CHILDHOOD OF ROBINSON CRUSOE.
old he could make boxes, and stools, and benches ; and though the boxes were not always very neatly dove tailed together, and sometimes one leg of a stool would be shorter than the rest, his parents encouraged him to persevere, and told him he would do better every time
he tried. In basket-making he was very successful ; and from an old blind man, who lived near his father's house and maintained himself by weaving baskets and mats ,
Robinson learned the art. He used to do many kind things for the blind man , who in return taught him to make basket-work almost as neat as his own ; and he not only supplied his mother's house with baskets, but fre
quently made presents of them to his friends. When he was old enough to work in a garden , his
father gave him a small piece of ground to manage as he pleased ; he had a spade, rake, hoe, and wheel barrow of the right size for him to work with conven
iently ; and his great ambition used to be to have a dish of pease out of his little garden , before there were any fit for use in his father's large one. Robinson was very fond of studying natural history , and whenever there was a show of wild beasts in the city, his father allowed him to go and see them as often as he pleased ; he would examine each animal
separately, and read the account of it in some book of natural history ; and sometimes he would take the
book with him , and spend hours in reading and compar ing the description and the plates with the real animal. In this way he became acquainted with each specimen ,
and never confounded tigers, panthers, and leopards all together, as some children do. Robinson took great pleasure in reading about the manners and customs of different countries ; and every
book of voyages and travels that he could get hold of,
he read through with delight. When he grew older , his fondness for this kind of reading increased ; and as he
could not understand all the hardships and sufferings which travellers and navigators are obliged to bear, he thought their life must be the pleasantest in the world .
