plastered with clay, and covered with rush-mats of my own contriving; I had beaten hemp, which there grows wild, and made of it a sort of ticking; this I filled with the feathers of several birds I had taken with springes made of yahoos hairs, and[1] were excellent food. I had worked two chairs with my knife, the sorrel nag helping me in the grosser and more laborious part. When my clothes were worn to rags, I made myself others with the skins of rabbits, and of a certain beautiful animal, about the same size, called nmuhnoh, the skin of which is covered with a fine down. Of these I also made very tolerable stockings. I soled my shoes with wood, which I cut from a tree, and fitted to the upper-leather; and when this was worn out, I supplied it with the skins of yahoos dried in the sun. I often got honey out of hollow trees, which I mingled with water, or eat with my bread. No man could more verify the truth of these two maxims, 'That nature is very easily satisfied;' and, 'That necessity is the mother of invention.' I enjoyed perfect health of body, and tranquillity of mind; I did not feel the treachery or inconstancy of a friend, nor the injuries of a secret or open enemy. I had no occasion of bribing, flattering, or pimping, to procure the favour of any great man, or of his minion, I wanted no fence against fraud or oppression; here was neither physician to destroy
- ↑ It should be, — and 'which' were excellent food. This sentence is faulty in other respects, but there, as well as in many other passages of these voyages, the author has intentionally made use of inaccurate expression, and studied negligence in order to make the style more like that of a seafaring man: On which account they have been passed over in silence, where such intention was obvious.
