until he had made two. One was for the bower and the other was for use out-of-doors. When his work was done in the evening or in the heat of the mid- day he would lie in it at full length under the shade of the trees. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Winds, regular or constant. Wind-zones, ocean currents, snakes that crush their prey, boa constrictors. (b) How do sail-boats sail against the wind? Could Robinson have sailed around the island starting in the other direction ? Would there not have been more danger from being blown out to sea ? Do you not think that Robinson cherished the secret hope that he might make his escape from the island ? Would not the western side of the island have been a pleasanter place for Robinson's abode? Do you know of any other man that made a voyage of discovery? i6o THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (c) Make a drawing of Robinson's boat rigged out from model you have made. Picture Robinson on his voyage of discovery. (b) Make provision baskets and vsrater jar for your model of Robinson's boat; also paddle, cordage and anchor. XXXV A DISCOVERY PREPARATION Do you think that Robinson has found out all about the island ? Do you suppose it is entirely unknown to other men, savages or Indians? Will not savage men from the mainland visit it? Will not ships go by and perhaps some of them stop to see the island ? Which side of the island was toward the mainland? Was the land east or west of the island ? Write a story about Robinson's meeting savage Indians and what happened. PRESENTATION Robinson could not forget his boat. It seemed a com- panion. "It may be the means of my escape from this place," he thought. He took frequent journeys across the island to where his little boat lay in the cove. He would start out in the morning and walk over to the west side of the island, take his boat and have a pleasant little sail. He always returned home before dark, for to tell the truth, Robinson was a coward. He was as timid as a hare. He was afraid of everything and spent many nights without sleep because of fear. It was while on one of his visits to his boat that Robin- son made a discovery that changed his whole life. It happened one day, about noon when he was going toward his boat that he with great surprise saw the print of a man's i6i i62 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE naked foot on the shore in the sand. He stood like one rooted to the ground. He could not move, so great was his surprise and fear. He listened, looked around, but could hear nor see nothing. He went up to a little hill to look further, but nothing was in sight. There was but the one footprint. There was no doubt about it, there it was, foot, toes, heel and every part of a foot. Robin- son tried to think how it might have gotten there, but he could not. It was a mystery. He was greatly afraid and started at once for his shelter. He ran like one pur- sued. At every little way he would look behind to see if anyone was following him. Never a frightened rabbit ran to his hiding place with more terror than Robinson ran to his cave. He did not sleep that night for fear and remained in his shelter for three days, never venturing out. But his food was growing short and his goats needed to be milked. He finally with a thousand wild fancies forced himself to go about his duties. But he could not get the footprint out of his mind. He spent many sad and fearful days thinking about it. "How could it have gotten there? Whose was it? Was the owner savage or not ? What did he want on the island ?" were some of the questions that haunted him. "Perhaps," he thought one day, "I just imagined I saw a footprint, or perhaps it was one of my own that I have made when going to sail my boat." He took courage at this and began to go about the island again. But he went in great fear, always looking behind him. He was always ready to run at the first sign of danger. He had made himself a large strong new bow and plenty of arrows. He carried these in a quiver he had made from his cloth. He fashioned too a sharp-pointed, lance-like weapon THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 163 which he hurled with a kind of sling. In his belt he car- ried some new sharpened stone knives. He had found a better kind of rock out of which to make his knives. It resembled glass and could be brought to a tine, keen edge. Armed thus, he began to have more confidence. He had a strong desire to see the footprint again and make up his mind about it. He wished to measure it. In this way he could tell certainly whether it was a chance print of his own foot or not. So after a few days, he again ventured across the island. Alas, on measuring the print it was much larger than his own! There could no longer be any doubt but that it belonged to someone else. Again great fear fell on poor Robinson. He shook with cold and fright. He resolved to make himself more secure against attack. He cut and carried willow stakes and set them in a thick hedge around in front of his shelter. This was outside the first and enclosed it. In a season or two these had grown to such a height as to shut out all view of his home from sight to one coming to it from the front. His flock of goats gave him many troubled thoughts. His goats were his greatest treasure. From them he ob- tained without trouble his meat, his milk and butter. "What if they were discovered and killed or carried away?" He resolved to divide his herd into three parts and secrete these in separate fenced pastures in different parts of the island. His herd of goats now numbered twenty-five. He made thorough search about the island for the most secluded and best hidden spots where he could fence in a pasture. One day as he was exploring on the west side of the island to find another open space for a goat field, he thought he i64 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE spied away out to sea a boat. He looked long and anx- iously and yet he was not sure that it was a boat he saw. But how easy thought Robinson for the people of the main land which must be at no great distance to the westward to come across to this side of the island in fair weather. He thought too, how fortunate he was to have been cast on the east side of the island. For there he had his shelter in the very safest part. As he was coming down from a hill where he had gone to get a better view of the sea he made another discovery. About him everywhere at the foot of the hill were bones of all kinds. Near by too, were charcoal and ashes. There could be no mistake, the place was visited by human beings. These were very likely savages. Everything showed that they came for the purpose of feasting and not for plundering. It was very likely that they neither sought anything on the island nor expected it. This thought greatly relieved Robinson. He returned home in a very thankful and composed state of mind. He had now been on the island almost eighteen years and had not been discovered. Yet, no doubt the island had been visited many times by the savages since he had been there. In a short time his fear of discovery wore off and he began to live just as he did before his discovery. He took, however, greater precaution against surprise. He always carried his bow and arrows, his lance and knives. He was also very careful about making a great smoke from his fire. He burned a great quantity of wood in a pit and made charcoal. With this material he had a fine fire with a very little smoke. Every day also he went to the top of the hill back of his shelter in order to discover if possible the approach of savages. THE TEACHERS' ROBINSON CRUSOE 165 THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (b) The Indians, Caribs, their manners and customs. Robinson's new weapon. How was it thrown? Will not Robin- son make a head for his lance or javeline out of the new kind of stone he has found ? The making of charcoal. (c) Do you think you would have been as frightened as Robin- son was when he saw the footprint? Shall we call Robinson brave or cowardly? Was his fear justified ? Would everyone or anyone have been afraid? Robinson was only one, the savages might be many. Robinson wanted companions so much, was it not pitiful that he was so afraid of his own kind? He was more afraid of them than of animals. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (c) Make drawings of Robinson's new lance and sling, his new bow and quiver of arrows. Picture Robinson looking for savages from his hill. Do not forget his new clothes, hat and parasol. KOBINSON WATCHING FOR SAVAGES XXXVI THE LANDING OF THE SAVAGES PREPARATION Do you think Robinson will see the savages that have visited the island. What will they be like? What will they do? How will they be dressed? What will Robinson do? Will he fight them? How will the fight come out? Maybe Robinson will be taken prisoner. Maybe Robinson will take a prisoner. Would it be a good plan for Robin.son to capture a savage and have him for a com- panion ? Write out the story of The Landing of the Savages and what happened. PRESENTATION Another year passed by, Robinson longed more and more to get avi^ay from the island. Year after year he had hoped and watched in vain for a passing ship. Every day he would scan the waters that held him prisoner for the welcome sight of a sail. He had been disap- pointed. Now his only hope was to escape to the main land in some way. He feared the savages. He had heard stories of their being cannibals. But if they could come to his island in their canoes against the prevailing wind, why could he not get to the main land with it in his favor ? Strange as it may be, Robinson began to wish for the return of the savages. He hoped to watch them at a dis- tance and find out something about their customs. More especially he wished that he might capture one of them. i66 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 167 He had two reasons for this. In the first place he would have a companion. He pictured fondly how he would teach him gentle manners and the English speech. And too, the com})anion would be able to help him. Besides this he longed above all to know more of the main land and whether it would be safe to go there. He wanted to find out in what kind of boats they made the voyage. He thought that if he had such a person he would have someone to show him the way to reach the land. The more he thought, the more anxious he became to sec the savages on the island. He thought so much about it by day that he dreamed about it at night. One night he dreamed that the savages came, drew their boats upon the shore and began to prepare their feast. As he watched them one of their number broke away from his fellows and came straight toward his hiding-place. Robinson thought he rushed out, drove away those that followed the fleeing man and rescued him. This dream made a deep impression upon him and made him await the coming of the savages with great ho])es and eagerness. It was more than eighteen months after he had formed this plan of capturing one of the savages before the savages made their appearance. Robinson was sur- prised one morning to see no less than five canoes drawn up on the shore at a point on his side of the island about two miles below his shelter, to the south. The people that had come in them were on shore and out of sight. Robinson went back to his shelter to make his plans. He made up his mind that he would be foolish to attack them. There must be twenty-five or thirty of them. He finally went to a point where he could see farther inland and soon caught sight of a crowd of about thirty savages. They were naked and dancing around and i68 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE around in a circle. All the while they were singing and making hideous noises. There was a fire in the center of the ring of savages. "They are cooking their feast," thought Robinson. "Maybe I can surprise them while they eat and rush in and seize one." But this seemed too great a risk to run. He had no weapons but his bow and arrows, his lance and knife. What could he do against so great a number? But fortune favored his plans. As he gazed at them from his safe distance he saw one of their number break away from the rest and run with utmost speed directly toward his hiding-place. At once two other savages pursued him. They had no weapons but clubs. They ran with great swiftness, but the man in front was steadily gaining ground. Robinson now to tell the truth was dreadfully frightened to see the savage run directly toward him and his shelter. He kept his place however, and watched the race. The man running away ran along the shore and would soon come to the little creek that emptied into the sea below his home. Robinson saw that the savage would have to swim this to escape. He ran down thither and con- cealed himself behind a tree and waited for the fugitive to come up. As he did so, the fleeing savage plunged in and swam across with a few strong strokes. When he was well on the bank, Robinson presented himself and made signs to him to come to him and he would help him. The savage was at first almost overcome with astonish- ment and fright, for Robinson presented a very unusual sight. The savage at once ran to him and fell down at his feet. Indeed so great was his fright and distress that he placed one of Robinson's feet upon his neck in sign that be yielded up his life into his hands. Robinson raised THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 169 him up and motioned for him to take the lance and help defend them against the men, now coming up. They hid behind trees and waited for them to swim across the stream. But this they did not do. When they reached the creek, they could see nothing of their runaway. They very slowly turned and went back to their companions. Robinson was well content not to let them know that there was any one on the island. He feared they might return and destroy his shelter and fields. Robinson took the savage to his shelter and gave him bread and raisins to eat, and a cup of water to drink. He was very hungry and ate greedily. After he had eaten, Robinson made signs for him to lie down and sleep, for the Indian was nearly tired out with his long and swift run. He was a handsome fellow of his race. His limbs were large, straight and strong. He had a good face. His hair was long and black, his forehead high, and his eyes bright. His skin was not black but of an olive color. His teeth were fine set and as white as ivory. He slept about an hour; when he awoke he came run- ning to Robinson and again made signs to him that he was his slave. "You saved my life," he seemed to say, "and now I will serve you." Robinson named him Friday at once, forth at was the day on which the great event of his escape had taken place. Robinson's next care was to fit him out with some clothing. He had by this time several suits made of his coarse cloth. He soon had Friday dressed in one of the old ones, with a straw or braided hat on his head. He did not think it safe to allow Friday to sleep with him in the bower. He made a little tent for him inside the enclosure. This was covered with goatskins and made a very good protection from both heat and rain. I70 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE FRIDAY AH Robinson's slave fridav in uis new clothes DANCE OF THE SAVAGES THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 171 Robinson took care (o ktcp all his kni\cs and weapons near him in the bower. But his fears that Friday might harm him were unfounded. Friday from the first was faithful to his master. He was sweet and obedient in all things.' He seemed to look upon Robinson with the love of a child for father and never tired of serving him. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) What is the name of the mainland to which Robinson planned to escape? Was it really the mainland or another island? An island (Trinitlad) lay between Tobago, Roliinson's Island, and the mainland. To what country does this island now belong? What are the natives of these Caribbee Islands called ? (ft) What are cannibals? It is the custom among savage or primitive men to kill prisoners taken in war or to make slaves of them. Savage men dance and feast to celebrate victory in battle. Sometimes they kill their prisoners at this time. (c) Do you not like Robinson because he did not kill any of the savages? Could he have done so? Tell how he might have killed the two men that pursued Friday? Would it have been right? Was it right for the savages to kill prisoners taken in war? Savage men do not think much about right and wrong. Robinson at first wanted to kill the savages, but he took pity on them and spared their lives. We praise him for this. He had a kind and good heart. He pitied them. He did not hate them and seek to harm them as many bad men would have done. Was not Robinson kind to Friday? We should always be kind to the helpless. Robinson was thoughtful. He gave Friday food when he was hungry, water when he was thirsty and bade him sleep when he was tired. He clothed him and made him a tent. Do you Hke Robinson for this? Friday too is kind to his master. Kindness always brings kindness. If we give kind deeds we will get them in return. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Picture the scene of the savages in their war dance. Robin- son rescues Friday. Friday and his new clothes. XXXVII ROBINSON AS TEACHER PREPARATION Was Robinson a good scholar? Has he forgotten how to write? What will Friday leam from him ? Does Friday know how to weave, make pots, bake bread, raise com or weave cloth? Does he know how to write or anything about the Bible? Friday will first have to leam to talk Robinson's language. PRESENTATION From Robinson's Diary "I began to consider that having now two mouths to feed instead of one, I must provide more ground for my harvest and plant a larger quantity of corn that I used to plant. So I marked out a larger piece of land and began to fence it in. Friday worked not only very will- ingly but very hard. I told him that it was for com to make more bread because he was now with me. He let me know that he was grateful for my kindness and would work much harder if I would tell him what to do. "This was the pleasantest year of all the life I led in this place. Friday began to talk pretty well and understood the names of almost all the things that I called for and of all the places which I wished to send him. I was care- ful to teach him all the things I knew. I showed him how 172 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 173 to plant and harvest com, how lo gather fibre, spin yam and to weave it into cloth. He learned these things quickly and became very skillful in making pots. He knew something about this because at home he had seen the women make them. He ornamented them with figures of birds and flowers. I taught him about the true God. But as for writing he could never do much with this. I had no books and could not make him understand the importance of writing. He began to talk a great deal to me. This delighted me very much. I began to love him exceedingly. He was so very honest and faithful. "After I had taught him English I tried one day to find out whether he had any wish to return to his own coun- try and as I talked to him about it I saw his face light up with joy and his eye sparkle. From this I had no doubt but that Friday w^ould like to be in his own coun- try again. This for a time made me sad to think how eagerly he would leave me to be among his savage friends. 'Do you not wish you were back in your own country, Friday?' I said to him one day. 'Yes,' he said, 'I be much O, glad to be back in my country.' 'What would you do there,' said I? 'Would you turn wild again and do as the savages do?' He shook his head and said very gravely, 'No, no, Friday tell them to live good. He tell them to plant corn and live like white mans.' " One day when we were on the top of a hill on the west side of the island, Friday suddenly began to jump and dance about in great glee. I asked him what the matter was. 'Oh, joy, oh, glad,' he said; 'there my country!' The air was so clear that from this place, as I had before discovered, land could be distinctly seen looking westward. "I asked him how far it was from our island to his coun- 174 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE try and whether their canoes were ever lost in coming and going. He said that there was no danger. No canoes were ever wrecked and that it was easy to get back and forth. I asked him many things about his people and country. He told me that away to the west of his country there lived 'white mans like you.' I thought these must be the people of Central America, and asked him how I might come from this island and get among these white men. He made me understand that I must have a large boat as big as two canoes. "I resolved at once to begin to make a boat large enough for us to pass over to the land we could see lying to the west and if possible to go on to the white man's country Friday told me about. It took us nearly two months to make our boat and rig her out with sails, masts, rudder, and anchor. We had to weave our sails and twist our rope. We burned out the canoe from a large fallen log. We used a great stone tied securely to the end of a strong rope for an anchor. "When we had the boat in the water, Friday showed great skill in rowing or paddling it. Fie had managed boats ever since he was old enough, but he did not know how to handle a sail or rudder. He learned very quickly, however, to sail and steer the boat and soon was perfectly at home in it. "We made our boat safe by keeping it in the little cove at the mouth of the creek. I had Friday to fetch rocks and build a dock or place for landing. But the rainy season was now coming on and we must wait for fair weather. In the meantime I planned to lay by such quantities of food as we would need to take along." THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 1 75 PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (b) Study the description of Robinson's boat. Make a model of this. His second boat. Make the sails. It will be much larger and better than his first one. (a) Make a drawing of the boat from many points of view. Picture Robirvson and Friday sailing in the boat. XXXVIII ANOTHER SHIPWRECK PREPARATION Do you think a ship will ever come to the island? Do not ships pass that way? Do you think Robinson gets oflf the island at all? How does he finally get off? Does he get away in his boat or does a ship come? Need we be surprised if another ship is wrecked off the island just as Robinson's was? What became of Robinson's ship ? Did he get anything from it ? Write out the story of another ship being wrecked on the island. PRESENTATION One evening Robinson sat in his shelter thinking of his plans to escape to Friday's country. He was sad. For, after all, this place was very dear to him. It was the only home he had. Had he not made ever)1:hing with his own hands? It was doubly dear to him on this ac- count. He thought how it would grieve him to leave his goats, his fields, and the many comforts he had here. He had been telling Friday of his home in New York. He told him of the great city, and of its many wonderful sights. He told him of his country and people of his flag and its history. All these things brought back memo- ries of his boyhood and he wondered what changes had come in his long absence. Friday listened to all Rob- inson told him with wonderful intelligence. He was de- 176 - _ THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 177 lighted in hearing Robinson tell of the wonders of the great world, for he had never known anything about it. As they talked Robinson noticed the approach of a storm. The sky was getting black with clouds. The winds were blowing a hurricane. The waves were coming in moun- tain high. It reminded him of the eventful night now twenty-five years ago when his ship was tossed up on the shore like an egg shell and broken to pieces. Suddenly there was a sound that made Robinson start from his seat with the wildest alarm. Was it the sound of a cannon from the ocean or the terrible crash and war of the water on the rocks of the coast? There it is again; it is a cannon! Some ship is in distress! This is its signal! Robinson ran out and down to the shore with Friday at his heels. "Oh master!" said Friday, "can we not help? If they only knew the island was here and how to steer into the harbor beyond the point of land on the south." Robinson was so excited that he scarcely knew what he was doing. He ran up and down the shore calling wildly, but the awful roar of the sea and wind drowned his cries. Suddenly his thoughts came to him. "Quick, Friday, get some fire in a pot. We will run to the point, gather grass and wood, and make a fire there. Maybe we can guide them into the harbor." They soon had a great beacon light sending its welcome greeting far over the sea. The pilot of the ship saw it and steered his ship nearer and nearer. Robinson was ready to shout for joy as the ship seemed about to make the harbor. The ship had her sails torn in shreds and her rudder broken. It was hard to steer her in such a gale. On rounding the point, she was blown on the rocks. With a frightful crash which could be heard above 178 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE the din of the storm she struck and held fast. Robinson could hear the cries of the men and the orders of the officers. They were trying to get boats ready to put off, but such was the confusion of the storm and the enor- mous waves breaking over the deck that it could not be done quickly. Before the men could get a boat into the sea, and get into it, the ship gave a lurch to one side as though about to sink. All the men jumped for one boat. It was overburdened. The wind tossed it about. The sea soon filled it and it went down and all were lost. Robinson and Friday remained on the shore all night. They watched to see if they could not help some poor sailor that might cling to a plank and be blown on shore. They saw no one. At last they lay down, but they could not sleep. Many times they sprang up and ran about for fear that some poor fellow would need their help. At last morning came. The storm ceased. Robinson and Friday searched everywhere for the bodies of the sailors, but could find none. But the wind had blown the ship in plain view, and into shallow waters. It was lying on the bottom with more than half its Inilk out of the water. The masts were gone. It was a sad sight. No human being could be seen on it They were now rejoiced that they had their boat ready. "Let us take it," said Robinson, "and go out to the ship. It may be some person is still on the unfortunate ship." They were soon by the ship's side. They rowed around it until they saw a rope hanging down from the deck. Robinson seized this and clambered up. Friday tied the boat fast, and followed. Robinson opened the door leading from the deck into the ship and went down. He searched in all the cabins, and knocked at all the doors. THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 179 He called, but all was still. When he was satisfied that every person on board had been drowned he we{)t bitterly. Friday stood there with open and staring eyes. He looked and looked. He was astonished at the large shij) and at the wonderful things before him. They were in the cabin where the passengers had been. There stood trunks under the benches and clothes hung on the hooks on the wall. One trunk was open. In it were tele- scopes through which the travelers had looked at the land. Robinson saw also paper, pens, penholders and ink. Books were also near by. Robinson first took a thick book. It was the Bible, out of which his mother had so often taught him. Then they came to the sailors' cabin. There hung muskets and swords and bags of shot and cartridges. Then they went to the work- room. There were saws, hammers, spades, shovels, chisels, nails, bottles, and pails, knives and forks. And something more, over which Robinson was most glad, matches. At last they came into the store-room. There lay bags of flour and barley, teas, lentils, beans and sugar. Then Robinson embraced Friday in his great joy and said to him, "How rich we are!" THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (b) Did Robinson do the best thing when ne built a fire on the point? Maybe the ship was led on to the rocks in this way. Is it safer for a ship out on the ocean or near shore in a storm ? Have you seen a life-saving crew practicing? Our country keeps companies of men at all dangerous places where ships may need help. If a wreck occurs these men go out in their boats and take care of the disabled ship, the passengers and the sailors. Some- times the life saving crew shows great bravery in risking their lives to save the people on board. XXXIX SAVING THINGS FROM THE SHIP PREPARATION What do you think Robinson will prize most and what will he first take back with him ? Make a list of things you think Robin- son will take from the ship. PRESENTATION After Robinson had looked through the ship he began to plan the way to get the tools and things he most wanted on shore. He and Friday first carried everything together that he wanted to take on shore. When they had done this, he found he had the following things. Robinson stood everything together that he needed most. 1 . A case of nails and screws. 2. Two iron axes and several hatchets. 3. A saw. 4. A small case of planes, tongs, augers, files, chisels, etc. 5. A third case with iron brackets, hooks, hinges, etc. 6. A case of matches. 7. A barrel of gunpowder. 8. Two muskets and a pistol. 9. Several swords. 10. A bag of cartridges. 180 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE i8i 11. A large sail cloth and some rope. 12. A telescope. By means of the ship's ropes, Robinson let everything down into his boat. He himself took the Bible and then they rowed to the shore, and unloaded the boat. Every- thing was put into the bower where rain could not harm it. By the time they had this done, night was coming on and they decided to do no more that day, but wait until the next day. "We must work fast," said Robinson. "The first storm is likely to break the ship in pieces and destroy everything in it." The next morning early they ate a hastily prepared breakfast and were off to the boat. Neither Robinson nor Friday stopped for their noon day lunch. "A storm is brewing," said Robinson, "the air is calm, the sky is overcast with clouds, the heat is oppressive. We must hurry." With the utmost diligence they rowed back and forth all day. They made nine trips. They had now on shore a surprising quantity of all kinds of tools, goods and weapons. They had all kinds of ware to use in the kitchen, clothes, and food. Robinson prized a little four-wheeled wagon and a whetstone. But in looking over his stores, Robinson suddenly dis- covered that he had no needles nor thread. They went at once to procure these important articles. In looking for needles and thread, Robinson found a small trunk full of money and valuable stones. There were diamonds, rubies, pearls, and much gold. Robinson pushed it to one side. "What can I do with riches on this island? I would give them all for some needles and thread," he said to Friday. But on second thought he took the trunk 1&2 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE and its contents along with him to his cave. For in the trunk were also letters and writings. "Perhaps," he said, "these tell to whom the valuables belong and I can re- turn them some time." Robinson at last found a case containing everything one could need with which to cut and sew cloth. There were scissors, thread, needles, thimbles, tapes, and buttons. But now the wind was rising and they must hurry. They were nearly ready for departure. They were passing through a part of the ship not before visited. They were surprised to hear a sound coming from a room whose door was kept shut by a heap of stuff that had been thrown against it by the violent pitching of the ship in the storm. Robinson and Friday cleared away the rubbish and were surprised to find a dog almost drowned. He was so weak from want of food that his cries could be heard a short distance only. Robinson took him tenderly in his arms and carried him to the boat, while Friday carried the sewing case and the trunk. The wind was now blowing a gale. A few yards from the ship they were in great danger. Robinson grasped the rudder and made Friday stand ready to cut away the mast in case they found the wind too strong. With the greatest difficulty they finally made the little cove at the mouth of the creek and were soon landed with their precious cargo. The next morning they eagerly searched the waters for the ship. Not even their field glasses could reveal anything of it. Some planks, a mast, and parts of a small boat were blown on shore. All else had dis- appeared. Robinson set to work at once to make a door for his bower out of the pine wood cast up by the waves. How easy the work proceeded with saws, hammers, augers, THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 183 squares, planes, nails, hinges, and screws! With the wagon loo, Friday could now gather his corn quickly and easily or haul in a great quantity of grapes to dry for raisins. Friday had never seen a gun. He did not know the use of firearms. The muskets that Robinson had brought from the ship were a great mystery to him. Robinson showed him their use. He showed how they could de- fend themselves. He told Friday that these weapons would kill at a distance. He took some powder and touched a match to it. Friday was greatly frightened. Robinson then proceeded to load the gun. He put ui some powder, a ball of lead or bullet. Then at the hammer he placed a little cap which gave a flash when struck. This ignited the powder. When all was in readiness Robinson bade Friday follow him. They went slowly out into the forest along the stream. Soon Robinson espied a rabbit silting under a clump of grass. Robinson raised his gun, took careful aim, pressed the trigger. There was a flash and loud report and there lay the rabbit dead. But Friday too, was lying on the ground. He had fainted from astonishment and fright. Robinson dropped his gun and raised the poor fellow up to a silting position. He quickly recovered. He ran to get the rabbit. He examined it carefully. Robinson at last pointed out the hole the bullet had made and the mystery of the way the rabbit was killed was solved. Robin- son had lived alone so long that he had learned to love every living creature on the island. He never harmed anything except when he needed food. He had lived so quietly that the birds and animals did not fear him. They lived near his shelter and seemed to know him. Robinson was delighted with his new tools and weapons. i84 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE But they reminded him of home. Nothing that he had seen in all the time he had been on the island so turned his thoughts toward home and friends. Robinson v/ould sit for hours thinking of the past and making plans for the future. He was homesick. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (a) Indications of a storm. Children make weather observa- tion. The usual order of coming on of a cyclone or spell of weather. (i) Wind S. E. ten or twelve hours. Cloudiness increases. Winds slow down, rain comes on. Storm passes over. Winds change to West and northwest and increase in strength. (b) What kind of tools had Robinson before the shipwreck? What material were they made of? We call the time when men had nothing but stone tools, the Time of Stone or Stone Age. At one time men did not know how to use any material but stone for tools. Then they used bronze and next iron. Our time is the Age of Iron. The ship and its contents changed Robinson from the Age of Stone to the Age of Iron. It changed him to living as a civilized man lives. Guns, kinds of, and uses. What is a telescope? A small one with double glass is called a field glass. Will not Robinson prize this? He can now watch for passing ships from his hill. He can see much farther. What trades does Robinson now practice ? What do we call one that makes pots? That weaves cloth? Makes hats? Makes bread? Does hunting? Sails ships? Does Robinson now have to do so many different things? Friday will do some things for him. Does your papa have to do as many different things as Robinson did? Why did Robinson have to do so many things? Why does not your papa have to do so many different things? Do savages have to do more or fewer different things than civilized men? Do savage men have trades? Did Friday have a trade? How many different trades made the tools Robinson got from the ship? (c) Do you like Robinson because he was kind to the dog? Was Robinson kind-hearted or cruel? Will a kind man mistreat any animal? Are there any animals we should kill? Poisonous THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE i8S snakes? Few snakes are poisonous. Most snakes are very useful in destroying injurious insects. Do we not like Robinson because he did not kill animals for sport or fun ? Even savage men do not kill animals for fun or sport. They hunt them for food. Animals that have never been hunted are tame. Robinson lived with the animals. They loved him and trusted him. PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Study different kinds of ships and draw one you think would resemble the one that was wrecked off Robinson's Island? Make a picture showing Robinson shooting the rabbit. Don't forget the dog. Study the drawing of dogs. Learn to draw them well. TUE WRECKED SHIP I86 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE HOBINSON SHOOTING XL THE RETURN OF THE SAVAGES PREPARATION Will not Robinson now make plans to escape? What will he do ? Will he dare to trust himself in the boat he made? Will he be afraid that the savages will kill him? Will not Friday protect him from them? Will they build a new boat or remodel the one they have, now that they have tools? Have you thought that maybe the savages will return and upset Robinson's plan to escape? Write out about the preparations for escape and an unexpected visit of the savages. PRESENTATION Robinson now renewed his plans for escaping from the island to Friday's country. They first rebuilt their boat with their new tools. They hollowed out the center till the sides were thin toward the top. They shaped her sides and keel. They made her prow sharp so that she would cut the water easily. They made a new mast, strong and tall and shapely. They made larger and stronger sails and ropes. They made two pairs of extra oars. They made boxes and cupboards in the prow and stern for keeping their fresh water and provisions. Friday's eyes sparkled with joy when it was done. He hoped he would now be able to return to his own island and parents. Robinson noticed his joy and asked him, 187 i88 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE "Do you want to return to your own people?" "Yes," said Friday, "very much." "Would you trust yourself in this boat?" "Yes," said Friday. "Very well," said his master, "you-hav^i may have it and start home when you please." "Yes Master, but you come too, my people will not hurt you." Robinson resolved to venture over to Friday's land with him. But before their preparations were complete the rainy season of our fall set in. They resolved to wait until the weather was settled and as soon as the rainy season was over to set out. They ran their boat well up into the creek and covered it well with a large tarpaulin made of sail- cloth obtained from the ship. Robinson had now been on the island twenty-seven years. For the last three years he had lived happily with his companion Friday. Every year in September, Robinson celebrated the day his life was saved and he was thrown up on the island. Robinson celebrated it this year with more than the usual thankfulness. He thought that it would be his last anniversary on the island. One morning, Friday had gone to the beach to find a turtle. Soon he came running back out of breath. "Oh Master," he cried, "they are coming, they are coming to take me prisoner!" He was trembling with fright. "We must take our guns and defend ourselves," said Robinson. "But we will not kill anyone unless they attack us." This quieted Friday. They loaded four muskets and three pistols. Robinson put the pistols in his belt where he also fastened a sword. He gave Fri- day a pistol and a musket, for Friday had learned to shoot well. Besides Friday carried a bag of powder and bul- lets. Robinson took his field glasses and saw twenty- THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 189 one savages with two prisoners. The prisoners were bound and lying on the ground. This was a war party celebrating a victory with a feast. They probably in- tended to kill their prisoners. "We must save the lives of those men," said Robinson. The savages this time had landed quite near Robin- son's shelter, not more than a half mile below the creek's mouth. Soon he and Friday started off. Robinson commanded Friday to follow quietly and not to speak or shoot. "We will surprise them and give them a good scare," said Robinson. When yet a considerable distance away they could hear the savages yelling and screaming. Some of them were dancing their war dance. Their faces and bodies were painted to make them look terrible to their enemies. They were dancing around their prisoners with hideous cries and gestures. They could now see the prisoners plainly. One had a beard and was plainly a white man. Robinson was surprised and determined to save him at all risks. "Get your gun ready to fire," he said to Friday, and when I say the word let us run forward yelling and firing our guns over their heads." This will fill them with such fright that they will take to their heels and boats and get away as soon as possible. In the scramble and confusion we will rush in and rescue the prisoners. This plan did not please Friday at all. His savage blood was up and he wanted to kill all he could. "Let's fire on them," he said. "Let's kill all but the prisoners." "No, no," said Robinson, "it's always wrong to take life unless it cannot be avoided to save one's own. Let's try my plan first." With great reluctance Friday consented. At a signal from Robinson they rushed forward, and when in plain sight they fired off their muskets in the air, If the ground igo THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE had suddenly exploded beneath their feet there could have been no more confusion, astonishment, and fright. A few took to their heels. Others lay as if dead. They had swooned from fright. But as Robinson came up they jumped to their feet and pushed into the boats leaving the prisoners behind. Robinson and Friday still rushed forward and fired their remaining loaded guns and pistols in the air. The savages made all haste to get into their boats and push off. Soon they were well out to sea, paddling rapidly for the west. Robinson reloaded his arms and gave them a farewell volley, but not a soul was killed or even wounded. This gave Robinson great pleasure. He had accomplished his purpose without bloodshed. They could now turn to the prisoners. Robinson ran back to them and cjuickly cut their ropes. Robinson asked the white man who he was, but the man was too weak to answer. Robinson gave him a piece of bread. The fear of death being removed, the white man soon grew stronger. When Friday came running back from watching the boats and saw the savage that had been a prisoner he gave a loud yell. He threw his arms around the man, kissed him and laughed and cried for joy. He put his head on his breast and hugged him again and again. Robinson was greatly surprised and puzzled. He asked Friday what his actions meant. But so intent was Friday that he got no answer. At last Friday re- covered far enough from his great joy to say with face beaming with delight, "Oh, Master, this man is my dear father." They at once began a long conversation, each one told his story. Suddenly Friday jumped up and said, "How foolish I am, I have not thought to give my father anything to eat and drink. He must be nearly starred." THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 191 And away he ran toward the shelter and was soon back with food and water to drink. Robinson learned through Friday from his father that the white man was a Spaniard, that he had been captured by the tribe that had a battle with Friday's people. The Spaniard was one of sixteen men that had been saved by Friday's people from a wrecked ship. So weak were the prisoners that they could not walk to the shelter. Robinson and Friday made a litter and carried them one after the other. When once there, Friday prepared some rich rice soup. The prisoners ate heartily and in a few days were strong enough to go about the island. THINGS TO THINK AND TALK ABOUT (c) Could Robinson have killed the savages without danger to himself? He did not wish to do this. What words describe his conduct? Kind? Good? Thoughtful? Considerate? Merci- ful? What words would tell the opposite kind of conduct? Do you like Friday's joy on finding his father? Friday was good to his father. He was a good son. He loved his father. He obeyed his parents. 192 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE PROBLEMS TO WORK OUT (a) Illustrate your written reproduction by a picture showing Robinson and Friday chasing the savages to their boats. XOBINSON AND FKIDAY CHASING THE SAVAGES XLI DELIVERANCE AT LAST PREPARATION Will not Robinson now carry out his plans of escape ? How will his new companions change his plans? Will they help or hinder him ? How do you now imagine Robinson will get away from the island ? Will he go in his boat or will a ship come ? Will not Robin- son plan to help the fifteen comrades of the Spaniard who are help- less in Friday's country? Does not Robinson always help others first? Write out a story of what changes Robinson makes in his plans and how at last he is delivered. PRESENTATION Friday had not forgotten the plan for going to his home. He would often mention it and spent hours talking about it during the long rainy season. But now that the Span- iard and Friday's father had come with the family, Robin- son felt he must change his plans a little. He felt very sorry for the Spaniards left in Friday's country. They did not have enough to eat and were sick and sad besides. He talked the matter over with the Spaniard many times. They at last planned to send for them. The Spaniard and Friday's father were to go. Robinson was for doing it at once. But the Spaniard advised delay. "How can we get food for ourselves and fifteen others? Your 193 194 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE small store will soon be used up," he argued. Robinson at last saw that this difficulty must be overcome. There was just one thing to do, and this, to delay their de- parture until a new crop of corn could be raised. This would take six months. But at it they went. The four men could do much and work fast. They cleared more ground and planted all the seed corn they could spare from their store. Be- sides this they sowed about twelve bushels of barley they had gotten in the ship. The care for so much crop, its harvesting and storing away, kept them very busy for the season. Robinson not only did this, but also increased his flock of goats by catching kids and putting them in his pasture. He gathered too, all the grapes he could and dried them on the branches of trees. At the end of the harvesting season, they made ready their boat. They filled it with all the bread it could well carry. They put in raisins and fresh water. Robinson gave the Spaniard and Friday's father each a musket and plenty of powder and bullets. Now, all was ready. Friday gave his father a loving farewell. He stretched out his arms towards him as the boat moved away. The Spaniard and Robinson waved their hats and they were off. They promised to be back in eight or nine days. Robin- son and Friday made every preparation to receive the guests. They were to have a home not far from Robin- son's built of poles, and thatched with the long marsh grasses, like Robinson's bower. There was no need of hiding or defending it. It did not take long to fix it up. Eight days had now passed since the boat had left. Friday could hardly restrain himself longer. He watched THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 195 the ocean all the time. He would go to the top of the hill with the field glasses every hour during the day to catch a first glimpse of them. On the ninth day, as Friday put up his glasses to search the waters he dropped them with a yell of surprise. He tore down the hill with the utmost speed and rushed up to Robinson as one gone mad. "Look, look, oh Master!" he cried, "a big ship; a big ship way out on the sea!" Robinson took the glasses and sure enough there within hailing distance was a large ocean going vessel. Robin- son was overcome with excitement. For twenty-eight years his aching eyes had scanned the waters for this welcome sight. His joy was boundless. The ship looked like an American. Yes, there floated the American flag! How welcome a sight to Robinson. He could not utter a word. Tears filled his eyes and streamed down his cheeks. He would soon have news from home. He ran to the shore and shot off a gun to attract the attention of those on board. He heard an- swering shots at once. Soon a boat was lowered and in it three men rowed toward the shore. It was the captain himself and two sailors. The captain was astonished to find a man in the lonely island. Robinson told how it all had happened and how he would like to return home. To his un- speakable delight the captain told him that the ship was bound for New York and would take him along free of charge, but he must leave that day. The ship could not be delayed on its course. Of course Robinson must go. Friday was beside himself with grief. He did not want to be left behind alone. He did not know that the Spaniards would ever return. Something might happen to them on the sea. But before the eventful day the 196 THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE Spaniards landed. They brought word that Friday's father had died after his return home. Friday was thrown into a fit of grief at the news. He wept and repeated over and over his praise of the good man. XLII ROBINSON AT HOME PREPARATION Will not Robinson feel sorry to leave his home on the island? What will he do with his many things? What will he find at home? Will he know the place ? Will he meet his parents again ? What will he do the rest of his life ? Write out a description of his arrival at home. PRESENTATION It was with a sad heart that Robinson made ready to leave. Every familiar place seemed now doubly dear to him. He went from one to another with tears in his eyes. Here lay his home. Here were his fields, his crops and his goats. Everything was the work of his own hands. He had made them aU. Which should he take? He hesitated long. He must take home some of his belongings to show the people at home. And there were his parrot and the dog which had won a place in Robnison's heart. He decided to take them along. At length he got together his diary, his parasol, his Bible, his treasures, a suit of clothes, his dog, and a hat. He had saved too his bow and arrows. These he decided to take along. Everything else he gave to his good man Friday and the Spaniard who wished to be allowed to remain on the island. 197 ipS THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE Robinson kissed Friday tenderly. He with great effort finally tore himself away and ran to the shore where the ship's boat awaited him. But Robinson had not counted on the strength of Friday's love for him. Robin- son's boat had not yet reached the ship when Friday sprang into the water and swam after him shouting, "Master, take me with you, I would rather die than stay here without you." Robinson was touched at the devo- tion showed by the faithful Friday, and gave orders to turn the boat back and take him on board. The anchor was raised. The ship started on her way to the home Robinson had left so long ago. The wind was favorable and in seven weeks the spires and high buildings of New York were in sight. His vessel came slowly up to the wharf where he had taken ship so many years ago. Here too, he had played and idled his time away. He remembered it all. His idle- ness and playing truant came back in sad memories. Before Robinson and Friday landed, their good friend the captain gave them each a new suit of clothes. Everything had changed. He scarcely knew the place. He was astonished and confused by the din, hurry and bustle of a great city. Friday seemed dazed by it all and clung to Robinson's side. The buildings were so tall, the street cars, the carriages were different. Everywhere there were iron machines, casting out smoke, puffing and running about on iron rails. Robinson had never seen these. Robinson, however, did not stop to admire; he pushed on to a certain street and house where lived his parents at the time of his departure. It was with difficulty that he found the place. It was now in the heart of the city. Upon inquiry he found, after much searching, that his THE TEACHER'S ROBINSON CRUSOE 199 father had removed his store and home to another part of the city, his mother had died of grief for her disobedient son. Robinson was sorely grieved at this. He had hoped to see her and tell her how sorry he was that he had caused her so much anxiety and sorrow. When he had found the place where his father lived he stole quietly up to the house and opened the door. His father, now a gray-haired man, bent with age and sor- row, was sitting in his arm-chair reading. Robinson came forward, but his father did not recognize him. "Who are you?" he said. "I am Robinson, your long- lost son." He knelt by his father's side and asked for- giveness for all the trouble he had caused. His father was overcome. He could not speak. He drew Robinson with feeble hands to his breast. "My son, I forgive you," he said. Robinson's boyhood friends heard 01 his strange re- turn. They had thought him dead long ago. They never tired of hearing him tell his strange story. They pitied him in his misfortune. But Robinson told them that it all happened to him because he was idle and disobedient in his youth. Robinson at once relieved his father at the store. The business thrived. His father died. He soon had a home of his own with a happy family. Friday, the dog, and the parrot lived in it, dearly beloved and cared for by their master, the rest of their days. In the home there is a young Robinson who loves to hear his father read from his diary of the wonderful things that happened on the island. Robinson tried many times to find the rightful owner of the gold and jewels, but never succeeded. At last he gave it to a school where boys with idle habits were taught to lead useful and industrious lives. UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY >»^ Los Angeles This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. ^^gfy FEB2 919:6^8 Kt UT^ z< iffro to-Uffli ^ lUR IHM JAR 01-1976 JUN \ 3 ^5^ Form L9-Series 444 f UCLA-Young Research Library LB1525 .A43 yr L 009 487 384 1 1